By Lee Seong-hyon
Will the coronavirus epidemic have an impact on President Moon Jae-in's New Southern Policy (NSP)? That's a legitimate concern. Also, with two years of Moon's presidential term remaining, he will need to think about which policies he wants to focus on, and how history will record his "presidential legacy." And it's important both for him personally and for the nation as a whole, to demonstrate sustained commitment to the NSP.
Moon first revealed his New Southern Policy during his first trip to Southeast Asia in November 2017. South Korea has been perennially obsessed with the North Korea issue and prioritized its diplomacy toward the so-called "Big Four" (the U.S., China, Japan and Russia) that wield clout over the Korean Peninsula. All this time, ASEAN was left outside South Korea's diplomatic purview.
Moon changed it.
The NSP was Moon's ambitious outreach to ASEAN. It is an all-inclusive policy, raising South Korea's relations with ASEAN economically, diplomatically and socially ― to the level South Korea maintains with the Big Four.
With the COVID-19 punching down South Korea's economic mettle, and with Moon's term winding down, a concern was raised that the NSP might be thrown on the backburner.
Moon should resist that temptation.
The ASEAN region has been accustomed to the opportunistic ebb and flow of powerful countries' outreach. It was understandable for them to feel cautious, if not skeptical, about Moon's outreach. It's important, therefore, for President Moon to genuinely assure ASEAN leaders of South Korea's sustained commitment to the region, particularly at a time like this when they will be wary of the same thing.
In a way, the NSP is South Korea's long overdue exercise of a truly independent foreign policy that it feels suits the nation's needs, but had been unfulfilled due to the nation's overwhelming and perennial concerns with North Korea and resulting geopolitical intricacy with the powerful Big Four.
Past South Korean leaders also tried some sort of an NSP too. For instance, as early as in 1966, then President Park Chung-hee attended the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) meeting. Park also envisioned a collective security system for anti-communist groups in the Asian region. Yet in the end, Park's vision couldn't exceed the security boundaries set by the United States' Asia policy. Broadly speaking, during the Cold War, South Korea failed to implement its own policy toward Southeast Asia.
With the end of the Cold War, South Korea's Southeast Asian policy entered a new phase. During the 1998-2003 Kim Dae-jung administration, Kim acted as an elder representing the democratic camp in Asia and had a personal relationship with some leaders of the democracy movements in Southeast Asia. But due to ASEAN's emphasis on sovereignty and non-interference in domestic affairs, his burgeoning interest in ASEAN did not advance to form a concrete structure that shared the values of liberal democracy.
As the Roh Moo-hyun government took power in 2003, Korea's ASEAN policy expanded from security to economy. Economic cooperation was an area where both sides could see common interests. But Korea's economic cooperation with ASEAN was not useful in solving the North Korean nuclear issue, which was the biggest problem for South Korea. With security towering over the economy, Seoul's diplomatic focus primarily stayed on its alliance coordination with the United States and also the Six-Party Talks, a multilateral platform hosted by China to tackle the North's nuclear crisis.
Even during the Lee Myung-bak and Park Geun-hye presidencies, South Korea's ASEAN policy did not make significant headway, and also did not deviate significantly from its economy-oriented approach.
By 2016, the importance of ASEAN in the realm of economy was beginning to gain more attention in Korea for a new reason. When it was predicted that China would retaliate against South Korea economically over their discord over the THAAD anti-ballistic missile system, and that would hurt South Korea's exports to China, discussions were raised in Korea to shift economic focus to ASEAN.
Naturally, the biggest criticism for the NSP is that the policy's approach is too mercantilistic. From South Korea's public diplomacy perspective, this is certainly not how the NSP wants to be viewed in the eyes of the world. The coronavirus has stopped nearly all public activities. Perhaps, then, this is a good time for South Korea to review, rectify and "level up" the NSP so that it can preserve both its sustainability and the substance President Moon originally envisioned.
Lee Seong-hyon (sunnybbsfs@gmail.com), Ph.D., is director, the Center for Chinese Studies at the Sejong Institute.
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Moon first revealed his New Southern Policy during his first trip to Southeast Asia in November 2017. South Korea has been perennially obsessed with the North Korea issue and prioritized its diplomacy toward the so-called "Big Four" (the U.S., China, Japan and Russia) that wield clout over the Korean Peninsula. All this time, ASEAN was left outside South Korea's diplomatic purview.
Moon changed it.
The NSP was Moon's ambitious outreach to ASEAN. It is an all-inclusive policy, raising South Korea's relations with ASEAN economically, diplomatically and socially ― to the level South Korea maintains with the Big Four.
With the COVID-19 punching down South Korea's economic mettle, and with Moon's term winding down, a concern was raised that the NSP might be thrown on the backburner.
Moon should resist that temptation.
The ASEAN region has been accustomed to the opportunistic ebb and flow of powerful countries' outreach. It was understandable for them to feel cautious, if not skeptical, about Moon's outreach. It's important, therefore, for President Moon to genuinely assure ASEAN leaders of South Korea's sustained commitment to the region, particularly at a time like this when they will be wary of the same thing.
In a way, the NSP is South Korea's long overdue exercise of a truly independent foreign policy that it feels suits the nation's needs, but had been unfulfilled due to the nation's overwhelming and perennial concerns with North Korea and resulting geopolitical intricacy with the powerful Big Four.
Past South Korean leaders also tried some sort of an NSP too. For instance, as early as in 1966, then President Park Chung-hee attended the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) meeting. Park also envisioned a collective security system for anti-communist groups in the Asian region. Yet in the end, Park's vision couldn't exceed the security boundaries set by the United States' Asia policy. Broadly speaking, during the Cold War, South Korea failed to implement its own policy toward Southeast Asia.
With the end of the Cold War, South Korea's Southeast Asian policy entered a new phase. During the 1998-2003 Kim Dae-jung administration, Kim acted as an elder representing the democratic camp in Asia and had a personal relationship with some leaders of the democracy movements in Southeast Asia. But due to ASEAN's emphasis on sovereignty and non-interference in domestic affairs, his burgeoning interest in ASEAN did not advance to form a concrete structure that shared the values of liberal democracy.
As the Roh Moo-hyun government took power in 2003, Korea's ASEAN policy expanded from security to economy. Economic cooperation was an area where both sides could see common interests. But Korea's economic cooperation with ASEAN was not useful in solving the North Korean nuclear issue, which was the biggest problem for South Korea. With security towering over the economy, Seoul's diplomatic focus primarily stayed on its alliance coordination with the United States and also the Six-Party Talks, a multilateral platform hosted by China to tackle the North's nuclear crisis.
Even during the Lee Myung-bak and Park Geun-hye presidencies, South Korea's ASEAN policy did not make significant headway, and also did not deviate significantly from its economy-oriented approach.
By 2016, the importance of ASEAN in the realm of economy was beginning to gain more attention in Korea for a new reason. When it was predicted that China would retaliate against South Korea economically over their discord over the THAAD anti-ballistic missile system, and that would hurt South Korea's exports to China, discussions were raised in Korea to shift economic focus to ASEAN.
Naturally, the biggest criticism for the NSP is that the policy's approach is too mercantilistic. From South Korea's public diplomacy perspective, this is certainly not how the NSP wants to be viewed in the eyes of the world. The coronavirus has stopped nearly all public activities. Perhaps, then, this is a good time for South Korea to review, rectify and "level up" the NSP so that it can preserve both its sustainability and the substance President Moon originally envisioned.
Lee Seong-hyon (sunnybbsfs@gmail.com), Ph.D., is director, the Center for Chinese Studies at the Sejong Institute.
