Dr Raja Muhammad Khan

For quite some time, the leading world thinkers and scholars of international relations have been describing the 21st century as the “Asian Century”. The historians have also predicted that, with Asia becoming the centre of world power politics and economic hub there would be return to Asia, the economic prosperity that this gigantic continent lost three hundred years ago, at the hands of European powers. As per Asian Development Bank, Asia would yield over half of the world’s global production by 2050 and its inhabitants would lead a quality life, similar to the contemporary European nations.

With 30 % of world land mass, and 60 % of global population, the Continent of Asia is rapidly emerging as a new ‘centre of gravity’ to the world politics. The term ‘Asian century’ has become a shorthand expression to conjure the rise of Asia. The scale and pace of Asia’s transformation is unprecedented. This region is not only already hosting world’s most competitive and sophisticated economies, but Asia is also projected to grow and dominate over half of world economic output by mid-21st century. According to Asian Development Bank’s research, Asian GDP will increase from $17 trillion in 2010 to $174 trillion in 2050, whereas according to a Nottingham University analysis, the Chinese economy will become the world’s largest economy in 2038.

While the ‘Global North’ remained entangled in recent economic meltdown triggered in 2008, Asia’s relatively robust economic performance highlights its resilient configuration. Today in Asia, each day matters, Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) economies constitute almost $50 billion in trade, and one third of total oil trade will pass through South China Sea or the adjacent Gulf of Thailand. This being said, the ‘Asian Century’ is not merely about Asia. It is a century of shared prosperity, with Asia having to take its share and responsibilities commensurate with its economic weight in the global economy.
Asian ascends to economy primacy, gradual drift of world’s political power base from Atlantic-centric to Pacific-centric, and growing strategic relevance of this region in defining the contemporary global military-balance. Key determinants of emerging Asian regional security patterns and policy interests will certainly have a defining impact on global security politics. While Asian century offers unprecedented opportunities, it also poses challenges for the region in particular and world at large. Managing such emerging challenges and exploring ways to exploit opportunities is the real issue for the global strategists.

Announcing his government’s future defence strategy of ‘pivot to Asia’ (Rebalancing Asia) in January 2012, US President Obama explained that after ten years of combat in Iraq and Afghanistan, the US military would shift strategic balance towards Asia-Pacific. Washington is consolidating and redeploying its forces, currently a 50/50 split in naval forces deployed in Pacific and Atlantic, to a 60/40 tilt towards Pacific by 2020. In the words of US former Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, “the future of politics will be decided in Asia, not Afghanistan or Iraq...” Behind the rhetoric of US ‘forward-deployed diplomacy’ and announcement of plans to begin rotational deployment of US Marines to Darwin - expanding the US military presence in Asia beyond South Korea and Japan - many see a renaissance of alliance-based politics in the region which will have long-term and significant implications for the future security architecture in Asia-Pacific.

Political and strategic relations in Asia and across the globe have entered a period of adjustment and readjustments. The presence of significant nuclear and missile arsenals in the region and rapid military modernizations are affecting regional security dynamics. What happens in Asia now will truly resonate at the global level in both strategic as well as politico-economic context. The global spatial compression and growing inter-connectedness of world societies have not merely sped up the processes of fusion and diffusion, but also the risks of conflicts based on identities, geography, history and resources.

Interplay of ideas and cultures in the region is yet another aspect that requires critical evaluation since inter-state affinities and acrimonies having defining impact on foreign policy behaviour. Diverse cultures and societies represented in Asia and interactions between Eastern and Western civilizations in this region will be test-bed for social and cultural sustainability as these interactions will shape perceptions of ruling elites and consequently affect pattern of both inter and intra state relations.

Asia has arguably become the most critical region in an evolving international order. Geopolitically, the region includes world’s great powers such as China whereas United States and Russia, lie just beyond Asian peripheries and interact with it extensively. Demographically, 60% of the world’s total population is Asian. Militarily, four key players in the broader Asia-Pacific - the US, Russia, China and North Korea - are nuclear weapons states. Asian defence budgets constitute the world’s largest arms market and the region’s ‘defence transformation’ programmes are growing with immense pace.

As Asia’s own powerhouses - China, Japan, South Korea, Russia and perhaps Iran and India - assert their prerogatives over the next decades, they will reshape the global order in their interactions with each other and with the United States. The challenge, of course, will be to bring each of the great powers to the realization that their interests are better served by active multilateral accommodation rather than by competitive manoeuvring. Napoleon Bonaparte famously and quite rightfully noted: “as China wakes, it is shaking the world”. And testimony to it is China’s steady and impressive economic growth, which offers promise rather than a peril in the region. There are overwhelmingly positive ramifications flowing from the fact that China is becoming increasingly enmeshed economically and strategically. China’s extraordinary transformation inescapably drives the nexus between Asian security and global security.

The combination of spectacular regional economic growth, the cultural and religious diversity of its massive population base and the sheer material resources this region will generate and consume over the course of this century justify the observation that ‘there is now a broad consensus that the Asian continent is poised to become the new centre of gravity in global politics’.

The worldwide growing inter-connectedness of societies is speeding up not only the fusion and diffusion but also the risks of conflicts based on identities, geography, history and resources, both between and within states. This will have far-reaching implications for both international and national security policies and perceptions of both states and non-state actors, both of which are competing for influence and legitimacy in an increasingly shared space the modern world has now become. Ideas, identities, ideologies and cultures of both East and Western civilizations are cooperating and competing at the same time in multiple dimensions. In some cases the conflicts that influence the social construction of national and personal interests, shape the perceptions though which opportunities and challenges for states and governments are identified, prioritized, selected and pursued. Understanding, accepting cultural differences is vital for constructing a peaceful, stable and secure world that is beneficial for not one but all civilizations and societies.
The onus is on Asia to show the world that the 21st century can be a century of peace, if world policies and politics are conducted in an environment of tolerance, understanding and not as a zero-sum game, which was the case in the last two centuries dominated by the West.

Within South Asia, Indian economy has rapidly grown over last few decades, but India failed to integrate other regional economies to broaden the base, thus remained the only beneficiary of its economic riches. Whereas Chinese economic advances benefitted the economies of East and Southeast Asia at the most trying times of 1997 crises, Indian economic development thwarted other South Asian economies. As in the political sphere, India has the motives to become an economic hegemonic power, which may not be an appropriate policy in the globalized world. This South Asian giant could have realized that, economic and political development and integration with regional countries could have complemented its economy, otherwise having a sound base.

Pakistan’s geopolitical location makes it an important junction between various regions of Asia, in the context of Asian century. As a junction point, it connects South Asia with Central, West, and East Asia. Then it is an intersection between the energy deficient and energy efficient countries of Asia. Though itself economically mismanaged, Pakistan has tremendous potentials to exploit its geopolitics, its own resources and more so benefit from the rapidly approaching opportunities of economic prosperities of the Asian century. This all would be possible only once there is a dedicated team of economic managers and strategic planners who have the political vision, economic prudence, the desired determination and long wished sincerity to lead Pakistan in this highly competitive and challenging Asia century.

(The writer is Islamabad based analyst of International relations)

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