Message for China and the US: Asia-Pacific needs the glue of trade, not the threat of war

Derwin Pereira says as necessary as security is, it is economic integration that truly fosters peace and prosperity in the 21st century

Reading Time:4 minutes

Why you can trust SCMP

Derwin Pereira

Published: 9:00am, 6 Dec 2015Updated: 9:00am, 6 Dec 2015

Essentially, trading states are better positioned for success than warring states.

It is a truism that economic links among nations enhance their security by giving them a stake in one another’s well-being. It is equally true that international trade requires a stable strategic framework in which to function. The challenge for the United States and China today is to keep both principles in mind as they reset their relations.

Economic integration does exercise a restraining influence on the war-making intentions of states

Unfortunately, that was not the impression created during the recent summits of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations. The general direction set there diverged from the nexus of trade and security, a principle that has served Asia well.

Instead, military strategy overshadowed the economic momentum which should bring Washington and Beijing closer, to the benefit of small and medium-sized Asian nations that depend on the buoyancy of Sino-American relations.

Thus, the Apec meeting in Manila was foregrounded by American gestures of military support for Southeast Asian countries in their maritime dispute with China. The point was not lost on Beijing, which watched haplessly as President Barack Obama delivered reassurances of material support in the Philippines, a claimant in the South China Sea dispute whose relations with China are under strain.

China’s reaction to America’s overtures to Southeast Asian nations was a studied response in stubbornness. Mixing defiance and disdain, Beijing made it clear that it would not be swayed from treating the South China Sea issue as one of implacable Chinese sovereignty.

READ MORE: Beijing-backed free-trade plan fails to advance at Apec

Filipino riot police cordon off a street in Manila after dispersing a large crowd staging a protest against Apec. At the forum, military strategy overshadowed the economic momentum which should bring Washington and Beijing closer. Photo: EPA

The mood created in Manila also reverberated at the Asean summit in Kuala Lumpur that followed. Several leaders at the gathering, including Prime Minister Shinzo Abe of Japan, an America ally, raised concerns about the South China Sea against the background of China’s land reclamation activities there.

Certainly, China’s military assertiveness cannot be denied in the South China Sea, a key international shipping route. To the extent that its muscle-flexing potentially threatens freedom of navigation, it is China that is guilty of breaching the trade-as-security nexus.