Читать книгу Регионы в современном мире: глобализация и Азия. Зарубежное регионоведение - Коллектив авторов, Ю. Д. Земенков, Koostaja: Ajakiri New Scientist - Страница 28

Considering all the developments outlined above, a timely question is what specific dangers ASEAN is exposed to, as well as what countermeasures it can adopt. Some observations are worthy of note.

Arguably, the association faces real prospects for losing its digital sovereignty (understood as ASEAN’s own digital infrastructure and strong digital competences, as well as the ASEAN member states’ ability to implement an independent policy in the internet in accordance with the international law), mostly as an aftereffect of the emerging Sino-US contradictions. In fact, the association is again being torn apart by China and the United States, this time along the digital lines, with prospects for digital bipolarity. While China and the US have repeatedly declared their intention to draw a line between their political contradictions and strengthen economic interdependence, including in Southeast Asia, does this priority extend to the digital sphere, and is the Sino-US technological interdependence possible? Or can it – by its definition – be nothing a “weaponized interdependence” at best?

Another potential threat for the association stems from prospects for new imbalances, both between and within (emphasis added – the authors) the Southeast Asian states. The Fourth Industrial Revolution entails large-scale social aftereffects, mainly a widening income gap, which will overlap with the deep-rooted social, ethnic and religious problems prevalent in Southeast Asia. If so, ASEAN will be unable to successfully develop regional integration as long as the processes of national integration are unfinished.

ASEAN’s vulnerability is reinforced by potentially negative implications for ASEAN-led multilateral dialogue platforms on political-security issues. As China continues to build its own security system in Eurasia portraying itself as the exclusive provider of economic benefits, the ASEAN-driven multilateral venues are likely to slip into irrelevance.

For ASEAN, a core premise in tackling these problems comes from its readiness to perform a double-edged task. The association should increase the manageability of challenges it encountered before the present digital problems appeared and at the same time strengthen its digital capacity-building. Both tasks make ASEAN upgrade its relations with extra-regional partners.

But these partners should simultaneously (emphasis added – the authors) meet multiple criteria. As the confrontation between the Asia-Pacific big powers is rising, this partner should be willing to preserve the ASEAN-favored neutrality and inclusivity in “driving” the regional multilateral dialogue. As digitalization is a global phenomenon, this partner should be an established global power capable of shaping the global digital agenda. As ASEAN needs digital competences, this partner should respond to these expectations. As the association is scared by the intentions of China and the US to obtain unilateral benefits at the expense of ASEAN, this partner should be free from such intentions.

Reiterating that these criteria should be met fully rather than partially, among ASEAN’s array of external partners there is only one appropriate. This is the Russian Federation, which recently enhanced its relations with ASEAN to the level of Strategic Partnership. To make this relationship really strategic, as its name suggests, ASEAN and Russia should develop future-oriented, long-term and resourceful directions of cooperation. Arguably, the digital sphere offers the parties the best presently available option.