Asialink Insights

Both China and the United States will emerge from the current crisis with their reputations damaged, says David Capie, Associate Professor in International Relations at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. He argues that today’s great power struggles are making it harder than ever for small and middle powers to navigate.

Like the United States, Indonesia’s response to the pandemic has been lax, says Jusuf Wanandi, former Secretary of the Indonesian Supreme Advisory Council. Moreover, he argues regional cooperation is lacking – and the prospects for renewal are not strong.

The COVID-19 phenomenon has accelerated degloblisation, writes Victor Sumsky, Director of the ASEAN Centre at Moscow State Institute of International Relations. Instead of preaching inclusiveness in the framework of economic cooperation in the Asia Pacific, the US has switched to the ‘free-and-open’ Indo-Pacific doctrine, aimed at containing China.

US-China relations are now failing ‘the rest of Asia’ says Tsutomu Kikuchi, adjunct senior fellow at the Japan Institute of International Affairs. He argues that we can’t narrow the range of  policy choices available to us as we push for a rules-based order.

COVID-19 has proven the weakness of ASEAN-led mechanisms, so it’s now time to rebuild a regional security architecture that can contain the more extreme effects of the growing US-China rivalry, writes Herman Kraft, Chair of the Department of Political Science at the University of the Philippines.

China is channeling aid to Myanmar, but the virus crisis is a chance for existing multilateral bodies within the Asia Pacific to reset and reshape the foreign policy environment, says Aung Zin Phyo Thein from the Myanmar Institute of Strategic and International Studies.

Each ASEAN member state has acted individually rather than collectively, writes Pou Sothirak, Head of the Cambodian Institute for Cooperation and Peace. Knowing that this virus crosses national borders, a regional response makes a lot more sense.