The Post Cold War Order in Asia and the Challenge to ASEAN

Introduction

1 Post Cold War Order in Asia & the Challenge to ASEAN By: ROS Size: 6" x 9" J/No: 05-14709 Fonts: Stempel Schneidler Introduction I shall argue that the current dynamics of the relations between the United States and the regional great powers of East Asia provide Southeast Asia with an external environment of relative stability. The regional great powers are engaged in a complex pattern of competition and cooperation within a framework of security and economic public goods provided largely by the United States. However, the long term durability of this pattern of relationships is open to doubt, both because of considerable uncertainties about the evolution of the domestic order in the major regional powers and because of the potentially disruptive character of SinoJapanese relations. Meanwhile the possibility The Post Cold War Order in Asia and the Challenge to ASEAN 01 Post Cold War 5/26/06, 4:45 PM 1 2 Michael Yahuda By: ROS Size: 6" x 9" J/No: 05-14709 Fonts: Stempel Schneidler of the eruption of a damaging crisis between China and the United States cannot be ruled out either. Regional stability may be seen to be multilateral and multi-tiered. American structural power (which will be explained below) provides the basis on which the major regional powers can focus on economic growth and development even as they both cooperate and compete with each other. That is accompanied by the expansion of regional organizations based on the ASEAN style of consensual and non-legally binding norms. Given the distrust between the major powers and concern about possible American dominance, nominal leadership of these regional associations by default is assumed by ASEAN. Regional security, however, depends not only on the existence of a relatively benign external environment, but it also requires of each of the countries to continue to develop their economies, to practise effective governance and to maintain social stability. These requirements, of course, are not found in all the countries of Southeast Asia and they are threatened by so-called “nontraditional ” security such as transnational criminal net-works, terrorism, the risks from 01 Post Cold War 5/26/06, 4:45 PM 2 3 Post Cold War Order in Asia & the Challenge to ASEAN By: ROS Size: 6" x 9" J/No: 05-14709 Fonts: Stempel Schneidler infectious diseases, maritime piracy and so on. I shall argue that the Southeast Asian countries have what might be called a strategic opportunity to work better together to establish their regional economic community and to institutionalize their cooperation in the management of non-traditional security threats. Otherwise the Southeast Asians may be marginalized by the economic rise of both China and India and their security threatened by the disruption of relations between the external major powers. The Impact of the End of the Cold War in East Asia The origins of the new pattern of great power relations in East Asia go back to the ending of the Cold War. In comparison paid with the attention paid to the changes wrought by the end of the Cold War in Europe, the impact of the disintegration of the Soviet Union on East Asia has tended to be overlooked. Perhaps the impact seemed less significant, for unlike their European counterparts, none of the East Asian communist governments fell and again, unlike Europe, the American series of bilateral alliances seemed little changed. However, although the impact of the collapse of the Soviet Union was less immediate and perhaps 01 Post Cold War 5/26/06, 4:45 PM 3 ...