Towards productive EU-ASEAN dialog

Towards productive EU-ASEAN dialog

By Aurora Ferrari

Europe can play a more effective role in its relations with
ASEAN.

SINGAPORE: The relationship between ASEAN and Europe goes back
many years. Indeed, the European Community (EC) became ASEAN's
first dialogue partner in 1972. However, Europe has failed to
capitalize on the opportunities provided by ASEAN's early
overtures.

Europe has so far lacked a clear strategy for South-east Asia.
Above all in recent years, European Union (EU)'s ASEAN policy has
been on a zigzag course between realpolitik and moralism and
between principles and embarrassing opportunism.

From 1993, the EU seemed to adopt a realist policy in order to
strengthen its economic presence in South-east Asia. It toned
down human rights issues at high-level meetings and concurred
with ASEAN's line towards Myanmar.

ASEM, in particular, seemed to be the climax of this process.
Yet, it is clear that the EU's strategy of giving priority to
economic objectives without sacrificing the normative
underpinning of its foreign policy requires a precarious
balancing act. Unfortunately, the EU has so far been unable to
strike the right balance. The EU has simply swept the
controversial issues under the carpet, without settling a clear
agenda.

A day-by-day decision-making approach would be efficient if
the EU were capable of an effective common approach. However,
foreign policy-making in the EU has been mostly characterized by
an inter-governmental process dominated by national executives
and the Council of Ministers. Hence, EU's ASEAN policy proved to
be a misleading deferment policy and controversial issues soon
resurfaced, as the developments after ASEM have shown in the case
of East Timor and Myanmar. The consequences of such a precarious
policy have been disastrous: contradictory statements from the
member states, from the European bodies and even from the same
European institutions.

The 1992 Dutch-Indonesian controversy over aid proved how
member states do not act in unison. Moreover, the controversy
showed how countries can react when pressured too hard. In the
end, the damage can be greater for the donor than for the
receiving country. At the ASEAN Post Ministerial Conference (PMC)
in 1994, the German Foreign Minister representing the Presidency
softened, in his speech, European criticism of the Myanmarese
junta and the ASEAN policy of constructive engagement. On the
same occasion, the EU Commissioner responsible for political
external relations seemed to accord a much higher priority to
human rights and democracy in his speech. The commission launched
two strategy papers dealing with South-east Asia in 1994 and
1996. Although intensified economic cooperation continues to
figure as the overriding objective, the 1996 paper puts a much
greater emphasis on human rights.

Abrupt policy shifts and a cacophony of contradictory
statements generate only great confusion. Moreover high moral
attitudes are not credible when they are easily dismissed for
short-run economic gains, as it was shown in the 1992 aid
controversy in Indonesia.

Clearly these policy reversals signify weakness in Asian eyes,
causing a loss of prestige for the EU. Such a lack of trust and
respect inevitably inhibits the effort to develop channels of
communication and fora where disputed issues can be discussed.
This is even more true if we consider that ASEAN cooperation is
dependent on a high level of harmony, consensus and informal
personal relations.

Indeed the success of Europe in South-east Asia very much
rests on the assumption of a common and new approach. Given the
strong influence of the U.S. and Japan in the region, none of the
individual member states can build up an equally significant
presence in the area alone.

All member states in one way or the other would benefit from
"economies of scale", rather than struggling for their luck on
their own in the region. (In this respect, the French and British
attempt to obtain a special status separate from the EU in the
ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF) can have negative consequences for the
EU's Common Foreign and Security Policy (CFSP), since ASEAN
countries can exploit this request to their advantage by driving
a wedge into the EU).

Ultimately, the problem of a common approach can be solved
only through a substantial reform of CFSP, as conceived in the
Maastricht Treaty. If the EU really wants to become an
independent political actor, it should, at least, fully subject
its foreign policy to the rule of majority voting.

As far as the new approach is concerned, the success of the EU
policy does not lie in the creation of new devices but in deeper
understanding, even cultural empathy. The solution does not lie
in a value-based or a realist policy, rather in a bi-dimensional
strategy, which means, on the one hand, pragmatic official
relations and, on the other, the creation of new channels of
unofficial communication which avoid public confrontation and may
be better suited for dealing with issues involving values.

This does not mean that fundamental issues such as human
rights should be sacrificed on the altar of economics. It must be
clear that there are limits to the toleration of human rights
violations (like genocide, massacres perpetrated by security
forces, torture, and so forth) whatever European economic
interests maybe. However, given Europe's relatively weaker
economic position, these fundamental values must be pursued in a
way that makes the economic costs tolerable. It should not be
forgotten that European economic competitiveness and jobs are
vital interests for the union because they are the foundations of
the European model of social peace and security.

If high-level official and public relations concentrate on
more practical matters, for example economics, public
condemnations of Asian governments by Western leaders could be
avoided. In Asian eyes, these attacks can only be interpreted as
a deliberate affront and another example of colonial paternalism.
In order to avoid unnecessary public humiliations, the EU could
install early warning mechanisms at the non-public level.

Finally, divisive political issues should be taken up in a
more sophisticated manner than hitherto. For this purpose, there
should be an incentive to shift controversial themes from the
official "track one" to an informal track. This approach could
also be extended to the business sector, as the Commission
encouraged in its 1996 strategy paper, something that ASEAN
currently does not engage in.

"We should concentrate our activities on the things that bind
us, instead of those that divide us," said the Singaporean
Foreign Minister. As far as the European side is concerned, this
does mean renunciation of values that have often guided its
foreign policy, but pursuit of them in a constructive way. A two-
tier strategy seems to be an essential condition.

Aurora Ferrari is a Visiting Associate at the Institute of
Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore.