Figure 10: Total FPTT References to ‘China, the Victim’
Figure 11: Total FPTT References to ‘The Philippines’
[13] Introduction
Over the last two decades, the Asia-Pacific has turned into the most dynamic and fastest growing region in the world, accounting for almost 50 percent of the total global trade volume. Apart from its unprecedented pace of economic development, the Asia-Pacific features severe political discord among its highly heterogeneous nations, not least by virtue of a variety of looming and ongoing conflicts, profound political tensions, and power shifts. The South China Sea (SCS) dispute constitutes the region’s major and most complex territorial conflict, its vast relevance and implications exceeding the Asia-Pacific by far. It represents a maritime space roughly encompassing around 1,400,000 square miles geographically located between the People’ Republic of China (PRC), the Republic of China (ROC/Taiwan), The Philippines, Malaysia, Brunei, Indonesia, Singapore, and Vietnam. According to rather pessimistic estimates, USD 3.37 trillion in trade transited the South China Sea in 2016 (Center For Strategic and International Studies (CSIS, 2017). This number reflects 21 percent of global trade and 39.5 percent of Chinese total trade2, thereby strikingly demonstrating the SCS’s international and strategic significance. The SCS dispute itself, inextricably linked to the region’s long and conflict-prone history, substantially evolves around conflicting claims to legal status, border delimitation and ownership of both numerous territorial features (islands, reefs, rocks, islets) and adjacent maritime zones. Even though the dispute had already erupted in the 1970s and witnessed numerous standoffs and contentious changes of ownership between the 1980s and mid-1990s, it remained below the radar of global politics and international attention for quite some time. This has successively changed as of 2009, triggered by a deadline for SCS claimant parties to submit their claims for an extended seabed hydrocarbon continental shelf to the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf (CLCS). In subsequent years, particularly from 2012 onwards, the general situation in the SCS has further aggravated. This was manifested by multiple diplomatic, political and military incidents3 and [14] countless endeavors by various actors to defend their interests and to support their disputed claims. As a result, the risk of conflict escalation has been significantly increasing ever since just as security dilemma dynamics while the feasibility of effective conflict management has been declining. It was during this time that the SCS dispute started to attract considerable scholarly and political attention worldwide.
A close analytical look at the conflict-prone course of events reveals several dimensions and factors that have somewhat facilitated the dispute’s rapid exacerbation, thereby accounting for the ongoing failure to effectively mitigate tensions at the same time. The first and most crucial of these dimensions is the unprecedented economic, political, but also the military rise of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) in past decades, which has not only shaken the entire region but global politics at large. While the PRC had represented a rather low-profile regional player until the early 2000s, it has started to occupy a much more active, strategic and confident role thereafter, particularly since the second half of the 21st century. As China has turned into a global power, a core regional player and an increasingly credible and visible foreign policy actor, it remains to be seen whether it will continue to constitute a (regional) status quo power or eventually become a revisionist power and (regional) hegemon. In any case, the PRC’s rise has affected the situation in the SCS in a crucial and sustainable manner. For instance, Beijing’s increasingly bold and committed stance on the SCS led to a substantial consolidation of the other claimant parties’ positions. Apart from general uncertainty in regards to China’s future intentions and objectives in the region, a range of specific measures adopted by the government in Beijing has generated serious concerns and fears among its neighbors. Examples for such measures include the initiation of a sweeping artificial island transformation and land reclamation project, the relocation of an oil platform to disputed waters, and the remarkable upgrade of the PRC’s military (especially maritime capabilities) and other capacities. As a result, driven by such uncertainty and spurred by severe trust deficits, worst-case scenario policies and arms race dynamics4 have been witnessed that strongly fuel regional security dilemma dynamics and, ultimately, further complicate the SCS dispute.
[15] The second dimension involves the direct clash of Chinese and U.S. interests in the SCS. Despite its non-claimant party status to the dispute, the U.S. regional footprint is profound, not least given its close ties with several claimant countries, substantial troop deployment, its active participation in various regional dialogue formats and institutions, and its leadership role in multiple regional military exercises and operations. In a similar vein, the Obama administration proclaimed its ‘pivot to Asia’ strategy in 2011 with the key objective of maintaining (or even expanding) its prominent position in East- and Southeast Asia. That said, the clash of the world’s two major powers in the SCS region considerably contributes to the dispute’s scope, level of significance and extra-regional relevance. This, too, is all but conducive to effective and sustainable conflict management, let alone conflict resolution.
A third and somewhat interconnected dimension concerns the overall changing balance of regional (but also global) power in favor of China and to the detriment of the United States during the last decades. This shift was facilitated by the 2008 global economic crisis, which hit the U.S. much harder than the PRC. While China has not replaced the U.S. as a regional hegemon just yet, at least not in terms of political or military capacities, it is increasingly challenging the latter’s regional status, thereby increasing the U.S.’ costs of regional cooperation and curtailing Washington’s regional outreach. This development has been further consolidated by the decision of the administration of Donald Trump to withdraw from the Transpacific Partnership Agreement (TPP), a region-wide free trade project with the U.S. in the driving seat (and excluding the PRC), to impose different rounds of trade tariffs on Chinese goods, as well as its general preference for unilateral approaches and policy measures. Both, decisions like these, and the current administration’s growing unpredictability have sparked concerns by U.S. allies and partners about U.S. regional commitment, a development likely to assist the PRC in its endeavors to expand its regional influence. Beijing’s visions to accomplish a “China-ASEAN community of shared future” (PRC Gvt., 2017a) and to propel its Maritime Silk Road project connecting China with Southeast Asia, are two prominent examples already foreshadowing this process. At this stage it is unclear as to whether Washington will approve of, let alone support such developments in the future or whether it will rather do its bit to cling to its previous regional impact and its key position in terms of regional integration and cooperation, a scenario which certainly would not fail to leave its mark on the SCS either.
Fourth, Southeast Asia lacks any kind of multilateral and appropriately institutionalized framework of cooperative security structures in which all relevant SCS stakeholders could jointly discuss sustainable approaches to [16] mitigate the dispute, thereby alleviating the risk of (unintended) conflict escalation by generating trust, establishing clear rules of conduct, fostering cooperation and bridging omnipresent perception gaps. To be sure, a number of formats and institutional frameworks have already been set up in recent years. At the same time, Beijing does no longer categorically reject any debate on the SCS as it used to in the past. It has commenced hosting a seminar on ‘Maritime Risk Management and Cooperation’ within the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF) framework, a multilateral dialogue format dealing with preventive diplomacy and confidence building. Similarly, the ASEAN Defense Minister’s Meeting Plus (ADMM) is increasingly tackling issues of maritime security as are the Information Sharing Center (ISC), the China-Southeast Asian Countries Marine Research and Environmental Protection Cooperation Forum and many others. Moreover, a few non-binding mechanisms between the PRC and the U.S. on the prevention of maritime incidents have been launched as well. The majority of these mechanisms and institutions, however, remain mere ‘talk-shops’ (Acharya, 2005) due to their often voluntary, non-binding and ad-hoc nature5 and their mostly reactive and operational instead of future-oriented and comprehensive approach. Additionally, while certain progress has already
