Alain Guidetti: Web-Editorial: Asia-Pacific in 2013: A New Political Landscape?

Recent elections in the United States, China, Japan and the Republic of Korea brought new Administrations to power in early 2013. Though it is too early to make meaningful prognostics as regards their impact on the fragile regional stability, the incumbent leaderships will undoubtedly shape a new political landscape in the Asia-Pacific. In particular, they may impact some of the most sensitive regional issues, from the sovereignty dispute in the China Seas to the acute tensions between China and Japan, to resurging nuclear and ballistic issues on the Korean Peninsula. The growing US-China rivalry for preeminence over the region will form the background for these developments.

The Korean Peninsula will be a testing point. Park Geun Hye, the forthcoming conservative South Korean President, expressed willingness to conditionally engage with North Korea, breaking a de facto containment policy initiated by the outgoing (conservative) Lee Myung-bak. Whether the former will be able to translate this aspiration into a renewed dialogue with the North and some form of cooperation will largely depend on the response from Pyongyang. A prudent reaction to the rocket launch on 12 December indicates that Seoul was keen to avoid a new diplomatic confrontation with the North in a time of transition. This is an opportunity for Pyongyang to show readiness, after the rocket launch, to take advantage of the new political configuration and to break with the confrontational posture of the last four years.  

For this to occur, however, the DPRK will have to give positive signals to Seoul and the latter will have to respond appropriately, and this should relate in particular to the nuclear and missile fields. This would also mean that both sides would have to follow a fine diplomatic line, avoid provocations and develop a constructive dialogue. In short, after four years of instability and political status quo, there is a chance to restart some interaction as a prerequisite for possible resumption of negotiations that neither the new young North Korean leader Kim Jong-un nor the forthcoming South Korean leader Park Geun Hye should miss. The US, which is currently considering alternatives to the current “strategic patience” towards Pyongyang, should provide its support to Seoul.

The East China Sea will be another testing point of the new political landscape in the Asia-Pacific. The forthcoming Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will face the arduous task of adjusting his nationalistic sentiments to the Chinese assertiveness in the Senkaku/Diaoyutai Islands dispute in the East China Sea. The disagreement regarding the sovereignty over those islets has led to major tensions between China and Japan during recent months, an unprecedented wave of nationalistic and anti-Japanese demonstrations in China and major losses on the part of  Japanese business in China. Mr Abe’s uncompromising stances over the issue and the Chinese assertiveness may lead the showdown towards some form of direct confrontation that neither Beijing nor Tokyo wishes.

Mr Abe professed that political issues and economic interests have to be considered separately. Economic interdependence between Japan and China is significant (China is the primary trade partner for Japan and Japan a leading investor for China) but putting all factors in perspective, Tokyo, which is facing a new economic downturn, may calculate that it has more to lose (than Beijing) in any disruption of the economic relations between the two countries. In any event, relationships promise to be uneasy given the blend of economic cooperation and political distrust between the two leading East-Asian powers. That will especially be the case since China’s military buildup is looked upon with increasing suspicion by Tokyo, whose inclination towards a revision of the pacifist constitution may be enhanced by the return to power of the conservative Liberal Democratic Party. This dynamic has already put the two countries at the centre of a broader competition for preeminence over the region.

A third testing point of the new political landscape in the Asia-Pacific is indeed the strategic competition for primacy over the region. Highlighted by the decision of the Obama Administration since 2009 to develop a strategy of rebalancing towards  Asia (“pivot” to Asia) in order to reset the US presence in Asia and to hedge against China’s military rise, this strategic competition is the actual result of two conflicting ambitions to secure preeminence over the region: the American one, based on modern/current history of American led order, and the Chinese one, based on the pre-modern regional history of Chinese dominance. The way this rivalry is to be managed is subject to various interpretations and models, but the ongoing regional military buildup suggests that its potential of conflict is growing alarmingly, though Conventional wisdom would stress the prevailing interdependence of the two economies and the unimaginable cost of a conflict between these regional powers.

In the final analysis, the sense of continuity that the Chinese leadership wants to preserve, at least during transition, and the prevalence of the domestic, economic and societal challenges, suggest that its current regional policy may not substantially change under Xi Jinping. Yet as this policy seems to reflect a growing confidence seconded by increasing force capabilities, it raises suspicion and unease from the dominant power and others. The absence of a framework within which security concerns may be discussed on a regular basis and at the highest level, in particular between the US and China, but also along with other partners such as Japan, the RoK, Russia and DPRK, according to the needs, is perhaps an issue the new Administrations might want to address as a matter of priority as they take over in 2013.

Alain Guidetti is Senior Diplomatic Advisor at the Geneva Centre for Security Policy (GCSP). Before starting at the GCSP in May 2011, Alain Guidetti had been working for the Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs (FDFA). In 2007, he became the first Swiss Ambassador to Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan.