Leadership Issues for Asia in the 21st CenturyReinhard Drifte

ASIEN – Nr. 100 (2006) pp. 33–37

Many if not most major international issues that currently agitate the Asia Pacific region may be discussed within the framework of leadership rivalry and a shift in the leadership paradigm. The ‚war against terrorism‘, Asian integration efforts, resource competition, the overcoming of national separation in the Taiwan Strait and on the Korean peninsula are part of the US endeavour to maintain its preeminence in the region against the background of China’s seemingly unstoppable rise. The territorial disputes in the East China Sea, the frictions over history, and the creation of a vast Free Trade Association (as well as bilateral FTAs) in the region have strong connotations with the Japanese-Chinese struggle for leadership in Asia and this will have an impact not only on the outcome of the US-China wrestling for regional but even for global leadership. The other countries of the Asia Pacific are watching carefully, eager not to lose current certainties and stability while not wanting to risk emerging opportunities. At the same time the paradigm of leadership seems to continue to change from the current American dominance which allows the mobilization of coalitions of the more or less willing to much more complex and incoherent ad hoc coalitions which in most cases somehow have to include China. Moreover, the objectives of regional leadership are no longer only chosen by the US, and even long
established US priorities – as can be seen in the case of nuclear non-proliferation and regional integration – are shifting…