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GB: Where will Italy be, politically, five years from now?
JW: It could be where many other countries in Western Europe are – that is, with populist parties in power or with very powerful positions in a coalition government. Given the failure of the constitutional referendum in Italy, there will still be, five years from now, much discussion about the cracks in the Italian political system, the difficulty of forming long-term governments, and what this all means for the creation of public policy in difficult times. Certainly the logic behind parts of what was on the table during the referendum had to do with modernizing parts of the Italian economy and making it easier to put structural changes in place. Five years from now, some believe that Italy may not be in the Eurozone. I am not one of those people. But that is probably more for political than economic reasons. As one of the original members of the European Community, it would take a lot for other member states not to support Italy remaining in the Eurozone. Still, five years hence, Italy's leadership on some of the common European problems may be less prominent, which would be a shame. Matteo Renzi has also left the political scene for now. He is down but certainly not out. He is a very gifted politician and may well come back in another form.
GB: Where will Europe be five years from now?
JW: Five years from now, Europe will either have taken on the very, very deep issues that lie at the heart of the EU – not just Brexit, which is obviously the most pressing issue – or it will be facing what people call variable geometry, involving different levels of engagement with the EU instead of one big, common institution. Major questions like monetary union, immigration policy and the management of migration will either be tackled in a collective way or we will see the development of a core and a periphery to the EU. My sense is that this is one of the most troubling decades for Europe since the interwar period. Populations will therefore have to become much more political in order to address the populist challenge that we are going to see unfold in 2017 in big elections in France and the Netherlands. Indeed, it is hard to predict the future, but it could well go in a very dark direction, where Europe is really struggling to uphold the values that are at the heart of the European project.
The other part to consider is whether Europe will still be the key partner for the US five years from now. While Donald Trump is making significant noises about wanting to have a different relationship with Europe – one that is much more transactional – I believe that the notion of a trans-Atlantic community was already fading before Trump. What we saw over the last five to eight years was a move from a trans-Atlantic community to a partnership, and a partnership is really different. A partnership is far more transactional. I therefore see, over the next five years, a continuation of that move from a community to a far more transactional relationship. And this transition could be quite dramatic under Trump. We do not know, for example, how seriously to take his musings about NATO, and how they will translate into concrete changes in funding and policy.
GB: Can you characterize the populist movements in Europe, including in Italy? What is driving them?
JW: There are two dynamics that are critical here. One is common to all liberal democracies – namely a profound disillusionment with the representative democratic system and the belief on the part of electorates that those who represent them in their institutions have not necessarily had their interests at heart. There may be a belief in these electorates that their representatives have become more beholden to a transnational interest, in the case of anti-EU sentiment, or to corporate interests or the interests of the wealthy. In some sense, then, this is a very democratic push-back against the perception that there has not been sufficient attention paid to the decline in citizens' relative living standards. We are not talking, in all cases, about absolute poverty but indeed about relative inequality inside these countries.
The second dynamic is a fear that is engendered by the very rapid movement of people. It is not the absolute numbers themselves that have always been so decisive, but rather the speed of the change – the velocity of the influx – and the degree to which populations have bought into this notion that this somehow represents a direct threat to them in terms of security (although the data do not support that, despite individual incidents) or through economic losses incurred in the context of a zero-sum game as more immigrants come in.
These two dynamics have come together and are overlain by a mantra of control – that is, as we saw in the British referendum but also in electoral discourses on the Continent, the people need to take back control. They need to take control of their destiny. As national communities, they have given away too much to those who are distant and far away, and to elite policy-makers more generally. That emotion is very human and very natural. There is nothing wrong with it. The desire to take back control is quite hard to argue against. And it has been a very powerful sentiment that the populists have used to increase their fortunes.
GB: Where will the UK be five years from now – still in Europe, out of Europe, or in some purgatory in between?
JW: I have come to believe that Brexit is very real. I do not say this from a normative perspective, meaning that this is what should be the outcome of all of this. I do actually believe that the British government misplayed its hand at a couple of stages – primarily prior to the referendum itself, by not clarifying the role of referenda in a constitutional democracy in which there are many institutions that have to share power. Still, Brexit is real. I do think that the UK will be out of the EU five years from now, and I do think that it will also be out of the single market. That does not mean, of course, that there could not have been other alternatives. The politicians had room. As much as I admire British institutions, British history and British values, I see this as a dark period. One of the most troubling aspects of the referendum and its aftermath has been the degree to which not just the tabloids, but also elected officials have gone after the judiciary in the UK. That is a very dangerous game. There has been a very worrying erosion of the balance of institutions that make up a contemporary democracy. As such, I do see the UK's institutional balance – its mixed system – in a weaker place in five years' time. The damage done by the referendum, in that respect, cannot be completely unravelled. It seems as if decision-makers made a move to do something – like hold a referendum – without properly considering what the process itself would do. They focussed instead on what the result would be. And yet the case of the UK referendum is so interesting because it has shown us – and especially political figures – what the process for such an event can do to a modern democracy. It can unleash very powerful, destabilizing forces – forces that cannot fully or easily be put back into the bottle. These forces include xenophobia, anti-immigrant attacks, the discourse of the tabloids, the attacks on the judiciary, and so on. All of these are corrosive.
The question of whether the British union itself will still exist five years from now is a really interesting one. My initial hypothesis after the referendum was that Scotland would go next. But now I am a little more circumspect about that. I am not certain that this will happen in the next five years. The politics of this issue are playing out a little bit differently. The area to watch is Northern Ireland because the impact of Brexit on Ireland – North and South – including through the possible creation of a new border, was underappreciated. We now have a political crisis in Ireland, with Martin McGuinness having resigned.
Let me add one final point about Brexit. I think that British higher education and universities will be diminished – and this for two reasons. First, all of the university development plans have been based on high numbers of European students coming for study in the UK. Second, there will be a huge impact on British research funding. There is already an impact in terms of researchers on the Continent being told that they should not collaborate with UK researchers. Of course, the UK today builds very little. There is very little manufacturing. Instead, the economy is all about services, and education is a major service sector in the UK economy. This is troubling. The one good thing that might come out of this is that elite British universities like Oxford, Cambridge and LSE may finally become properly global. They have always talked about becoming truly global, but they have not had to do it to date, or have otherwise attempted to do so in a half-hearted way.
GB: Where will the US be in two years' time?
JW: It is hard to know. It very much depends on the strength of America's checks and balances. Obviously, the composition of the Supreme Court is going to change. What we need to remember is that the election was actually very close. So there is still a massive constituency with a different set of political goals and political values. If things go in a healthy direction, we will see the US showing signs of what a democracy should do in a period like this. There will be peaceful and frequent protests, and perhaps civil disobedience in some cases. We could, of course, see other forms of attempts to resist inequality and injustice or to influence change, including mass strikes or violence.
It is also possible that the political parties in the US will use this whole train wreck of an election as a wake-up call to reorient reform. But that is harder to see at this point. I was hoping to see in the US what we see in other liberal democracies – that is, some form of party realignment or shakeup in the party system. Right now, however, I am not sure that this will be the outcome. The Democrats may essentially say that they have demographics on their side. They may conclude that they simply have to have a better candidate and a better machine. As for the Republicans, they do not have to learn the hard lessons that they should have learned. They created the monster. Some of this may result in people disengaging from the American political process altogether. Those who speak the loudest in four years' time will win again.
Much will also depend on the behaviour of Congress. We have seen this already with the sanctions on Russia, with Senator John McCain and others coming forward saying, roughly, "This is what we in Congress want to see happen. Never mind what the executive branch believes about what our relationship to it should be." Bref, if the checks and balances in the US work in a robust fashion, then we will not see a 180-degree turn in American politics. Instead, we will see something that is much more incremental.
Having said this, the checks and balances do not extend everywhere. In trade, for instance, we can safely predict a broad push toward greater protectionism – that is, a re-evaluation and possible pulling out of NAFTA. We will, on the other hand, see a much more transactional relationship with Europe and a call for greater burden-sharing.
Trump will try very hard to create a great-power condominium with Putin. Will this condominium include China as well? The Chinese dimension is really harder to predict. It is not impossible to imagine some forms of cooperation, despite some of the theatrical moves in respect of Taiwan. But it is clear that the US will try to move toward a much less liberal internationalist agenda.
GB: Do you see contradictions between the professed positive disposition of President Trump toward Russia and the antipathy toward China?
JW: There is a big contradiction, but for reasons that are largely interpersonal, given Trump's team and his own experience. Trump believes that Russia is a different type of power, but the evidence does not suggest that this is the case. In fact, the evidence suggests that Russia is much more disruptive to American interests than is China – and particularly in international institutions. Russia has been very disruptive at various points inside the UN; China less so. Beijing picks its spots. It is concerned about certain issues. It is much more predictable.
GB: Will Trump discover this contradiction? If so, when?
JW: This is so personality-driven. Congress will have a lot to say on both of those relationships. But he will discover it early – to be sure.
GB: What are the limits of American power over the next four or five years? What can it do and not do? Which problems can it solve or not solve?
JW: There are quite substantial limits to American power. In terms of economic interests, for example, these require a certain degree of international cooperation. With the recent breakdown of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, with the US walking out after huge international diplomatic investment, there is evidently considerable international disillusionment. This means that the US will now find it difficult to achieve its economic goals in collaboration with similarly large groupings of states. The US will still be able to achieve certain things bilaterally, given the asymmetry of economic strength that it enjoys vis-à-vis certain other states. It may very well do that in a heavy-handed way.
Militarily, what has been interesting about the Obama period is that, even with the world's largest military, the US has not wanted to exercise, in the post-Iraq and Afghanistan context, that military power. In theory, of course, Trump could behave in the opposite way. But Trump may also feel limited or reluctant in this respect because of beliefs about what American public opinion will bear. Having said that, as we saw with Obama in Libya, Trump does not have to declare war formally or have Congressional approval to take military action.
Whether Trump will use military force or whether he will instead prefer to reach diplomatic bargains over things that he does not believe the US should fight for is yet to be seen. If we roll back the clock on Syria, we can run the counterfactual that under Trump, Washington would never have backed the opposition from the beginning, and would never have given the signal that it wanted a different political system.
Multilaterally – to be sure – we are in a very different and far less collaborative world from the world that Obama had when he came into office.
GB: What has driven the changes in the multilateral context?
JW: Two things were important. One was the Libya intervention, which had a multilateral mandate and required significant diplomatic muscle to implement. A number of states that initially supported that initiative felt or believed afterward that, in the second phase of the intervention, there was an overstepping of the multilateral mandate. This group of states includes not just Russia but also Brazil and a number of European and African states. I do not entirely buy this narrative. There is a lot of looking back and denying that there was support for certain aspects of the Libya intervention.
In the current international context, it would be very difficult to get an agreement of that kind again. We do see continued agreement over peacekeeping and stabilization missions in Mali, in the Central African Republic, and in South Sudan.
The second factor is the change in Russia, which in a certain sense has also emboldened China and others. There is a stronger sense that if there is a kind of Western agenda, including certain interventions, being pushed within the Security Council, then there will be resistance. The multilateral tools may not be there. For example, in the case of Burundi, where 15 years ago there would have been much more cooperation and engagement, it was extremely difficult to get agreement on anything because of the suspicion and lack of willingness to give a mandate to powers.
Of course, on climate change, which requires collective action, the Paris Agreement is one of the bright spots of the last few years. But now we have Trump making noises on that score as well. This makes other major international diplomatic endeavours of that kind much shakier.
GB: How should the new Secretary-General of the UN approach his mandate? What should his goals be?
JW: There clearly is an internal and an external dimension to this. There is an ongoing and pressing need for the UN to operate more effectively than it presently does with the resources that it has – from how it manages human resources to how it mounts field operations, to how it organizes itself to fulfill its core mandates. So the new Secretary-General has to be very squarely focussed on that at a time when there is a greatly diminished willingness by European countries in particular, as well as by the US, to invest funds. Budgets for all of these activities are shrinking.
In terms of the external dimension, we have a conflict context that is much different from even the recent past. There are several protracted conflicts. The average length of a conflict today is greater than it was 20 years ago. You also have situations that are not formally war, but where there is large-scale political violence and large numbers of deaths. The new Secretary-General has to really support the reform efforts that have been launched in respect of peacekeeping, in particular, but also in peace-building. And he must cleverly use the authority that he has – of which there is not an inexhaustible supply. The Secretary-General has very peculiar sources of authority. He has his good offices, his role under the UN Charter, and, of course, his relationships with member states, where he must be seen by them as indispensable.
One of the things that he needs to do – particularly in respect of the Security Council – is to remind member states, and perhaps particularly the P5, of how important it is for the institution to function effectively in order for it to maintain its legitimacy. The argument needs to be made to states to the effect that the longer there is paralysis and a failure to act, the more these institutions will just lose their authority in international affairs. To this end, the Secretary-General must assist in every way that he can to make Security Council decision-making more effective, and to help members reach collective solutions. But again, the world inherited by Antonio Guterres is a very different one from the one into which Ban Ki-moon entered as Secretary-General. That base level of goodwill and cooperation is not there in the way that it was 10 years ago.
GB: Is there a reasonable interpretation of the UN's mandate that could hold that sometimes not taking action may be the lesser evil? Is that an interpretation that can be brought to bear on some of the world's theatres?
JW: I have heard this a lot over the last two to three years – that is, that acting is costly and has unintended consequences. The argument holds that because action may have effects that we either cannot see or anticipate, the right thing to do is to do nothing, because at least we do not make the situation worse. Many people say that about the Middle East. There is a strong thread behind this line of argument, but there are two issues that have to be considered against it. The first is that this position assumes that the slate is clean in the sense that there is no prior responsibility for the problems or conflicts being experienced in a theatre. We are not talking necessarily about direct responsibility in all cases, but indeed about actions that may have been taken in the past by states to influence the way that a situation looks today. In such an event, inaction is less palatable. Of course, causal responsibility is a tricky thing, but we should not just assume that these regions fell into the situation in which they find themselves without any external involvement to begin with. You cannot completely atone for the actions of the past, but that does give you more of a reason to be really certain that there are no options that have reasonable prospects of success.
And the second is that there are humanitarian responsibilities – even legal obligations – that must be honoured by states. Where the 'do no harm' doctrine can go too far is that even if you may not want to take direct action, there are other humanitarian responsibilities that still need to be exercised and honoured. If we consider the refugee crisis, we can argue that there has been an exacerbation of the humanitarian problem in that the situation created has forced refugees to take treacherous paths to try to leave their respective countries.
GB: How should Canada think of its position in the world, or how can it position itself for effect?
JW: This is a very difficult time in which to be advocating for some of the values that Canada has pushed in the past. This is particularly so when people around the world can rightly say that Western societies themselves need to look in the mirror and at the cracks in their own systems. There needs to be, first and foremost, a great deal of humility in anything that Canada does. And what needs to be driving Canadian policy on a number of global issues is a very hard-headed search for where the common ground is. That does not necessarily mean the lowest common denominator, because that would not honour what the Canadian population would want to see the country doing.
There is still a role for Canada to play in trying to find common positions in multilateral settings. I do not think that paralysis is the rule everywhere, and so Canada should not be disengaging but re-engaging differently. For instance, in peacekeeping, Canada must determine what is the right way to go about this in the present multilateral and conflict contexts. Canada should also use the same lens in respect of any form of development assistance in which it engages. What does Canada want to achieve? For whom? It will need to be far more targeted in its activities. Canadian leaders will need to make the case to the population. And on major global questions like the refugee crisis – which is not a European crisis, but a properly global one – Canada will need to ensure that it is sharing the burden and taking very seriously the idea of burden-sharing.
GB: How seriously are alternatives to democracy being taken in Europe or in other democracies? What are the fixes that need to be made in the democratic scaffolding for it to regain its stature, or to address concrete problems?
JW: That is a big question. Part of the issue we faced over the last decade or so is that there has not been a viable alternative out there. The discrediting of other systems seemed to be complete. There will be this interesting anomaly of China being an economic powerhouse but politically very closed. The Russian idea of sovereign democracy may work in certain limited post-Soviet circles, but it is not an idea that travels – in part because of who is advocating it, but also because it is a very particularist conception of governance.
In terms of improving and strengthening our democratic systems, a key question is how to maintain healthy liberal democracies without predatory capitalism. In fact, that was one of the questions that kept coming up in the Massey Lectures when I was on tour across Canada. A number of people said to me, "You seem to believe liberal democracy is a valuable system, but was it not always inherently problematic because it bred this form of inequality and many of the problems of injustice that we are now seeing?" My answer is, "I do not think it had to." You can see other jurisdictions where this is not the case. But the answer lies not just in the democratic core, which is really just about how we select rulers or public leaders. It is the institutional mix that goes with this democratic core that is critical.
To be sure, we are already seeing alternatives to this democratic institutional mix – in Hungary, in Russia, in Turkey, and in parts of Africa. These are not liberal democracies. As those models begin to proliferate, that is the challenge of the next decade – to wit, how do we strengthen liberal democracies? If we cannot, there will before long be viable alternatives out there.
Jennifer Welsh is Professor and Chair in International Relations at the European University Institute in Florence, and a Fellow of Somerville College, University of Oxford. She is past Special Adviser to the UN Secretary-General on the Responsibility to Protect. In 2016, she gave the CBC Massey Lectures on The Return of History.
The US and China are groping toward a new modus vivendi with each other and other countries in East Asia. Neither finds it easy. Neither really knows what exactly it wants from the other, or indeed what it must concede to the other. Southeast Asia, where the South China Sea (SCS) has become something of a proxy for these geopolitical adjustments, finds itself uncomfortably at the centre of the process.
Washington and Beijing are not looking for trouble. War by design is highly improbable. Despite their bluster, China's leaders know that war with the US would place the most vital interest of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) – its hold on power – in grave jeopardy. China is not reckless. President Xi Jinping is a 'princeling.' The CCP is his patrimony, and he will not gamble with it. But rivalry is intrinsic to any major power relationship, and neither Beijing nor Washington will forswear the pursuit of its interests.
The CCP today confronts fundamental questions about itself. The next phase of national reforms must square the circle: give the market a larger role in crucial areas of the Chinese economy to maintain competitiveness, while preserving central political control by the Party. Can it be done? No one really knows. Social and labour unrest are endemic at the local level across China. The national anti-corruption campaign has already unsettled CCP cadres in every sector – the People's Liberation Army, the security services, state-owned enterprises and, among others, the energy sector.
But we should not assume failure. Unlike the Communist Party of the former Soviet Union, the CCP has proven to be an extremely adaptable creature. It is, for all practical intents and purposes, the latest and most successful iteration of a series of Chinese political experiments in search of wealth and power to resist Western predations dating from the late Qing dynasty. The CCP defines its role as leading the 'Great Rejuvenation' of the Chinese nation after a century of weakness and humiliation. And yet the outcome of this second phase of Chinese reforms (the first phase of market reforms and China's opening to the world having been launched by Deng Xiaoping), even if completely successful, will be slower growth, as the CCP has itself acknowledged. The 'Great Rejuvenation' must therefore be as much, if not more, outwardly as inwardly directed.
For a hundred years, the legitimacy of all Chinese governments has been measured by their ability to defend China's borders and sovereignty. In the SCS, then, the 'Great Rejuvenation' is increasingly a revanchist narrative. Beijing insists that areas disputed by others have been Chinese territory since 'ancient times.' The SCS is the theatre where the CCP can put, without undue risk, some credible shreds of meat on the bare bones of the historical narrative by which it justifies its right to rule.
The US, for its part, defines its interests in the SCS in terms of upholding international law and freedom of navigation. These are important interests, but not of the same order as the CCP's primary existential interest – to wit, the legitimacy and ultimately the survival of the CCP. The US has made clear that the US-Japan alliance covers the Senkaku Islands. It has been ambiguous about the US-Philippines alliance, and hence in effect has made clear that the alliance does not cover the disputed areas in the SCS. The US going to war in support of its principal East Asian ally, Japan, is credible, if unlikely. The US going to war over rocks, shoals and reefs in the SCS would be absurd.
Given the asymmetry of interests, it is doubtful that the US can stop China from continuing its reclamation activities in the SCS, and deploying military assets on the artificial islands that it is creating. But it is doubtful, too, that China can deter the US from operating in the SCS. For to deny access must evoke an American response. The CCP would then face a Hobson's choice: escalate and risk war or at least serious conflict, which would surely jeopardize CCP rule; or respond weakly, which would expose the hollowness of the 'Great Rejuvenation,' thereby shaking national confidence in CCP rule. Beijing will not willingly place itself in such an invidious position.
China's strong rhetoric masks this dilemma. Beijing has carefully kept each action in the SCS below a threshold that must impel a response from even the most reluctant of US administrations. Miscalculations are, to be sure, always possible. If an accident occurs, then the highly nationalistic public opinion that the CCP both cultivates and fears could lead Beijing down a path that it does not wish to travel.
Still, the probability of accidents can be minimized. China of late seems to have adopted a more positive attitude toward rules of engagement for unplanned encounters at sea. If we look past the chest-thumping by both sides, the probability of US-China competition in the SCS becoming ritualized is strong. The SCS is already as much a mind game to influence ASEAN as it is a traditional geopolitical contest. As US-China competition settles into a pattern of patrol and protest, Washington must pay more attention to this aspect of the issue.
There is a school of thought that believes that concern about China's increasingly assertive behaviour will make ASEAN naturally gravitate toward the US. This is true only to a degree. There are new diplomatic opportunities for Washington in Southeast Asia. But small countries fated by geography to live amid great powers do not regard balancing, hedging and bandwagoning as mutually exclusive alternatives. Instead, they see nothing contradictory in pursuing all three courses of action simultaneously. To this end, a senior Vietnamese official once told me that every Vietnamese leader must be able to stand up to China and at once get along with it, and if anyone thought that it was not possible to do both at the same time, he did not deserve to be a leader. To various degrees, this is true of all Southeast Asia countries.
The US is a welcome presence in Southeast Asia. It was the stability that the US provided that became the foundation of the region's prosperity. But the American porridge is always going to be too hot or too cold. It is difficult to get the temperature just right to suit the tastes of all countries in a diverse region. Some ASEAN members will fear abandonment, while others fear entanglement. This is one of the burdens of being a global power and off-shore balancer.
And yet the US has added to its own burdens. The American intervention in Iraq left that country broken. During the Arab Spring, within a mere week, Washington switched from treating Hosni Mubarak as a valued 30-year ally to unceremoniously dumping him. In Southeast Asia, this evoked echoes of how the US had treated Indonesia's Suharto, another 30-year friend. The US drew a 'red line' in Syria, which quickly faded away as the Obama administration desperately grabbed at the threadbare line thrown to it by Russia. (No one today really believes that a stable political settlement is possible in Syria.) And all of this happened at a time when China was constantly reminding ASEAN in ways subtle and not that the Middle Kingdom was a geographical fact, whereas the American presence in Southeast Asia was only a geopolitical calculation by Washington. In other words, geography does not change, but geopolitical calculations can be revised. The artificial islands that China is building in the SCS may well be of limited military utility. However, they serve an important domestic political purpose for the CCP, and additionally drive home to ASEAN members China's inescapable contiguity with Southeast Asia.
The metaphor of the American 'pivot' or 'rebalance,' by contrast, connotes discontinuity. That which 'pivots' or 'rebalances' one way could well swing another way. Washington's emphasis should have been on the essential continuity of US policy in East Asia over the last 30 or more years. Of course, American politics forces each new administration to stress policy differences with its predecessors even when there are none. But not everyone in Southeast Asia understands the eccentricities of the US system, and this reinforces doubts about American consistency.
ASEAN's basic and enduring purpose is to maintain a modicum of order and civility in relations among its members in a region where these are not to be taken for granted. On this score, ASEAN has not done badly over the last half century. Nevertheless, the organization is divided on the SCS, and will remain so, even if it occasionally comes up with useful statements on this theatre. Evidently, these statements do not change realities on the ground.
The US is an irreplaceable element of the regional balance. But the 'balance' that ASEAN seeks is not directed against one major power or another, as during the Cold War. Instead, it seeks an omnidirectional state of equilibrium that will allow member states to maintain good relationships with all of the major powers of the region in order to avoid being forced or boxed into poor choices. This requires a balance of influence as well as a balance of military power. These balances are related, but not identical. The US is still predominant in ships and aircraft and other military assets, and will likely remain so for some time. Yet the balance of influence, which is a psychological phenomenon or frame of mind, is less stable in Southeast Asia. The US naval presence in the SCS is a vital but insufficient condition to maintain psychological equilibrium. Internal developments within ASEAN are just as crucial an influence on this frame of mind. Bref, what happens on land is as important as what happens at sea.
China's growing economic ties with Southeast Asia and the infrastructure projects planned or already underway – all now subsumed under Xi Jinping's concept of 'One Belt, One Road,' an ambitious vision of a Sinocentric Eurasian order – are binding southwest China and Southeast Asia into one economic space. It would be foolish for ASEAN countries to forswear the economic opportunities. However, the integration of Southeast Asia into China's economic framework must also change how at least some members of ASEAN calculate their interests vis-à-vis China and the US.
This is particularly so on mainland Southeast Asia. The dams that China is constructing in the upper reaches of the Mekong River are a new geopolitical reality – analogous to the artificial islands in the SCS – that the five ASEAN countries through which the Mekong runs (Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam) cannot ignore. Earlier this year, China released more water from its dams when Thailand, Laos and Cambodia were hit by a severe drought. (An old Chinese proverb runs: When drinking water, remember the source.)
This, then, is the geopolitical significance of the new ASEAN Economic Community (AEC), launched in 2015. Modest though its goals may be, it provides something of a balance to the Chinese strategic framework. Without an integration project of its own to widen the options available to its member states, some countries in ASEAN could slip into a fatalistic frame of mind that sees no alternative to China. ASEAN did reasonably well in the first phase of economic integration that started in 2003 and ended in December 2015. How will it do in the next phase? It is too early to tell.
Economic integration is always politically painful. ASEAN has dealt with the easy issues, such as lowering tariffs. Some degree of buyer's remorse at the present level of commitment to the AEC is already visible in all ASEAN members, with the exception of Singapore. Consensus on the more complicated issues that will have to be confronted in the next phase will be more difficult to reach. Some ASEAN members, particularly in mainland Southeast Asia, could well be tempted by Chinese largesse as a politically easier alternative, while paying lip service to the AEC. Even if this does not occur, the political changes underway in several key ASEAN members pose serious complications for moving integration forward.
Middle Eastern Islam is exerting a profound influence on Southeast Asia. The texture of the Muslim-majority societies in Malaysia, Brunei and Indonesia is changing as the traditional syncretic and tolerant Islam of the region is being replaced by harsher and exclusive variants and sectarian tensions. The Arabization of Islam in Southeast Asia inevitably changes the domestic politics of the affected countries.
The effects are most pronounced in Malaysia, where the political space for non-Muslims has significantly narrowed and continues to shrink. The ruling coalition in Kuala Lumpur has lost the support of the majority of Malaysian Chinese, and is unlikely to win it back. Malaysia essentially now has a Malay government and a non-Malay opposition, with a few ornaments of other races on each side, and with race relations increasingly fraught. All of this conspires to make for a potentially explosive situation in Malaysia. The ruling Malay party, UMNO, and the Islamist party, PAS, may well form some sort of political compact that could accelerate the marginalization of non-Muslims.
Prime Minister Najib Razak is in no imminent danger of losing power. But he cannot hold office forever. To maintain his hold on UMNO, Najib has had to tolerate a steady move by UMNO's core supporters to the right, with more economic and other privileges for Malays and a narrower interpretation of Islam. Political effects aside, this has made jihadism attractive to some Malaysian Muslims, just as it has increased protectionist pressures. Najib has nevertheless managed to preserve some space for non-Muslims, has been hard on terrorism, is friendly toward the US, and supports the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). But how Najib's successor will deal with the political complexities that he will inherit is not yet known to anyone.
In Indonesia, the Arabization of the Muslim population is diffuse and patchy, and less obvious because of the country's size. The leaderships of the main Muslim organizations are still moderate. But Indonesia is not just a geographical place: it is an idea. Since independence, the idea of Indonesia has been contested between adherents of a secular-nationalist Indonesia and those in favour of a more Islam-inspired Indonesia. This debate was suppressed by force in favour of nationalism by Indonesia's first two presidents. Suharto's fall reopened the debate, and that debate cannot be suppressed again. It will colour Indonesian politics for a long time to come.
Indonesia has not yet reached a stable post-Suharto equilibrium, and is unlikely to reach one anytime soon. It will not fall apart, but will instead stumble along sub-optimally as an incoherent, rent-seeking polity, susceptible to external influences – including that of ISIS, which inspired a terrorist attack in Jakarta in January of this year. Muslim groups have sporadically launched attacks against Christians and other Muslims whom they consider deviant. Politics is increasingly infused by a shrill and petulant nationalism characterized by a strong sense of entitlement and prone to externalize Indonesia's own failings. President Jokowi is not personally hostile to the US, and the Indonesian elite is not generally anti-Western. But he is arguably a weak president who leads no major political party, and thus has been unable to pursue consistent policies. Given Indonesia's fragmented politics, his successor is unlikely to be significantly stronger. No elite can indefinitely remain aloof from its base.
Thailand, for its part, has been mired in political conflict ever since former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra was toppled by a coup in 2006. No resolution is in sight. The country's relationship with the US is uneasy. Despite his wealth, Thaksin was not a member of the traditional Thai elite, and so to create a political base he enfranchised and mobilized the hitherto politically passive rural poor – particularly in his native northeast. The traditional Thai elite based in Bangkok resented and feared this, and therefore moved against him. What the Thai elite essentially wants is impossible: to return to the pre-Thaksin status quo and the old social compact in which the rural poor subordinated themselves to the monarchy and let the elite run the country. Those enfranchised by Thaksin will not meekly accept being disenfranchised again. However, the elite is unwilling to confront this fundamental reality.
The elite evoked the King's name to remove Thaksin, but the basic electoral arithmetic is against them. The poor in northeastern Thailand will always outnumber the rich in Bangkok. They can be cowed by superior force, but unless the elite is willing to give them a real political role, they will always outvote the elite, whenever given a chance. Thaksin's proxy parties have won all of the elections since 2006, with the elite having to resort to street demonstrations, judicial manoeuvres, and finally, in 2014, another coup to keep them out of power. The current coup has only frozen the conflict. It is unlikely that a new constitution or a new civilian government will resolve the underlying conflict. (Since 1932, Thailand has had 17 constitutions or charters.) In any case, the military does not seem to be in a hurry to give up power. Nor will royal succession help. A new king will not be able to do more than keep the conflict frozen. He will not be able to re-establish the old social compact, and will not likely be able or willing to create a new compact that provides for a genuine political role for the rural poor.
Myanmar and the Philippines have new governments. Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy has no experience of governance, and it is not clear that it has reached a stable accommodation with the Burmese military. Aung San Suu Kyi has so far behaved imperiously – more like a Burmese queen than an elected leader – and has not displayed much interest in policy. She has not given any indication of which economic or foreign policies her government would pursue, except in broad generalities.
It is anybody's guess what the new policy agenda of Rodrigo Duterte, the new Philippine President, will be, or even whether he has a defined policy agenda, as his statements to date have been inconsistent or vague. The governments of Singapore, Brunei, Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, for their part, are stable, although political change in the last of these could be sudden and disruptive if Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen should go the way that all flesh eventually must. Still, these countries will not by themselves be able to move the AEC decisively forward.
In general, the US cannot influence internal developments in ASEAN member states. Any attempt to do so would only further complicate already complicated situations, and would in all probability only redound to US disadvantage in the ongoing competition for influence with China. Beijing, for its part, has been more successful than Washington in its natural attempts to interfere in the internal affairs of various ASEAN states – even if there has been some pushback. First, China is geographically contiguous to the region, and therefore cannot be ignored. Second, China generally comes with gifts, including infrastructure projects and generous aid.
Modern Southeast Asian history can be understood as a continuing struggle for autonomy by the small states of the region in the context of major power competition. This is a powerful motivation that should not be underestimated. The states of Southeast Asia have a record of internal resilience, and while the immediate prognosis – that of growing Chinese influence – is not one that may inspire great confidence among regional states, they should not be written off as inevitably 'lost' to China. The US must stay engaged – on land as well as at sea – in order to create the context within which they may continue their quest for autonomy. In Southeast Asia, as in East Asia as a whole, economics and trade is strategy. In particular, the US and its allies should pursue a more ambitious and coordinated economic strategy as a supplement to the current overreliance on military instruments.
Such an approach must include ratification of the TPP as soon as possible, and a bolder approach to infrastructure investment. The US could form consortia with allies like Japan, South Korea and Australia to undertake infrastructure and other projects that may not be commercially viable for individual companies. This will require some form of investment guarantees from Washington and other capitals. There is no reason to exclude China from such consortia. Indeed, the US and China working together would go a long way to reassure Southeast Asia. It was, on this logic, a strategic mistake for the US and Japan to have stayed out of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB). Fortunately, it is not an irreversible mistake.
Bilahari Kausikan is the former Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Singapore. He is now Ambassador-at-Large.
Where is India's foreign policy two years into Narendra Modi's term as prime minister? The answer is that Modi has built on Manmohan Singh's and Atal Behari Vajpayee's policies, but has pushed ahead to make some key changes. While these changes were signalled quite early in his premiership – indeed within the first six months of taking office – the extent of the changes has now become far more clearly visible. Bref, Modi is moving India from a Nehruvian to a more neoliberal and even hyper-realist posture.
Modi obviously brings a huge amount of energy to foreign policy, travelling roughly once a month. During his visits, he is indefatigable, addressing legislatures, meeting with the diaspora, visiting sites of local cultural and social importance, and attending the usual round of official meetings. He projects his personality as integral to the future of India and its foreign policy in a way that no Indian prime minister since Jawaharlal Nehru has done – dressing carefully, choosing symbolic gestures with great attention (including the kinds of gifts he brings), and turning on the charm in his personal and public interactions.
A particular feature of Modi's trips abroad is his use of Hindi rather than English for speeches and even for smaller official meetings. Modi is manifestly trying to convey – and not too subtly – that he represents the 'authentic' India, in identity and cultural terms, and that he is proud of his native heritage.
Beyond the more personal and idiosyncratic elements of his foreign policy approach, where does Modi stand in terms of Indian strategic thought? In the Winter 2013 issue of GB, I identified three major schools of grand strategic thought in India: Nehruvianism, neoliberalism and hyper-realism. Nehruvians are wedded to the ideas of India's first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, in seeing non-alignment as the key to India's security. In practice, non-aligned India tilted away from the US and the West toward the Soviet Union during the Cold War, and remained suspicious of an imperialist America after 1990. Nehruvians remain opposed to any formal alliances. They see China and Japan – in partnership with India – as being the core of any Asian security system, and put their faith in diplomacy before force in dealing with rivals.
Neoliberals are associated more closely with Prime Minister Narasimha Rao (1991-1996) and his pragmatism in building closer relations with the US and putting economics at the centre of Indian strategy. Rao enunciated India's Look East policy and deepened India's economic and diplomatic engagement with China. His successors, Atal Behari Vajpayee and Manmohan Singh, hewed closely to neoliberalism, though Vajpayee made India a nuclear weapon power in 1998 and placed more emphasis than Manmohan on the use of force. For instance, in 2001-2002, he mobilized India's military along the border with Pakistan after Islamic militants attacked India's parliament. In 2008, after the Mumbai terrorist attacks, Manmohan turned instead to diplomacy to deal with Islamabad, seeking to isolate it internationally.
Hyper-realists, by contrast, believe that India, like any other country, must invest in alliances if necessary, but in the end must build its own military strength. They regard China as the biggest threat to India, and would build a coalition in Asia and beyond, if not a formal set of alliances, to strengthen India's position vis-à-vis its northern neighbour. Bref, hyper-realists urge India to be more attentive to a balance-of-power approach in international affairs.
I had suggested in my past GB article that India was transitioning from Nehruvianism to neoliberalism. Where does Modi stand? Is he a Nehruvian, a neoliberal, or a hyper-realist? Two years into his term, it is quite clear how he and his national security adviser Ajit Doval see some key challenges to India's security – particularly in the immediate and extended neighbourhood. They identify three key challenges: China, asymmetric and unconventional conflict, and border management. The prime minister himself has been careful not to mention China as a threat, for that would be too provocative. Doval, on the other hand, has not been shy about naming China explicitly as a threat. China is a challenge not just because the border quarrel remains unresolved, but also because it is a formidable power and its influence is nearly everywhere – and especially in India's immediate and extended neighbourhood.
Modi has also made it plain that he regards terrorism, insurgency and other forms of unconventional war – including cyber-war – as being the future of conflict. Beyond China and unconventional conflict, India must deal with the problem of vulnerable borders with Pakistan (and Kashmir), Myanmar (insurgents to and from India's eastern neighbour), and Bangladesh (illegal migration).
I focus here on India's China problem, since this is undoubtedly the greatest concern for New Delhi. China impacts India's relations with Pakistan and the smaller states of South Asia (from Afghanistan to Sri Lanka and the Maldives), its influence in the rest of Asia, its border security, its internal security, and its maritime security. It also impacts its nuclear programme – for instance, China's refusal to let India into the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) prevents India from engaging more deeply in the global nuclear trade.
Modi's aphorism for dealing with China is that India will not "lower its eyes" before China, but will not stare China down either. It will look China straight in the eye. During his visit to Singapore in 2015, Modi did not mention China when he repeated this aphorism, but it was reasonably clear that he was referring to how he intends to deal with the Middle Kingdom. This way of dealing with China is evident, too, in Doval's various remarks on security. Doval has noted that while the two Asian giants are in contention over territory and influence, they have much in common, can cooperate on common challenges, have a 5,000-year history of peace, and will settle their differences through negotiations.
In terms of actual policy, Modi has given expression to his approach in a number of ways. On the one hand, he has said that he wants to deepen the economic relationship, including encouraging Chinese investments and manufacturing in India. When Xi Jinping visited India in September 2014, the Chinese promised up to US$20 billion in investment funds over five years. Modi, in return, promised to make available land in Gujarat and Maharashtra for two industrial parks for Chinese companies. He has gone along with China on the BRICS Development Bank in accepting that the headquarters would be in Shanghai. In return, Beijing agreed that the first chairman of the Bank would be an Indian. Modi also quickly brought India into the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB). Moreover, he has made it a point to schedule a bilateral meeting with Xi on the sidelines of almost every 'minilateral' conclave that the two have attended together.
Having said this, Modi has taken a number of steps to signal a tougher stand. During his trip to Japan in late 2014, just days before Xi came to India on his first official visit as president, Modi went out of his way to deride China, saying that some of today's powers, in their expansionism and aggressiveness, were behaving like 17th or 18th century European powers. When Xi came calling, Modi told the Chinese leader that progress on the border was essential if relations were to deepen. He repeated the need for quicker resolution of this dispute when he visited Beijing in May 2015, arguing that progress in the border talks was vital if economic and other aspects of their relations were to flourish. This suggests a reversal of the position held by India since 1998 – to wit, that normalization of diplomatic, economic and social relations between the two countries would lay the foundation for a border settlement. In the military confrontation in Ladakh, during Xi's visit, Modi sent nearly 1,000 additional troops to bolster India's position there. India has also thus far refused to join China's One Belt, One Road (OBOR) initiative, arguing that Beijing had not included New Delhi in the shaping of the idea.
Looking beyond these initial moves, Modi has taken a number of steps – some symbolic and some more tangible – to signal that India will be more assertive vis-à-vis China. First, Modi's outreach internationally is in large part about projecting India in relation to China. New Delhi does not want to allow the international diplomatic space to go uncontested in China's favour. The message is simple: a democratic, economically surging, demographically attractive, and non-aggressive India, at peace with those around it, is an alternative to China. This is clearly an exercise in Indian soft power.
Second, Modi has made a clear shift in alignment toward the US. Inviting President Barack Obama to be India's guest at the Republic Day Parade in January 2015 was unprecedented – no US president had ever been accorded this honour. Before this, Modi had made a quite successful first visit to Washington in September 2014, just days after Xi's trip to India. While the visit was low on substance, it was high on symbolism. Modi, long denied a visa to the US after the 2002 Gujarat riots, dined at the White House. He also held a huge rally with local Indians and attended a music concert in Central Park, where he appeared on stage. Among his first foreign policy deliverables was a deal with the US on the Doha round of trade negotiations, which only weeks earlier New Delhi had effectively stalled. More important was the deal on nuclear liability, with the common pool insurance solution providing a way out of the corner into which India had painted itself with its 2010 nuclear liability bill.
While there continue to be differences with the US, over Pakistan, Afghanistan, conventional weapons sales, Ukraine, Russia, intervention, and climate change, Modi has reached out to Washington as perhaps no Indian prime minister has done before. Dealing with China is a common concern. The US-India Joint Strategic Vision for the Asia-Pacific and Indian Ocean Region, made public during Obama's visit, was, in its insistence on freedom of navigation and the rule of law, clearly aimed at China. This was not the first time that India and the US had jointly made such remarks, but embedding those words in a vision document was intended to send a message to Beijing and East Asian states about the evolving partnership with Washington. Thus, the joint statement issued at the end of the visit stressed that the two sides were in agreement on India going beyond Look East, to Act East, and that New Delhi and Washington would increase their cooperation in the region. Moreover, in the aftermath of the Permanent Court of Arbitration ruling on the South China Sea this past July, New Delhi repeated its stand that "India supports freedom of navigation and over-flight and unimpeded commerce, based on principles of international law as reflected notably in the UNCLOS."
In April of this year, India and the US made progress on the Logistics Exchange Memorandum of Agreement (LEMOA). The agreement, when signed, will allow both sides to obtain supplies, spare parts and services from each other. (It does not, however, include basing rights.) This is the first time that New Delhi has inked such a far-reaching military agreement with the US.
More recently, in June of this year, Modi made a fourth visit to the US in two years. During the visit, he addressed the US Congress for the first time. The visit was also notable for designating India as a Major Defence Partner of the US for the Defence Technology and Trade Initiative, cybersecurity cooperation, and US support of India's application to the NSG (in the face of Chinese opposition). At the heart of defence technology collaboration with the US is American help for India's aircraft carrier project. Interestingly, New Delhi will be simultaneously cooperating with Moscow on its nuclear and other submarines, and with Washington on its carriers.
Third, Modi's focus on visiting the immediate and extended neighbourhood with such regularity is intended to remind those closer to home that India can be a friend and partner, and that China is not the only economic or security game in town. In South Asia, Southeast Asia, Central Asia, and the Indian Ocean states of Mauritius and Seychelles, in dealing with the economically more needy states, Modi has come with a package of development and technical aid, lines of credit, and infrastructure and connectivity initiatives. He has also attempted to promote bilateral trade and investment. Virtually everywhere in the region – even in more advanced Southeast Asia – Modi has tried to sell Indian capabilities in satellite, cyber and information technology. Of course, this is not the first time that India is putting together these kinds of economic and technological packages, but Modi's visits and his speeches have advertised India's initiatives as never before.
Arguably, too, Modi has been far more aggressive than his predecessors in presenting India as a security provider. While he did not emphasize this in his South Asian visits – in order not to reinforce fears of a hegemonic India – he has, in the extended neighbourhood, been fairly direct. Again, it is not that Modi has invented these initiatives de novo. India has had defence agreements with all of the major states of Southeast Asia going back to at least the early 1990s. Likewise, India has been the mainstay of security in Mauritius and Seychelles since the 1980s. Indian involvement in Central Asian security is also not new, and can be traced back to the days of Taliban rule in Afghanistan in the late 1990s. Thereafter, the Manmohan Singh government had worked to build links between the armed forces and security bureaucracies in Central Asia to deal with the issue of terrorism and to balance against Chinese influence.
Still, Modi, with his far more public utterances on the subject, has underlined India's desire to be involved in providing security. Everywhere he has been in the extended neighbourhood, including Japan, South Korea and Vietnam, he has flown India's defence manufacturing flag, renewing or signing new defence cooperation agreements to institutionalize high-level political and bureaucratic interactions, military exercises, military exchanges, and training of personnel. India, Modi has suggested, is interested in building its own defence industry through collaboration in co-producing specific systems, as well as through the export of its own existing weapons systems. For instance, New Delhi has repeated its interest in buying and possibly co-producing Japan's Soryu submarine and US-2 amphibious aircraft. India also seems to be edging closer to promising the BrahMoS cruise missile system to Vietnam, provided Moscow agrees to go along (as the missile is being developed with Russia).
There is also little doubt that Modi has made a number of changes in Indian foreign policy with a security focus aimed squarely at China. The first change consists in the expansion of India's naval exercises. After some initial hesitation, in July 2015, Modi invited Japan to join the Malabar naval exercises as a permanent member. India usually holds these exercises with the US. Japan has participated from time to time. After Modi's visit to China in May 2015, he ordered that Japan be invited as a permanent member of the exercises. The US urged him to also invite Australia. This he did not do, although he did start a bilateral India-Australia naval exercise for the first time, held in the same month as the Malabar exercise.
The second change that Modi has brought about has been to forge a formal, long-term defence agreement with Australia. New Delhi has traditionally held Canberra at arm's length. Australian suspicion of India's naval expansion in the 1980s and its non-proliferation stance on India's nuclear programme irked New Delhi, which in turn saw Australia as an uncritical follower of the US. While the Manmohan Singh government had tentatively begun the process of defence cooperation, Modi has been far more enthusiastic about the strategic convergence with Australia, and is keen to bring India, Japan and Australia together. For the first time, a trilateral India-Japan-Australia security dialogue was held in June 2015.
The third change has been to increase India's role in the Indian Ocean. Modi has built on earlier Indian policies, but there are signs of more ambitious engagement with the regional states. New Delhi is trying to put in place the Coastal Surveillance Radar System involving Sri Lanka, the Maldives, Mauritius and Seychelles – begun by the previous government – and is trying to cobble together a maritime security group comprising India, Sri Lanka, Maldives and Seychelles. (In the 2015 Sri Lankan presidential elections, New Delhi made quite public its preference for the eventually victorious opposition candidate, Maithripala Sirisena, encouraging opposition groups to coalesce. This came after Chinese submarines docked at Sri Lankan ports in September and November 2014.) Ajit Doval has referred approvingly to the Indian Ocean as a Zone of Peace (IOZP) – an idea that India more or less abandoned in the 1970s. IOZP envisioned regional and littoral states taking the lead in ensuring security and stability in the Indian Ocean. In addition, the increased cooperation with Australia, including in the Indian Ocean Rim Association (IORA), presages a new coalition to deal with Indian Ocean security even as the US navy relocates assets to the Asia-Pacific region. Modi has also undertaken a review of maritime capabilities and policies, and is attempting to launch a single-point maritime agency in India.
Where, then, is India's Modi in terms of our original grand strategy triptych of Nehruvianism, neoliberalism, and hyper-realism? First of all, Modi seems to have clearly identified China as India's biggest grand strategic challenge. This is consonant with the thinking of the hyper-realists, who see China as India's greatest security threat.
Second, like so many other states in Asia and the rest of the world, Modi's India is engaging China economically. Bilateral trade runs to approximately US$70 billion annually. India is beginning to attract Chinese investment. Between 2000 and 2015, Chinese investment was estimated to be just over $1 billion. Between 2015 and 2018, it will likely rise to between $5 billion and $10 billion. India is a member of the BRICS Development Bank and the AIIB. It may soon also be a member of the proposed Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) Development Bank. Here Modi seems to be close to the thinking of the neoliberals, who see the road to security through trade and other economic interactions.
Third, in the defence and security sphere, more than any of his predecessors, Modi has moved India from non-alignment to alignment with the US and a range of Asian and Indian Ocean states in an effort to strengthen India's bargaining position vis-à-vis China. New Delhi does not expect war with China. Nor does it expect anyone – not even the US – to come to India's aid if there is war. What it is hoping is that, with India in a broad coalition, Beijing will be more sensitive to New Delhi's concerns and will settle various matters – preeminently the border conflict – sooner rather than later, and on terms more favourable to India than Beijing appears to fancy at present. This is suggestive of a more neoliberal and hyper-realist sensibility than a Nehruvian sensibility in grand strategy.
Neoliberals in India have supported a strong relationship with the US, and hyper-realists argue for a coalition strategy against China – with or without the US.
Bref, Modi is transitioning India from a Nehruvian to a hybrid neoliberal-cum-hyper-realist grand strategy. Question: Is Modi's China strategy working? In particular, is a more aggressive coalition-building strategy causing Beijing to rethink its stand on the border conflict, its support of India's neighbours – particularly Pakistan – against India, and indeed India's membership in the NSG and on the UN Security Council? Answer: It is too early to tell. But it is telling that China continues to underline that there is a huge dispute over territory in Arunachal Pradesh (or South Tibet, in Chinese terminology). Moreover, after promising India $20 billion in investments in September 2014, it offered $46 billion to Pakistan just a few months later. China is promising to build the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor with those funds – through territory that India claims as part of Kashmir. Most recently, China balked at India's bid for NSG membership, arguing that unless India signs the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), and unless Pakistan becomes a member of the grouping on the same terms, New Delhi should not be allowed into the club.
Will Beijing's responses deepen or soften Modi's inclinations? That is the question for the years ahead. Modi has shown, over the course of his political career, that he is a deeply strategic politician. He plots a course carefully, and proceeds with determination. It seems clear enough that he has identified China as India's main foreign policy and security challenge. It is also clear that while he will continue to engage China and stand by the various modes of engagement that the two sides have forged over the years – regular summit meetings, border negotiations, confidence-building along the border, and growing trade and investment ties – he will deepen his efforts at coalition-building and balance of power manoeuvring in order to improve his bargaining hand. And he will attempt to bring coalition pressures to bear on Beijing, as he did during India's campaign for membership in the NSG in May and June of this year. He has already warned China that there must be progress toward a border settlement if Beijing wants a healthier, comprehensive relationship with New Delhi, and that growing trade and investment will not substitute for a settlement. He will continue to remind China of this, playing for the long term.
Kanti Bajpai is the Wilmar Chair of Asian Studies, Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, National University of Singapore.
On July 26th of this year, in Laos, Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Stéphane Dion sat down for his first formal meeting with Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov. It may prove to be a watershed moment in bilateral relations.
After the Russian annexation of Crimea in March 2014, Canada's previous Conservative government, led by Stephen Harper, had adamantly refused to talk with anyone from the Kremlin until Russia left the peninsula. Although Canada's new Liberal government continues to denounce Russian military involvement in Ukraine and Syria, it has indicated its desire to renew a dialogue on potential cooperation in "areas critical to our national interests," such as space, counter-terrorism and the Arctic.
The Arctic is a natural area of focus for the two countries. Canada and Russia are the geographical giants, spanning most of the Northern circumpolar world. The region plays strongly into both countries' identity politics, with leaders often invoking sovereignty and security frames to drum up support for investments in this frontier of destiny. The purported need to protect sovereign territory and resources from foreign encroachment or outright theft, backed by explicit appeals to nationalism, produces a siege mentality that encourages a narrow, inward-looking posture.
Although the end of the Cold War seemed to portend a new era of deep cooperation between these two Arctic powers, lingering wariness about geopolitical motives and a mutual lack of knowledge about the other's slice of the circumpolar world are conspiring to pit Canada and the Russian Federation as Arctic adversaries. While these Arctic neighbours will continue to find themselves on different sides in an era of renewed great power rivalry, this general state of competition does not portend Arctic conflict. Instead, the circumpolar world provides room for substantive cooperation and collaboration in areas of common interest, as long as there is political will to avoid holding circumpolar cooperation hostage to broader geostrategic rivalry (see the Query Article by Alexander Sergunin and Valery Konyshev in the Fall/Winter 2016 issue of GB).
The key audience for confrontational rhetoric on Arctic issues in both countries is domestic. In official policy and statements, however, the Russian and Canadian governments follow a pragmatic line and pursue their maritime and continental shelf claims in the region in compliance with international law – while highlighting that, as sovereign states, they will not be pushed around by neighbours that might encroach on their respective jurisdictions. This serves as a convenient pretext to invest in more robust military capabilities to protect territory, natural resources, and national interests.
The precise nature of the threats to each country's Arctic realm remains ambiguous, however, with alarmist narratives regularly conflating regional dynamics with grand strategic considerations. Bref, growing great power competition between Russia and the West does not arise from Arctic issues or probable conflicts. The myth of Arctic resource or boundary wars is pure fantasy, conjured by political and media commentators seeking simple, sensational frames to grab public attention.
Accordingly, the long-term goal of a stable and secure circumpolar world, where each Arctic littoral state enjoys its sovereign rights, must not be lost in hyperbolic rhetoric geared toward domestic audiences for short-term political gain.
Unfortunately, a deep history of mistrust means that Cold War narratives are easily resurrected whenever either side declares its right to assert sovereignty, and rattles its sabres to show resolve. As newspaper editor Robert Keyserlingk told the Empire Club of Canada in 1949, "We have actually stretching across the Arctic a veritable ice curtain, which is impenetrable." Polar projection maps unfurled after WW2, which showed Canada sandwiched between rival superpowers, made the circumpolar neighbourhood a cause for concern. Deep ideological divisions and strategic realities dictated that prospects for Russo-Canadian collaboration in the Arctic would remain frozen for decades.
Scientific cooperation, however, began to draw open the ice curtain separating the two countries beginning in the mid-1960s. Reciprocal political visits showed that the high politics of the Cold War need not freeze out other forms of collaboration, such as research (including in the social sciences and issues concerning northern indigenous peoples) covered by the 1984 Canada-USSR Arctic Science Exchange Program. Mikhail Gorbachev's landmark Murmansk speech in October 1987 called for the Arctic to become a "zone of peace," opening new opportunities for political, economic and environmental agendas previously subordinated to national security interests. Inspired by this vision, Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney proposed an international Arctic Council that would draw Russia into the new world order. Bilateral relations began to thaw. In 1992, Mulroney and Boris Yeltsin issued a Declaration of Friendship and Cooperation, then a formal Arctic Cooperation Agreement.
Canada, in particular, embraced broader interpretations of security with environmental, cultural and human dimensions, promoting a vision of circumpolar stewardship, stable governance and human capacity-building. At the turn of the new millennium, "The Northern Dimension of Canada's Foreign Policy" – a major foreign policy statement – set four objectives for Canadian circumpolar engagement: to enhance the security and prosperity of Canadians, especially northerners and Aboriginal peoples; to assert and ensure the preservation of Canada's sovereignty in the North; to establish the circumpolar region as a vibrant geopolitical entity integrated into a rules-based international system; and to promote the human security of Northerners and the sustainable development of the Arctic. Traditional security threats were notably absent, and working with Russia to address northern challenges, such as cleaning up Cold War environmental legacies and funding Russian indigenous peoples' participation in the Arctic Council, formed a core priority. "Perhaps more than any other country," the document declared, "Canada is uniquely positioned to build a strategic partnership with Russia for development of the Arctic."
Developments over the last decade have both reinforced and challenged this polar partnership. The acute impacts of global warming in the Arctic, dreams of increasingly navigable sea routes, boosterism surrounding oil and gas deposits in the offshore, uncertain boundaries, and heightened interest from non-Arctic states have thrust the region into the international spotlight. A popular 'race for resources' narrative has fed anxieties about the potential for interstate conflict, fuelled by imaginary resource disputes and sovereignty challenges. These ideas weigh heavily upon Russian and Canadian minds. With a Russian economy heavily dependent upon oil and gas, it comes as no surprise that senior officials in Moscow should emphasize that "the Arctic must become the basic strategic resource base of Russia." Canadian politicians harbour similar visions when they declare their country an emerging "Arctic power," trumpeting "the immense promise of the North," as Harper did in committing to "unleash the tremendous potential of this region" and its "vast natural resources – to create jobs and prosperity for the benefit of Northerners and all Canadians."
With so much at stake, symbolism can easily be mistaken for substance. In the West, Artur Chilingarov's flag planting exploit at the North Pole in August 2007 and Russia's announcements of reinvestments in military capabilities to defend its Arctic interests aligned with a burgeoning awareness of a resurgent Russian nationalism. The resumption of long-range bomber patrols, coupled with the announcement of new fleet units, airfields and special Arctic brigades protected by S-400 missile systems, pointed to a renewed 'militarization' of the region. On the other side of the pole, the Harper government also proclaimed a 'use it or lose it' strategy framed by aggressive rhetoric predicated on potential sovereignty threats and the need to protect Arctic resources. Was a new Arctic Cold War emerging, with Russia and Canada as the main protagonists?
Hardly. While the possibility of Arctic conflict attracts media attention, the dominant international messaging from both countries since 2008 has stressed cooperation. The existing governance framework in the region is robust and compatible with state sovereignty, the Arctic Council remains the premier international forum for dialogue on regional issues and for scientific collaboration, and the Arctic states consistently reiterate and demonstrate a common commitment to international law in the region.
Even the most obvious potential friction points, such as competing claims to extended continental shelves up to the North Pole, are much more exciting in theory than in legal and political reality. Misconceptions abound. The outer limits of the Canadian and Russian extended continental shelves in the Arctic Ocean are sure to overlap on the basis of scientific evidence, but they will be defined through diplomacy. There is no defence component to this issue, and relative capabilities to assert control over resources have no bearing on the outcome. In fact, both Russia and Canada stand to gain the most if the delineation process unfolds in conformity with the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). And it will.
Just as overenthusiastic commentators prematurely forecast an Arctic resource rush and the imminent opening of new Arctic transit routes, so too have many prematurely heralded the end of the cooperative, post-Cold War Arctic regime. The governance and legal structures in place – both international and regional – remain very much intact, from the Arctic Council to UNCLOS and myriad bilateral agreements between Arctic states. Recent achievements like the mandatory Polar Code through the International Maritime Organization, the Arctic search and rescue agreement, measures to address oil pollution, as well as the creation of new institutional mechanisms (e.g. the Arctic Coast Guard Forum), point not to an unravelling of regional cooperation but to its quiet persistence and entrenchment. By fixating on potential conflict, highlighting uncertainty and distrust, and misrepresenting the Arctic as a highly contested space, we tend to overlook the positive patterns and norms of behaviour, and also the strong cooperative frameworks that guide regional relationships.
Last October, Justin Trudeau's Liberals swept into power in Canada. While the main substantive elements of Canada's Arctic policy are likely to remain intact and will continue to focus on domestic issues, the political tone and emphasis have changed.
Building on Trudeau's promise that Canada would have a more "compassionate and constructive voice in the world" after a decade of Conservative rule, Stéphane Dion has called for renewed engagement with Russia, despite Canada's ongoing displeasure with Russian foreign and defence policy. While the Harper Conservatives had suspended almost all bilateral contact with Russia after the Crimean annexation, Dion stressed that this position deviated from the less extreme actions of the US and other G7 partners. "We also need to think about our national interests because Russia is our neighbour in the Arctic," Dion explained.
This revised stance provoked debate among Canadian commentators, some of whom worried that it would send the wrong signals to an increasingly assertive and unpredictable President Putin. But deterrence and more open dialogue are not incompatible strategies, and Canada's intention to resume cooperation with Russia in areas of common ground is an eminently sensible one. To do so, both countries should send clear messages that their military investments in the Arctic are defensive in nature, that they do not anticipate conventional military threats to their territorial integrity in the region, and that they will strive to insulate relationships on Arctic issues from geopolitical tensions elsewhere. Canada's announcement in July 2016 that it will lead a 1,000-strong NATO battle group in Latvia to deter Russia from aggression in the Baltics does not contradict this logic. In fact, it legitimates the idea that Canada can show resolve against Russian aggression in one theatre, while seeking to 'reset' the bilateral relationship on issues of common interest in another theatre.
To facilitate constructive circumpolar dialogue, both countries should strive to reinforce the Arctic Council as the primary high-level international forum for dialogue on Arctic issues. To ensure that it does not become another stage for geopolitical grandstanding, however, both countries should firmly resist calls to expand the Council's mandate to include military security issues. Similarly, calls for NATO to adopt an explicit Arctic agenda or to include Sweden and Finland as members are sure to inflame Russian sensitivities about Western encirclement.
Provoking the bear by prodding its known insecurities will only encourage it to bite. Fortunately, Russia has, in strategic terms, few good reasons – and deep economic and political disincentives – to lash out at its neighbours militarily in the Arctic theatre. First and foremost, the 'resource rush' anticipated a decade ago now appears overblown. The global collapse of oil and gas prices, coupled with increasing supply, has rendered most Arctic resources grossly uneconomical, with dramatic impacts on the near- to medium-term future of the Arctic offshore as a viable resource frontier. Self-interest dictates that, if Russia wants access to the necessary foreign capital and technology to exploit its offshore energy reserves – something that it considers essential to maintaining its energy superpower status, and something that is clearly complicated by the current sanctions regime against Moscow – it cannot afford to clash with its Arctic neighbours. Perpetuating the narrative of an unstable region is likely to kill any remaining appetite for large-scale foreign investment.
Although the prospects of Arctic sea routes becoming imminently accessible to regular commercial traffic and ultimately competing with established routes for global maritime trade have foundered on the shoals of harsh environmental, technical and economic realities, issues related to the governance of navigation and shipping in Arctic waters remain high priorities for both Moscow and Ottawa. Russia's vigorous efforts to develop and commercialize the Northern Sea Route as a wholly integrated international shipping route connecting Europe and Asia have yielded disappointing results – not least for reasons of poor infrastructure – while domestic cargo traffic continues to grow and facilitate state-funded industrial revival efforts. For its part, Canada officially claims to be 'open for business' in the Arctic, but has done little to encourage international shipping through the Northwest Passage, choosing instead to prioritize sovereignty as the principal pillar of its Arctic foreign policy. Both countries, however, have comparable interests in upholding their respective legal positions on the status of their Arctic waters, adopting and enforcing navigation and shipping standards through national legislation and international regulation, and developing enhanced search and rescue capabilities. Coupled with emergency preparedness, and prevention and response issues more generally, Moscow and Ottawa can sell these to their populations as human and environmental security imperatives benefiting from international collaboration.
While policy-makers and academic commentators are predisposed to dream up 'new' initiatives that suggest innovation, history also offers strong examples of priority areas where Canada and Russia can further their respective Arctic agendas by working together – most obviously by strengthening partnerships in science and research, including cold weather construction, transportation technologies, and measures to address air pollutants, prevent oil pollution, and protect biodiversity. Russia is hardly considered a global leader in climate change mitigation efforts, and the Trudeau government's aspirations to have Canada become one remains a work in progress. Nevertheless, both countries face similar challenges in terms of local adaptation to climate change and management of impacts on ecosystems, food and water security, public health and infrastructure.
To promote these activities, the two countries should also resume engagement through the Arctic and North Working Group of the Canada-Russia Intergovernmental Economic Commission, a key conduit for bilateral discussions that Canada suspended in March 2014. Although the dream of an 'Arctic bridge' sea route linking Eurasian and North American markets through the Port of Churchill may have faded, as has the prospect of a 'Northern Air Bridge' connecting Winnipeg and Krasnoyarsk, other opportunities to promote subnational cooperation and sustainable economic development should be explored. In particular, Ottawa and Moscow should encourage the activities of the recently formed Arctic Economic Council to facilitate Arctic business-to-business relationships, promote best practices in environmentally and socially responsible development, and foster grassroots initiatives that can help build healthy, resilient Arctic communities with diversified economies.
The countries have a solid history of sharing best practices in sustainable development – particularly in terms of Indigenous peoples, capacity-building, and governance. "No relationship is more important to me and to Canada than the one with Indigenous Peoples," Trudeau highlighted in his mandate letter to each of his Cabinet ministers last fall. In an era of 'truth and reconciliation,' Canada will place the highest priority on ensuring that its activities in the Arctic acknowledge, protect and promote Indigenous peoples' rights – and, by extension, will insist that other Arctic stakeholders do the same.
Partnering with Canadian Inuit groups, who have been strong proponents of the Russian Association of Indigenous Peoples of the North and its participation in the Arctic Council, Ottawa should resume its technical assistance for initiatives designed to share indigenous best practices with Russian counterparts. This can contribute to regional and local entrepreneurship, as well as improved indigenous governance systems. It cannot proceed, however, without basic assurances and trust that this is not intended to undermine the Russian state or Russian industrial and resource development.
In practice, the existing multilayered governance regime in the Arctic serves the interests of Canada and Russia well. Both countries have a similar stance on the primary rights and roles of Arctic states in regional governance, rooted in international recognition of Arctic state sovereignty and sovereign rights.
Of course, as mentioned, Canadians and Russians still lack deep knowledge of one another as Arctic actors. Addressing this unfamiliarity is foundational to any constructive engagement. The Arctic theatre offers a stage for these Arctic citizens to become better acquainted with one another – perhaps correcting misconceptions and ensuring that blanket characterizations derived from disagreements or divergent interests in other parts of the world are not misapplied to circumpolar relations, and conversely, presenting the possibility of growing familiarity through the Arctic medium facilitating the resolution of disagreements in other theatres.
To begin, rather than conceptualizing the Arctic as an 'interstitial theatre' that will experience increased contestation between Arctic states in the years ahead (as Irvin Studin anticipated in his Feature article in Fall/Winter 2016 issue of GB), analysts could emphasize that Canada and Russia have vested interests in a stable, secure and sustainable circumpolar world.
Appropriately situating the Arctic in the resurgent great power rivalry between Russia and the West requires both nuance and clarity. The evolving Arctic security environment is too readily conflated with grand strategic issues – such as Russia-NATO relations, the rise of China, global energy security, and global climate change mitigation – that are best assessed through a global rather than a regional lens. The most acute Arctic challenges facing regional actors are not generated by great power competition, resource ownership questions, outstanding (and usually well-managed) boundary disputes, or different applications of international law. Instead, they relate to community-level security and safety, the practical challenges associated with adapting to climate change, assurance that Arctic shipping and resource development will be conducted safely, and outlining what sustainable development looks like across a spectrum of economic sectors.
Bref, Canada and Russia should return to cultivating the positive image of an Arctic region where peace, cooperation and stability continue to prevail. If an ice curtain continues to distort each side's views of the other, it is time for both, as Arctic neighbours, to pull the blinds and get to know their opposite number. For the circumpolar neighbourhood is safe by comparison with nearly every other regional theatre – which means that political developments and divergent strategies in other parts of the world should not preclude Arctic cooperation where this serves national and regional interests.
P. Whitney Lackenbauer is Professor of History and Co-Director of the Centre on Foreign Policy and Federalism at St. Jerome's University, Waterloo.
The norms, ideas and institutions that have provided the foundation for the global economic system for decades are under great pressure. Consider the protectionist rhetoric in the US presidential campaign, the growing challenges facing European integration – most obviously in the Brexit vote – and the increasingly explicit role of geopolitics in shaping international commerce, including trade agreements such as the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP).
All of this may not yet amount to a reversal of globalization, but it is a marked step away from the hyper-globalization of the past 25 years – a period of very strong growth in cross-border trade and investment. To better understand the emerging fault lines in globalization and the potential for disruptive change, it is instructive to look at the experience of small advanced economies – that is, countries like New Zealand, Singapore, the Nordics, the Baltic states, Switzerland, the Netherlands and Israel. As I noted in the Spring/Summer 2013 issue of GB, such small advanced economies have long served as a good barometer of the health and functioning of the global economic system. Because they are acutely exposed to the global economy, global dynamics show up cleanly and quickly in these countries.
To be sure, small advanced economies have prospered in an era of intense, rules-based globalization. However, recent small-country experience suggests a much more challenging political economy of globalization. Small countries are reflecting a global context that has much in common with the 1970s – a period of slowing, volatile growth, domestic political unrest, and a fluid international economic system. For the most part, small advanced economies are responding quickly and creatively to this emerging environment. And yet the scale and nature of the new fault lines in the global economic system, as well as the potential for rupture, commend themselves to an aggressive watching brief.
Small advanced economies are pointing to the emergence of three fault lines in the global economy: increased domestic economic and political pressures from globalization; challenges to existing models of regional economic integration; and, finally, a more explicit interaction between international economics and politics.
Domestic Pressures. Small advanced economies benefited enormously from the intense processes of globalization over the past 25 years. The high, growing exports and outward investment shares, as well as the successful activities of small-country multinational companies, have supported strong economic performance by small countries. The strategic posture of most small countries is deeply outwardly oriented, aimed at building positions of competitive advantage through high-quality policy settings and investments in innovation and public goods like education and strong social insurance systems. Relative to larger economies, small countries have managed globalization well. This policy approach has helped to sustain solid public support for openness and globalization.
Nevertheless, the experience of globalization in small countries is changing in ways that are weakening public support for openness and requiring different policy approaches. For example, strong migration rates are placing pressure on labour markets and infrastructure in several small countries. Some governments are responding with increasingly tough stances, with referenda in Switzerland on restricting migration, and Singapore imposing tighter controls on migration. In Europe – from Austria to the Nordics – this trend has been exacerbated by large refugee inflows from the Greater Middle East.
Similarly, ultra-loose monetary policy in the US and the Eurozone is having disruptive spillover effects on small economies, leading to strongly appreciating exchange rates (Switzerland and New Zealand), rapidly appreciating property prices (the Nordics and New Zealand), and low or negative inflation rates (Singapore and Sweden). This is creating significant complications for small-country policy-makers as they try to deliver strong growth rates, low (targeted) inflation, and general financial stability. From Switzerland to Israel, then, and from Singapore to New Zealand, small countries are intervening more actively in foreign exchange markets and establishing restrictions on foreign ownership.
There are also indications of increased small-country resistance to international liberalization in the service sectors. In New Zealand, for example, there has been a surprisingly high level of protest against specific aspects of the TPP deal – such as the investor-state dispute settlement mechanism – as well as against liberalization in a general sense. Bref, the instinctive small-country support for globalization is weakening as global engagement presents increasingly material challenges and risks to growth, employment and asset prices. That these behaviours are observed consistently across quintessentially open small economies that have profited substantially from globalization suggests structural changes in attitudes toward globalization. This is, in other words, more than concern about globalization from the usual suspects or discontents.
Small-country governments are responding with a more managed approach that allows them to exercise more policy discretion in areas that are economically or politically important. Of course, this is a tough balancing act. And in larger countries, from France to the UK and the US, there is frequently a less calibrated response, with greater protectionist sentiment, as governments respond to global forces that are reaching further inside national economies.
Regional Integration Challenges. An important driver of globalization over the past few decades has been regional integration: 70 percent of European trade is intraregional in nature, as is 50 percent of Asian and 60 percent of North American trade. Formal regional arrangements in Europe, Asia and the Americas, such as the EU, ASEAN and NAFTA, together with the connective tissue of regional supply chains and infrastructure networks, have shown that globalization remains heavily regionally organized.
Small countries have long placed regional economic integration at the centre of their economic strategies. In Europe, of course, the Benelux countries were the founding nations of the six-member European Economic Community. Subsequently, other small European countries became very active participants in the EU. For its part, ASEAN is a central element of Singapore's external strategy. Indeed, only two small countries have developed into advanced economies without deep integration into their respective regional economies: New Zealand (for geographic reasons), and Israel (for geopolitical reasons). But for the overwhelming majority of small countries, regional economic integration is a strategic imperative.
In this context, it is striking that small countries have been at the forefront of resisting more intensive European regional engagement. Northern European economies like the Netherlands have long been signalling frustration with Brussels on issues such as the patchy application of economic and fiscal rules, as well as the bailouts of countries like Greece. Other recent examples include Iceland suspending EU membership negotiations, the latest 'No' vote in a Danish referendum in 2015 on removing that country's opt-out from several EU home and justice policy matters, the 2014 Swiss referendum vote to impose limits on immigration, and Finland's foreign minister suggesting in December of last year that Euro membership had been a mistake for Finland. The Austrian presidential election result in May of this year – now to be rerun this fall – was another signal of increased nationalism in a small European country.
Tighter regional integration is being challenged by a desire for greater domestic policy autonomy to respond to issues in ways that reflect the local context, as well as by associated concerns about the political legitimacy of decision-making at the centre of very large economic blocs. There is little small-economy appetite for formal European integration – that is, into an economic or fiscal union, or into some deeper federal framework. Instead, there is a consistent view in small northern European countries on EU reform that emphasizes a looser model of integration based on the primacy of nation-states, clear rules, and a liberal approach.
Small economies are not decoupling from their respective regions in response to these emerging political pressures, but are instead trying to alter the balance between domestic and regional-level policy autonomy. By contrast, larger economies are more disposed to push for a more centralized model with institutions such as an economic and fiscal union, or to completely separate in a quest for national sovereignty (as reflected in the UK's Brexit vote). Small economies, in turn, see both of the latter approaches as containing fundamental dangers.
Although post-Brexit opinion polls in several small countries confirm ongoing strong support for EU membership, the small-economy experience clearly indicates that there are fault lines emerging in regional integration. If this pressure is not well managed by the EU member states, both individually and collectively, it could quickly lead to institutional unravelling that weakens the global economy.
Geopolitics. The liberal, rules-based global economic system that has prevailed over the past several decades has helped to separate international commerce from the projection of political or strategic power. However, the demarcation between international economics and politics is arguably becoming less clear. The weakening of multilateral institutions means that trade liberalization increasingly occurs on a regional or bilateral basis, which elevates political considerations. And the transition to a multipolar world, in which major economic players like the US and China have differences in their strategic preferences, exposes the functioning of the global economy to geopolitical considerations and calculations: consider, in Asia, overlapping trade deals like the TPP and ASEAN's Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, or new development institutions like the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB).
To be sure, these developments create specific exposures for small advanced economies. This is most apparent in the negotiation of trade agreements, where the ability of small countries to secure agreements is constrained by their limited domestic market size. More importantly, of course, these negotiations also necessarily expose small advanced economies to the strategic predilections and caprices of larger countries. For example, New Zealand signed a free-trade agreement with China in 2008, partly on the back of Wellington's early willingness to grant China 'market economy' status at the WTO. However, New Zealand has not secured a bilateral deal with the US, reflecting the challenged relationship with Washington since Wellington took New Zealand out of the ANZUS alliance in the 1980s.
Small countries can also be squeezed by larger countries. I have written in GB about the risk exposures inherent in the asymmetric relationship between small and large countries such as New Zealand and China (see my In Situ article in the Fall/Winter 2015 issue of GB). This is true in many other bilateral relationships – for example, between China and several of the ASEAN countries. Small advanced economies increasingly have to deliberately balance economic and broader strategic interests, which invariably imposes economic costs.
Moreover, small advanced economies are often exposed to the spillover effects of strategic economic competition between large countries. Increasingly, international economic engagement by large countries, through vectors like the TPP and the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), is framed in geostrategic terms. For instance, a primary stated source of value of the TPP for Washington is to set the rules of the game on a basis that is acceptable to the US, and to represent the economic arm of the pivot to Asia. And yet many small-economy members of the TPP value the agreement principally for economic reasons, and do not wish it to become part of a binary strategic choice between Washington and China.
Small countries are also affected by the apparently increased willingness or disposition of large countries to take unilateral action – a trend that poses significant long-term risks to an open global economy. For example, the US tendency toward extra-territorial jurisdiction on tax and financial sector issues has impacted small economies like Switzerland. And the increasing noise in the US in respect of imposing sanctions on 'currency manipulators' or countries with sustained current account surpluses is another example of the potential unilateral use of power in the global economic system. For its part, Russia's annexation of Crimea sent clear signals to smaller NATO border countries like Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, to neutral small countries like Sweden and Finland, and indeed to small-country members of the Eurasian Economic Union like Armenia.
Better than most, small advanced economies appreciate the impact that geopolitical frictions are already having on globalization, and indeed how marked a change this is from the past few decades. Small countries in Asia, such as New Zealand and Singapore, and in Europe, such as Finland and the Netherlands, have first-hand experience of these emerging challenges. They are responding through a combination of strategic balancing and hedging, even if major exposures remain.
Small advanced economies around the world – the canaries in the mine, as it were – are reflecting the emergence of new fault lines in the global economy. The impact of the pressure from moving tectonic plates depends significantly on how it is managed by national government policy-makers. A careful release of pressure through calibrated policy may lead the global economy to a better, more sustainable position. Alternatively, growing pressure could cause fault lines to rupture – causing significant damage.
For the most part, small advanced economies are remaining open, responding to domestic economic and political challenges even as they manage international economic integration. This is reminiscent of the 'embedded liberalism' aspiration of the design of the original Bretton Woods system, in which an open, liberal international economic system was designed to be consistent with a measure of domestic political autonomy. For at least a few decades after 1945, this system underpinned rapid growth in cross-border trade and investment while retaining reasonable political legitimacy.
Positively framed, this may suggest that the basic structure of the global economic system can be maintained even with a more challenging political economy. Indeed, this small-country policy response may be relevant to larger countries in terms of how to reckon with the new fault lines. And yet the small-country experience also suggests a less encouraging set of implications. The depth of current concern in small-economy capitals in Asia and Europe about the outlook for the global economic system – with the rise of protectionism, the weakening of regional integration, and the use of political power in the international economic system – should be understood and taken seriously.
The type of global economy that develops will – to be sure – rest heavily on how large countries respond to these emerging pressures. But large countries place less weight on the external economy, and have fewer imperatives to balance domestic political concerns with international engagement in a way that preserves openness.
It seems unlikely that a Bretton Woods 2.0 will emerge – at least not in the foreseeable future. Post-crisis international coordination has been patchy, with domestic interests consistently privileged over the global system. The US and China do not at present have aligned interests or perspectives, and international institutions such as the IMF and G20 are not well-placed to lead a new consensus. There are, instead, indications of a tilt toward more inwardly oriented policies in large advanced economies (the US) and emerging markets (China and Russia). And Brexit is an ominous warning sign that public support for a liberal, open system may be weakening quickly, and that the system is more fragile than it has been assumed to be. Bref, there is a growing likelihood of rupture along the new fault lines.
Although, absent future great wars, it is not possible to put globalization back in the bottle, it can be diminished considerably. The 1970s, as mentioned, provide a useful historical analogy. Four decades ago, economic and political stress after the ending of a period of sustained global growth led to the dismantling of the Bretton Woods exchange rate system, the rise of protectionism, and competitive international behaviour (OPEC, as well as competitive devaluations).
Today, the potential for similarly costly developments is high. Indeed, the protectionist dangers of a possible Trump presidency in the US, uncoordinated loose monetary policy leading to currency wars, and the unwinding of the EU project – now further complicated by the growing instability in Turkey and also Ukraine, both at the edges of the EU – are all readily identifiable risks. Taken further, the prospect of system-wide protectionism and tariff competition, the development of competing rather than open regional blocs, and the 'weaponization' of international economic policy, are all plausible. In this febrile environment, black swan events are perhaps more likely.
In response, large-country decision-makers, as well as those in global institutions such as the IMF, would do well to better involve small countries in these policy debates. There is much that can – and should – be learned from small countries in terms of how to better manage globalization in these more challenging times. And small countries can play a valuable part in highlighting the costs and risks of inwardly oriented policies, as well as challenging larger economies to perform a global stewardship role.
From a small-country perspective, the global economy is as complex and challenging as it has been in decades. It is no time for complacency, nor is it time to assume that the world will proceed in a linear fashion. States, both large and small, should take note of these small-country experiences and prepare for disruptive change as pressure continues to build along new fault lines.
David Skilling is Director at Landfall Strategy Group in Singapore.
If asymmetrical federalism remains topical in Russia, then it applies most directly to the complex North Caucasus region. The North Caucasus is distinct from other Russian regions in multiple ways – for some observers, because of its deeply archaic nature, the adherence of most of its population to Islam, its susceptibility to conflict, and the prevalence of violent social practices. Of course, some might contend that there is little that is fundamentally unique about the region, as clannism, corruption, limited upward mobility, and a predisposition to violent dispute resolution are present in many parts of contemporary Russia.
The truth, of course, lies somewhere between these two camps. The North Caucasus macro-region is indeed very different from most other Russian regions, though it is not internally monolithic: the larger constituent republics are Dagestan (population of approximately three million) and Chechnya (population of 1.4 million), while the smaller republics, each with populations of less than 500,000, are Ingushetia and Karachay-Cherkessia. Multiethnic (with Avars, Dargin, Kumyks and Lezgin) and very Islamized, Dagestan is different from the ethnically homogeneous and more traditional (though also Islamized) Chechnya and Ingushetia.
The Northeast Caucasus, which includes these three republics, is different from the Northwest Caucasus, which includes Kabardino-Balkaria, Karachay-Cherkessia, and North Ossetia-Alania. The most distinct province is Stavropol Krai, which is culturally much closer to other Russian regions, and where diverse values and ethnic groups often collide due to regular migration into the province.
For purposes of public policy, no less important than the particularities of North Caucasian societies is the need for these not to be supplanted by myths and stereotypes that have been built up over time in the Russian public and policy understanding. For now, public policy in contemporary Russia is in many ways still based on unsophisticated representations of the North Caucasus – perceived as depressed, primitive and inhabited by a passive population. Indeed, the key defect of present-day Russian public policy in the North Caucasus is that it does not take account of the not inconsiderable internal resources of the region – to wit, the existence of centres of economic development and modernization (including in the underground economy), an active, young and increasingly urban population, and also a proper culture of dialogue in the resolution of conflicts.
There are arguably four dominant Russian policy stereotypes of the North Caucasus that must be corrected in order to make the national policy approach to the region more effective.
Stereotype 1: The North Caucasus is a depressed region with high unemployment and no resources for investment.
The policy approach taken by Moscow envisages the development of the Caucasus through private investment from outside the region, accompanied by significant state guarantees as compensation for the high investment risks. Moscow presumes that such development – starting with the regional tourist industry – can create jobs and otherwise decrease the tensions in the region.
In reality, this policy approach has run into serious problems of implementation. While external investments (external to the Caucasus, but still largely Russian) have flowed into some of the North Caucasian provinces – first and foremost, to Stavropol Krai and the republics of the Northwest Caucasus – these investments have been unable to substantially change the economic situation on the ground. For its part, the Northeast Caucasus has seen no real external investment projects, except those launched strictly for demonstration purposes and delivered by politically motivated local oligarchs.
What happened? The push to deliver large-scale projects with outside investment significantly increased conflict between private investors and local residents. Lands proposed for the projects belonged to local residents. Thus, instead of giving local people sources of survival and reason for hope, the investments were seen by these people as a threat – that is, as presenting the prospect of expropriation, as well as the sudden need to compete with new and more powerful economic actors. This led, predictably, to public protests, resulting in the delay or termination of certain projects.
Bref, the North Caucasus is not a stagnant, depressed region. But if the economic processes in the North Caucasus are highly differentiated across the different territories, and if there are some areas of economic dynamism and modernization in both the official and underground economies, then it follows that external investors will often enter into competition with internal projects. In this context, the chief problem of the macro-region is not so much its depressed state and unemployment as the lack of protection for entrepreneurs and workers, the precariousness of labour and income, and the absence of social guarantees combined with widespread black market activity – not to mention ineffectual institutional mechanisms for insuring against agricultural risks. There are therefore no long-term economic incentives for private investors, resulting in a public preference for quick-spend projects and conspicuous consumption.
Economic policy for the Caucasus should, as a matter of priority, operate on the basis of the internal resources of the region, including support for local economic projects at the level of municipal governments, the removal of barriers to accelerated economic development based on the self-organization of local communities, support for the existing tourism infrastructure, and support for small- and medium-sized businesses and start-ups. Moreover, a policy of careful legalization of the underground economy must be developed, based on negotiations and consultations with local business groups and associations.
Stereotype 2: The core problems in the North Caucasus have an ethnic character – or, interethnic tensions are the foundation of the conflict potential in the region.
In Russian public policy, ethnicity is typically taken to be something fixed and unalterable. The conflicts in the Caucasus region are therefore seen as inevitably springing from the very nature of things, as it were. There really is no precise strategic framework to address the ethnic issues in the region, but instead a deference to quite general sociological concepts and constructs, the creation of state organs responsible for national policy in strictly functional terms, as well as organs trading in extreme forms of intervention, including through the use of force in conflicts that reach a 'hot' stage.
What are the real factors that strengthen or weaken interethnic tensions in the North Caucasus – that is, what are the factors that are so poorly appreciated by Russian policy-makers? First, power and property are the foundation of nearly all of the conflicts between ethnicities in the region. The absence of normal democratic mechanisms for transitions of power, the absence of strong property rights protections, and especially the non-susceptibility of land questions to regulation, all lead to heightened tensions. Land problems are aggravated by the extant moratorium on the privatization of land.
Land conflicts are most characteristic of Dagestan and Kabardino-Balkaria, where highly discretionary administrative decision-making in respect of land and abuse of power are relatively common. In Dagestan, flat lands are also used for the migration of highlanders (gortsy), which leads to increased tension between incumbent residents and newcomers or settlers, along ethnic lines. At the same time, in Karachay-Cherkessia, where land reform was undertaken and there is, exceptionally, no moratorium on land purchases, such conflicts are less common – although, of course, at the end of the 1990s, there were extremely sharp (prima facie interethnic) internal conflicts over political power in Karachay-Cherkessia.
Second, many of the interethnic conflicts – once again, interethnic in form, but essentially about land – are the long-term consequence of the deportations of the Stalin period and the less well known compensatory repopulations in which the residents of other territories were resettled by force to take the place of deported people. When those deported returned, tensions erupted among conflicting claimants – most famously in the Prigorodny district of North Ossetia and in lands in and near Dagestan's Khasavyurt district, where Chechens are trying to re-establish the Aukhovsky district that existed prior to their deportation. Of course, these are very complex problems, for which the path to resolution is not yet apparent.
Third, in the cities of the North Caucasus – especially in the larger cities of Chechnya and Dagestan – ethnic identity is starting to fade due to the high rate of urbanization. It is being supplanted by urban identity, and often by Islamic identity. This transformation is not fully appreciated and incorporated into policy – that is, the new supra-ethnic or extra-ethnic character and consciousness of these urban communities are not taken into account.
To regulate interethnic conflicts, the central policy task is surely the resolution of land questions. This is a manifestly complicated task, given that a significant part of the land is already allocated via corrupt practices (with the allocation acquiring 'legal' status). At the same time, the land is in many cases used according to customary law and unofficial norms, on the basis of decisions made by local communities.
Migration also causes problems. In Dagestan, for example, there are more than 200 unregistered population settlements as a result of highlander migration to flat lands. Questions have been raised about settlement legalization, against which the residents of flat lands began to protest publicly from the start of the 1990s. Of course, national movements exploit all of these problems – typically without any interest in a peaceful resolution.
Policy here should be restarted from scratch. For it is impossible to change the present general equilibrium in land relations – specifically, to bring these into the legal sphere – without a rapid escalation of conflict. An alternative process should review land relations on a case-by-case basis – that is, gradually, on the basis of compromises and non-zero sum solutions, levering the authority of the state, but without direct pressure on the relevant parties. Given that regional level officials often belong to particular ethnicities and may even represent the interests of these minorities in a conflict, this process should be curated by the authorities at the level of the North Caucasus federal 'okrug,' which sits between the federal and regional levels of Russian government.
Stereotype 3: Intra-Islamic conflict in the North Caucasus is linked to the fact that the Islam that is traditional to this region is unlike the radical variant imported from Arabia (the adherents of which are, or will become, terrorists or supporters of terrorists).
Russian public policy is based, on the one hand, on unconditional support for so-called traditional, official Islam and, on the other hand, the suppression of alternative Islamic currents. This suppression sometimes even includes maltreatment of people based on their appearance (e.g. women in hijabs and men with beards). The results of this policy approach are mixed. Terrorist activity in the North Caucasus has been largely crushed, including through special operations and clampdowns. However, it is not obvious that this outcome is sustainable – for one thing, there has been a massive exodus of North Caucasian youth to Syria. Ultimately, the price that will be paid for this outcome is high: bloated state security forces, massive infringement of citizens' rights based on people's religious beliefs, marginalization of large numbers of young people, and underground radicalization as a reaction to violent repression.
What is the reality of the relationship between conflict and Islam in the region? First, there are important internal factors driving North Caucasian youth to reject traditional Islam in favour of more fundamentalist strands of Islam – specifically, the profound shifts in the nature of social relations in the North Caucasus, as well as intergenerational conflicts, the erosion of traditional sources of authority in the region, social protest, and the tendency of the younger generations to search for a fairer system of rules and norms in the absence of social and professional upward mobility.
To be sure, not everyone in the North Caucasus who has switched to Islamic fundamentalism is radicalized. Instead, the believers arguably fall into three categories, depending on how they see their place in contemporary society, how they conceive of their future goals, and how they wish to achieve these goals: first, Muslims who wish to live according to Islam at home and in their family life, observing all of the rules, but without pursuing any political goals; second, Muslims working to stand up a caliphate in the long run, by peaceful means, and only when the necessary conditions are in place; and third, Muslims who wish to create the caliphate immediately, by violent means.
Evidently, having a uniform policy approach, based on force and involving massive infringements of citizens' rights, for all three groups leads only to increased protest and radicalization – even if the use of force is manifestly legitimate against the third of these groups, and especially against those involved in violent or terrorist activities, or who call for armed struggle against the Russian state. Overall, however, public policy in this area must be significantly transformed, putting at its core not pressure by force, but rather measures to advance civic agreement and consensus. Some attempts were made at such a policy posture in various Caucasian republics, but they were inconsistent and ultimately negligible in impact. The policy settings must be based on the following: sustained protection of the principle of freedom of conscience in Russian law (as guaranteed by the Constitution); development of civic dialogue, including intra-Islamic dialogue; the creation of robust institutions for the reintegration of fighters into civilian life; the establishment of credible civilian control and oversight over force operations; guarantees against religious discrimination in employment and mobility rights; and inclusion of Muslim youth in different mechanisms and processes of socialization.
The region also requires a sophisticated policy revamp for its Sharia courts. While Sharia courts should not be suppressed, guarantees in respect of the life and health of Russian citizens should be fully protected, and attempts to violate these guarantees on the basis of Sharia law should be stopped. The primacy of Russian law must be strengthened by increasing its efficiency and fairness – a major challenge today in the North Caucasus, given that the professionalism of Russian courts in the region is low, and corruption is widespread.
Stereotype 4: Clannism and corruption in the North Caucasus can be overcome by political will, using the legal mechanisms currently available.
This was the governing ideology of the last major 'cleansing' campaign targeting abuse of power, when a large number of criminal charges were laid against members of the political elites in the region – especially in Dagestan. What was partly broken in this and past similar campaigns was the link between guerrilla fighters (militant groups) and North Caucasian elites, leading to a weakening of the armed or underground resistance.
However, given the structure of Caucasian societies, such initiatives will not have enduring systemic effects. The overwhelming majority of the residents of the North Caucasus tend to solve their problems with the help of clan-related mechanisms, including through influential relatives. Although the growth of cities and economic development of the region will gradually break down the universality of these mechanisms, this will not happen quickly.
Clan-based practices and corruption are common to North Caucasian elites. The high degree of 'closedness' – largely preserved from the Soviet period – is particularly characteristic of elite groups in Dagestan and Kabardino-Balkaria. The situation is different in Chechnya, where elites changed as a result of social shocks and wars, and where the principle of 'loyalty in exchange for social mobility' remains du jour. In the Chechen context, of course, authoritarian rule militates against the recruitment of the most talented and capable into the elites. Indeed, the most educated youth try to leave the republic.
The character of the North Caucasian elites not only freezes the development of the republics, but also holds the federal government hostage, with huge grants from Moscow to the region accumulating primarily within the elite groups. Cuts in these grants from Moscow, if significant, could lead to social disturbances, provoked by these very groups. This leads to the vexed question of whether there needs to be a wholesale 'renewal' of North Caucasian elites as a prerequisite to regional development. For one thing, free elections in the North Caucasus could to some extent improve the situation, but would almost certainly result in the reshuffling of the same political class. Indeed, the key 'real' opposition to the old elite is an Islamized youth, whose integration into political power would come with its own – granted, sometimes exaggerated – political risks.
Large-scale educational programmes, along the lines of the selective kadroviy rezerv programme launched by the Russian government in 2008, are critical for the creation of a community of highly talented North Caucasian youth – indeed, to create a future regional elite – with modern skills and a broad outlook, capable of developing their own views on the challenges and strategic prospects of the North Caucasus. These programmes should include the study of modern administrative methods, immersion in new cultural contexts, linguistic training, and also practical exposure to the cultures, economies and public systems of other countries, at both the national and local levels.
Bref, the fundamental weakness of contemporary Russian policy settings in the North Caucasus consists in the fact that they do not recognize and do not properly account for the internal resources of the region. Incorrect diagnostique leads to incorrect and often counterproductive policy moves in practice. The decrease of conflict potential, the introduction of democratic political mechanisms, and credible guarantees of rights and freedoms for people of all religious and ethnic groups – all of these are part of a revised institutional framework that can lighten the inevitable problems of transitions to a more modern and urbanized society in the North Caucasus, and form the basis for proper use of the human, economic and natural potential of the region.
Irina Starodubrovskaya is Director of the Centre for Political Economy and Regional Development in the Gaidar Institute in Moscow.
The turmoil in the Middle East is affecting, directly or indirectly, the security and stability of all of the states in the region. In Syria, Iraq, Libya and Yemen, the central government does not control the entire territory of the country. The power and legitimacy vacuums in these states have enabled jihadist organizations to penetrate into significant territories, and to use these as a base for conducting attacks against rivals or local populations.
As a consequence, the level of violence in the region is extremely high. Hundreds of thousands of civilians have been killed in fighting – most of them in Syria and Iraq, but also in Libya, Yemen and Egypt. Millions of civilians have been displaced – including half of Syria's 23 million population – and many have become refugees in other countries. Bref, acute uncertainty reigns in the Middle East today, and no one knows when the deterioration will end. Countries that have not been affected by the turmoil might face disasters in the near future. Leaders of Middle East states do not know whether they – or indeed leaders of neighbouring states – will survive, and therefore face serious difficulties in policy planning and implementation.
Israel is among the few countries in the region that has not been directly affected by the general deterioration. Its regime is stable, it has no power vacuum, and the new militant Islamist organizations have not penetrated into its territory. It enjoys significant military and technological superiority over its regional rivals. By contrast, the Arab world is suffering from strategic weakness. Arab leaders are preoccupied with their survival and domestic problems, and face difficulties in advancing inter-Arab policies or organizing Arab coalitions in order to deal with regional problems. Moreover, part of the Arab threat toward Israel has disappeared. Many erstwhile Syrian military capabilities have been destroyed in that country's civil war. Iraqi military power, of course, disappeared in toto after the First Gulf War and the American occupation in 2003. And for the time being, Israel has managed to deter non-state organizations from launching substantial attacks against Israeli targets.
Having said this, the Middle East crisis has created certain challenges for Israel. Indeed, the jihadist organizations – especially ISIS and Jabhat Al Nusra (affiliated with Al Qaeda) – are currently fighting against each other in Syria, as well as against the Syrian army and the Assad regime. For them, the armed struggle against Israel can wait. Still, Israel remains a very important enemy for these groups, and they may well direct their attacks against it before long. Once jihadist organizations decide to launch attacks against Israel, it may be difficult to deter them – not only from Syria, but also from the Sinai Peninsula, and perhaps even from Jordanian territory.
The unrest in Jordan is still limited, and the Hashemite regime is stable. However, a threat to its stability will negatively affect Israel's security, as its survival is a critical asset and strategic interest for Jerusalem. Moreover, any material deterioration of stability in Saudi Arabia, if it occurs, will endanger the stability of all of the moderate states in the Middle East, including Israel, and create a major setback for the US and for Western governments.
In the short run, of course, the most severe threat to Israel's security is terrorism or asymmetric attacks. The most dangerous organization, in this respect, is Hezbollah, acting mostly in south Lebanon. Hezbollah has a small army, combining terrorist and military capabilities, and is equipped with sophisticated weapons. Above all, it has a huge arsenal of 130,000 rockets, with ranges that cover the entire territory of Israel. Few countries around the world have such a huge arsenal. Over the last decade, Israel has succeeded in deterring Hezbollah from attacking its territory. Moreover, since 2014, Hezbollah has been deeply involved in the fighting in Syria, suffering hundreds of casualties in that theatre. However, under Iranian influence, Hezbollah has been working to open a new front against Israel from the Syrian Golan Heights, whence it might well launch a rocket offensive against Israel at some point in the future.
For its part, Hamas has not tried to provoke Israel from the Gaza Strip since Operation Protective Edge was carried out in mid-2014. Still, it is not clear how long Hamas will be deterred, and whether the suffering of the population in Gaza will induce Hamas to resume the firing of rockets and mortars. More importantly, Hamas continues to dig and construct cross-border attack tunnels, which penetrate from the Gaza Strip into Israeli territory, with a view to abducting and killing Israeli civilians and soldiers. In response, Israel is developing a technological system to detect the tunnels.
The Palestinian organizations – especially Fatah, but also Hamas and Islamic Jihad – maintain a ceasefire in the West Bank as well. And yet, since October 2015, a new threat has emerged – the so-called 'knives uprising.' This uprising is not organized by any particular organization, though Hamas has encouraged it. Instead, the attacks are carried out by young, unaffiliated Palestinians who, motivated by social media, decide independently to stab Israelis both inside Israel and in the West Bank. The impact of these attacks has been limited, and their number has dropped significantly (although not irreversibly so). Still, it is more difficult to collect intelligence about the intentions and activities of – and therefore to prevent attacks by – young Palestinians previously unknown to the security services.
In the longer run, the main threat to Israel comes from Iran's potential nuclear capability. The nuclear agreement, concluded with Iran in July 2015, has negative and positive aspects. The positive aspect is that the limitations imposed by the agreement on Iran's nuclear programme postpone the timetable needed for acquiring nuclear weapons, as long as Iran does not violate the agreement. On the other hand, when these limitations are removed, after eight to 10 years, Iran will be allowed to develop a huge enrichment programme, in which it could in principle enrich any amount of uranium, including weapons-grade uranium. At this future stage, it would be far more difficult to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons, if Tehran decided to move in this direction. And the acquisition of nuclear weapons by Iran would create the most severe threat to Israel's security.
Even without an extant nuclear capacity, Iran still has a large arsenal of ballistic missiles – the largest arsenal in the Middle East. This arsenal – in addition to Hezbollah's huge arsenal of rockets, supplied by Iran – has created the most significant threat to Israel's home front. The principal Israeli answer to this threat has been the standing up of a qualitative anti-missile defense system, though its interception capability in the event of a massive missile attack is still not clear.
Against the background of these threats, there have, to be sure, been recent improvements in Israel's international posture. On the one hand, the relationship between the Obama administration and Netanyahu government has been tense – mostly due to disagreements in respect of the Palestinian and Iranian issues. Both issues may affect the relationship between Jerusalem and Washington in the future, though much depends on the nature of the next US administration. (The infrastructure of security cooperation between the two governments has not been damaged, and will likely continue to develop in the future.)
On the other hand, Israel has managed to improve its relations with other governments. Israel has an ongoing dialogue with the Russian government, at the highest levels. This dialogue includes the unprecedented establishment of a joint senior military committee to coordinate Russian air attacks in Syria. (Evidently, the improved relationship with Russia is not an alternative to Israel's special relationship with the US.)
In June of this year, Jerusalem and Ankara agreed to resume normal diplomatic ties, ending a six-year deterioration following the Israeli naval operation against the Turkish ship Mavi Marmara on its way to Gaza. The improvement will probably not bring back the close defence contacts that existed between the two countries in the 1990s. (Turkish officials have emphasized that the severe domestic crisis in Turkey will not negatively affect the improved bilateral relationship with the Jewish state.)
No less important are Israel's relations with Egypt and Jordan. The two Arab states share significant common interests with Israel in the context of the present regional instability, including in respect of threats created by the Islamist organizations. Indeed, relations between Israel and the two governments – especially with Egypt, and particularly in terms of military cooperation against jihadist attacks – are in principle better than ever.
Bref, Israel's current security concerns are limited. However, these challenges may well grow in future – above all, due to the implications of the Iranian nuclear threat, the missile-cum-rocket threat to Israel's home front, and also further regional deterioration. The severity of these threats will depend largely on Israel's counter-measures, including its preservation of strategic superiority, its deterrence capabilities, its domestic resilience, and also its cooperation with various partners.
Ephraim Kam is a Senior Research Associate at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel-Aviv. He previously served as the Deputy Head of the Research Division, IDF Military Intelligence.
On July 16th, the Turkish people woke up to a different country – one traumatized by the failed coup attempt the day before. It had only been weeks since commentators had begun to speak of a 'normalization' or 'reset' of Turkish foreign policy, following the resumption of bilateral ties with Israel (for the first time since the Mavi Marmara incident in May 2010) and Russia (President Erdogan had just sent a letter to President Putin, expressing regrets for the downing of the Russian jet in November 2015). Erdogan spoke of these changes in terms of a 'win-win' approach to Turkey's relations with the world. Prime Minister Yildirim hinted at policy shifts vis-à-vis Iraq, Syria and Egypt. And Foreign Minister Cavusoglu intimated a possible reconciliation with Armenia following his visit to Azerbaijan in July of this year.
Just as Turkey was working to mend fences in its turbulent neighbourhood, putschist elements in the Turkish military attempted a violent coup against a democratically elected government. The Minister of the Interior reported that 238 people were killed and 2,797 injured during these events. The Turkish authorities have linked the botched coup to the Gulenist movement – classified by Ankara as a terrorist organization – led by Fethullah Gulen, who has been living in Pennsylvania since the late 1990s.
An extensive purge began in the wake of the coup attempt, with 26,000 people placed in custody (according to the Minister of Justice). Those arrested also include military personnel (more than 9,000 soldiers and one-third of the generals and admirals of the Turkish Armed Forces), police officers, judges, prosecutors and governors. There is no question that the failed putsch has severely weakened the country's military structures – a weakening that began predominantly with the Ergenekon and Balyoz cases investigating coup plots, and resulting in the conviction of hundreds of soldiers. As a consequence, the capacity of the Turkish army to fight against the PKK (Kurdistan Workers' Party) and ISIS is now significantly diminished.
The thwarted coup will have far-reaching strategic consequences for Turkey's international relations – most notably with the US, the EU and Russia. First, the fact that the US requires clear evidence of Gulen's involvement in response to Ankara's formal demand for his extradition portends serious deterioration in the relationship with Washington. Some senior Turkish officials have accused the US of involvement in the planning of the coup, while Washington has criticized the possible expansion, post-coup, of Turkish state power. For his part, President Obama denied any US involvement in the coup and urged all parties to "support the democratically elected government of Turkey, show restraint, and avoid any violence or bloodshed."
Another indication of the post-coup deterioration in bilateral relations is Turkey's use of the Incirlik air base – which is important to the US-led coalition's fight against ISIS – as leverage against Washington. Of course, Ankara had already been at odds with Washington since the 2003 Iraq war, and more recently because of sharp strategic differences in respect of the Syrian theatre, where the US has allied with the PYD-Democratic Union Party and its military arm, the YPG-People's Protection Units (which has links with the PKK).
Turkey's relations with the EU are also newly strained over questions of fundamental values – complicated by the post-coup state of emergency in Turkey, the temporary suspension of the European Convention on Human Rights, and the possible return of the death penalty (outlawed in 2002). Of course, this new clash between Ankara and Brussels takes place against the backdrop of the major refugee deal struck in March of this year. To be sure, the relationship had long been in a stalemate, plagued by a loss of momentum in Turkey's political reform process, the lack of genuine progress since 2005 in negotiations over EU membership (with only 16 of 35 chapters of the acquis communautaire having been opened to date) and, most importantly, by the growing lack of enthusiasm for the accession process from the political elites and the public in Turkey and in Europe.
With the landmark refugee deal, it appeared as if Turkey had another chance to re-energize relations with the EU in the service of its membership objective. And yet the contradictory public discourses in EU member states in respect of Turkey – on the one hand, recognition of Turkey as a strategic partner, and on the other hand, reluctance to move ahead with the accession process (with anti-Turkish rhetoric peaking in the UK's Brexit debate) – seem to suggest that Turkey-EU relations may only progress, in the foreseeable future, on the basis of a new organizing framework – one already implicitly in place. This framework, if formalized, would be based on three pillars: bilateral trade (effectively conducted within the Customs Union framework since 1996), the migration deal of March 18th (which has succeeded to date in decreasing the number of illegal crossings from Turkey to Greece); and security issues, embedded mostly in the still-evolving NATO-EU partnership, to which Turkey could contribute as an important NATO ally.
Of course, this new model is imperfect from the outset, as visa liberalization for Turkish nationals travelling to the Schengen zone in return for readmission to Turkey of Syrian refugees is tied to Turkey's revision of its anti-terrorism framework. The failed coup took place just as Turkey and the EU were in a standoff, with Ankara refusing to change its anti-terrorism framework, and Brussels resisting visa liberalization, thereby risking another cycle of migration flows to Europe.
To be sure, it is not realistic to expect any near-term changes in Turkey's anti-terrorism framework in the aftermath of a coup attempt that has been associated with terrorism. The Turkey-EU relationship is therefore now at a critical juncture. The EU's values-driven conditionality must take into account Turkey's basic imperatives under its state of emergency, which is not altogether dissimilar from the states of emergency declared very recently in France and Germany. Turkey, on the other hand, while fully respecting the procedural requirements of Article 15 of the European Convention on Human Rights in respect of derogation from the Convention, should refrain from official statements that would jeopardize its half-century long relationship with Europe. And critically, when stability is fully restored in Turkey, it will be high time for both sides to reconsider their finalité politique and to work decisively to this end, whatever it may be: full EU membership or, alternatively, strategic partnership without membership.
Stuck between a rock and a hard place in its post-coup relations with the US and the EU, Turkey may need to pivot forcefully toward Russia, with which it has a bittersweet history. The last 15 years of Russo-Turkish relations saw an anomalous rapprochement, with Ankara and Moscow both putting aside the contentious issues of Cyprus, the war in Georgia, the PKK and terrorism. Both countries prioritized a strategic partnership based on closer economic cooperation, energy interdependence, political exchanges through the High-Level Cooperation Council, and cultural exchanges facilitated by the lifting of the visa restrictions. This productive period in bilateral relations was shattered by the downing of the Russian SU-24 by Turkey last November (although tensions had already been growing over the Crimean annexation and Syria). President Putin described the incident as a "stab in the back." For their part, Turkish officials argued that the Russian jet's violation of Turkish airspace, despite multiple warnings, violated Turkey's airspace policy in respect of Syria. Russia quickly imposed sanctions against Turkey in trade, tourism and construction, and hardened its stance in Syria by increasing its military presence and supporting Kurdish elements against the rebels (Turkmen brigades and jihadist Arab groups) in order to secure the Assad regime. Bref, Russian engagement in Syria effectively shut Turkey out of the Syrian theatre.
Turkey soon recognized the strategic and economic repercussions of such a confrontational policy with Russia. The new chapter in the Russo-Turkish relationship, formalized by the visit to Moscow by President Erdogan in August – a symbolic first visit abroad after the failed coup – is marked by re-established diplomatic channels and the restoration of economic and cultural ties. If both sides can now find common ground in the Middle East theatre – particularly in strategies against ISIS – then it will be indeed possible to talk about a genuine normalization of Russo-Turkish relations.
What Turkey now requires, after the events of July, is constructive recognition from the world that the country needs solidarity with, and support for, its democracy as it recovers from what, for the Turkish state and the Turkish people, was a catastrophic shock. In order not to isolate Turkey from its transatlantic and Western connections – connections upon which Turkish foreign policy has been based since the creation of the Republic – it is high time for partners to go beyond prejudices and to establish candid ties with Turkey, recognizing the country's strategic import in the fight against ISIS, in the refugee crisis, and as a NATO ally. Still, it is obvious that Turkey has entered a difficult period with the US and its European allies, and that new tensions might arise as Ankara's requests for closures of Gulen-affiliated institutions around the world, as well the extradition of hundreds of Gulenists who fled Turkey to several other countries, multiply. In this context, that Ankara should be pivoting back to its Eurasian connections – and especially toward Moscow – may not be that surprising after all.
Mitat Celikpala is a Professor of International Relations at Kadir Has University in Istanbul.
Sinem Akgul Acikmese is an Associate Professor of International Relations at Kadir Has University in Istanbul.
While much is made of Iran's hard power, the recent nuclear deal hints at the prospect of the country's untapped soft power being far more central to its long-term success in the 21st century. As the 13th-century Persian poet, Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi, wrote: "Raise your words, not voice. It is rain that grows flowers, not thunder."
To be sure, in Iran's conflict-ridden neighbourhood, the military instrument is critical to deterring would-be aggressors. The devastating 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq war taught Iranians this lesson at great cost in blood and national treasure. And yet hard power will not win the permanent admiration of Iran's neighbours, build lasting alliances, or indeed help Iran to leaven its relative isolation. As the Arab states of the Persian Gulf annually increase their military spending – largely in direct response to Iran's military capabilities – and with Tehran duly taking countermeasures, an acute security dilemma dictates the geopolitical logic of the region, fuelling instability and insecurity.
The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (the Iran nuclear deal), concluded in July 2015 between Iran, the P5+1 and the EU, which received UN Security Council backing through Resolution 2231 and resulted in the lifting of economic sanctions on Iran, was not only a major success for Iranian diplomacy, but also boosted Iran's soft-power credentials as a real player in the preservation of international peace and security (through peaceful means). That deal has created a golden opportunity internationally – and political space domestically – for the government in Tehran to devise and implement a comprehensive strategy to project soft power in a way that both mitigates the regional security dilemma and serves the national advantage.
Since the founding of the Islamic Republic in 1979, Iran has relied heavily on its unique Shia character as the basis of its soft power to galvanize support from pockets of Shia populations in a Sunni-dominated Middle East and Central Asia. This policy has been deliberate and strategic, with clear ideological underpinnings. While it has had its successes – including Iran's manifest clout today in Lebanon and Syria, or in Iraq after Saddam Hussein – its net effect is, by definition, limited in scope (and geography), constraining Tehran's ability to generate long-term strategic dividends.
Indeed, relying on the Shia character for soft-power projection is arguably inconsistent with the Constitution of the Islamic Republic, which requires the government to formulate its foreign policy on the basis of "fraternal commitment to all Muslims," and its general policies "with a view to cultivating the friendship and unity of all Muslim peoples." Moreover, just as it limits the full reach of Iran's soft power beyond the Shia world, this approach also plays directly into sectarian divisions in the region. This is manifestly self-defeating, as it not only complicates Iran's already difficult security environment, but also further isolates the country within its own geopolitical space.
Given Iran's historical role, as well as its linguistic and cultural ties, in the 'Greater Iran' region – encompassing the Caucasus, West Asia, Central Asia, and stretching to parts of South Asia – the country has the potential to exert soft power to a 'natural market' – as it were – to advance its national interests. On this logic, the country can acquire greater influence regionally if, in addition to religious bonds, it skillfully invokes common historical, cultural, ethnic and linguistic ties with neighbouring states. Part of this push can involve, over time, a de facto reversal of some of the consequences of the Treaties of Gulistan (1813) and Turkmenchay (1828) – that is, closing the artificial gap that these Russo-Persian war capitulations created between Iranians and their brethren from the Caucasus over the last two centuries.
President Rouhani's carefully worded Nowruz message in March of this year is an example of such soft power in action. In a letter addressed to the heads of state of nine neighbouring countries, he stated: "Nowruz is a festival of moderation and the most ancient dynamic tradition in our common history." He went on to encourage "the countries of the Nowruz Zone to establish better and further relations with each other, in addition to friendship and reconciliation and create modern conditions for peaceful coexistence based on the historic nuclear agreement between Iran and the P5+1 and the lifting of sanctions." Much more such public diplomatic seduction is required.
Tehran should also capitalize on the momentum of the Iran nuclear deal to forge a network of states friendly to its interests, and to provide them with the necessary incentives to remain invested in such friendship through strategic partnerships, common projects, and financial cooperation. The tripartite agreement between Iran, India and Afghanistan, concluded this past May, to position the Iranian port of Chabahar as a transport and trade corridor is a case in point of a major national initiative that fits well into a larger soft-power push by Tehran. Such economic intermeshing may even lead to a common security regime over time, further integrating this triad. Other examples include efforts to revive the Silk Road trading route connecting Iran to China (through the Yiwu-Tehran train), the Iran-Azerbaijan agreement on trade and joint ventures to build hydroelectric plants and cooperation in respect of (increasingly scarce) water resources, as well as the International North-South Transport Corridor currently being explored between Russia, India, Iran and Central Asian states. Tehran should now look to extend similar projects to its Arab neighbours in the Persian Gulf, as well as to other states in the region and to other regional theatres – in full recognition of the fact that, with investment in political relationships and the necessary infrastructure, Iran could realistically become the region's principal international transit hub.
As I have argued in past issues of GB (see my Feature article in the Fall 2012 issue), the Middle East is in dire need of a reengineering of the regional order through new institutions and structures that will enable it to better manage and avoid interstate conflict, and also to create opportunities for region-wide collaboration and integration. Of course, short of a comprehensive regional governance regime, Iran and Egypt were, in the 1970s, the first countries in the region to call for a Middle East Weapons of Mass Destruction Free Zone. The recent Iran nuclear deal, then, arguably sits within this tradition of working toward a nuclear-free zone, and provides Tehran with an opportunity to champion the idea of a new regional security architecture based on the concept of common security, free of weapons of mass destruction and anchored in a non-aggression pact. This would, of course, be a long-term vision with undeniable challenges. In the immediate term, therefore, Iran should seek the support of regional partners to establish a standing regional security forum to discuss issues of strategic concern, including the threat from ISIS, cross-border terrorism, and internally displaced populations. Tehran should not be shy in positioning itself conspicuously as a leader in the promotion of regional peace and stability.
Turning to cultural and people-to-people diplomacy, given Iran's rich literary and artistic tradition, it stands to reason that the country's filmmakers, actors, musicians, writers, poets, craftsmen, artists and athletes should be better known and celebrated in the world than they are today. They are worthy of funding and support in their own right, but for strategic purposes, they are a major source of untapped Iranian soft power in the region and internationally. On this same logic, the promotion and mainstreaming of the Persian language abroad should be prioritized by strategists in Tehran. While some efforts are already underway in this regard, they need to be bolstered. Moreover, one of the other central pillars of Iran's cultural diplomacy should also be continued commitment to inter-religious dialogue, building on past initiatives such as the Dialogue Among Civilizations, introduced by former Iranian president Mohammad Khatami.
An effective soft power strategy would also require the agents of this crucial work to be conversant in the tongues of their audience. Many countries around the world – and particularly some of the most strategically astute countries – already profit from the competitive advantage of competence in a multitude of tongues. The more languages the Iranian knows, the more effectively she or he can make an imprint beyond Iranian borders.
While preserving Persian as the official language and script of the country, it is in Iran's interests to invest in a national languages strategy that will generate a critical mass of Iranians fluent not only in Persian but also Arabic (beyond grades six to 11), Turkish and other languages of the region. The English language should be taught earlier – ideally from the primary school level, as prescribed by countless pedagogical studies around the world. We might therefore eventually envisage an Iran where the average Iranian, in addition to Persian, also masters Arabic, Turkish, English and at least one other foreign tongue – say, French, Russian, Spanish, Chinese or German.
Iran's ability to maximize its soft-power potential also surely rests on the quality of its domestic governance – that is, its ability to keep its own house in order and ensure the general well-being and happiness of its citizens. Easing rigid state regulation of, and restrictions on, the private lives of Iranians, and taking steps to protect, and be seen to protect, human rights will be crucial not only for greater social cohesion and harmony – and ultimately, a stronger, united Iran – but also for Tehran's ability to credibly project soft power abroad.
In this same vein, Iran's multiethnic, linguistic and religious diversity should also be seen as an important part of the country's soft-power toolbox. Iran should fully embrace this diversity not just for its intrinsic virtues, but also to ensure internal stability, and to demonstrate to the world that the country has an open and tolerant society. With a number of militant organizations, conceived on ethnic lines – and often supported by external elements – operating in Iran and posing a threat to national security and unity, Tehran's countermeasures should include a targeted strategy of winning the hearts and minds of the country's ethnic minorities in order to strengthen their loyalty to land and country. Where legitimate, the government should properly address the grievances of these minorities. Intense and active consultation with minority groups should form part of this strategy of redress. The socioeconomic health of ethnic minorities in the aftermath of the lifting of sanctions is one area in need of attention by Tehran. So too is the opportunity to create new programmes to meaningfully celebrate Iran's multiethnic and multilingual population – something anticipated by Article 15 of the Iranian Constitution.
Bref, diminishing internal discord in the country can only help Iran to more sustainably project influence beyond its borders, and also to parry disruptive forces and designs from outside the country. And while there is no substitute for hard power, which clearly has its place in Iranian strategy, the soft power dimension is for now underplayed and underappreciated in Tehran. But a proper national soft power strategy and push may be just the energy that the country and the region need to reckon with some of the vexing challenges of this early new century.
Sam Sasan Shoamanesh is Vice-President of the Institute for 21st Century Questions and Managing Editor of Global Brief. The views expressed are the author's alone.
Le Brexit peut s'analyser de deux façons: une aberration britannique à circonscrire au plus vite, ou bien le symptôme extrême d'un mal perceptible dans toute l'Union, voire le décrochage des peuples par rapport à la construction européenne.
En France, depuis le vote du Brexit, les milieux dirigeants, qui s'attachent à l'objectif presque mythologique d'une «Union sans cesse plus étroite», sont pour le moment sur la ligne de l'absurdité britannique. Le Royaume-Uni se séparerait d'une Europe qui, jusqu'ici, marchait bien, pour des raisons populistes, démagogiques et des mensonges des partisans du Brexit. Et donc ils voudraient que Londres enclenche dès que possible la sortie, avec l'article 50 (bien que la nouvelle première ministre, Theresa May, ne l'entend pas ainsi). Cela ne serait donc qu'un problème britannique. Pour ces élites françaises, l'évidence que l'Union s'est mêlée trop, de tout, et de n'importe quoi, abusivement et lourdement, comme le dit Jean-Claude Juncker lui-même, que trop de promesses exagérées ont été faites au nom de l'Europe et se sont retournées contre elle, est niée. C'est seulement la ligne suivie qui aurait été mauvaise (la fameuse «austérité», en réalité assez limitée mais obligatoire pour mettre fin à un endettement toujours aggravé) et mériterait d'être corrigée, et non pas l'abus de décisions détaillées et trop intrusives du niveau européen (du fait de la Commission, du Parlement, de la Cour, et des États membres eux-mêmes), finalement confiscatoires de la démocratie. Ceux-là défendent l'idée d'une «relance» à l'identique – c'est-à-dire d'une intégration renforcée de la zone euro. Cette ligne est dominante dans les milieux financiers, mais pas seulement: création d'un ministre des finances de la zone euro, d'un trésor, d'un budget, etc. (sans même préconiser un contrôle accru des parlements nationaux).
Problème politique: on ne voit pas en quoi ce surcroît d'intégration enthousiasmerait les eurosceptiques, ou en quoi cela calmerait les euro-allergiques, sans même parler des anti-européens. L'accord de l'Allemagne n'est même pas assuré pour une relance de ce type qui réduirait les pouvoirs de son ministre des finances. Et si au bout du compte cela impose un changement de traité, serait-il ratifiable? Rien n'est moins sûr. Bref, on peut prédire que cette idée de relance autiste, fondée sur plus d'intégration dans la zone euro, ne trouvera pas l'accord des 27 surtout englués dans la gestion du Brexit, avec un nouveau gouvernement britannique déterminé à avancer à son rythme (pas de déclenchement de l'article 50 avant le début 2017) et à défendre ses intérêts, et risque de provoquer un désenchantement ultérieur accru des Européens par erreur de diagnostic sur l'origine du rejet, et erreur de réaction.
Une autre approche, apparemment plus novatrice, circule, notamment à Paris et dans d'autres capitales: celle de «recentrer» l'Europe sur les sujets «qui intéressent les gens»: on cite la sécurité, la défense, la croissance, l'emploi et l'immigration. C'est déjà un progrès d'écouter «les gens». Mais chaque point se discute. La sécurité? Cela constituerait à refonder un Schengen viable et contrôlable. C'est indispensable et cela devrait être sans doute la priorité qui s'imposera avec une harmonisation réelle des critères. La défense? Ce serait très nouveau si tous les pays d'Europe sont prêts à hisser leur budget de la défense à deux pour cent du PIB pour constituer ensuite le «pilier européen» de l'alliance atlantique. Véritable révolution! Sinon, on parle surtout de coopérations industrielles entre Européens, très souhaitables bien sûr, mais dont on connaît les difficultés de mise en œuvre. L'immigration? Il s'agirait de gérer les flux avec les pays de départ, et de transit même si cela ne les enthousiasme pas – ce qu'on aurait dû faire depuis longtemps. Mais parler de croissance et d'emploi: à force de prétendre que l'Europe va s'occuper d'encore plus de choses et finalement de tout, de créer de nouvelles attentes ne va-t-elle pas passer aux yeux de l'opinion pour responsable de tout, ne va-t-on pas aggraver ce qui a nourri la frustration et le mécontentement général des peuples européens? N'est-ce pas contradictoire avec l'aspiration des peuples à une démocratie plus proche? Ce serait une pompe aspirante, soit le contraire exact du principe de subsidiarité. Donc par empilement, et accumulation, une dépossession accrue des démocraties nationales – surtout si rien n'est fait au préalable pour restituer des compétences au niveau national et stopper la furie normalisatrice, des partenaires de la codécision communautaires, Commission et Parlement, paradoxalement poussés par les gouvernements nationaux aveugles qui demandent, France en tête, plus de réglementation détaillée dès qu'ils croient que cela les aide contre des concurrents. Ce «plus d'Europe», quoique mieux présenté et mieux fondé que la simple et automatique poursuite de l'intégration, est voué lui aussi, au bout du compte, à un échec probable, en tout cas à des déceptions tant les résultats seront éloignés des espérances.
Une réaction plus radicale est possible pour enrayer le décrochage des peuples même si les gouvernements ne semblent pas s'orienter dans ce sens. «Tenir compte des peuples», comme on l'entend, cela signifierait d'abord, avant toute autre proposition, que les gouvernements convaincus (c'est indispensable), à commencer par la France et l'Allemagne, s'ils étaient d'accord, imposent à la Commission et au Parlement, par une «subsidiarité» massive et drastique (on ne décide au niveau européen que ce que l'on ne peut pas décider efficacement en dessous), une authentique diète normative stoppant la surenchère dans la réglementation – un arrêt de la réglementation «à outrance», pour reprendre l'expression de Jean-Claude Juncker. Que les États qui ont eux-mêmes, tout à tour, la France largement en tête, alimenté cette fuite en avant, dans des règlements ultra détaillés, ou pour faire passer via «l'Europe» des textes au niveau national s'auto-disciplinent. Il est vrai que seule la Commission en a fait sa raison d'être. Mais cela ne change rien au problème politique et à la nécessité politique de le résoudre pour enrayer la désaffection des peuples.
On peut comprendre que la Commission européenne et le Parlement européen ne puissent soutenir une telle approche qui touche à l'essence-même, même si la lucidité de Jean-Claude Juncker et de Frans Timmermans et le bon sens du président Donald Tusk doivent être salués. On peut comprendre également que deux ou trois générations qui avaient fini par faire de l'intégration européenne le combat de leur vie, en France notamment, après que toutes leurs autres croyances se soient effondrées ou aient été balayées par l'évolution du monde, se sentent totalement perdues, et luttent de toutes leurs forces contre toute remise en cause de ce système. Comme si la liberté, l'ouverture, le bonheur, l'espoir et l'amitié entre les peuples en Europe, ne dépendaient que de la seule forme d'intégration communautaire forcée des deux dernières décennies. Mais c'est un autre débat…
C'est pour cela qu'il me semble que pour enrayer la désaffection croissante des peuples européens envers la construction européenne, dont le Brexit n'est que le signe le plus spectaculaire et le plus perturbant, les gouvernements les plus déterminés devraient saisir l'occasion du Conseil européen informel convoqué à Bratislava à la mi-septembre. Certes, ils auront à négocier le Brexit et les désaccords seront nombreux à ce sujet (être durs ou accommodants avec le Royaume-Uni?). Mais ils devraient aussi fixer rapidement les contours d'une nouvelle subsidiarité rétroactive, retirer certaines missions à la Commission, réduire le nombre de ses fonctionnaires (33 000), et assigner après cela quelques rares nouvelles missions clefs (sécurité, influence, préparation de l'avenir) à cette Union repensée essentiellement pour assurer la pérennité du mode de vie européen dans le monde de demain, ce qui permettrait à la démocratie de retrouver son espace et sa légitimité au sein de chaque État membre. Mais cela suppose que les États membres s'auto-disciplinent eux-mêmes et cessent de pousser la Commission à réglementer «plus» et de s'insurger quand ce sont d'autres États membres qui le font. Cette Europe-là aurait des chances d'être à nouveau écoutée, comprise et soutenue par les peuples. Mais, pour le moment, ce n'est pas l'hypothèse la plus probable. Toutes les énergies européennes vont d'abord être consacrées en vérité à gérer les suites compliquées du Brexit. À cet égard, le Royaume-Uni saura plus vite ce qu'elle veut que les dirigeants de l'Union. Les tensions qui en découleront seront fortes pendant un temps indéterminé. Parallèlement, le système européen va tout faire pour éviter une remise en cause sérieuse et persévérer à l'identique, avec quelques changements cosmétiques. Il faut souhaiter qu'il n'y parvienne pas et que les gouvernements qui se soucient de l'avenir de l'Europe reprennent la main, car sinon ce serait une occasion perdue.
Hubert Védrine est ancien ministre des Affaires étrangères de la France.