Trade and rights

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations member countries have formally rejected the inclusion of workers' rights, labor standards and environmental issues in international trade agreements. A joint statement issued at the end of the ASEAN foreign ministerial meeting in Bangkok last weekend cited among the reasons for the refusal the possibility of market access restrictions and their impact on employment opportunities in developing countries.

The ASEAN members believe that the developed countries' move to link human rights and environmental issues with international trade agreements is a mere pretext for protectionism.

As has been known for some time, many Asian governments have grown more and more irritated in the last several years by what they see as the high-handed habit of forcing values and standards on Asian countries on the part of a number of developed nations.

Initially those Asian countries, which badly need market access and capital from the West, tended to bow under the pressure. Later, however, they became convinced that what they initially perceived as being a genuine concern over human rights and the environment was turning out to be a smokescreen to hide a plot to stamp out the growing threat of Asia's newly industrialized countries.

For one thing, while acknowledging that there is, indeed, a real concern among many Western communities and non-governmental organizations over human rights and environmental issues, these Asian countries believe that some Western countries are adopting a double standard in imposing their values.

The United States' failure to cut China's most favored nation trade status last June, after President Clinton was forced to bow to U.S. business pressure, has further convinced Asian countries that the United States' main concern is its national interests. This has encouraged other Asian countries to take a more hard- line stance on human rights and environmental issues.

One can expect that following ASEAN's hardened stance, confrontation will be the menu of the day in the weeks to come. Although we do not think that a full-scale trade war will start in the near future, one can expect that lengthy bickering may occur.

A trade war aside, our concern is the possible impact on our human rights movement of the newly decided ASEAN common stance on the human rights issue. It is no secret that in the past some of our human rights activists relied rather heavily on international pressure in the belief that such nudging would move the government to improve our human rights condition.

Such a notion may have been correct a few years ago, but of late we have seen that the government has tended to ignore such nudging, perhaps because of a growing confidence that the so- called "international pressure" is nothing but the roar of a paper tiger. For example, a few months ago nobody would have believed that with the APEC Summit due to be held here in November the government would dare to clamp down on the press.

Moreover, such an international linkage has its drawbacks: It has caused the authorities to question the validity and "honesty" of the human rights movement here, and to suspect that it could be a vehicle for undermining national stability.

However, one should not forget that in the last several years there have been many improvements in the human rights condition here. Thus we believe that a real political will exists in the government to improve the human rights condition in Indonesia.

What we hope to see most, given the apparent prevailing symmetry in principle, is our commonly shared ideal of a just society achieved without unnecessary delay or shocks.