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Diplomacy
OpinionComment
Pang Zhongying
Pang Zhongying

Opinion | Indo-Pacific needs US-China cooperation, not conflict with the Quad

  • The key to peace and prosperity in the old Asia-Pacific concert of nations was the inclusion rather than exclusion of China
  • It is in everyone’s interest to build a new concert of Indo-Pacific powers based on the principle of great power multilateralism

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Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison (seated, second right) participates in the inaugural Quad leaders meeting with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, US President Joe Biden and Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga, in Sydney on March 13. Photo: AP
Pang Zhongying
In the post-Cold-War years of the 1990s and 2000s, the Asia-Pacific region was really a de facto power in concert, although it was far from perfect with regional problems including the complexity of China-US relations.

I remember Susan Shirk, a prominent China expert in the US and the Clinton administration’s deputy assistant secretary for East Asia, arguing for “a full-fledged Asia-Pacific concert of powers”. One dimension of US foreign policy in the post-Cold-War era is a de facto concert of the Asia-Pacific.

Yesterday’s Asia-Pacific can be regarded as inspiring the solution to today’s Indo-Pacific conflict. The key to the Asia-Pacific concert was in including rather than excluding China, which pursued “reform and opening up” and peaceful development after the end of the Cold War.

China joined almost all Asia-Pacific regional institutions and forums. The US and its allies almost fully engaged China. The mutual engagement processes made the post-Cold-War Asia-Pacific peaceful and orderly for three decades. However, this peace is fragile and vulnerable.

Since 1989, the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) forum has helped promote regional economic growth and integration. Meetings led by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations let leaders from Asia-Pacific and Indian Ocean countries meet annually in a Southeast Asian nation.

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What is Apec all about?

What is Apec all about?
Four Asean members signed on to the Trans-Pacific Partnership in 2016, and Asean orchestrated the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership that was signed in 2020. These agreement have brought fruitful results despite the US exiting the TPP in 2017 and India withdrawing from RCEP negotiations.
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