Asian Security Reassessed

13. Asian Security as a Global Public Good

Asian Security as a Global Public Good 311 Chapter Thirteen Asian Security as a Global Public Good Hermann Schwengel INTRODUCTION Asia is beset by security dilemmas.1 These dilemmas have their origins in the collective memories of Asian societies, and were sharpened by colonial experience and intensified by interaction patterns of the Cold War period. These pre-colonial, colonial, and post-colonial experiences still influence the perceptions of contemporary actors. Present day security dilemmas appear to be embedded in the driving forces of technological change, globalization and cultural diffusion.2 Policymakers need conceptual tools to resolve these dilemmas, or at least manage them by bridging the different ways of thinking about them. This chapter is an attempt to construct a conceptual bridge by proposing the idea of global public goods. To conceptualize security dilemmas in terms of globalization, structural change, or the polarities of realist versus liberal political theory is a start. But more concrete results are needed, for example, good governance, sustainable growth and cultural resilience. Reaching consensus on the best route from diagnosis to reform is, however, more difficult than ever. In the 13 Asian Security Ch 13.pm65 6/12/06, 2:43 PM 311 312 Hermann Schwengel years since the fall of the Berlin Wall, those advocating Kantian agendas for peace have suffered disenchantment, but so too have those proposing new Hobbesian world orders. The expectation of an era of fresh opportunity for international peace and security 3 which characterized the early years of the post-bipolar world definitely has gone. Those in the moderate centre advocate pragmatic means of conflict management, including early attention to potential conflicts, confidence-building measures, negotiated peacemaking , pre-emptive containment of disputes, and the threat or use of military force as a last resort.4 Others support a benevolent hegemonial strategy to allow free markets, sustainable development, and democracy to flourish. Policies abound but a vision is needed to direct them. TOWARDS A FRESH DISCOURSE The time is ripe for a fresh discourse on security frameworks. If new concepts of global growth can be manifested to stabilize and strengthen Asian economies, then new comprehensive concepts may be able to meliorate security dilemmas, too. This search for comprehensive concepts should be motivated not by optimism but rather cool political calculation. I propose the concept of global public goods to interpret the dynamics of international relations, security dilemmas and the opportunities of regions such as Asia. One should not confuse this idea with a renaissance of ambitious human security ideals, worthy though that is, but see it clearly as a concept reflecting: • The persistence of strong states; • The growing flexibility and cosmopolitanism of leaders; • The strengthening of non-state actors; • The formation of multiple inter-relationships, allowing • Emergence of “regional states” and “multiple regionalisms”.5 Global public goods theory is a way to encompass the experience of structurally expanding global markets demanding new modes of public regulation without waiting for inter-governmental institution-building. Asia thus may become one of the key laboratories for region-building because it is located between the well-established attraction of American global market-building and the new European state-building experience. Southeast Asian regionalism, as manifested in the evolution of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) has in part been inspired 13 Asian Security Ch 13.pm65 6/12/06, 2:43 PM 312 Asian Security as a Global Public Good 313 by and compared to the growth of the European Union (EU) even as academic analysts distinguish it from the European model. At the same time, Southeast Asia has had to adapt to the influences of two large nationstate neighbours, China and India, each representing unique economic, political and cultural institution-building experiences, and to the impact of United States hegemony.6 The reaching out by China, Japan, and Korea to ASEAN in the ASEAN+3 (APT) initiative is the most recent manifestation of a growing Asian regional consciousness. The literature on globalization carefully distinguishes between the three different levels of globalization, namely, the international, transnational and global levels.7 But if one places the historical experiences of China, India, Europe and the United States in the same context, then one may discern new patterns that have much to teach. Policymakers trained in realist think tanks or state bureaucracies will have to expand their thinking to take these unique patterns into account. THE CONCEPT OF GLOBAL PUBLIC GOODS Kaul, Gruneberg, and Stern...