Political conferences all have their own character, which also determines their actual value.
ONLY a quarter of a century ago, Malaysia launched the first premier annual conference for the most dynamic part of the world.
Thus
was ISIS’ Asia-Pacific Roundtable (APR), organised by the Institute of
Strategic and International Studies in
Kuala Lumpur. It soon became an
institution and a pilgrimage for strategic thinkers, policymakers and
analysts with a focus on security in
East Asia and the Americas, with
Russia, Australasia and the Pacific somewhere in between.
As a
non-governmental forum, the APR became the top “Track Two” dialogue for
the Asia-Pacific mega-region’s movers and shakers. Because Track One
(governmental) forums were official, delegates there would be inhibited
and dialogues overburdened with protocol.
Track Two dialogues, however, were non-official and included governmental officials alongside
academics and others. With everyone speaking in a private capacity,
exchanges tended to be more open and candid.
This allowed officials
the time and space to speak their mind, while giving non-officials an
opportunity to “listen in” and address officials directly. The APR
series would go on to inspire copies, or at least near-copies.
In
2002, Singapore began its own annual conference series in the
Shangri-la Dialogue (SD).
This would be a Track One exercise managed by
Britain’s Institute of International and Strategic Studies (IISS).
Through
the years other
Asean countries also established their own national
think- tanks, with one from each country forming part of the Asean-ISIS
network. The APR then became their joint project, while still being
organised by ISIS Malaysia in Kuala Lumpur.
After the SD, the
Swiss-based
World Economic Forum (WEF) also turned its gaze eastwards.
Apart from the WEF’s annual meetings in Davos, it also began to hold
several conferences a year elsewhere, including the annual WEF on East
Asia.
The APR is held in late May or early June each year. For
both the SD and the WEF on East Asia to be held back-to-back with the
2012 APR testifies to the APR as a form of mainstay. Organisers tend to
hold broadly similar forums in a region around the same time to
economise on travel expenses for international participants. That the
other international conferences adjusted their schedules to suit
Asean-ISIS’s timing is a measure of how Asean and its institutions can
implicitly drive international events involving major world powers.
While
the SD focuses on politics and provides a political platform for
delegates, the WEF on East Asia (like other WEF forums) emphasises
corporate activity and provides a business platform for delegates. Their
similarities and differences with each other and with the APR became
obvious this year.
The APR’s agenda this time ranged from
regional security with the rise of China and India, to US strategic
interests, sub-regional perspectives, governance issues and Myanmar’s
future.
There was, as usual, a fair assortment of delegates from
various countries around the Asia-Pacific. Someone remarked on how much
of the discussion was taken up on China and the implications of its
continued rise, but at least the conference could not be accused of
skirting the reality outside.
This concerns the key question of
how much of the region’s realities are actually reflected in conference
discussions. What is their street credibility like?
The SD
tended, perhaps typically, to be dominated by Western voices. Much of
the time it was US officials in particular talking to their Asian
counterparts over everyone else.
US-China military relations or
rather the lack of them this time became almost the dominant theme.
Attracting most interest was the US view of China’s rise, in particular
with the attendance of US Defence Secretary and former CIA director Leon
Panetta.
The SD’s strategic focus on China came at a time when
Vietnam and the Philippines were experiencing renewed problems with
China’s rival claims to South China Sea territory. Perhaps for this
reason, several Chinese would-be delegates apparently gave this year’s
SD a miss.
This showed that Chinese delegates had yet to prepare
themselves sufficiently for vigorous public debates. That would require,
for example, adequate mastery of the main language of discourse,
English, to engage with others convincingly and persuasively.
With
the “China component” virtually absent, there was a complaint that the
Shangri-la Dialogue proved to be not much of a dialogue. And since
friendly relations across the seas this time were somewhat strained, it
wasn’t much of a Shangri-la situation either.
Further north in Bangkok, several important social issues were aired along with the platforms for businesses.
There
were the obligatory discussions on China-US or US-China relations, of
course. Who could seriously omit such a pivotal issue in the region?
But
China was discussed in a variety of ways beyond the flat topic of a
military enigma. There was, for example, consideration of how the
worsening
European debt crisis could hit China and then impact on the
rest of the region in myriad ways.
There were also important
exchanges on the reform process in Myanmar. However, these were somewhat
dwarfed by the presence of
Aung San Suu Kyi, on the podium addressing
everyone directly in her first trip outside her country in 24 years.
For
the first time, delegates could speak with her and relate to the needs
of Myanmar and its people. Such was the impact created that the WEF on
East Asia decided to hold next year’s conference in Myanmar.
The
discussion on how banks must also serve the poor had a showing by the
Boston Consulting Group. However, talk of how providing banking access
to some 20% of the world’s population still without access could
re-energise growth did not arouse much debate on how this might require a
whole reconceptualisation of banking priorities.
Discussion on
the need for mobile healthcare, particularly for rural areas, saw
representations by the Telenor Group and Boston Consulting. While this
would clearly maximise the capacity of healthcare professionals, it
would also involve a serious re-assessment of private and public sector
roles in healthcare funding.
Food security was a main item on the
agenda, with the observation that despite increases in food production
in the past half century, a billion people are still starving. But
again, there was not much debate on how the question is not the amount
of food produced but its distribution, as determined by global markets
and prices.
As a conference in the heart of the Asean region,
surrounded by Asean realities, the WEF could not miss the quickening
pace of Asean economic integration and the creation of a common market
by 2015. There was no doubt that Asean integration would proceed
full-speed in all its intended spheres. In attempting to learn from the
EU experience, however, Asean needed to adapt from European successes
while avoiding the failures.
Over at the SD in Singapore, the
question of how the US could grapple with a looming Chinese presence in
the region led to consideration of the US navy’s new intended toy, the
super-high-tech destroyer DDG-1000.
At US$3bil (RM9.56bil) each,
this would push the navy into the space age and the Defence Department
into near-insolvency. Perhaps not surprisingly, there was also little
debate on how the greatest threats confronting the US are not other
countries but non-state actors like terrorist groups and various
militant organisations.
Perhaps some help could come by way of more Track Two dialogues.
Behind The Headlines By Bunn Nagara
Myanmar pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi
visits the Louvre Museum on Friday, June 29, 2012 in Paris. Myanmar
authorities sternly urged Suu Kyi to stop calling the country 'Burma'
and start using the name 'Myanmar.' (AFP Photo/Fred Dufour)
By their dialogues we shall know them
