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CHAPTER 2 CONCEPTUALISING POLITICO-SECURITY REGIONALISM
Introduction
The term politico-security regionalism is composed of two different concepts: ‘political security’ and ‘regionalism’. That is, politico-security regionalism is concerned with political security in its regional context. By politico- or political security, on the one hand, is meant the ‘security politics’ of conflict and cooperation as social reality, which is defined and redefined by states as main actors. By regionalism, on the other hand, is meant a bundle of political ideas, norms and interests, which are socially (re)constructed by regional states. In this context, it is important to note that ‘regional states’, which denote the member states of regional grouping, should be distinguished from both global states and nation-states. In terms of the agents of regionalism, in fact, both terms ‘global states’ and ‘nation-states’ are not sufficient to explain the concept of politico-security regionalism. From a globalist perspective of Wallerstein’s world-system theory, states are normally seen as a substructure of international system to maintain a capitalist world system that contains a core, a periphery, and a semi-periphery (Viotti and Kauppi 1999:341-360). From a neo-realist perspective of Waltz’s structural realism, states (which can be regarded as a major component of anarchical international structure) are powerless to change the structure in which they find themselves (Viotti and Kauppi 1999:66-76). Both perspectives are deterministic in character in which individual policymakers can do little to affect events despite a differing degree. In exploring the concept of politicosecurity regionalism driven by regional states as main actors in this study, however, the term ‘regional states’ is often used from a perspective of social constructivism so that it can be seen as constitutive elements in which intersubjective factors such as norms, identities and interests are not treated as fixed, but as being flexible, to be made and remade (cf Söderbaum 1998:75-92). Given the aforementioned assumptions, thus, the concept of politico-security regionalism can be understood in the open-ended context of political projects to be constructed by ‘regional states’ in response to external, as well as internal forces.In fact, both concepts of security and regionalism seem to encompass widely diverging definitions. In terms of security, as Buzan (1991:7) points out in People, States & Fear,the concept has an ‘essentially contested nature’. A number of scholars contest the definition of the term because at its core, there are moral, ideological, and normative elements that render empirical data irrelevant and prevent reasonable people from agreeing with one another on a fixed definition (Lipschutz, 1995:7). Despite the lack of an agreed definition, Buzan et al. (1998) suggest a typology for analysing security comprised of five major sectors: military, political, economic, societal and environmental. The authors attempted to broaden the definition of security to include freedom from military, political, societal, economic and environmental threats. Yet, given that all security threats are constituted politically (Ayoob, 1995:8-12; Buzan et al., 1998:141- 162), it becomes possible to see the concept of security in the political context. As indicated above, thus, given that ‘all [security] threats … are … defined politically’ (Buzan et al. 1998:141), the influence of the other sectors on matters that affect security must be filtered through the political sector and must be relevant to that sector:namely, when developments in other sectors threaten to have political meanings, contexts and consequences such as threats to state boundaries, political institutions, or governing regimes, these other variables must be taken into account as a part of politico-security calculus (Ayoob, 1995:8). In this sense, it can be argued that the political sector needs to be informed by the other areas of human activities, including military, economic, social and environmental (Buzan 1991:19). However, as Ayoob (1995:8) points out, the politico-security realm should retain its distinctiveness from other realms: that is, phenomena such as economic deprivation and environmental degradation can be viewed as events, occurrences, and variables that may be linked to, but are essentially distinct from, the realm of politico-security as defined for purposes of this study.
In terms of regionalism, as mentioned earlier, the concept is also contested and complex. As Hurrell (1995a:333; 1995b:38) notes, ‘the range of factors that may be implicated in the growth of regionalism is very wide and includes economic, social, political, cultural and historic dimensions’. In addition, Fawcett (1995:10) argues that ‘just as there are no absolute or naturally determined regions, there is no single explanation that encompasses the origins and development of the regional idea’.
Nonetheless, given that regionalism becomes a state or political project (Hettne, 1994; Gamble and Payne, 1996; Grugel and Hout, 1999), regionalism can also be studied in the context of political dynamics that are socially constructed through various interactions among states. Thus both terms ‘security’ and ‘regionalism’ can be understood in the political context of states as main actors. However, the assumptions above need to be argued more fully in this chapter.
Therefore, this chapter will focus on the term ‘security regionalism’ in the political context by illuminating related concepts, including region, regionalism, regionalisation, regional security, and politico-security. In reviewing the literature on these topics, this chapter seeks to address key issues which are at the heart of a debate on politicosecurity and regionalism: what is meant by these terms? what does link the two different concepts such as ‘politico-security’ and ‘regionalism’? and why is it that the multi-level approach is necessary to utilise these concepts? In exploring these central questions, firstly, the chapter will try to define politico- or political security with exploring the related concepts, including weak states, states-making, sovereignty and the state as the primary referent/agent of politico-security.
Thereafter, it will discuss the characteristics of ‘regionalism’ in particular context of ‘new’ regionalism. In doing so, in this chapter, I suggest the three different levels (including the domestic, regional, extra-regional levels) so as to assist in clarifying the concept of politico-security regionalism. Under the assumption that such regional organisations as ASEAN and SADC(C) are primarily driven by the ‘member’ states respectively, nonetheless, I attempt to stress the regional level through holding the political sector as primary and regional states as the focal point to analyse security regionalisms of ASEAN and SADC(C). In conceptualising the term ‘politico-security regionalism’ in this chapter, it is important to note that the concept will be seen as regional (political) projects which can be shaped and reshaped by the regional (member) states.
Defining Security: Politico-Security
As mentioned above, politico- or political security concerns the politics of conflict and cooperation amongst states as main actors. In general, the politics of conflict and cooperation is socially constructed by human agency (Vasquez, 1995:221). According to Buzan et al. (1998:141-162), politico-security is about relationships of political authority, recognition and such a means of managing conflict as compromise and consensus. In this context, that is, Buzan et al. (1998:7-8) argue that politico-security concerns the organisational stability of such social order(s) as states, systems of government and the ideologies that give them legitimacy. In more detail, Buzan (1991:118-119) defines politico-security as follows:
Political threats are aimed at the organisational stability of the state.
Their purpose may range from pressuring the government on a particular policy, through overthrowing the government, to fomenting secessionism, and disrupting the political fabric of the state so as to weaken it prior to military attack. The idea of the state, particularly its national identity and organising ideology, and the institutions which express it, are the normal target of political threats. Since the state is an essentially political entity, political threats may be as much feared as military ones. This is particularly so if the target is a weak state.
Threats to politico-security in developing states come mainly from within their borders.
Political systems in many developing states, including the member states of ASEAN and SADC, generate autocratic practices embodied in a minority regime, which anipulates the apparatus of the state in a discriminatory and arbitrary manner that furthers the interests of the minority. As a result, regimes in power face challenges from domestic opposition in the form of strikes, riots, rebellions and even armed resistance.
Consequently, such regimes generate oppressive and repressive violence, which endangers the security of excluded populations or those advocating alternative policies (Fall, 1993:76).
South Africa during apartheid provided a good example of an illegitimate regime since the ruling regime was racially exclusive and thus based on minority rule. The regime security was maintained at the expense of the security of the majority of South Africans.
However, SADCC as a response to apartheid South Africa appropriated such norms as racial equality which were supported not only by continental forces but also by global forces (see Klotz, 1995; also Chapter 5). Consequently, for SADCC, the security of the region was believed to be achieved by attaining a non-racial political system in South Africa which at the same time represented the insecurity of the Pretoria government and its apartheid regime (Booth and Vale, 1995:307; also Chapter 5).
Meanwhile, for ASEAN, the East Timor crisis (1999-2000) is a case in point in explaining the characters of politico-security in the developing world. The political instability caused by external forces (the Asian economic crisis during 1997-1998) as well as internal forces (growing riots against human rights violations during 1999)
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The Mechanisms of Politico-Security Regionalism in Southeast Asia and Southern Africa: A Comparative Case Study of ASEAN and SADC
