Endgame with Gita Wirjawan - Kiyoteru Tsutsui: Japan-ASEAN Economic Diplomacy and Minority Rights Activism

Episode Date: March 3, 2023

“Japan assist, not interfere.” Those are the four words that summarize Japan's foreign policy stance towards ASEAN countries, told Kiyoteru Tsutsui, the Professor of Sociology and Director of the Japan Program at The Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (APARC), Stanford University, in the conversation. This statement is reminiscent of Ryu Hassan's comment in Endgame's earlier episodes with one of the prominent neurologists in Indonesia. He said that a happy country is a country in which its citizens refrain from infringing upon the personal boundaries of others. Japan serves as a salient example of this phenomenon. An intriguing question, then, arises: is this 'knowing one's place' attitude that is ingrained in Japanese society also manifest in its political outlook? Kiyoteru Tsutsui's discussion with Indonesian entrepreneur, educator, and 2022-23 visiting scholar at APARC, Stanford University—Gita Wirjawan—reflects upon the 46 years of Japan-ASEAN friendship which its foundation was built by Prime Minister Takeo Fukuda. Nearly half a century later, Japan still consistently demonstrated steadfast actions to help Southeast Asia's economy, health sector, and education that can help the region foster its soft power. The three 'hear-to-heart' promises resulted in ASEAN's courteous manner toward Japan, a country that Muthiah Alagappa refers to as the 'stabilizer of the Asia-Pacific region'. Moreover, the author of "Human Rights and the State: The Power of Ideas and the Realities of International Politics" (listed among the 10 best books of 2022 in Japan) also touches on the ethnic discrimination issue in Japan and how international human rights institutions could help to address this problem; risk of a Taiwan invasion for Japan; modern history of Japan; and his optimism on the future of ASEAN. #Endgame #GitaWirjawan #KiyoteruTsutsui ---------------- SGPP Indonesia Master of Public Policy March 2023 Intake: admissions.sgpp.ac.id [e-mail] https://wa.me/628111522504 Other "Endgame" episodes on ASEAN: https://endgame.id/scotmarciel https://endgame.id/martynatalegawa https://endgame.id/kishoremahbubani Visit and subscribe: @sgppindonesia @visinemapictures

We're not going to push for democracy per se in the sense of free vote and all of that. But democracy here means rule of law. You have to have predictability if you want to thrive in the economy. So talk about rule of law. You're going to revert back to the liberal part of a liberal democracy and establish the legal setup. Go back to what you used to have on that form. That's what democracy means, interpret it in that way.

Hi, friends and fellows, welcome to this special series of conversations involving personalities coming from a number of campuses, including Stanford University. The purpose of the series is really to unleash thought-provoking ideas that I think would be of tremendous value to you. I want to thank you for your support so far, and welcome to the special series. Hi, everyone. Today, we're visited by Professor Keoteru-Tero-Suitary. He is a professor of sociology at Stanford University, but he's also a senior fellow at A. Park, and he's also the co-director for the Center of Human Rights and International Justice.

Keo, thank you so much for making it. Thank you for having me. You've written so many publications and books. One of the most outstanding ones is your book, Rights, Make, Might. I want to basically ask you about some of the stuff you talked about in that book. Talk about how the issue of human rights in the context of some of the minorities in Japan, the Ainu's, the Burakumis, and the Koreans have evolved in the last few years. Great. Thank you.

So the book, the context for that book is this is a, topic that I have been studying since my dissertation, PhD dissertation. And it kind of follows up on the debate about the efficacy of international human rights institutions, international human rights treaties, whether they serve any purposes, whether they actually do have some impact on the ground. And I've done a lot of, before the book, I had done some quantitative cross-national analysis looking at the impact of, looking at whether states, governments that have ratified international humanities treaties have improved the actual practices.

And there's still ongoing debates about whether the impact is positive, positive, or neutral or even negative. Around the times I was doing my dissertation around the turn of the 21st century, around that time there was a lot of skepticism about the actual impact of treaties and it was quite well-founded because a lot of countries that ratified those key treaties international UN-sponsored human rights treaties a lot of those countries were not particularly in a human rightsy kind of countries because it's a lot easier for them to ratify those treaties in countries like the United States or the U.S. is infamous for not having ratify some of the most important human treaties,

right? But there's a reason for that it's hard for rule of law countries like U.S. or Japan to ratify. There's a real process, right? Whereas if there's a dictator in certain country in Africa, it's easy for that person to go to the UN promises, sign the treaty and then bring it back. there's no ratification process. So there were a lot of countries that actually did not deliver on the promise that they made when they ratified those treaties.

So at that point, the relationship was not particularly good. But the impact of human treaties was mediated by civil society linkage. So the key findings in that series of analysis that I did early on in my career is that if there's a vibrant civil society in that country whose government has ratified those treaties, or if the country is open and there's international NGOs that can go in and push the government to deliver on the promise that they made when they ratify those treaties, then actually indirectly, not directly by just ratifying the treaties, but indirectly, treaties could have some positive impact in improving the actual practice, right? So then I did this.

quantitative analysis, and then I wanted to get to the bottom of the actual mechanisms and processes in which these impacts kind of unfold. And I'm from Japan. I knew a little bit about Japan. And really, originally, I got interested in those issues because I observed around me this kind of hidden minority groups, often called hidden minorities in Japan, that are not often very open in the public, but it's still ethnic minority politics in Japan. And then I started looking into those cases. And then I looked at three, these are the most salient minority groups in Japan. Ainu indigenous people, Korean, Dainichi Koreans, Colonial Legacy kind of group,

and the Brachman, formal outcast group. And then I looked at the trajectory of these three groups, and how Japan's participation in the international human rights regime in the form of ratification of key treaties and participation in the Commission on Human Rights, today Human Rights Council, how those things actually shaped minority politics in Japan and really changed the course of groups like Ainu,

which, you know, Ainu was very, very dormant politically. They didn't want to engage in a lot of politics. But since the 70s, they got exposed to international human rights, National human rights norms, especially international indigenous rights movement, and then they became more active, and then they became quite successful. I'm not suggesting everything is perfect for Ainu today, but they have achieved quite a bit, considering where they were in the 1970s before Japan got exposed to international human rights treaties. I can say more about these groups, but that's kind of like a real, the big picture story of that book. Do you see the role of civil society and non-state actors as? things that are sustainable in the long run in making sure that there's this empowerment

of the actors as to help improve human rights, not just in Japan, but hopefully globally. That is a critical question today especially. Yeah. Because, so the international human rights regime grew, well, since 1945, UN Charter, 1948, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and then 1996 to key international covenants on civil and political rights and also economic social and cultural rights, those got adopted. But really, people like point to the 1970s as kind of a takeoff point. And if you look at statistics on how many human treaties exist, how many countries have we

gone parties, states to those treaties, and also how many international human rights NGOs. existed. Since the 70s, 80s, the number has exploded on all counts. And what happened in those decades, 70s, 80s, 90s, that's when institution building took place. And the ideas about, with the institution, ideas about human rights spread throughout the world empowered a lot of civil society actors across the globe into activism. And in the 90s, Cold War ended. Cold War created a lot of gridlock in the international institutions about advancement of human rights.

So it was kind of activities, global activities on human rights were limited, mostly, to institution building, right? But they worked hard on institution building that paid off after the Cold War ended. And the 90s was a kind of golden era of human rights, despite some genocide cases that couldn't be prevented. In general, the 90s was a good era for global human rights. And civil suicide activities really took off. Then 9-11 happens, terrorist attacks,

and then U.S. goes into this mode of war on terror. And then 2008 financial crisis and all that and the rise of what we call illiberal. States. China's rising. Russia's coming back. And their influence in the global south have also expanded. And that creates a lot of challenge. But what we have today is what you pointed out, which is that international civil society has been empowered. And that's sustaining that is critical. And it's hard because, you know, the states still have the monopoly of, legitimate use of force.

So a lot of states can actually suppress those civil society activities, and they are suppressing, especially with the rise of illiberal states, which do not want to hear dissents openly. So the challenge really today is to – but what's encouraging is that because of this institution-building era, because of the 90s, the golden era for human rights, the ideas of human rights, universal human rights, rights that everybody is entitled to basic fundamental human rights, right?

They should not be put to prison, put into prison just because of their political opinions. Those kinds of ideas are out there. So a lot of people in the world have internalized that. So the ideas are out there. Many more people have that understanding. But so I think the next decade is critical, but there's this rise of illiberal powers. and they begin to, in a sinister way, suppress those ideas or spread, they engage in disinformation work

to shift their understandings. So in the next decade, we really need to ensure the vibrancy of this civil society space domestically in those countries, but also internationally, will continue because otherwise, right, these ideas might actually wilt in the face of this strong counter-attack, counter-offensive by illiberal states. There just seems to be a structural challenge because you've alluded to the need for

this sort of initiative being multilateralized, right? And you aptly pointed out that the 90s would have been the golden era when human rights was being propagated in a good way. Fortunately or unfortunately, that was the era when the global order would have been unipolar. And I've always talked about how unipolarity made multilateralization a lot easier. However, ever since we started multilateralizing, multipolarizing, multilateralization has become somewhat more difficult. Do you see that as a challenge then for not just the non-state, but also the states, the state actors, to basically play a part in promoting? human rights regionally locally or even globally yeah so much has been said about the state of the

international liberal order and human rights was developed squarely in that tradition right the united states uk those countries um pushed for human rights inclusion of human rights in the post war war two international order um and they could constituted their backbone of the international better order. And what's been happening in the last six, seven, eight years is the UK pulled out of EU. United States had Trump era, America first. Even though President Trump is no longer in power, you know, there's some continuation of President Biden wouldn't say America first.

He says America's back and going back to Mount. the lateral forums. So it's an improvement. But still there's this remnant of Trump-era, America-first mindset in some people. And, you know, nobody expects the United States to go back to something like CPTPP, for instance, right? So the international liberal order needs other parties

to really uphold its ideal. And a country like Japan, Germany, they're doing their share. But to your point, it really needs multilateral institutions to sustain that. And thankfully, especially for human rights, the efforts to multilateralize these institutions have been in existence really since the early period. Because when the Universal Declaration was adopted, there were efforts to induce. to include, I mean, even in those days when Western powers were quite dominant, there were efforts to include

non-Western voices in drafting of that document, for instance. And from early on, so once the UDH in Western Declaration Human Rights got adopted, then it was supposed to be turned into treaties. And then it took a long time because there was Cold War and the Soviet bloc and the U.S. Bloc couldn't agree on what rights are human rights. And then in this era, it was actually what we call the global South countries today that were really pushing for human rights.

What they meant was more self-determination, decolonization, but really they also use the language of human rights. So their voices were heard from early on, and then anti-apultite movement was central in that era. right. And, you know, it was housed in all these efforts were housed in the United Nations, multilateral institutions, right, global institutions. And there were some regional efforts, like in Europe and in the Americas, in Africa. But a lot of these efforts to establish human rights, because human rights was seen as universal, it's a universal principle. Democracy may be a little bit

different, human rights is universal. And it applies to every single human being in the world. So I think it's from, in its DNA, it's this multilateral component. So that's an advantage. So even today, a lot of the activities, and even in the 90s, the unipolar power era, it was helpful that the U.S. was supportive of human rights, and U.S. saw that human rights as an important component of the world order at the time. But it wasn't just the United States. U.S. was criticized.

And when 9-11 happened and the U.S. engaged in war on terror, condoning torture. basically, right? Then U.S. are harshly criticized. So it's always multilateral. And today, too, it's multilateral. So that is there, and I think that might be one strength that human rights, global human rights institutions have,

that can sustain this global efforts to move forward. And I couldn't say the same about something like democracy, because democracy is seen more as American or Western conservative. of governance. I want to talk about democracy, but I want to revert back to Japan. A prominent Japanese, Taro Asso, had made a statement that no great civilization could last thousands of years without heterogeneity, right? The work you've done and others have done in the context of what the Burakumi's, the Koreans and the Ainuz would have to do and would have to become. in the context of how Japan has always tried to maintain homogeneity, at least in the perception of the outsiders, right?

And you put that in a bucket of how demographically you're getting less youthful, population decline and all that. Do you see Japan in the coming decades as a nation that's likely to become more open-minded, more heterogeneous? heterogeneous or something that would be more sticky with the legacy or the past? Japan has to become heterogeneous. So let's take a step back and look at the modern history of Japan, right? So Japan becomes a modern state in 1868 with a major restoration. And there were, you know, people in northern parts of what became Japan spoke rather different language than people in the southern, right?

So the dialects were very powerful. And so there was this effort, peasants into Frenchmen type of process of homogenizing the nation into a modern state. Once that's going, then this colonization by Japan,

to keep up with the West, was the argument, started. And then Japan became a multi-ethnic, multicultural empire. Right? That was Japan, before 1945.

So there was initially there was this in Meiji Japan, there was some arguments about Japan's homogeneity or cultural unity, but once it became necessary to frame Japan as multi-ethnic

empire, then that discourse took hold. So before 1945, there was a recognition that Japan is a multi-ethnic, united under the emperor, but, you know, different ethnic groups existed.

from the Japanese perspective harmoniously, right? That's not how it was seen in other parts of Asia, but that's kind of how they framed the existence of Japan at the time. Then the war ends in defeat, and then Japan's Japanese territory now is contained to the main land in Hokkaido and up to Okinawa. Then Japan had to come to this different ideology about the nation, and then homogeneous Japan became that idea.

ideology. And that was reinforced by Japan's success, right? And this 1986 famous statement by then Prime Minister Nakasone about how, you know, that's a heyday of the height of Japanese economic might, Japan was gobbling up properties in the U.S. Rockefeller Center, Hyloos studios, Pebble Beach, golf course. And at the height of that hubris, prime minister talked about how Japan is so successful because it's a homogeneous nation, the United States. multi-esthetic countries like the United States are pulled down by the existence of minority groups, right? That faced a lot of backlash, obviously.

But that was kind of the mindset in Japan at that time. And that didn't change very quickly, right? But by now, somebody like Tarawa So he's not a lot of people see him as a conservative person, right? But even somebody like Kim recognizes because of the economic needs, Japan has to take on two things. One is to include more women in the labor force and in the prominent positions, right? There are a lot of talented women in Japan who cannot really utilize, show their talents domestically. But people actually go abroad, come to the United States to become successful, right?

But Japan should be able to tap into that female resources. And then the second is immigration, right? And Japan, there's this reality of dwindling population. The Japanese government has been trying to increase the fertility rate and all that, but there's limits to what the government can do on that front. So taking on more migrant labor is critical, but it's challenging because Japan's post-war institutions are built based on largely homogeneity of the nation.

So Japan was not quite set up to invite people from abroad, especially talented people from abroad. Skilled labor is what the government wants. But skilled labor from Asia, Southeast Asian countries have other more attractive places to go, like the United States or South Korea or Europe. So Singapore, right, Hong Kong.

So Japan has to do a lot of work to make it attractive for skilled labor from other parts of the world, especially Asia, and to attract them. And I think Tokyo has changed quite a bit. If you go to Tokyo today, it's quite diverse. You just see it on the streets. It's more cosmopolitan. Right, than it used to be.

So it's happening, but it has to happen more quickly, is my view, for Japan to keep up. You mentioned democracy, and I want to broaden the discussion in the context of what's happening between the U.S. and China, right? And while your population is likely to decline in China's rise seems to be inevitable, and we'll sort of like to reach the end of the strategic ambiguity era, right? What do you think is Japan likely to undertake in the next few years, if not decades, in this context? Yeah. So I make the argument that 2022 is a very, very important year for Japan, for the world, for democracies in the world in particular. because there has been what my colleague Lari Diamond

called the democratic recession. And I mean, if you put it in the historical context, and then people look at statistics from Freedom House Index or VDM. And, I mean, if you look at 200-year arc of development of democracy, I mean, it's still on the rise, and the recent decline is kind of marginal. But if you magnify the last 20 years, right, 21st century, then the decline is quite steep. And it's especially concerning because a shining beacon for, right,

democracy, the United States has to fix its right, house in order. And you go to China and they're very confident about their governance model, right? And, you know, they have something to show for, I mean, COVID and all that changed a little bit, but they had something to show for and Belt and Road Initiative and all of that, it was expanding. So before 2022, there was a lot of, and during the COVID initially, China seemed to be doing better than clearly in terms of looking at the number of deaths, although statistics might not be that trustworthy. So there were a lot of concerns. And then 22 comes along, and President Putin invades Ukraine, that changed the dynamic and, and, and, President Putin invades Ukraine, that changed the dynamic and, and, and, like NATO, which President Macron said was brain dead,

came back strong, reunited, re-invigorated, new members are joining NATO, and consolidation of this democratic alliance, right, is now powerful. China, zero-COVID policy was, right, showing its limits. And President Xi seemed to, to stick to that but he realized that he had to make a change so right um so a lot of things changed

in 2022 and its impact especially Ukraine uh impact of Ukraine quickly was seen in Germany where Germany decided to double or increase the defense budget to right up to 2% um and Japan followed somewhat slower but Japan followed yeah and it was a big year for Japan because um And what's interesting is, you know, since especially President, Prime Minister Abe, the Japanese government has been wanting to expand its defense budget and its military capabilities because, you know, China's threat was felt by Japan much earlier than it was in the United States. So Japan has for a long time been wanting to prepare for that. But there was this, you know, domestic resistance, if not a strong opposition.

Mistake resistance was quite powerful in Japan for a long time. Now, after seeing Ukraine, and the argument against Japan expanding its defense capacity is, well, we live in the era where nobody is going to invade another country to change the national borders. That's darking. That's 20th century. Nobody does that anymore. Well, for women to be completely wrong, right? So people saw that.

And Russia and China are different, but people in Japan. see what Russia did to Ukraine and then look at China's defense military budget increases the military capacity expanding exponentially and look at that reality and think

well this could happen in East Asia and then the public mindset I think changed so what's more surprising to me in what happened in 2022 was not just not that the government

changed this defense mindset, but the public was quite supportive of the new approach by the government. And there was not too much resistance to defense budget increase to 2%. And there's a lot of debates about where that money is coming from, and there's some opposition to tax increase,

a strong opposition to tax increase and all that. But the idea of Japan expanding its military capacity, defense capacity and defense budget, That does not see us, I mean, I'm not suggesting there's no opposition, but the majority seem to agree that that's what Japan needs right now. So that's what happened with Ukraine in 2020. If we saw what happened in a Congress meeting a few months ago in China, there seemed to be

a lot less collective leadership in China, right? which kind of like would entail inevitably a greater degree of risk for not just Northeast Asia, but all of Asia, right? But you juxtapose that with some of the earlier or recent observations where Xi Jinping has shown a capacity and ability to make a U-turn, right, including on a zero COVID policy, right? So I don't know, which camp I want to be in. But what's the risk of a Taiwan invasion occurring and how that would vote for Japan's militarization going forward? Yeah, so that's something that I've been thinking a lot of.

and I think you have Oriana Mastrow in her podcast at some point soon and she, so Larry Diamond, you have Frank Fukuyama. We were just in Japan to talk to key policymakers about the particular topic because that's on their mind as well, right?

And Americans also want to understand where Japan is from that. So something like Oriana is, her observation is her assessment is that it's likely to happen

before 2027, right? China's attack on Taiwan. People in Japan have China experts in Japan have somewhat different views about it and I don't

I'm not an expert I'm not a military expert I'm not a China expert so I don't really know who's right who's wrong but these are estimates assessments right so i think i generally agree with oriana that we have to be prepared for the worst and we have to try to deter china from doing things um i think most people in

japan despite what Putin did to ukraine still think that uh china is a china doesn't like to take great risk right and it's probably true that china is a careful country very cautious and generally rational country but as you alluded to the recent party Congress got even some China experts in Japan

nervous because of consolidation of power and also because President she dropped a lot of key economic advisors it seemed as if he doesn't care about he doesn't worry about it

he cares more about the legacy yeah and if If the Chinese economy starts to tank and people are unhappy, this diversion of attention to Taiwan might become attractive option for President Xi. So there are all kinds of different scenarios that could unfold. But the direction that he took in party Congress was not particularly reassuring. So I think there are more people in Japan are concerned about this. But in general, I think the assessment is a little bit different.

The U.S. side sees it more likely. I mean, not everybody in the U.S. thinks the same as Oriana, but in general, I think U.S. side thinks it's more likely that Xi Jinping would do something on Taiwan, whereas people in Japan are more less worried. about this as a real possibility. But having said that, I think policy makers in Japan are obviously thinking about it, and that's the job, right?

And they're doing the job of evaluating a situation and preparing for the worst. So the sense I get talking to really highest-level officials in Japan is that they are careful what they say. I mean, the reality is Japan's right next to China, right? U.S. is the Pacific Ocean away, right? So it's understandable. Japan has to be a little bit more careful, right?

Not to provoke China unnecessarily. Economic relations also, right? Important. I mean, it's important to everybody in the world, including the United States, but Japan is right next to it, and China is the biggest trade partner. So there's reason to be cautious.

But I got the sense that behind the scenes, they are really worried and they are trying to do some prep work for that. But whether that's enough or not, I mean, I don't think Oriana would think that it's enough what Japan is. Oriana doesn't think what U.S. is doing is not enough. So there's more to be done, certainly. But the Japanese leaders cannot come out and say, well, China, if you go down China,

we're going to shoot down your vessels in the Taiwan Strait. You know, Japanese government cannot say that. So they're not going to come out and say that. But they are looking at different scenarios. They're doing a lot of war games and doing the work of, especially legislative kind of work. They have to do Japan has this constitution, Article 9. And there's a lot of reinterpretation of that.

and Prime Minister Abe prepared for a lot of that in 2015 when he changed past a new law. But to prepare for, and what's important is that Japan has to make a move very quickly if it happens in Taiwan, because US is not as close, right? And US base is in Okinawa, but Japan is closer. So that's an important component to pre-examines. component to prepare for a very quick move if it happens within 24 48 hours kind of move that Japan needs to prepare to do.

So that's the sense I got in Japan is people are thinking about it but not quite making the move. I mean, God forbid. I mean, if you think Japan is not adequately prepared, you would also agree with the fact that the United States is also not adequately prepared. prepared for this catastrophic scenario, God forbid. But I'm still sort of in the camp that still sticks to the idea that this, from an economic standpoint at least, the interconnected nature between China and the U.S.

It's so massive. We're talking about what, $7 to $800 billion worth of collective trade, right? Not to mention China's interconnectedness with the other guys that are vested in the in this being of peace and stability, it just seems not likely that they would do something this crazy, right? But who's to say, right? And some would also argue that, you know, he's sort of like persistent on making this a legacy of his, you know, administration. I want to jump to Southeast Asia, which I know you've been working a lot on also. Japan has been known as a projector of soft power through courtesy,

which is really good, I think, for Southeast Asia. I mean, you've been a major mobilizer of monetary capital, economic capital, and also technological capital. Talk about this, you know, vis-a-vis what other countries are trying to do with Southeast Asia, particularly China. Yeah. So it's not as if Japan, Japanese people are so nice that they just organically became nice to Southeast Asian

and took different approach than the U.S. or China. I mean, maybe some of that I can believe, but I wouldn't put that out there. So it was by necessity Japan became what I call the courteous power in Southeast Asia because of the history before 1945, right? And there was this Tanaka Riot and all that. And Japan learned its lesson and issued this Scuda doctrine to talk about Japan's approach to Southeast Asia, which is what I characterize as courteous, right?

Japan would be a supporter, provide economic aid, provide consultation, trying to get the sense of what Southeast Asian countries want, and deep sense of respect for ASEAN's operation, its autonomy. So that's really, there was a learning curve, right, learning process. And by the time of the Fukuda doctorate, Japan took that approach and stuck with it. And it's continuing on today. And I think it's a really good approach. And it got a lot of support of Southeast Asians. If you look at a lot of public opinion polls today, Japan has a lot of people's trust in the region.

I mean, when I published with my colleague, John Tiro Chari, this co-edited volume, the Cody Spower, people are asking me like, okay, so it's nice that Japan's respected,

but how is Japan going to cash in on that? That's a tough question, because, you know, trust is not something that you try to earn and thinking that you cash it in at some point,

right? If it's obvious, you don't gain trust, right? So I think Japan really genuinely, since the Fukuda doctrine tried to assist the cease-aging countries. Also, Japan in the 70s and 80s was economic superpower, right, 75% of the economy in Asia was Japan at the time. So Japan could afford to take the position in the flying geese model and all of that was there, right?

I mean, so things changed with the China's rise. Now China is the bigger economy, arguably more influential. although as you point out in terms of stock of investment, Japan still is the biggest, more than China. So this courteous approach was very effective, started by necessity, but has been very effective. And it is also effective because Japan did not interfere in domestic politics. Asian affairs, but also each.

country's domestic affairs. There was very little in the way of conditionality that other Western nations attached to any kind of economic agreements. And Japan has been criticized for that, right? You just give money without trying to expand democracy or human rights in those countries. In hindsight, right, today, people actually think that maybe that was not so bad. because the way countries like the United States push for democracy in the region

backfired, right? So even today, Japan is hesitant to criticize countries like Myanmar, right? Well, from my point of view, if it gets to Myanmar, you kind of have to be a little bit more assertive. Sensitive. But like Thailand, like Kudita happens and the U.S. was very critical.

So Japan kind of intervened and tried to smooth things out. I mean, Thailand is not exactly back to being a vibrant democracy, perhaps. But it takes time. Takes time. So Japan understands that because Japan was a recipient of that kind of criticism. Your democracy is not real democracy because it's just one-party dominance, right? So Japan understands that democracies operate differently in different historical. context.

So that has been Japan's approach. And I've been during this trip to Japan a couple weeks ago, we met with Jaika officials. And I've been very impressed with Jaika's approach of listening to local constituent's needs and cater to their needs rather than to dictate, right, the course of economic aid saying, this is what Japan wants to see. So you've got to do this. They don't say that.

They go and listen. And also they compliment what. other countries do. China, US have their own approach to investment and aid. And Japan's approach is to see what they're doing and say, okay, this is an area that US and China are not quite helping. So we will go in and help in that area. So I think, and in terms of resources, Japan doesn't have the kind of resource that it did in the 80s. So the amount of aid and investment today might be less than China or the US. But It's done, I think, in a very smart way of targeting different.

I want to put this in the context of the degree to which monetary capital has been mobilized from liberal democracy countries to countries in Southeast Asia that want to be better liberal democracies. We've kind of like talked about this separately before, but if you take a look at countries like Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia, Indonesia, Indonesia, and the Philippines. their FDI on a per capita per year basis would be within the range of $100 to $400 on a per capita per year basis for each respectively. Compare that with Singapore. I've been able to get $19,000 worth of FDI on a per capita per year basis. There is this argument that Singapore is a tiny country. But even with 5.5 million people, they were able to... able to get $105 billion worth of FDI compared to the next largest recipient, which is Indonesia,

at about $31 billion. So the argument of Singapore being smaller is not sufficient. It sort of collapses. And it really balls down to how Singapore has been able to promote and enforce rule of law, really. That's what it balls down to. So if you're a big liberal democracy country like the United States or Japan, you want to see some or many or all of Southeast Asia becoming better, if not more robust liberal democracies, you need to put food on a table, right? Money needs to be deployed a little bit more, better and faster, particularly for institutional building purposes so that there's better rule of law and all that. What is your view about this in the context of how you want to have?

help promote liberal democracy in countries like whatever in Southeast Asia that want to be better liberal democracies. Yeah. So in the context of this bigger debate about democracies versus authoritarianism in the world and in Asia, in Southeast Asia, well, really in the world, Southeast Asia is critical, right? Those countries are what I would call swing states. These are the ones that decide the outcome of this. I mean, there's debate about whether to frame this in terms of this battle between those two sides to size,

because there are a lot of hybrid models. But let's buy into this confrontation. Then Southeast Asian countries are critical for the United States, Japan, the liberal side. And in trying to win hearts and minds of Southeast Asia and public, it's very important to show that it's beneficial economically. it helps to put foot on the table to take the liberal side. And in doing so, as you astutely point out, Singapore is a great example. And people still, if you look at democracy statistics,

people don't see Singapore as a democracy in the sense of, right, for a multi-party competition and all of that. But Singapore is a vibrant, reasonably liberal, in the sense of rule of law strength, state. And Japanese, Jaika and Japanese authorities also kind of learn that. And some of what they're doing, a lot of what they're doing today is to not talk about democracy per se, but talk about rule of law. So they spend a lot of resources on legal infrastructure building in Southeast Asian countries. And I think it's very wise.

I think that's the right approach. Because if you have the rule of law, you have predictability that brings investment. you said. And that's an important process. And the book, Carrier's power has a chapter on Coudetard in Thailand. And the Japanese

government, the U.S. government was criticizing the coup d'etat. It's completely undemocratic. You have to we have to sever ties with this regime. The Japanese government goes in there and talk to the military regime about how, you know, this is, we're not going to push for

democracy per se in the sense of free vote and all of that. But democracy here means rule of law. You have to have predictability if you want to thrive as an economy. So talk about rule of law, right? You're going to revert back to the liberal part of a liberal democracy and establish the legal setup, go back to what you used to have on that form. That's what democracy means, interpret it in that way.

And then the military regime talks about democracy in that sense. And the U.S. government was, okay, they are at least talking about democracy, even if it might mean something different. So liberal democracy in the sense of rule of law is a good sort of marketing ploy, if you will, to sell to Southeast Asian countries because that directly leads to economic benefits, which is critical to make liberal democracy attractive. Because China has been succeeding, right, by putting a lot of investment without any strings attached in terms of conditionality

for democracy, rule of law, human rights. And that is unraveling in some countries, like Sri Lanka. But that needs to be understood more broadly, that taking, especially the rule of law aspect. And rule of law is something that China wouldn't object to either. China values rule of law, too, because of economic benefits. So that's an area in which we can also kind of circumvent this crash of liberalism and authoritarianism.

Because we can all agree on riverbord as being important in economic transactions. We can't do that without some expectations that contracts are observed. I think what makes it, at least recently, what's made it difficult is that we keep getting lectured on how to become better liberal democracy by guys that actually ironically are not perfect themselves, right? And on top of that, they're not putting money on the table. Having said that, I think the onus is upon us also to fix our system. But there is a structural impediment here in the sense that, you know, in the era of post-truth, it's become so tough to align power and talent at the rate that people attain a position of leadership in anything through sensationalization as opposed to

intellectualization. So I think Southeast Asia has got its work cut out in trying to beef up its infrastructure so that it can be a better recipient while, you know, the guys that are deploying monetary capital need to also be more cognizant of the fact that they got to put money on the team. So I want to put this in the context of how the region of Southeast Asia with 700 million people, $3.5 trillion economy, it's been so peaceful and stable for the last 2,000 years. Yes, there's been skirmishes, frictions, and whatever, but the number of casualties is nothing compared to what we might have witnessed in other regions of the world. But it's so tough to get somebody's attention in the U.S.

with respect to Southeast Asia. It's so much easier to get somebody's attention on what's happening in China, Japan, South Korea, and India. Is that an observation on your side also? Yeah, I've been so much surprised. So I got educated in Japan. And you go to Japanese major universities.

I went to Kyoto University. There was an Aung San Suu Kyi office because she spent some years studying at the Sars. Asian Study Center at Kyoto University. I mean, that was 90s, so Ansan Suuji was still held up. Now with Rohingya and all that, maybe there's some different perception, but still, she was a hero of heroin of democracy, right, advancement. And there was a lot of respect for her and for Southeast Asia more broadly

because a lot of universities had, I mean, it has to do with the proximity. So geographically, Southeast Asia is right there and Japan. from very early on, recognized Southeast Asia as an important region. Somewhat, I think, akin to Latin America is to the United States because it's just in a sphere of influence. So in Japan, it's not hard to find a prominent political scientist or sociologists who focus on Southeast Asia.

Here, too, we had this James Scott, and we had this tradition. Benedict Anderson, a prominent social scientists who were focused on Southeast Asia. So coming to places like Asia Pacific Research Center here, I'm a little surprised that there are more people studying Southeast Asia. And also there's a decoupling because there are a lot of students, right, undergraduate and graduate students who are from Southeast Asia, who are studying or interested in Southeast Asia. and that's not matched quite by the faculty, number of faculty members.

So something needs to be done, and it might be different in different universities. So I haven't surveyed all the universities in the U.S. But I think in general, I agree with your observation that Americans in academia or otherwise have not quite recognized how important Southeast Asia's, especially in thinking about this competition with China, I think a lot of Americans are beginning to realize Japan is critical, especially as they think about Taiwan contingencies. Now Japan is emerging as the most important ally.

So I think at some point there should come this understanding that Southeast Asia is very, very important in the broader competition with China, which will be ongoing for some years, decades. So I think it'll come. I think it's coming and we're both trying to make it happen quicker. But it has to happen quickly, I think. Throughout this conversation, I feel more optimistic about human rights than I do about what could happen in Taiwan.

I'm more optimistic about what could happen. and in Southeast Asia and in the context of what Japan could do. Give us something that makes us feel optimistic about the region of Southeast Asia going forward. Yeah. Well, it's still a lot of those countries are growing economies when a lot of other countries, Japan, South Korea, and China too. Right. Aging, potentially declining,

China will peak at some point economically, some point soon. It's not going to be like 2050. It's probably going to peak sooner. So that's when Southeast Asian countries emerge as kind of a superpower block in the Asian region. And Southeast Asian countries have asked,

ASEAN, right? That's served, that has served them quite well, I think. Because now it's established that it is autonomous. We have to respect ASEAN autonomy. I mean, I think ASEAN has to work on internally, work on making sure that everybody, because Myanmar is a challenging case, right, for other countries in ASEAN. But ASEAN is there to wield its influence once the region becomes more powerful. economically. So I think there's a lot of people are already looking at Vietnam for instance as a really

quickly growing economic power. Vietnam has now with EV that's VinFest. Right? It's right across. Yeah. Yeah. That's doing quite well, it seems to me. So all these things are happening, that young talents coming up, now being educated, higher education, institutions of higher education. So I think there's this growth potential

that countries like Japan, South Korea, China are still kind of struggling to find. It's there. So I think there's a lot to be optimistic about. And educated people, right? Young generations quite educated in that region. So that's really both very well. for the future of Texas KHA.

One last question. You've alluded to the possibility or the need for Quatt to be a Quatt plus. I'm just curious as to why ASEAN was not involved in the earlier discussion within Quatt or amongst Quad members. It's precisely because respect for ASEAN autonomy, right? It's kind of challenging to... Some people talk about ASEAN. are minus, right? So just, it's hard to move Asia as a whole. So let's try and move some

countries that are more sympathetic to something like quad. If that's a possibility, then then things can move forward in that direction. But in general, if, as in as a whole, it's going to be hard for them to participate in whatever quad-like activities because they are countries who are very close to China. They would oppose that. So it won't be unanimous decision. And so that's a challenge. But it also has to do with kind of a nature of

Quad. I think today the history of Quad is interesting. So in 2006 or seven, eight, when it emerged, Japan was the most forward leaning. Because Japan faced China's threat much earlier, right?

Or realized China's threat much earlier. And Australia was not going on board, right? Initially, it participated pulled out basically India was kind of wish watch it but it's still there So it

You know It kind of died Initially Then it came back Especially after Australia Face the ire of China And then Right now

It seems to me like It exists to include India basically In that alliance Of the US, Japan and Australia To counter China's threat So it's very important

that India is part of that. But India has bricks and different approaches too. So India is a key player there. And, you know, country is like South Korea. It's an obvious partner, New Zealand. And Pacific Islands

also, right? These are another swing states. Much, much smaller than other countries. But in terms of geopolitics, security, military deployment, it's very important. And China understand that.

China goes out there, tries to get Fiji in all those countries, Marshall Islands. So there are different battlegrounds. But so, yeah, I mean, that's Southeast Asia is also critical. And if there are ways to bring Vietnam or Indonesia to Kuat, that would be very powerful. But I think first we need to think about what exactly what is. It's not a military alliance or anything right. Close to that. There's sensitivity, I think, is what needs to be discussed.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, so what Qaeda did well was something like distributing vaccine for COVID vaccines and things like that. And that's a good starting point. And then we can do probably more to establish Qad as a solid multilateral. or a forum that can do good in the region.

And then we can think about expanding it to other countries. Thank you so much, Ki. Thank you for having me. It was fun. That was Professor Kyoto-Sutsui from Stanford University. Thank you. Thank you so much, Kim. Thank you.

It was fun. That was great. That was great. We didn't miss anything, right? No, not that I can think of. Yeah. Okay. All right.

I'm going to have dinner with you on. Good. Good. So the noise is amplified. I'm trying to amplify that. Yeah. Could have spent at least another half hour just so you know. Oh, well, thank you.

It was fun. I thought the quad discussion could have been to hold on to this. I know why. It's not like a friend. She has one. I borrowed it for two minutes and I said, oh. Yeah. Yeah.