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The
Southeast
Security
1, June 1988
Asian
Complex
BARRYBUZAN
Asian
complex.
The
The
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Barry
Buzan
of
shared
interests.
. . .
Security
complexes
characteristic
products
of an
anarchic
international
an
are
roots. They
system,
and
system.2
level, which is very often dominated by great power perspectives, and the
is always very narrow, and frequently
individual country level, which
marred by partisan biases. All three levels are necessary to any compre
hensive analysis of security problems. The fact that each has its own
there is a case for this view. As Ole Waever has suggested, the internal
dynamics of a security complex can, in theory, vary across a broad spec
trum.5 They might, at one extreme, be governed by unrestrained balance
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4
The
Barry
Southeast
Asian
Security
Buzan
Complex
The Regional
Complex
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other. The
munist
current domination
of Laos
power that results from Vietnam's
seems to be pursuing its own vision of an
and Kampuchea.10
Vietnam
Indochina "federation", and also faces the problem that an independent
seems likely to be hostile to it,whether communist ruled or
Kampuchea
not. Thai desires for a more neutral Kampuchea,
free of Vietnamese
troops,
are difficult to reconcile with Vietnam's hegemonic aspirations. The whole
is consequently
clashes
alive with tension, from Thai-Laotian
boundary
over disputed territory in the north, to volatile juxtapositions of Vietnamese,
Thai and Khmer military forces along the Thai-Kampuchean
border.
is also
its serious conflict, the Southeast Asian
Despite
complex
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Barry
Buzan
unusual, and fortunate, in having many of its internal and external bound
in a nuclear
aries moderated bywater. The analogy of the water moderator
? a water
state
boundaries
land
reactor is not inappropriate
gap between
across them inmuch the same
interactions
down
security
potential
damps
a
reactor
absorbs neutrons thatwould
way as the heavy water in nuclear
otherwise generate fission chain reactions. At its crudest, the reasoning
here is simply that it is much more difficult to mount major military
attacks across water than it is across land. Water also tends to provide
clear boundaries, or if it does not, to arouse much less passion than dis
that the
significance
putes over land territories.11 It cannot be without
areas
are
in
the
most intense and intractable conflicts within the region
six
members
where states share long land boundaries, while many of the
of the ASEAN
"quasi-security community"12 are separated by water.
The Regional
Complex
and
its Neighbours
Southeast Asian
security complex borders on three neighbouring
two
complexes: South Asia, South Pacific, and Northeast Asia. The first
states
of
of these, like Southeast Asia, are local complexes
composed
whose power is very largely confined to their own regions. The Northeast
Asian complex, however, contains several great powers, and is therefore
The
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residual security links to Southeast Asia remain from the heyday of the
Southeast Asia Treaty Organization
(SEATO), but these mostly reflect
common ASEAN
and antipodean
ties to the United States, rather than
durable local security patterns. Australia might feel some long-term unease
about the juxtaposition of itshuge open spaces with the teeming migration
of Indonesia, but this is a long way from defining any
minded masses
immediate security concern.
To the north, the Southeast Asian complex borders on the great power
complex inNortheast Asia. In part, these two complexes are also insulated
from each other by water, but the major factor for the Southeast Asian
complex is its long land and sea boundary with China. China is a regional
great power whose presence is a major independent factor in Southeast
security, but which for the purposes of the analytical scheme used
here is not counted as part of the Southeast Asian complex. The clearest
way to define the security relationship between China and the South
east Asian security complex is to look at the 4'super-regional'' pattern of
security in thewhole of Asia.13 In that context, China's principal security
rivalry is with the Soviet Union, and both are part of the higher level
Asian
Northeast Asian
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Barry
Buzan
ison to the influence of the global superpower rivalry between the United
States and the Soviet Union. This process has all the hallmarks of classic
balance of power behaviour, and represents an early stage in a systemic
shift from bipolarity tomultipolarity as American
power slowly declines
its importance in
As
has
increased
China
from its early post-war peak.
common
in opposing
It
is
interest
their
Asia, the United States has waned.
a
in the
kind of half-superpower
Soviet influence that has made China
a
at
States
retains
the global level. The United
strong
pattern of security
position
Pakistan,
mainland
to
in Northeast Asia, and still has a significant commitment
since
its defeat in Indochina, has largely withdrawn
from
but
Southeast Asia. Although the United States is still an important
its involvement in
states, especially the Philippines,
has largely been supplanted by the Sino-Soviet
rivalry. China
provides the United States with a major opportunity to pursue the ideals
of the Nixon Doctrine, whereby the United States would pursue its own
local
(usually anti-Soviet) security interests by supporting sympathetic
powers rather than by asserting its own military power directly. China's
of power, and
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addition to Vietnam, also have strong historical reasons for seeing China
as a threat. China's historical suzerainty over Indochina, and sometimes
occupation of it, is feltparticularly strongly by Vietnam, but is not insigni
ficant elsewhere, particularly Indonesia and Malaysia.16
Beijing's claim
(echoed by Taiwan) to the Spratly Islands, which lie in the southern part
of the South China Sea, is a potent reminder of how far China's historical
nesia, where the fusion of the local Chinese and communism precipitated
domestic conflicts during the period following independence.
For all these reasons, the looming presence of China is an important
independent element in any assessment of security in Southeast Asia. The
existence of significant security issues between China and the Southeast
Asian states makes the boundary of the local complex somewhat messy.
For the purpose of analysis, however, one gets a much less distorted picture
major
Complex
and
the Superpowers
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10
Barry
Buzan
China has also to struggle against the fact that most of its potential
allies in the region view it as a threat for the reasons discussed above. Since
the late 1970s, after the consolidation
of the Soviet-Vietnamese
alliance
and the Vietnamese
of
China's
natural
occupation
security
Kampuchea,
interest has been to identify itself with ASEAN's
fears of both Vietnam
and welcomes
the Chinese
and Indonesia, by
counterweight. Malaysia
contrast, focus more on the longer-term threat of Chinese hegemonism
to the region than on the more immediate, but in the long-run, much
is divided, Viet
smaller, threat from Vietnam.22 Because opinion inASEAN
nam can portray itself and the Soviet Union as serving regional interests
by resisting the reassertion of Chinese hegemony over Southeast Asia.23
This
interaction between
local and great power security dynamics
a security community covering the
to
all
create
explains why
attempts
whole region have failed. ASEAN's
promotion of a Zone of Peace, Free
dom and Neutrality (ZOPFAN) confronts two difficulties. Firstly, it creates
divisions within ASEAN
about the meanings
of the terms in relation to
the trade and security links that individual members
already have with
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11
want
Girling argues, most of the states in the region also seek outside support
states seem to trust each
against domestic threats. Although the ASEAN
other enough to have created a security community among themselves,
"...
if any regime felt gravely threatened itwould be more likely to appeal
for help from outside the region than from fellow members within it".28
In this way, as also in South Asia, the domestic, local and great power
security dynamics reinforce each other to keep the region both divided
within itself, and penetrated by more powerful outside interests.
Conclusion
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12
Barry
Buzan
agreement to reduce rivalry in the area, then the prospects for ZOPFAN
would
improve. It is, however, hard to think of reasons why the Soviets
and given their
would
give up their doubly useful position in Vietnam
concerns about China, hard to think why the Vietnamese would want the
Soviets to leave. The only leverage available to theWest is its ability to help
resuscitate its appalling
Vietnam
economy. To the extent that Vietnam
fears losing power because of itsweak economy, itmay be open to such
leverage. For theWest, however, such a strategy has to overcome not only
American
reluctance to deal with a country still seen as an enemy, but
is made stronger
also the classic problem of the risk involved ifVietnam
and therefore more able to pursue its hegemonic
aspirations.
There are only two obvious sources that could contribute towards a
the region, and its outcome could well shift the whole
security equation
states
within
the local complex. Should Burma or one of the ASEAN
look like joining the Soviet-Vietnam camp as a result of such a process,
this would
strengthen the identity of interests among China, the United
in the
States and ASEAN,
and greatly sharpen the degree of polarization
as
As
states
with
weak
structures
domestic
exist,
region.
long
political
such dramatic transformations can never be ruled out.
Paradoxically, however, as Sukhumbhand Paribatra has argued, South
east Asia also derives security benefits from the fact thatmost of the states
within it are weak both as states and as powers. Lack of means prevents
old rivals like Thailand and Burma from pursuing their rivalry. Similarly,
states hang together in part from a common awareness
the ASEAN
that
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13
both the cohesive national identities, and the widely accepted government
structures necessary
for a strong nation-state.28
The second possible source of change is Japan. In general terms,
role in the pattern of global security. Be
Japan still plays an anomalous
of Japanese power and interest as it did during the 1930s and 1940s,
though obviously under wholly different domestic and international cir
cumstances. But even the use of purely economic
instruments is fraught
with problems. Japan, for example, could not use such instruments towoo
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14
Barry
Buzan
wars
rivalry than by concern for local outcomes, and since their access to local
influence usually depends on their taking sides in local conflict, the natural
outcome of their intervention in the Third World
is to perpetuate
local
rivalries. If a local victory would mean
the triumph of a superpower
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15
of local rivalries and conflicts, both domestic and within the local security
complex, over any joint interest in insulating the region from great power
intervention. The fate of ZOPFAN
shows the truth of this statement even
for a subregional grouping like ASEAN, which within itself has made
impressive progress towards the development of a security community.
Partly because of their different domestic vulnerabilities, partly because
and
of their different attitudes towards the polarization between ASEAN
Vietnam within the Southeast Asian security complex, and partly because
NOTES
1. Barry
and Gowher
Rizvi et al., South Asian
Insecurity and the Great Powers
Macmillan,
1986); ch. 1.
2. Ibid., pp. 7-8.
3. A full exposition
of this logic can be found in ibid., ch. 1.
in Internationa]
4. Barry Buzan,
Security Problem
People, States and Fear: the National
Buzan
(London:
1983), ch. 7
(Brighton: Wheatsheaf,
of Security"
"The Interplay of Some Regional
and Subregional
Dynamics
November
Peace
Centre
for
and
Conflict
Research,
paper,
(Conference
Copenhagen,
1987) , pp. 2-8.
Relations
5. Ole Waever,
6. Robert
7 Waever,
8. Figures
Balance
International
1986-87
Organization
(London:
International
357-78.
Institute
for Stra
9. Chai-Anan
for Security,
and Sukhumbhand
Paribatra,
"Development
Samudavanija
in Durable
for Development:
for Durable Stability in Southeast Asia",
Prospects
Paribatra
and Sukhumbhand
Stability in Southeast Asia, edited by Kusuma
Snitwongse
Asian
Institute of Southeast
Studies,
1987), pp. 22-24.
(Singapore:
10. Sheldon W. Simon, "The Two Southeast Asias and China's
Asian
Security Perspective",
Security
24, no.
Conflict",
World:
Ayoob
13. Buzan
14. The
Case
Asia and
Studies from Southeast
(London: Croom Helm,
1986), p. 229.
and Rizvi, op. cit., pp. 17-18, 158.
Asian
has
Northeast
security
complex
beyond
Suzuki,
1988) .
the Middle
some
East,
unusual
is a fuller assessment
the Superpower
Security
edited
by Mohammed
that are
characteristics
in Barry
System"
Buzan
and Yuji
(unpublished,
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16 Barry Buzan
15. Buzan
and
Rizvi,
16. Sheldon
in Southeast
Asia",
Asian
Asias
and China's
"The Two Southeast
Simon,
Security
Perspectives",
and Goliaths",
"Davids
Simon,
24, no. 5 (1984): 526-27;
p. 304; Tajima,
Australian
Outlook
Southeast
Asia?",
op. cit., pp. 21-26; and J.L.S. Girling, "A Neutral
27, no. 2 (1973): 127-29.
and Tajima, op. cit., pp. 17-21.
18. Simon, "The Two Southeast Asias",
pp. 523-25, 527-30;
of ASEAN
19. Shee Poon Kim, "A Decade
1967-77", Asian
Survey 17, no. 8 (1977): 92-95.
17
W.
Sheldon
Asian
Survey
20. William
Century
World
Press,
University
22.
24.
Simon,
Two
and US
Neutrah'sm
Policy
25. Tajima,
26. Girling,
27
1975), pp.
op. cit., p. 30.
op. cit., p. 124.
S. Ross,
Robert
Sukhumbhand
"Indochina's
Paribatra,
Asia"
Simon,
Barry
Institute
D.C.. American
Enterprise
(Washington
and Girling, op. cit., pp. 125-26.
53-57;
Continuing
Tragedy",
Problems
of Communism
for Public
25, no. 6
87-92.
in Southeast
29.
Policy
Research,
(1986):
28.
Buzan
University
and Goliaths",
is Senior
ofWarwick,
on
paper, Workshop
Asian
Institute of Southeast
discussant's
(Singapore:
"Leadership
Studies,
and Security
10-12 December
pp. 306-7
Lecturer, Department
United Kingdom.
of International
Studies,
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