Brookings: Topics - Asia and the Pacific

Shooting for a Century : The India-Pakistan Conundrum

Stephen P. Cohen — Fri, 24 May 2013 00:00:00 -0400

Brookings Institution Press 2013 275pp.

Synopsis:

Shooting for a Century is the first comprehensive survey of the deep historical, cultural, and strategic differences that make it probable that the India-Pakistan conflict will endure, despite many efforts by the international community to resolve it. Stephen Cohen develops a comprehensive theory of why the dispute is intractable and suggests ways in which it may be ameliorated. He draws on his rich and varied experiences in South Asia in exploring the character, depth, and origin of Indian and Pakistani attitudes toward each other. He proffers ways in which the tensions might be ameliorated, including a more active role for the United States on a range of issues that divide the nations.

The India-Pakistan rivalry is one of the five percent of international conflicts that have been labeled as intractable. The rivalry is one reason why South Asia remains the least-integrated region in the world, and despite recent steps toward normalization, the future could be as unpromising as the last sixty-five years. Can the two states resolve the many territorial and identity issues that divide them? Are there possibilities for their cooperation on one level, even if antagonisms remain? Should normalization from the bottom up be encouraged, or do they have to agree on resolving strategic conflicts first? Stephen Cohen provides an authoritative and instructive examination of these and similarly important topics in Shooting for a Century.

In the past fifteen years the stakes have become higher for both countries: each has acquired nuclear weapons and had multiple crises, and Pakistan has shown signs of failure. Ironically, as Cohen explains in Shooting for a Century, India is booming, but the time for normalization may not have come yet, and there are groups on both sides that would oppose it.

Praise for the work of Stephen P. Cohen:

"Stephen P. Cohen is America's most seasoned expert on Pakistan. . . .The Idea of Pakistan is impressive in its breadth and scope."—Foreign Affairs

"Stephen Cohen's India: Emerging Power is an objective, lucid, and incisive analysis of India's emerging role in the global village."—Dawn

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Stephen P. Cohen

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The Containment Fallacy: China and the TPP

Mireya Solís — Fri, 24 May 2013 09:30:00 -0400

In recent commentary for the Financial Times, David Pilling argues that the central objective of the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade negotiations is the exclusion of China. In his view, the desire to build an “anyone but China” club is due both to the perception that China got an easy pass when it joined the WTO and has continued to flaunt international trade and investment rules; and to the articulation of a larger political strategy to marginalize this emerging superpower. Pilling goes on to predict that the TPP will fail to deliver major liberalization as the traditional pattern of shielding sensitive sectors will emerge, and admonishes that only a much diluted trade agreement faces a realistic chance of ratification given the fractured consensus on the new proposed rules. In this rendition, the TPP appears politically myopic and economically irrelevant.

The argument that the TPP is a club that bars Chinese entry is inaccurate and unhelpful. China, like any other APEC economy, has the right to request entry into the TPP. Whether the Chinese leadership will judge TPP membership to be in their country’s national interest and whether TPP members can be persuaded that China is prepared to abide by the negotiated disciplines is a separate matter. But it is important to dispel the notion that the TPP precludes Chinese entry. In fact, this trade agreement scores better than most in incorporating an accession mechanism that has already delivered membership expansion from four to twelve members –now comprising 40% of world GDP. More fundamentally, it is hard to understand why TPP countries would pursue the counter-productive and unfeasible goal of marginalizing China. China sits at the apex of the world economy as it ranks number two in share of world GDP and is at the center of global supply chains. A trade agreement that by fiat sought to defy these fundamental economic realities would be foolhardy indeed. Hence the TPP concept is expansive: it aims to eventually develop an Asia-Pacific wide platform of economic integration, not to draw lines encircling China.

If Chinese exclusion were the selling point of the TPP for countries like Japan, then one would be hard pressed to explain why the Japanese government is concurrently negotiating two major trade agreements with China: a trilateral FTA in Northeast Asia and an East Asian trade agreement known as the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP). And the same is true for all other Asian countries in the TPP who already partake in the ASEAN-China FTA and are participating in the RCEP talks. The “us versus them” dynamic of security alliances is not really applicable to free trade agreements. The noodle bowl that characterizes the maze of FTAs illustrates the fact that in the world of international trade overlapping memberships render moot purely exclusive arrangements.

Ascribing an anti-China objective to the TPP is not helpful on three main fronts: 1) it provides political cover to protectionist interests, who argue that they should not be asked to undertake painful economic adjustments for the sake of trade agreements driven by geopolitical concerns; 2) it sends a chilling message to prospective members, who may fear that in joining TPP they will be seen as enlisted in the anti-China camp; and 3) it will discourage China from finding points of convergence with the TPP agenda if this is seen as capitulating to an American strategy of containment.

The most fundamental challenge to the TPP project vis-à-vis China is not that it is built around a faulty notion of containment, but rather that it may not constitute a powerful enough enticement to propel China to sign on to these new standards on trade and investment. China so far has reacted by accelerating its own trade initiatives in Asia. The risk that the United States and China will remain for the foreseeable future in separate trade groupings, without a significant bilateral dialogue on trade and investment, is very real. TPP negotiators cannot postpone the task of fashioning a strategy to engage China until after the TPP agreement is completed. They must be mindful of the fact that rules must be evaluated both in terms of their quality and dissemination potential. China must see in the new trade agenda a deal not unlike its accession to the WTO: while hefty commitments are to be expected, the accompanying domestic reforms will pay off handsomely in terms of improved economic performance.

Authors

Mireya Solís

Image Source: © Bobby Yip / Reuters

The Way Forward with Myanmar/Burma

Lex Rieffel — Fri, 24 May 2013 11:39:00 -0400

Be thankful that the Washington Post does not make foreign policy decisions for the United States. A case in point is our relations with Myanmar, formerly known as Burma.

In its May 22 editorial (“Burma’s Path: U.S. Optimism May be Outrunning Reality”), the Post highlights the position of Representative Joseph Crowley (D-N.Y.), who claims “The big risk is that we’re going to lose leverage in terms of reform.” With the belief that sanctions can leverage reforms, Representative Crowley and others initiated legislative action last week to extend some of the U.S. sanctions against Burma for another year.

However, there was no mention in the editorial of a statement made by Senator Mitch McConnell on the floor of the Senate the day before: “I do not believe that Congress should reauthorize the . . . import sanctions [in the Burmese Freedom and Democracy Act].” From where I sit – in the center of U.S. political opinion and as an analyst of Myanmar’s economic and political development over the past five decades – Senator McConnell’s statement has much more significance for readers than Rep. Crowley’s remarks.

What’s going on here? How can one of our country’s most thoughtful newspapers do such a disservice to its readers?

The simplest explanation seems to be inertia. Since the 1990 elections in Myanmar, when Aung San Suu Kyi was blocked by a military junta from playing a leading role in the country’s governance following her party’s landslide victory, the Post has been one of the loudest and clearest voices in calling attention to the human rights abuses of Myanmar’s military rulers. These abuses were terrible, including the suppression of the monk-led Saffron Revolt in 2007, and the Post served its readers well by featuring them.

The rapid and unexpected progress Myanmar has made in the past two years toward democratic rule and economic prosperity has been encouraged by the engagement policy adopted in the first year of Barack Obama’s administration and has been rewarded by the progressive relaxation of a bewildering array of sanctions imposed over the past 20 years.

However, a civilian (but military dominated) government replaced the junta in 2011, and new President Thein Sein has since forged a remarkable partnership with Aung San Suu Kyi to lift the country out of the poverty and the conflicts of the past. She is now a member of the legislature, arguably the most prominent, and it is conceivable that she will emerge from the 2015 national elections as the country’s president. The rapid and unexpected progress Myanmar has made in the past two years toward democratic rule and economic prosperity has been encouraged by the engagement policy adopted in the first year of Barack Obama’s administration and has been rewarded by the progressive relaxation of a bewildering array of sanctions imposed over the past 20 years.

Violation of human rights is still a terrible fact of life in Myanmar today, especially in the army’s campaign against the Kachin ethnic minority and other minorities, and in the treatment of a Muslim group known as Rohingya. U.S. policy begins with efforts to reduce the human rights problems in Myanmar, but it doesn’t end there. In particular, it does not assume that U.S. sanctions can leverage reforms in Myanmar, as suggested by Representative Crowley, nor is it premised on the belief, implicit in Senator McConnell’s statement, that the historic transition underway in Myanmar today was prompted by the sanctions imposed by the United States and other countries.

Instead, U.S. policy gives credit for the astonishing turnaround in Myanmar’s governance to President Thein Sein and the other military and civilian leaders who saw that a course change was required to become a respected nation and who then had the courage to make it happen.

The last words come from Senator McConnell’s exceptional statement on the floor of the Senate, words that give the Post’s readers a better sense of our smart U.S. policy toward Burma/Myanmar than what they received in the May 22 editorial: “Many of us who have followed Burma for years never thought reform would come to this troubled country. This is an important moment and I believe it is time for Congress to take responsible action to continue to promote progress by encouraging those who are risking much within Burma . . .”

Authors

Lex Rieffel

Image Source: © Larry Downing / Reuters

North Korea’s Turn to Diplomacy: Resuming the Six-Party Talks?

Richard C. Bush III — Fri, 24 May 2013 12:14:00 -0400

As summer follows spring, so too does North Korea transition from provocative words and deeds to a seemingly statesmanlike desire for diplomacy and peace. Before, it threatened to hit the United States with nuclear weapons. Now it expresses a willingness to engage in dialogue, even to return to the Six-Party Talks.

But this is all part of Pyongyang’s playbook. We have seen these peace offensives before. The crucial question now is the basis on which North Korea might be willing to negotiate. Is it the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula, which is the core of the Six-Party Talks and the stated objective of the United States, South Korea, Japan, and China? If so, there is a reason to engage – carefully. Or is it Pyongyang’s most recently enunciated point of departure – that Washington, et al., must accept it as a nuclear weapons state, with all the rights and benefits that that implies under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty? That is a non-starter, because it is a recipe for instability in Northeast Asia and for prolonged tension in the U.S. alliances with South Korea and Japan.

The goal of American policy has not been to secure talks for the sake of talks. It has been to induce Pyongyang to understand that it can only have a normal relationship with the international community if it credibly undertakes a fundamental change in policy: regarding nuclear weapons, its relations with South Korea, its role in the region, and its domestic system. North Korea’s latest and predictable shift to diplomacy does not in any way guarantee that change in policy (it may indicate, however, that sanctions are beginning to work). After its recent belligerence and before anyone rushes to the negotiating table, it is up to Pyongyang to demonstrate to Washington, Seoul, Tokyo, and Beijing that the leopard is indeed going to change its spots.

Authors

Richard C. Bush III

Image Source: © Reinhard Krause / Reuters

Obama’s National Security Speech and Pakistan

Bruce Riedel — Wed, 22 May 2013 10:22:00 -0400

On Thursday, President Obama plans to deliver a speech on national security and counterterrorism issues. The speech comes at a particularly awkward time in Pakistan, the epicenter of the global jihad for more than a decade. Nawaz Sharif has just been elected for an unprecedented third term in a nation extremely unhappy with America's counterterrorism policies, especially the drone war fought in its skies from bases in Afghanistan.

President Obama faces the challenge of defending his policies and explaining why they are needed. He must do this without further alienating an angry Pakistan and its newly elected civilian government which is struggling to find its own way to deal with the terror Frankenstein that threatens the world and Pakistan itself. It may be mission impossible. Despite years of drone attacks and the death of Osama bin Laden, Pakistan remains the base for the top three most wanted terrorists on the U.S. Most Wanted list: al Qaeda leader Ayman Zawahiri, Taliban chief Mullah Omar and Lashkar e Tayyiba (LeT) boss Hafez Saeed.

In fact, Omar and Saeed enjoy the patronship and protection of Pakistan's army. More global terror plots have originated in Pakistan than anywhere else since 9/11. Without the drones, there would be little or no pressure on the terror infrastructure in Pakistan. Despite over $25 billion in American economic and military aid since 9/11, the Pakistani authorities cannot be relied on to fight the danger posed by al Qaeda, the Afghan Taliban, or LeT. Obama recognized that fact when he sent the SEALs to kill bin Laden without telling any Pakistani official that we had found him hiding inside the highly secure Pakistani city of Abbottabad.

But Pakistan is also a victim of the terror monster it has coddled for decades. Over 45,000 Pakistanis have died in terror-related violence since 9/11, and dozens more died in the election campaign just ended. Sharif has pledged to seek a political solution to the violence. He has campaigned against the drones and faces a national consensus that wants them to end. His main opponent Imran Khan promised to shoot them down if elected (probably with American supplied F-16s).

Obama significantly expanded drone attacks in 2009 and many dangerous terrorists have been eliminated by them. The price has been to further alienate the Pakistani people. His speech this Thursday is not likely to please many in Pakistan. The already very difficult U.S.-Pakistan bilateral relationship is at a crucial juncture with the first ever transition from one elected Pakistani civilian government to another in the country's history after a full term in office. Reconciling our counter-terror mission with our interest in promoting democracy in Pakistan will not be easy. If it is impossible, then the fate of U.S. relations with the most dangerous country in the world is headed toward an even more deadly outcome.

Authors

Bruce Riedel

Image Source: © Larry Downing / Reuters

Barack Obama and China's Xi Jinping to Meet In California

Richard C. Bush III — Tue, 21 May 2013 11:37:00 -0400

Yesterday, the White House announced that President Obama will meet with China’s President Xi Jinping on June 7-8 in California. The announcement said that the two will hold “in-depth discussions on a wide range of bilateral, regional and global issues, . . . review progress and challenges in U.S.-China relations over the past four years and discuss ways to enhance cooperation, while constructively managing our differences, in the years ahead.”

Yet the purpose of this meeting is not to bargain or to solve specific problems, but to set a tone and create a sense of shared fate between the two leaders by allowing Obama and Xi to firmly establish a good personal relationship, a precondition for the successful conduct of their bilateral relations. The two got a start on that task last February, when Xi visited Washington as China’s vice-president. Two days in California allows both more time and an informal environment for each to talk about his domestic challenges and visions for the future, about his country’s role in the international system and how US-China relations fits with all of this.

Such an interchange is particularly important because each president sits atop a complex and sprawling governmental system that is not easy to monitor or control. This is one of the reasons for recent frictions between the two countries. Their California encounter meeting provides Xi and Obama the opportunity to identify and enlarge the areas of overlap in the interests of their two countries, and then, when they return to their capitals, to set priorities in their systems accordingly. Having seen the value of creating this opportunity, they should seize it.

Authors

Richard C. Bush III

The Week After Pakistan's General Election

Madiha Afzal — Mon, 20 May 2013 15:07:00 -0400

The week after May 11, all Pakistanis can stand tall and be proud of what they have accomplished. We have shown that we are among the bravest citizens of any country in the world, participating in massive rallies leading up to the election, and turning out to vote on election day in record numbers, despite the Taliban threats and violence. We were also decisive, handing the PML-N a landslide victory, yielding the PPP a massive blow and giving third-party status to the PTI.

While a small number of results may turn out to be affected by vote rigging and irregularities, these election results truly reflect the voice of the Pakistani people. My research using election results and development funds data from the 1990s shows that Pakistani voters are not irrational: they will vote for the candidate or party, who provides them the most benefits, and against those they see as having wronged them. For its resounding victory, the PML-N deserves nothing but congratulations, genuine goodwill and support for tackling the monumental tasks it faces. Nawaz Sharif has shown maturity in his last five years in the opposition and exudes determination going forward. These characteristics will serve him well in office.

Imran Khan deserves accolades for energising Pakistan’s vocal urban youth, as well as many older, educated, and previously politically unengaged urbanites in turning out to vote. As such, the increase in voter turnout to around 60 per cent must, at least, partly be attributed to his efforts. The PTI is now a formidable third party in Pakistan, fundamentally changing the structure of the Pakistani party system and democracy as we know it. According to my calculations based on data from the Election Commission of Pakistan’s (ECP) website (as of May 16), of Punjab’s 138 National Assembly constituencies where the PTI was not the winner (it won eight National Assembly seats in Punjab) and where results were not withheld, the second runner-up candidate belonged to the PTI in 48 constituencies. That is an impressive achievement, one which the PTI and Mr Khan must be very proud of. It demonstrates that the PTI has made considerable inroads in Punjab.

The passion of Mr Khan’s followers in documenting and protesting vote-rigging, ballot stuffing and other illegal activities at polling stations over the last week also deserves commendation and heralds the arrival of a Naya Pakistan, one in which citizens speak up when they are wronged, a Pakistan which demands fairness and justice.

The passion of Mr Khan’s followers in documenting and protesting vote-rigging, ballot stuffing and other illegal activities at polling stations over the last week also deserves commendation and heralds the arrival of a Naya Pakistan, one in which citizens speak up when they are wronged, a Pakistan which demands fairness and justice. Mr Khan’s appeal to the ECP to look into vote-rigging in 25 constituencies should be taken very seriously, whether it changes the results of the election in his favour or not. Regardless of whether ballot-stuffing happened in four constituencies or 40, it is illegal, and a truly fair electoral system should tolerate no instance of it.

But let’s talk for a minute about where the PTI did very well — Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. Mr Khan’s party won 17 out of its 27 National Assembly seats there, and a plurality in the K-P provincial assembly, winning 35 seats out of 99. Mr Khan’s supporters on social media have hailed the Pashtuns as visionaries, as being more progressive than the rest of Pakistan. Photographs of a modern Peshawar skyline in 2018 as the outcome of five years of a provincial PTI government are doing the rounds. But are the Pashtuns really the idealists they are being made out to be, the path-breakers to a Naya Pakistan? What about the role of the Taliban in all this?

The truth is a lot less romantic than the PTI stalwarts would proclaim. We know that the PTI is the only party that was able to effectively campaign in K-P given the Taliban’s brutal and unrelenting assault on the ANP. True, the ANP faced a disadvantage as the incumbent provincial government, which supervised over a terrible five years in K-P. Nevertheless, it is astounding that it got no sympathy for the bullets and the bombs it took for Pakistani democracy. Not from the voters of K-P, and not from the active PTI protesters who were out at Teen Talwar and Lalik Chowk protesting alleged election fraud in Karachi and Lahore. What do these newly mobilised youth think of the fact that the Taliban essentially handed the K-P to the PTI?

Regionalism and provincialism, already reflected in the election results, have become even more pronounced in this past week as blame is assigned for not embracing Mr Khan’s vision, and class fissures have opened up. The Punjabis are being maligned by PTI supporters outside Punjab for being misguided, and rural Punjabis denigrated by urban Punjabis for being irrational. No one is thinking of Balochistan at all, where turnout was dismal amid security concerns. The truth is that the PTI energised and engaged a minority, the urban young, who did not, in the end, garner it significant voting power in parliament.

This is not to discount by any means the notable performance of the PTI candidates as runners-up in Punjab’s constituencies. But the irony is that those who got the PTI over the finish line are the residents of K-P, a very different segment from the elite Lahore and Karachi base, who consider themselves the PTI’s face. In the end, the illusion generated by massive rallies in Lahore and Islamabad belied the truth that the PTI represented but a minority of Pakistan’s population. Mr Khan led an extraordinary campaign, and over the next five years, he can make significant inroads where he does not yet have a base: in rural Punjab and in Sindh and Balochistan.

Authors

Madiha Afzal

Publication: Tribune

Premier Li Keqiang of China Goes to India

Tanvi Madan — Sat, 18 May 2013 14:00:00 -0400

On Sunday, Chinese premier Li Keqiang heads out from Beijing for his first visit abroad in that role. His first stop: India. He’s probably wishing the trip had taken place about a month and a half ago. At that time, there was a sense in India that the new leadership in China was reaching out to India for a number of reasons. Over the last month, however, temperatures rose in the Himalayas, as the long festering China-India boundary dispute flared once again. The good news for those interested in stable Sino-Indian relations: the two governments seem to have got past the recent incident. They continued to communicate throughout the crisis. Pre-scheduled China-India talks on Afghanistan were held in the midst of the crisis—their first such dialogue focused on the subject. Chinese and Indian military officers held a border meeting. The Indian foreign minister traveled to Beijing. And Li’s visit is going ahead. The bad news: The border incident reinforced the mistrust that many in India feel toward China and its intentions. Furthermore, it was a reminder that despite increased engagement, bilateral differences have the potential to stall, if not, reverse progress toward more stable relations. Li’s challenge: to get the relationship back on a positive trajectory and begin to convince a skeptical Indian public that the border incident was not representative of the new Chinese leadership’s approach toward India. Overall, the premier has his work cut out for him.

Before mid-April, many observers of Sino-Indian relations noted that under the new Chinese leadership there seemed to be an “upswing in relations.” Chinese president Xi Jinping proposed a five-point formula to improve ties with India. The two countries agreed to discuss Afghanistan. “Positive vibes” were detected at Xi’s subsequent meeting with Indian prime minister Manmohan Singh on the sidelines of the BRICS summit in Durban. The Chinese government indicated that Li soon planned to travel to India.

This trend did not surprise observers. After all, there were enough reasons for Beijing to seek a stable relationship with India: economic ties, cooperation in the multilateral realm and a desire to limit India’s burgeoning relationships with the U.S. and Japan (reports indicated that Chinese officials were eager for the premier to visit India before the Indian prime minister headed to Tokyo in late May), as well as other countries in the region. There were also reasons for the political leadership not to want the relationship with India to deteriorate: such as preoccupation with China’s eastern maritime disputes and the North Korean situation, as well as the need for stability in the region with the impending American withdrawal from Afghanistan.

What did surprise observers was the border incident. Former U.S. deputy secretary of state James Steinberg, who was in India as the crisis played out, said “I don't know what the Chinese leadership is up to…confronting India and Japan, especially when they have been trying to build strong bilateral relations...The Chinese leadership should understand, it will not benefit them in the long run.” The opacity of Chinese decision-making meant that various theories were floated about why Chinese troops had taken the unusual step of setting up camp across the Line of Actual Control (LAC): differing perceptions of the LAC; “a rush of testosterone by local officers;” in response to India building up its border infrastructure; the desire of the People's Liberation Army to assert authority; the result of an internal political power struggle; Chinese expansionism; or Chinese strategic designs against India. One observer contended that a clear motive was near impossible to pinpoint: that “Chinese foreign policy is an enigma wrapped in a mystery.”

Since the resolution of the crisis, Beijing has tried to press a “reset” button, trying to return the relationship to its pre-crisis trajectory. The Chinese ambassador to India unusually took to the editorial pages of an Indian newspaper to emphasize, “To strengthen good-neighbourly and friendly cooperation with India is China’s strategic choice and established policy which will not change.” Chinese officials indicated that greater efforts should be made toward a boundary settlement.

The Chinese government also signaled that the choice of India as the premier’s first stop was very deliberate and a sign of the importance Beijing placed in the Sino-Indian relationship. Hosting an Indian youth delegation, Li put a personal spin on the choice, noting the “the seeds of friendship sown” when he visited India 27 years ago—a trip that he said left a “lasting impact.” Beyond trying to win hearts and minds, he also seemed to want to appeal to Indians’ pocketbooks, talking about the economic benefits of greater ties. Finally, he pointedly mentioned experiencing the “warmth and hospitality of Indian people.”

That hospitality will certainly be forthcoming on the part of key policymakers in the Indian government. Delhi has its own reasons for seeking stable relations with Beijing. Thus, Indian officials had joined their Chinese counterparts in playing down the border incident and seeking to resolve it speedily. Since it’s been resolved, both sides have sought to highlight their success in defusing the crisis, pointing to that as a sign of progress in the relationship. During that visit, they will work toward agreement on certain issues. Expectations are that there will be developments on the economic front. China-India watchers will also be looking for any sign of progress on the border and Brahmaputra river issues.

Among the Indian public, the welcome for Li is likely to be cooler. The recent tensions at the border—heavily covered in the Indian media—reinforced negative impressions of China among many in the Indian public. Many—even beyond the public—will take with a larger grain of salt the new Chinese leadership’s assurance that it intends for China to rise peacefully, be a responsible state, and seek good relations with India. The crisis has reinforced the narrative that has prevailed in many quarters since the 1962 China-India war: that China only understands strength; that while Beijing’s leaders say China and India “must shake hands,” they cannot be trusted—that one hand held out might just be a precursor to the other stabbing one in the back.

The border incident has also kept the focus on bilateral differences and even beyond the border issues there are many of those: China’s growing political and economic ties with India’s neighbors, its Indian Ocean ambitions, the overall lack of trust, cyber-security concerns, Tibet, the diversion of the waters of the Brahmaputra, a trade imbalance and restricted market access in China for Indian companies, the sense that China does not respect India and/or that it will seek to prevent India’s rise and, significantly, China’s relationship with Pakistan, which, of course, is Li’s second stop.

The incident also seemed to strengthen the hands of those inside and outside government who are skeptical of China’s intentions towards India and weakened the voices of those urging engagement with that country. Furthermore, the crisis negatively affected the credibility of the Indian government on issues related to security broadly and China in particular. This matters because significant bilateral progress on crucial fronts will require concessions from both sides—concessions that might now be harder for the Indian government to sell on its side.

Overall, that’s a lot of mistrust and skepticism to turn around in one visit. But if Li Keqiang wants to see the relationship prosper, the trip is a good time to start trying on two fronts. First, substance: progress on key issues will go a long way in building trust. Second, style: Li should take the opportunity to introduce himself and reintroduce the new Chinese leadership not just to Indian government officials and private sector leaders, but also to the Indian public—for it might be tempting to dismiss public sentiments, but they will play a key role in setting the limits of the relationship.

Authors

Tanvi Madan

Image Source: © China Daily China Daily Information Corp - CDIC / Reuters

John Kerry’s Indian Image: Moving American Policymakers Beyond "Pro" and "Anti" India

Tanvi Madan — Fri, 17 May 2013 15:17:00 -0400

Later this summer, US Secretary of State John Kerry will visit India for the US-India Strategic Dialogue. Before and during his visit, many observers in India will likely try to assess whether Kerry is "pro-" or "anti-" India. This is not surprising. In the narrative of US-India relations, there has always been a hall of fame and a hall of shame. Praise was heaped upon "heroes" — such as President John F. Kennedy and US ambassadors to India Chester Bowles, John Kenneth Galbraith and Robert Blackwill — for being pro-India. President Richard Nixon and secretaries of state John Foster Dulles and Henry Kissinger found themselves on the anti-India "villains" list. More recently, Kerry and Secretary of Defence Chuck Hagel have been labelled anti-India or pro-Pakistan. However, this focus on whether policymakers are pro- or anti-India is limiting at best and harmful at worst. It can lead to an exaggerated view of the extent of the impact of one individual's personal bias and obscure more complex motivations and drivers of policymaking.

Conclusions about policymakers' biases have often been based on one or more statements made or one or two high-profile decisions taken. It is crucial, however, to focus on individuals' track records. Take Nixon. He has often been tagged as anti-India. In the early-to-mid 1950s, when he was vice-president, Nixon indeed had little patience for non-alignment and was a proponent of military aid to Pakistan. By 1957, however, he was internally arguing for greater economic aid to India. He made his view public too, asserting that "what happens in India... could be as important or could be even more important in the long run, than what happens in the negotiations with regard to Berlin."

In 1967, long before people were talking about the next century being an Asian century, Nixon also laid out the importance of Asia and how that continent's future would largely be shaped by four "giants" — China, India, Japan and the US. Writing at a time when there was much pessimism in the US about India and the Indira Gandhi government, Nixon noted with sympathy that India's "present leaders at least are trying... in exceedingly difficult circumstances" to move forward and doing so in a democratic context. Once in power, his administration did make the infamous one-time exception to provide military assistance to Pakistan, but he vetoed recommendations for a larger, more sustained package.

The pro/ anti-India narrative also does little to explain change. Why, in 1972-73, did Nixon and Kissinger work to rebuild the relationship with an India they disliked? Or, why did policy towards India change over the course of the Clinton administration with a similar set of policymakers? The narrative also assumes individuals' views stem from an inherent dislike or love for India, rather than circumstances or worldviews. It does not often recognise that individuals can change — and that Indian words and actions can shape views of India. Biographers of Indira Gandhi proclaim, often approvingly, that she treated Nixon badly in 1967, without any consideration of whether that treatment might have affected his views of India and her.

Furthermore, the narrative cannot explain how policymakers can make some statements and decisions that are "pro" India and others that are not. As Rajeev Sharma has noted in the case of Kerry, and Dhruva Jaishankar on Hagel, one can identify instances when these supposedly "not-India-friendly" individuals have supported legislation helpful to India — the India-US nuclear deal, for example.

In narratives of India-US relations, these simplistic conclusions are not restricted to depictions of US policymakers. Nehru is often portrayed as anti-US, even though he was perhaps the first to use the term "natural partners" to describe the bilateral relationship. Others insist on identifying Indira Gandhi as pro-Soviet, ignoring instances such as her resisting for two years her advisers' entreaties to sign an India-Soviet treaty.

This is not to say that personalities don't matter. They do, but their role needs to be put in context. They can facilitate cooperation or exacerbate conflict. They can help determine the policy option chosen. Personal relationships, too, matter. However, personalities are not the only factor — or often the primary one — determining policy and consideration of their role should go beyond discussions of the pro- or anti-Indianness of particular policymakers.

The pro/ anti India narrative often neglects to consider whether and how much the "pro" or "anti" policymaker influences policy broadly, and policy towards in India in particular. Cabinet members' or ambassadors' roles and influence are not the same as those of presidents. Moreover, it sometimes overlooks actors involved in shaping policy and the policy debate outside the White House and state department.

Instead of focusing on whether key policymakers are anti- or pro-India, it would be more worthwhile to assess which individuals are making policy; their role and influence in the policymaking process, especially relative to other policymakers, and their proximity to the president; and the nature of interaction between policymakers. Furthermore, it is crucial to analyse the worldviews of key actors; their perception of US interests and preferred strategy for achieving them; whether they see a role for India in that strategy and, if they do, is it as potential spoiler or supporter. Finally, it is essential to think about what India can do to build enough constituencies for the relationship in the US and ensure its own importance so that bilateral relations do not depend on — and are not thought to revolve around — one or two individuals.

Authors

Tanvi Madan

Publication: The Indian Express

Image Source: © B Mathur / Reuters

American Foreign Policy in Retreat? A Discussion with Vali Nasr

Tue, 14 May 2013 09:30:00 -0400

Event Information

May 14, 2013
9:30 AM - 11:00 AM EDT

Falk Auditorium
Brookings Institution
1775 Massachusetts Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20036

For the past decade, a debate has raged about the future of American power and foreign policy engagement. In his new book, The Dispensable Nation: American Foreign Policy in Retreat (Knopf Doubleday Publishing, 2013), Brookings Nonresident Senior Fellow Vali Nasr questions America’s choice to lessen its foreign policy engagement around the world. Nasr argues that after taking office in 2009, the Obama administration let fears of terrorism and political backlash confine its policies to that of the previous administration, instead of seizing the opportunity to fundamentally reshape American foreign policy over the past four years. Meanwhile, China and Russia – rivals to American influence globally – were quietly expanding their influence in places where the U.S. has long held sway. Nasr argues that the Obama administration’s foreign policy decision making could have potentially dangerous outcomes, and, what’s more, sells short America’s power and role in the world.

On May 14, Foreign Policy at Brookings hosted Vali Nasr for a discussion on the state of U.S. power globally and whether American foreign policy under the Obama administration is in retreat. Brookings Senior Fellow Robert Kagan joined the discussion, which was moderated by Vice President Martin Indyk, director of Foreign Policy.

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American Foreign Policy in Retreat? A Discussion with Vali Nasr

Nawaz Sharif, Pakistan’s Comeback Kid

Bruce Riedel — Tue, 14 May 2013 09:12:00 -0400

Nawaz Sharif is the comeback kid of Pakistani politics. With his party’s electoral victory, he is poised to become prime minister for an unprecedented third time. The Sharif odyssey has been remarkable—but now we will see if he can convert his victory into a new beginning for his deeply troubled country and our own tortured relations with it.

The 63-year-old Nawaz Sharif was born into money as the scion of a very wealthy family in Lahore. He entered politics to protect the family’s industry from nationalization. In the 1980s he became a protégé of Pakistan’s third military dictator, Zia ul Huq, and became the dominant politician in the country’s richest and most populous province, the Punjab. In 1990 Sharif was elected prime minister after his great rival, Benazir Bhutto, was booted out by the military.

I first got to know Sharif when I was President George Bush’s Director for South Asia and Persian Gulf Affairs in the White House in the early 1990s. Sharif was America’s partner in trying to wind down the decade-old war in Afghanistan against the Soviet-backed communist government that had outlived the defeat of the Soviet 40th Red Army in 1988, and was still clinging to power in Kabul. Unfortunately, when the communist government finally did collapse in 1992, it only ushered in a vicious civil war among the victorious mujahedin. Pakistan was left to deal with the consequences on its own as America abandoned Afghanistan to its fate. And Sharif lost power in 1993 to Benazir Bhutto.

He was elected back to a second term as prime minister in 1997. A year later he tested Pakistan’s nuclear weapons after India tested its first. As President Clinton’s Special Assistant for Near East and South Asia Affairs, I tried to persuade Sharif not to follow India’s path, but to no avail. In 1999 Sharif’s hand-picked Chief of Army Staff, General Pervez Musharraf, exploded a détente Sharif had arranged with India by starting a war in Kashmir. Normally very shy, Sharif invited himself to the White House on July 4, 1999, to find a way out, and wisely agreed to Clinton’s demand that Pakistan unilaterally abandon the war Musharraf had orchestrated. Sharif’s decision averted a wider—and very possibly nuclear—war.

Sharif fired Musharraf on October 12, 1999, while the general was visiting Sri Lanka. The general refused to step down and instead orchestrated a coup and arrested Sharif. A military court was summoned to try Sharif for treason. Only in Pakistan could a legitimately-elected prime minister be labeled a traitor for firing the country’s top general—a general who Sharif had selected for the job in the first place. Many expected Musharraf to have Sharif executed, just as Zia ul Huq had executed Benazir Bhutto’s father, Zulfikar Bhutto.

Clinton tasked me with saving Sharif’s life. The president believed Sharif did not deserve death, and that it would be a disaster for Pakistan to execute another elected leader after a military coup. I spent a great deal of time arguing for clemency with the Pakistani ambassador in Washington. The ambassador was sympathetic to the argument—but I needed more help. The Saudi ambassador to Washington at the time, Prince Bandar, provided the heavy lifting.

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia also did not want a repeat of the Zia-Zulfi nightmare. Then Crown Prince Abdallah used the Kingdom’s considerable influence in Pakistan to save Sharif. Saudi Arabia is Pakistan’s closest ally, and has given more financial aid to Pakistan than to any other country in the world. Abdallah asked Musharraf to let Sharif go into exile in Saudi Arabia. As Musharraf later wrote in his memoirs, it was an offer he could not refuse. After 14 months in prison, Sharif went into exile in the Kingdom in December 2000. Few expected him to ever return home.

Now the tables have turned. Sharif has won a massive electoral victory and his long time tormentor, Musharraf, is under arrest in Pakistan after returning from his own exile to run in the elections. Musharraf was ousted by popular pressure in 2008, became a billionaire in exile in London, and then foolishly decided he was Pakistan’s savior this winter and decided to go home to be swept back into power by the people. He miscalculated badly. No one in Pakistan wanted the self-appointed savior, and he is now under house arrest. He faces a number of charges and could be tried for the coup he orchestrated against Sharif. The irony is rich.

But Sharif faces a real challenge over what to do with Musharraf. The general has few supporters even in the army, but the officer corps will be very uncomfortable with the prospect of one of its own serving prison time, or worse. Since many of the senior commanders in the army today, including Chief of Army Staff Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, are former Musharraf protégés who rose with him to power, the question of what to do with Musharraf now is a dangerous challenge. The courts will decide his fate but the next prime minister’s voice will matter.

Deciding how to handle the Musharraf affair is only one of Sharif’s huge challenges. The country is under siege by some of the extremists it nurtured during the wars in Afghanistan. Some 45,000 Pakistanis have died in extremist terrorism since 2001, and violence wracked the election. Sharif has urged a political process to try to end the terror, and has been widely accused of being too soft on the Pakistani Taliban. He has long coddled Pakistan’s most dangerous terrorist group, Lashkar e Tayyiba, which carried out the Mumbai massacre in 2008 and which has its headquarters in Sharif’s home city of Lahore. LeT retains very close links to the army and the intelligence service, the ISI.

Nonetheless, Sharif has also promised to turn a page in Pakistan’s relations with India and has invited Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to his inauguration. As an industrialist billionaire, Sharif knows the Pakistani economy desperately needs more trade and investment from its far more vibrant Indian neighbor. Pakistan’s economy is in shambles, and half the people in the country are under 15 with little hope for a decent education or a good job. Sharif is not obsessed with rivalry with India like his generals; his vision of Pakistan is more about building highways and mass transit than an arms race Pakistan cannot win. In the campaign, he promised that he will build a fast bullet train line linking the port city of Karachi to the northern city of Peshawar. When last in the prime minister’s office, he built a modern highway to link Lahore to Islamabad.

America’s relations with Pakistan are at an all-time low, yet Washington provides huge quantities of military and economic aid to Pakistan: over $25 billion since 2001. We are on opposite sides of the war in Afghanistan where Pakistan and the ISI are the Afghan Taliban’s key ally, even as we depend on Pakistan for the vital supply line that allows us to withdraw our heavy equipment from Afghanistan as we transition out of the country by 2014. Inside Pakistan, our drones fly daily missions looking for al Qaeda— missions Sharif promised to try to halt during the campaign. He did not endorse his rival Imran Khan’s call to shoot down American drones (probably with American-supplied F-16s) but he will face much popular demand to end the drone war.

Two presidents, Bush and Clinton, worked with Sharif with mixed results during his two previous tours as prime minister. Now that the comeback kid of Pakistani politics is on the verge of his third time in the top office, President Barack Obama will need to partner with Sharif. It’s an opportunity Obama needs to make a success.

Authors

Bruce Riedel

Publication: The Daily Beast

Image Source: © Goran Tomasevic / Reuters

The U.S., China and Africa: Pursuing Trilateral Dialogue and Action

Mon, 13 May 2013 14:30:00 -0400

Event Information

May 13, 2013
2:30 PM - 4:30 PM EDT

Falk Auditorium
Brookings Institution
1775 Massachusetts Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20036

With six of the ten fastest growing economies in world, sub-Saharan Africa is attracting both American and Chinese investors. The growing importance of sub-Saharan Africa to the global economy has made the region a focal point for the differing policies of the United States and China. China recently pledged significant financing to Africa over the three year period from 2012-2014, while the U.S. looks to extend the Africa Growth and Opportunity Act ahead of schedule. Despite the opportunities and growth in the region, the U.S., China and Africa all face shared and separate challenges in the areas of security, trade, investment, foreign policy, and natural resource extraction and management.

On May 13, the Africa Growth Initiative and the John L. Thornton China Center at Brookings, with the Institute for Statistical, Social, and Economic Research at the University of Ghana and the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in Beijing, hosted a discussion to examine the relationships among the U.S., China and African states. This forum was the first in a series, which brings a balanced perspective to the examination of the challenges and opportunities for trilateral dialogue and action.

Mitigating Natural Disasters, Promoting Development: The Sendai Dialogue and Disaster Risk Management in Asia

Fri, 10 May 2013 10:00:00 -0400

Event Information

May 10, 2013
10:00 AM - 5:00 PM EDT

Falk Auditorium
Brookings Institution
1775 Massachusetts Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20036

The Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami of March 11, 2011 (3/11) had both immediate and long-term consequences. Over 20,000 people lost their lives in the triple disaster, hundreds of thousands were displaced and the economic costs were the highest ever to result from a natural disaster. Since the disaster, however, both Japan and the international community have sought to learn from this tragedy by drawing lessons for preventing, responding to, and rebuilding after natural disasters. Specifically, the Government of Japan and the World Bank launched the Sendai Dialogue in October 2012 as a way to re-conceptualize the role of disaster risk management (DRM) in development strategies, emphasizing the importance of building resilience against natural disasters.

On May 10, the Center for Northeast Asian Policy Studies and the Brookings-LSE Project on Internal Displacement co-hosted a discussion featuring experts on natural disasters and disaster risk management from the United States and Asia. Panelists representing the private, public, and international sectors sought to refine some of the topics considered at the Sendai Dialogue. They identified the lessons learned from 3/11; how these lessons can be applied to overseas economic assistance programs, focusing on DRM; the specific challenges of disaster risk management among Asian countries; and how DRM can be integrated and mainstreamed into development assistance across different platforms.

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Transcript

Uncorrected Transcript (.pdf)

Event Materials

Can Imran Khan Ride to Victory?

Madiha Afzal — Thu, 09 May 2013 17:27:00 -0400

With election day almost upon us, and with Imran Khan certainly enjoying momentum, the outcome of the May 11 election is anybody’s guess. Will Pakistan’s next government be led by the PML-N, by a PPP-led coalition, or a PTI-led coalition? Why do we have no idea what to expect? The main reason is that election campaigns are short and frenzied in Pakistan, with little time for polling (in contrast, the US presidential campaign, for example, lasts nearly two years, including the primaries). In addition, surveys are conducted at the national level, and are, therefore, largely meaningless in predicting outcomes in Pakistan’s parliamentary democracy. Surveys in Pakistan need to be undertaken at the electoral constituency level in order to have predictive power.

In this election, two additional factors have compounded the usual electoral uncertainty. The first is the emergence of the PTI as a serious third-party contender in a country where politics has hitherto been dominated by only two parties, effectively changing the landscape as we know it. Imran Khan has energised a disenchanted voting population, and voter turnout is expected to be higher than in previous elections. The second factor is demographic: specifically, the youth vote. There are 35 million new voters on the rolls in this election, most of them between the ages of 18 and 25.

Having mentioned the unknowns, it is worth better understanding what we do know. It is widely understood that there is a national-level incumbency disadvantage in Pakistani politics, with the PPP and the PML-N’s alternating stints in power in the 1990s. A national level incumbency disadvantage is to be expected this year, with approximately 91 per cent of the population dissatisfied with the way things are currently going in the country. The constituency-level roots of this national effect are not well-known. During the course of my work, using constituency-level election results data from 1988 to 1997, I show that incumbent MNAs who were elected by relatively small margins face a large incumbency disadvantage i.e., they are much less likely to be elected in the next election than candidates who previously lost by a small margin.

What does this empirical fact mean for the 2013 election? The biggest implication is that Mr Khan’s party may have a chance on May 11, since, all else equal, people are really voting against two incumbent parties this year i.e., against the national-level government of the PPP, and against the provincial Punjab government of the PML-N. Discussions with PTI supporters certainly bear out this hypothesis — their vote is as much a vote for Imran as a vote against the other parties. In addition, Mr Khan’s party platform and campaign of a Naya Pakistan is, in a word (or two), anti-status quo. His campaign has also effectively used some pages from US President Barack Obama’s social media strategy during his first electoral campaign, championing ‘change’.

What about the high-ranking and powerful PML-N and PPP candidates, those who are long-standing politicians? They are unlikely to be replaced by a PTI newcomer. On the other hand, any relatively weak candidates from these parties need to be very worried. But, one may counter, Imran Khan’s appeal need not translate to each candidate his party has fielded for election across Pakistan’s electoral constituencies. I would argue that in these constituencies, if the vote is truly a vote against the PPP and the PML-N candidates and a vote for the PTI, candidate identities largely will not matter. This is not unthinkable in a country where party trumps candidate identity at important points (such as when candidates cross party lines to move away from the unpopular incumbent party).

In a country rife with ethnic, sectarian, provincial, class and political conflicts and on a downward spiral, Mr Khan represents the one source of passionate unity for the country — cricket — and a true source of national pride: the leader of the 1992 cricket World Cup victory. Given this, he has truly picked an ingenious party symbol with the bat. He has also run a tireless campaign, culminating in his chilling fall on May 7. Whether or not his efforts will pan out, we will know soon.

There is hope for an Imran Khan victory, and with it, a renewal of lost confidence regarding the power of the vote. There is a palpable energy in the air, similar to Benazir Bhutto’s election to power in 1988. But let’s not forget that a violent and bloody campaign led to this historic election. The attacks against the ANP and the MQM have reshaped the electoral map and restricted the field of candidacy. In fact, we have seen disqualification of candidates similar to the 2002 election with the laws limiting candidacy instituted by General (retd) Pervez Musharraf, except this time, instead of Musharraf, the Taliban are (literally) calling the shots. This is a situation far from ideal and hardly represents a flourishing democracy. But a strong vote for Mr Khan will reassure many that a Naya Pakistan may yet be possible.

It is ironic that the very existence of an incumbency disadvantage that Mr Khan may ride to a victory has harmful consequences. For legislators on the margin, who know they will be voted out in the next election, an incumbency disadvantage is likely to create incentives for extraction and corruption. But this all rides on the politician’s expectation of being voted out. That may no longer exist if Pakistan sees a political sea-change in the election of the PTI.

Authors

Madiha Afzal

Publication: The Express Tribune

Counter-Terrorism and Emergency Management: Keeping a Proper Balance

Jibum Chung — Tue, 07 May 2013 12:16:00 -0400

Counter-terrorism strategies and tactics are rightly in the consciousness of officials and civilians in the wake of the Boston Marathon bombing. While preventing future attacks should be a leading priority for government at all levels, officials must take care not to focus only on the threat of terrorist attacks. Doing so could diminish the resources, preparation, and skills needed for management of other disasters, and therefore result in greater risk to the population.

Psychology of terrorism

The major characteristic of contemporary terrorism is its unexpectedness. The time and manner of attacks are unpredictable and catch targeted communities – normally innocent civilians – by surprise. In the past, targets of were often political and symbolic figures, not the general public, and the perpetrators proudly notified who they were and why they had acted. The purposes and targets of contemporary terrorism, on the other hand, are often very unclear. Terrorists attack innocent civilians indiscriminately without prior notification, making attacks more difficult to prevent.

Even though the physical damage from terror attacks is normally smaller than that from large natural disasters, the psychological damage of such terror attacks is significant. Early research performed by Paul Slovic and others in 1980s delved into this concept of psychological damage. Using psychometric methodologies, they defined several important characteristics of many different forms of risk. At that time, in the wake of the Three Mile Island (TMI) nuclear power plant accident in 1979, their main research target was nuclear power plants. Slovic underlined the importance of psychological effects of risk stating that “despite the fact that not a single person died (in the TMI accident), … no other accident in our history has produced such costly societal impacts.”[1] Reminiscent of today’s terror attacks, they concluded that the nuclear risk is unknown, dread, uncontrollable, involuntary, and likely to affect future generations, so it has a very critical impact on the minds of the general public. Contemporary terrorism shares many of these characteristics: it is usually unknown, frightening, uncontrollable, involuntary, and also indiscriminately fatal to even children (future generations). It surely has significant psychological effects on people’s minds.

Terrorism and media

For the news media, terrorism is a very strong “product” which easily attracts a lot of viewers. Most media aggressively sell the product, terrorism, and help sow fear as people enthusiastically consume the product. In a seminal work on the “social amplification of risk,” Roger Kasperson and colleagues[2] described how the public perception of risk interacts with social and cultural systems (such as the media) and can be amplified during the information delivery process, sometimes resulting in “institutionalized fear.” This amplification process can eventually generate certain public behaviors, some negative and some positive, and may result in disruptions in society. Obviously, some risks are more likely to be amplified than others. Terrorism, because of its special characteristics, is easily amplified. Also, today’s social network communication technologies, such as Facebook and Twitter, can accelerate and strengthen the amplification process.

Thus, the media focus and public concerns create political pressure, and national emergency management policymakers prioritize counter–terrorism, or “civil defense,” over other forms of risk management, such as “civil protection” against all hazards including natural disasters.

Civil defense again?

Culturally and historically, “civil defense” is quite different from “civil protection.” Civil defense, “born out of wartime efforts to organize air-raid precautions, sheltering arrangements and alarms for non-combatants,” has military origins and focuses on protection against foreign military attacks.[3] Civil protection, on the other hand, has disaster origins and focuses on many forms of natural and man-made disasters and other public safety issues. In the Cold War era, civil defense against nuclear attack was the main objective of national emergency management in the United States. At that time, nuclear attack was an “institutionalized fear” made by media and government authorities. Many American homes and public buildings prepared nuclear fallout shelters, illustrating this fear very clearly.

Following the end of Cold War and recognition of the increasing trend of large man-made and natural disasters, “civil protection” gradually replaced the term “civil defense” in most countries. Civil protection focuses more on generic disasters than on the armed aggression, and administratively it is more decentralized than civil defense. In the United States, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) was established in 1979. It was mainly a civil defense organization during the Cold War, but in the last two decades has worked to redirect some resources toward the management of various disasters (civil protection). James Witt, director of FEMA under President Clinton, clarified this change of direction. As the FEMA website explains, “the end of the Cold War also allowed Witt to redirect more of FEMA's limited resources from civil defense into disaster relief, recovery and mitigation programs.”[4] FEMA also introduced an “all hazards approach,” recognizing the many different kinds of disasters that may require mitigation, preparedness, response, and recovery.

The September 11, 2001 terror attack dramatically changed the direction of emergency management in the United States. After the attack, the United States hastily constructed the Department of Homeland Security and downgraded FEMA, whose main duty was civil protection. This attracted criticism from some public administration experts that the U.S. government concentrated too much on terrorism, perhaps because of the “social amplification” of the risk in the wake of the attack, despite the many other critical risks facing U.S. citizens. Basically, the critics charged, the United States changed the direction of its emergency management from civil protection back to Cold War-style civil defense.

Balance collapsed in emergency management

The cost of that shift in priorities was on full display when Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans in 2005, easily destroying the weak levee system and submerging much of New Orleans under water. Federal and local governments’ mitigation, response and recovery to the Hurricane Katrina were mostly inadequate – resulting in the most severe disaster damage in U.S. history at that time. Due to budget cuts, the Army Corps of Engineers had been unable to strengthen the levee system protecting New Orleans. After the flooding and other damage occurred, the governments’ disaster situation awareness was poor. Communication among authorities and between authorities and civilians was broken. Assistance from the federal government was delayed and insufficient, and people died while awaiting rescue or other assistance. Critics also charged that too many government officials were not familiar with the “National Response Plan” which was implemented in December 2004 after 9/11 terrorist attack. Planning and training for large natural disasters were insufficient after the implementation of the plan. In short, too great a focus on counter-terrorism undermined capacities for natural disaster mitigation, response, and recovery in the post-9/11 United States.

This not only the case in the United States, however. The United Kingdom experienced a similar transition after the 7/7 London bombings in 2005, in which suicide attacks by four home-grown terrorists killed 55 civilians. In response, the U.K. government introduced several measures such as the Prevention of Terrorism Bill. Critics said that some responses to the attacks were anti-liberal, militarizing, and centralizing, and were in the wrong direction from the viewpoint of an all hazards approach. The problem, as one observer wrote, was that “too great a focus on one type of threat and on institutional preparedness can divert attention away from other problematic areas and distance the public.”[5]

In South Korea, the provocations of North Korea can divert the direction of national emergency management. South Korea had been under a thorough civil defense-oriented culture since the end of the Korean War in 1953. All citizens, for example, must participate in compulsory civil defense training preparing for military attacks from North Korea, and there is a military service requirement for men.

The mood of reconciliation that developed on the Korean Peninsula during the post-Cold War Kim Dae-jung and Roh Moo-hyun administrations (1998-2008) changed the direction of Korean emergency management policies, highlighted by the 2004 establishment of the South Korean National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) by the Roh Moo-hyun administration. Large disasters such as Typhoon Rusa in 2002 and the Daegu subway accident in 2004 demanded a comprehensive emergency management system that can manage the all types of hazards, not only a military attack by North Korea. South Korea is gradually replacing its civil defense culture with one of civil protection. The Lee Myung-bak administration (2008-2013) established the Ministry of Public Administration and Security (MOPAS) in 2008. MOPAS enlarged the scope of disaster management to include fostering a safety culture and anticipating future disasters induced by climate change. The Ministry has proposed civil protection strategies such as promoting public safety awareness, strengthening leadership of local governments, and promoting participation of private companies in disaster preparation and mitigation. Also, MOPAS pushed ahead several projects like the “Safe City” initiative that tries to enhance the safety level of local communities by encouraging the participation of various local stakeholders in preparation, mitigation, and response planning an activities. This means that the civil protection ideals and an all hazards approach were widely adopted as a government policy direction at that time.

However, the bombardment of Yeonpyeong Island by North Korean forces in November 2010, which was unexpected and resulted in four deaths, changed this trend back again. After the Yeonpyeong Island bombardment, most projects for disaster and safety management were canceled and delayed because the highest priority was placed on national defense against North Korea. To some extent, this mirrors the experiences of the United States after 2001 and the United Kingdom after 2005. Although the deaths by Yeonpyeong Island bombardment were relatively few compared 209 deaths in Typhoon Rusa and 192 deaths in the Daegu subway accident, the political impact on the Korean government was huge.

Keeping a balance in emergency management

Civil protection and an all hazards approach are vital to maintaining preparation and the best possible response to major natural and man-made disaster. But they can be weakened if governments focus too heavily on national security (including civil defense against terrorism). And that can result in the other large disasters. Keeping balance in emergency management planning, and implementing an all hazards approach are crucial to effect public administration in this area.

The United States is at risk from a diverse range of natural and man-made disasters. Climate change will produce historically strong hurricanes like Katrina and Sandy more and more frequently. There is a high possibility of large earthquakes and outbreaks of new pandemic diseases. As indicated by the recent Texas fertilizer plant explosion, man-made disasters can also have big impacts. To cite another area where civil protection should not be neglected, the number of road fatalities per one million inhabitants was 111 per million inhabitants – or, well over 30,000 individuals – in the United States in 2009. This rate is almost three times Japan’s rate of 45 fatalities per one million inhabitants, and higher than the European Union average of 70 fatalities per one million inhabitants.

How do we keep balance in emergency management? Though officials in democratic countries such as South Korea and the United States must respond to public opinion, approaches to emergency management should be decided neither by public opinion, which can be easily agitated by shocking incidents, nor by the news media which tend to follow sensational events. Although the number of casualties in the Boston terror attack was much smaller than Texas explosion, the psychological impact and news attractiveness of Boston were much higher. Indeed, the news of the Texas fertilizer plant explosion was almost swept away in an ocean of news about Boston. Instead, priorities in emergency management should be decided based on the scientific evidence, accurate statistics, and rational policy planning.

Counter-terrorism is necessary and obviously very important. Governments must take policy measures to prevent terrorism, but they should resist contributing to institutionalized fear. They must also remember that human beings are surrounded by a plethora of risks, many of which cause more physical damage than terrorism. Governments should prepare policy measures for mitigation, preparedness, response, and recovery for all hazards we can encounter, and should keep a balance based on sciences and accurate statistical data.

For this purpose, a number policy measures are appropriate. First, we need a clear cost-benefit analyses of the current policies in emergency management. According to research conducted by John Mueller and Mark G Stewart and published in 2011,[6] the United States has spent over $1.1 trillion on homeland security after 9/11; Mueller and Stewart evaluate the effectiveness of this massive spending as very low. If this money, or some of it, had been applied to other public safety areas, such as climate change mitigation or industrial safety management where the cost effectiveness is high, the United States could be a safer place.

Second, people should know what the real risks are. The well known risks such as traffic accidents, industrial accidents, and floods kill far more people in America than terrorism does. According to several psychological research studies, familiarity can reduce the level of the public’s risk perception. So, there is a much smaller sense of urgency about many of the risks that surround us every day. Science and statistics on risks, and governmental efforts to provide information and education about risks, can help individuals and local communities effectively increase their overall safety level.

[1] Slovic, P. “Perception of Risk,” Science, Vol. 236, No. 4799 (1987): 283.

[2] Kasperson, R., Renn, O., Slovic, P., Brown, H. and Emel, J. “Social Amplification of Risk: a Conceptual Framework,” Risk Analysis, 8(2), (1988): 177-187.

[3] Alexander, D. “From Civil Defense to Civil Protection--and Back Again,” Disaster Prevention Management, 11(3), (2002): 209.

[4] FEMA, about the agency, http://www.fema.gov/about-agency.

[5] O'Brien, G. “UK Emergency Preparedness: A Step in the Right Direction?” Journal of International Affairs, Vol. 59, No. 2 (2006): 79.

[6] Mueller, J. and Stewart, M.G., Terror, Security, and Money: Balancing the Risks, Benefits, and Costs of Homeland Security (New York: Oxford University Press, 2011).

Authors

Jibum Chung

United States Policy towards Northeast Asia

Richard C. Bush III — Tue, 07 May 2013 14:37:00 -0400

Editor's note: This article originally appeared in the April 2013 edition of SERI Quarterly.

With the Obama administration making the transition to its second term, it is appropriate to review its policy goals towards Northeast Asia and whether policy implementation can be sustained. In this essay, I review what senior officials have said on these subjects, and consider the challenge of coping with the rise—or revival—of China, while focusing more sharply on the Korean Peninsula.

Declaratory policy

Three texts reveal how the United States government views its interests and objectives towards Asia. Chronologically, they are: Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton’s October 2011 article in Foreign Policy; President Obama’s speech to the Australian parliament on November 17, 2011; and National Security Adviser Tom Donilon’s remarks to the Center for Strategic and International Studies.[1] Five topics merit attention: terminology; the purposes of policy; its scope; the approach to China; and sustainability.

In terminology, two words have gained the greatest currency: “pivot” and “rebalancing.” “Pivot” is a vivid word that plays upon Obama’s love of basketball, it also has a rather absolutist connotation. “Rebalancing,” on the other hand, is more relativistic, both in terms of where America places its priorities geographically and which policy arenas it emphasizes. The word that is least appropriate for Northeast Asia is “return,” which had some currency in the early part of the administration. “Return” may have been accurate for Southeast Asia but not for Northeast Asia.

In terms of the purposes of rebalancing, senior officials spoke in different but substantively convergent ways:

Clinton referred to “harnessing Asia’s growth and dynamism”; to “maintaining peace and security across the Asia-Pacific”; to responding to the wishes of the region itself; and, in effect, the long, benign impact of America’s presence in and posture toward the region (“We are the only power with a network of strong alliances in the region, no territorial ambitions, and a long record of providing for the common good. Along with our allies, we have underwritten regional security for decades . . . and that in turn has helped create the conditions for growth.”)
Obama spoke simply of a “large and long-term role in shaping this region and its future, by upholding core principles and in close partnership with friends and allies.”
Donilon also implied a “shaping” objective, even though he did not use the word. He said, “We aspire to see a region where the rise of new powers occurs peacefully; where the freedom to access the sea, air, space, and cyberspace empowers vibrant commerce; where multinational forums help promote shared interests; and where citizens increasingly have the ability to influence their governments and universal human rights are upheld.”

[1] Hillary Rodham Clinton, “America’s Pacific Century,” Foreign Policy Magazine, October 11, 2011 (www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2011/10/175215.htm); “Remarks by President Obama to the Australian Parliament—As Prepared for Delivery,” November 17, 2011, White House website (http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2011/11/17/remarks-president-obama-australian-parliament); “Remarks by National Security Advisor Tom Donilon—As Prepared for Delivery,” November 15, 2012, White House website (http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2012/11/15/remarks-national-security-advisor-tom-donilon-prepared-delivery).

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Richard C. Bush III

Publication: SERI Quarterly

Chinese National Security Decision-making: Processes and Challenges

Yun Sun — Mon, 06 May 2013 16:03:00 -0400

In studies of contemporary China, information about the national security decision-making process is largely absent, despite the abundance of information and analysis on leadership politics and domestic policy-making. A proliferation of foreign policy actors in China has attracted much attention from researchers, leading to a booming number of investigations into the governmental and non-governmental players involved. The processes themselves―in which these players operate and interact to produce the eventual policy decisions―have eluded academic scrutiny, mostly due to the scarcity of available information. The topic, however, is critically important in achieving an accurate understanding of China’s national security policies which often seem unclear and plagued by conflicting messages.

In the Chinese context, the definition of “national security” is significantly different from that in the United States. For the American policy community, the term “national security” usually refers to the country’s external national security interests and threats. The responsibility for coordinating national security affairs lies primarily with the National Security Council. In China’s case, the term “national security” encompasses both domestic/internal and foreign/external security and, therefore, has a much broader connotation. This paper is primarily focused on the external dimensions of China’s national security. There are many overlapping aspects between China’s national security policy and its foreign policy, as the latter also serves to protect China’s national security interests. However, because national security also covers military security, national defense, economic security and other non-traditional security challenges, the framework and coverage is broader than with foreign policy.

This paper examines three processes of China’s national security decision-making: the decision-making at the top level, the policy-coordination process conducted through the National Security Leading Small Group (NSLSG), and the informational process for national security decision-making. Generally speaking, the supreme decision-making authority in China is monopolized and exercised through the collective leadership of the Politburo Standing Committee; this is especially true with regard to “strategically important” issues, such as Sino-U.S. relations. However, the paramount leader at the time of this writing, President Hu Jintao (the Politburo’s designated person for national security affairs) commanded large authority and privilege in determining regular national security policies. His primary advisor on national security (at the time of this writing State Councilor Dai Bingguo) played a central role in informing and advising him on key policy decisions. As the Director of the Foreign Affairs Leading Small Group (the same organization as NSLSG),[1] Dai also carried responsibility for inter-agency policy consultation and coordination through the NSLSG/FALSG. Information for national security decision-making is produced primarily by participating agencies and think tanks, but there is a standard process of screening, organizing, and disseminating that allows information to flow to the top.

A fundamental challenge for China’s national security decision-making system lies in the conflict between the need for centralization and the diffusion of power (collective leadership) at the top level. Decisions on strategically important issues must be based on consensus, which is created through time-consuming debates; consensus-building proves especially problematic when a timely response is required. As an informal and ad-hoc committee, the NSLSG does not operate as the core national security team designated to follow, analyze, and coordinate daily national security affairs, nor does it have the adequate human resources and professional capacity to play that role. In reality, its role is more or less confined to the organizer of research and coordinator of policies. Its authority on national security affairs is further undermined by unbalanced civil-military relations and the lack of civilian oversight over daily military operational activities. In the informational processes, the players in the Chinese system are extremely risk-averse. Confined by agency perspectives and career advancement interests, they are reluctant to report new findings that are not in line with established conventional wisdom.

Understanding that most of the challenges in the Chinese national security system have deep historical, political and structural roots, any attempt to address them must be bold and might seem politically unrealistic. Nevertheless, the recommendations offered in this paper are aimed at addressing the fundamental deficiencies of the current system. Their feasibility depends on the future of political reform, which although widely agreed as inevitable, has thus far been successfully avoided.

[1] The general understanding of the relationship between FALSG and NSLSG in China is that it is literally the same organization with two different titles (一个机构两块牌子). However, several government analysts pointed out that within the same organization there is a distribution of labor on national security and foreign policy between two different bureaus.

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Yun Sun