Long and winding road to reforms<\/p>\n
Economic reforms bring mixed results in Southeast Asia's
\nunderdeveloped region. Andrew Nette examines the changes in this
\nInter Press Service report.<\/p>\n
HANOI: When aid and political support from the former
\nSoviet Union dried up in the late 1980s, Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia
\nall took the road to reforms. Since then, however, the three
\nIndochinese countries have taken widely divergent paths.<\/p>\n
The change has been most dramatic in Cambodia, where a UN
\npeace plan helped it become the only Indochinese country to
\nestablish a multi-party system. The groundwork for this shift was
\nlaid in 1991 when the Kampuchean People's Revolutionary Party,
\nwhich had ruled Cambodia since Pol Pot's fall in 1978, changed
\nits name to the State of Cambodia party and formally dumped any
\nadherence to Marxism.<\/p>\n
Vietnam and Laos also tempered their Marxist rhetoric, but
\nthey modeled their reforms on the Chinese model: opening their
\neconomies while retaining one-party rule.<\/p>\n
Vietnam's free market reforms have produced an annual growth
\nrate of nine percent. But the continued secrecy on economic
\naffairs and the fact that 87 percent of the nation's business
\ncapital remains under state control shows Hanoi is still lukewarm
\ntoward capitalism.<\/p>\n
Indeed, speaking at the 50th anniversary celebrations of
\nVietnamese independence in September, President Le Duc Anh
\npledged the government would continue toward the creation of \"a
\njust and civilized society along the socialist oriented line\".<\/p>\n
For its part, Laos launched economic reforms in 1979, four
\nyears after the Lao People's Revolutionary Party (LPRP) took
\npower. A decade later, Vientiane introduced the `new economic
\nmechanism' that included measures aimed at attracting foreign
\ninvestment, cutbacks in state services and widespread
\nprivatization.<\/p>\n
The transition has been relatively painless in Laos. \"The
\ncountry was in a better position to move more quickly with reform
\nbecause in a sense their socialist activities had not penetrated
\nso far as the system has in China and Vietnam,\" says Grant Evans,
\nan Australian academic who has written widely on Laos.<\/p>\n
But Laos echoes Vietnam in making clear that economic openness
\nshould not be confused with political change. Both countries
\nstress that there is no one rule book for democracy, and that
\npolitical systems should be applied as befit the \"special
\nconditions\" pertaining to a country's economic and cultural
\ndevelopment.<\/p>\n
In Vietnam, these sentiments have been accompanied by stepped-
\nup attacks on what are apparently considered `hostile forces'
\nworking against the country. Barely a week after U.S. Secretary
\nof State Warren Christopher visited Hanoi in August, for
\ninstance, seven Vietnamese and two Vietnamese-Americans were
\ngiven stiff sentences for activities described by the local media
\nas \"very serious violations of national sovereignty and
\nsecurity\".<\/p>\n
In June, two elderly Communist Party dissidents were also
\narrested, in what political experts say was a retort to their
\ncalls for more pluralism in the party.<\/p>\n
The experts say these moves seem like the authorities'
\nattempts to assert control after the normalization of relations
\nwith the United States and Vietnam's entry into the Association
\nof Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). Says one analyst: \"It's the
\nleadership's way of saying even though they are opening up to the
\noutside world, the party is still very much in control.\"<\/p>\n
The arrests coincided with official denunciations of Western
\ninterference in Vietnam's human rights affairs. \"We are willing
\nto continue a dialogue on human rights, which we consider a
\nglobal issue, but do not accept it as a condition for trade and
\neconomic relations,\" said a foreign ministry spokesperson.<\/p>\n
In Laos, meanwhile, the LPRP has also explicitly ruled out any
\nchance of sharing power. Evans says a key difference in Laos is
\nthat there is little demand for change. \"The relative isolation
\nof the vast majority of the people from the affairs of the city
\nhas made them less interested in politics, \" he says, noting the
\nlargely peasant-based nature of Laotian society.<\/p>\n
But not everyone agrees there has been no political change in
\nVietnam and Laos. Says a Vietnamese official who asked not to be
\nnamed: \"Many in the foreign media say reform has just been
\neconomic. Things have definitely become more liberal.\"<\/p>\n
He points to the growing independence of the respective
\nNational Assemblies in both countries, the lifting of internal
\ntravel restrictions, and the rising availability of foreign media
\nsuch as newspapers and satellite television. Says the official: \"
\nThree years ago you could not even invite a foreigner into your
\nhome without permission but now this is no longer the case. The
\nbottom line is that while change is happening it will be step by
\nstep.\"<\/p>\n
Some observers believe Laos and Vietnam have good cause to be
\nwary of the changes sweeping them, as both poor countries
\nconfront a painful integration into the world economy on terms
\nthat can hardly be considered favorable.<\/p>\n
Neighboring Cambodia has also provided them vivid proof for
\ntheir assertion that multi-party systems bring instability and
\ncould endanger economic growth. Vientiane and Hanoi had pointed
\nto Cambodia under the direction of the United Nations as an
\nexample of the risks of unrestricted opening to the outside
\nworld: a lack of indigenous sovereignty, economic chaos, a rise
\nin crime, the influx of foreigners with dubious intentions and
\nconnections.<\/p>\n
And while the 1993 polls went smoothly, many believe
\nCambodia's human rights situation two years after the UN
\npeacekeepers left is far worse than that of its two neighbors.
\nThese include attacks on the press, and what a 1994 U.S. State
\nDepartment report called \"credible reports that individual
\nmembers of the security forces committed serious human rights
\nviolations including instances of extra-judicial killings\".<\/p>\n
Cambodia also suffered a series of financial scandals recently
\nand is still battling the Khmer Rouge insurgency that drains
\ndrain resources and creates a general climate of uncertainty.<\/p>\n
But the future of the one-party rule in Laos and Vietnam
\ndepends on the continued ability of Chinese-style reforms to
\ngenerate sufficient economic development to buy off the emerging
\nmiddle class of these nations. Adds Evans: \"If the LPRP and the
\nVietnamese Communist Party can transform themselves into straight
\nnationalist parties in the tradition of capitalist one-party
\nstates so common in the developing world, they might survive in
\nthe long run.\"<\/p>\n
-- IPS<\/p>", "url": "https:\/\/jawawa.id\/newsitem\/long-and-winding-road-to-reforms-1447893297", "image": "" }, "sponsor": "Okusi Associates", "sponsor_url": "https:\/\/okusiassociates.com" }