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Article Excerpt
During this 40th anniversary of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and 30th anniversary of the United States-ASEAN Dialogue, unfortunate scheduling decisions have overshadowed generally improving ties between the United States and ASEAN. Recent attention has been monopolized by the postponement of President George W. Bush's planned visit to Singapore for the first-ever US-ASEAN Summit in September 2007, Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice's decision not to attend (for the second time in three years) the ASEAN Post-Ministerial Conference (PMC) as well as the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF) in Manila in August 2007, and Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia and the Pacific Christopher Hill's no-show at the US-ASEAN dialogue meeting held earlier this summer in Washington.
These two anniversaries provide a useful occasion on which to go beyond day-to-day events and examine trends not only in US relations with ASEAN as an organization, but also US relations with ASEAN member countries. There are of course overlaps amongst the organizational and bilateral "levels" of interactions, but they are also distinct--and, importantly, seen differently in Washington.
Though understandably disappointing to ASEAN (which marked its 40th anniversary in August 2007)--not to mention many American officials and observers who thought the Bush Administration's high-level postponements and substitutions were misguided--the recent diplomatic contretemps should not obscure positive elements of USASEAN relations. These positive elements appear even more stark when set against what relations were roughly thirty years ago following the long, bloody US war in Vietnam, communist takeovers in Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos, and the even deeper cleavages between communist Indochina and the then founding members of ASEAN. While there is certainly ample room for improvement in US-ASEAN relations, this assessment from one American's perspective presents a number of hopeful elements as well. Before turning to several important "issue areas" in US-ASEAN relations (e.g., economic ties, counter-terrorism cooperation), it would be useful to highlight a couple of "structural" features of US-ASEAN relations and how they are changing--largely for the better.
Calibrating Bilateralism, Sub-Regionalism, Regionalism, Globalism and Multilateralism in US-ASEAN Relations
First, the United States is challenged to calibrate relations with ASEAN as an organization; with Southeast Asia as a geographical sub-region of wider US East Asia policies; with Southeast Asia as part of US global strategies, interests and values; and most importantly on a day-to-day basis with sovereign, unique countries. Meanwhile, ASEAN and its member-countries are simultaneously calibrating their own relations with the United States. The United States, however, has a wider range of imperatives affecting its relations with ASEAN than ASEAN does in dealing with America. These imperatives often have spill-over effects in the various approaches to Southeast Asia. One example is US concerns about Myanmar's human rights and democracy situation impinging upon US attitudes towards ASEAN's efficacy as an organization, or global democracy and human rights considerations complicating bilateral relations with individual ASEAN states. Moreover, both the United States and ASEAN must balance domestic considerations--further complicating the management of mutual relations.
It is fair to say that in the past three decades, bilateral and global factors have dominated US approaches to Southeast Asia and continue do so. However, there are signs that wider East Asian developments (e.g., China's rising regional profile, growth in transnational threats such as avian flu, terrorism, natural and manmade disasters, and efforts to create regional multilateral institutions) as well as the ASEAN's own efforts to strengthen and institutionalize itself (e.g., movement towards an ASEAN Community by 2015 and the framing of an ASEAN Charter) are requiring Washington to take a more "regional" (rather than bilateral and global) approach. The net effect of such developments has been to highlight the need for Washington to consider ways in which to strengthen its relations with ASEAN qua ASEAN.
For example, within the United States there has been much discussion of how to demonstrate greater commitment to ASEAN as an organization. Generally, discussion revolves around four main possible initiatives: the hosting of a regular "heads of government" US-ASEAN Summit (rather than a meeting on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation which does not include all ASEAN member-states), the appointment of a US Ambassador for ASEAN Affairs; signing and/or ratifying the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation (TAC); and "putting meat on the bones" of already-announced initiatives such as the US-ASEAN Trade and Investment Framework Agreement (TIFA), ASEAN Cooperation Plan (ACP), Enterprise for ASEAN Initiative (EAI), and the ASEAN-US Enhanced Partnership (EP). Each of these avenues for enhancing US relations with ASEAN as an organization has its difficulties and limitations.
As noted at the outset, the planned first-ever US-ASEAN Summit for September 2007 has been postponed--though since the anniversary year of relations runs through the autumn of 2008, there is an opportunity to reschedule. As of this writing, there is a possibility that President Bush may host ASEAN leaders in Crawford, Texas in March 2008. The postponement of the planned September 2007 summit unfortunately obscures an important change in US policy: that is, to hold a US-ASEAN Summit at all. In the past, there has been wariness about holding such a summit for many reasons including a view that ASEAN is insufficiently "action-oriented", that it would de facto accord legitimacy to the government in Myanmar, undermine US interests in strengthening APEC, and even because ASEAN espouses or at least tolerates regional multilateralism that excludes the United States--i.e. the East Asian Summit (EAS). Most of these arguments have missed the symbolic and diplomatic gains of a summit between the government leaders of ASEAN member countries and the United States. With these concerns seemingly overcome at least in terms of holding a summit, it remains now to either reschedule the event in the remainder of the "anniversary year" or maintain a commitment to holding it early in a new US administration that will take office in 2009. (It would be unhelpful to hold the summit in the relatively brief interregnum between the end of the official anniversary year and the start of a new administration.) The US Senate has already expressed its commitment to a US-ASEAN Summit as outlined in Senate Resolution 110 marking the thirtieth anniversary of US-ASEAN dialogue...
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