Before reflecting upon some of the successes and shortcomings which have flowed out of this dramatic burgeoning in regional security cooperation, we must acknowledge that this evaluative task is an inevitably subjective one. As Amitav Acharya has observed: ‘Despite decades of intense debate, international relations theory provides no agreed and definitive way of assessing what constitutes “success” and “effectiveness” in regional organizations. Understanding the effects of Asian institutions on state behavior and regional order depends very much on the analytical lens used.’^[11]

By way of example, many if not most regional players will tend to assess regional security cooperation not in terms of its immediate outcomes, but rather as a process through which confidence is built, consensus reached and common regional understandings or ‘norms’ achieved.

This issue of analytical subjectivity notwithstanding, it is, I believe, possible to identify a number of areas where Asia-Pacific security institutions have unequivocally fallen short. As alluded to previously, no regional security institution has been able to respond effectively to the major crises that have erupted in the Asia-Pacific during the past decade and a half—the North Korean nuclear crises of 1993–94 and today; the 1995–96 Taiwan Strait crisis; the 1997–98 Asian financial crisis; the crisis in East Timor of 1999 and again of today; the 2003 SARS crisis or the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami. Partly as a result of the consensual style approach to decision-making which has emerged as the preferred modus operandi for most if not all of these regional institutions, they have also tended to move rather slowly toward implementing their stated aims and objectives. In the case of the ARF, for instance, it has experienced real difficulties in progressing from the confidence building phase to the preventive diplomacy phase, contributing toward the perception that it is nothing more than a ‘talk shop’.^[12] Related to this, many regional institutions have struggled to keep pace with and adapt to their changing security surrounds. For example, the fact that APEC does not presently count India—an increasingly significant regional economic power and security actor—among its members seems incomprehensible.

These criticisms notwithstanding—and even if one does not accept the proposition that dialogue and discussion are useful as ends in and of themselves^[13] —there are areas where tangible benefits have accrued from the recent growth in Asia-Pacific security cooperation. In my view, first and foremost among these accomplishments has been the engagement (some would say enmeshment) of China in the regional security architecture which has taken place from the mid-1990s onwards. This process has succeeded in significantly dampening regional apprehensions regarding China’s rise. At the same time, however, it is interesting to note that while a primary aim of engaging China through Asia-Pacific multilateralism was to ‘socialise’ it by exposing it to regional and global norms, Beijing has proven rather adept at shaping (or dare I say ‘socialising’) many of the institutions to which it is a party. In the case of CSCAP, for example, China’s deepening involvement has actually allowed it to shape the direction and outlook of this leading Track 2 institution, particularly in relation to the issue of Taiwan.

Second, although Asia-Pacific security institutions haven’t been particularly effective in responding directly to regional crises, they have periodically served as useful venues for the discussion of highly sensitive or controversial issues that might otherwise not have been discussed, or as ‘circuit-breakers’ to stalled diplomatic relationships. The September 1999 APEC Leaders summit, for instance, provided an opportunity for US President Bill Clinton and Chinese President Jiang Zemin to hold their first meeting since the accidental US bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade the previous May. The crisis talks held at this meeting—and particularly a forceful speech delivered at the meeting by the then US President Bill Clinton—also appear to have critically influenced Indonesia’s decision to allow a UN force into East Timor.^[14] Likewise, the then US Secretary of State, Colin Powell, was able to meet with his North Korean counterpart on the sidelines of the 2004 ARF meeting, which marked the first high-level contact between the United States and North Korea since Madeleine Albright’s visit to Pyongyang in 2000. More recently, the Chinese and Japanese foreign ministers were able to hold a productive 20 minute meeting in the toilet in the lead-up to the 2006 ARF, helping to arrest somewhat a deepening rift in Sino-Japanese relations. So, it seems fair to conclude that regional security institutions have served as more than mere ‘talks shops’ and that they have produced some tangible successes, albeit highly qualified ones and often only at the margins.

Added to this, the very existence and continued evolution of ASEAN can itself be counted as an important success. It is always important to consider counterfactual scenarios in international politics, and to contemplate what type of Southeast Asia might exist today were it not for the existence of ASEAN. It is certainly no small feat that a ‘shooting war’ amongst its members is today all but unthinkable. As Rodolfo Severino of the Singapore-based Institute of Southeast Asian Studies recently noted:

Before moving to conclude with a few observations regarding the main issues and prospects facing security cooperation in the Asia-Pacific, it is worth briefly contemplating some of the contributions that the SDSC has made toward the furtherance of security dialogue in this part of the world.

Given the prominence of bilateral (namely US-led) cooperation as the primary mode of Asia-Pacific security collaboration throughout the Cold War period, it is important to acknowledge the substantial contributions that members of the SDSC have made to better understanding and explaining US alliance relationships in this part of the world. Coral Bell has led the way here through her extensive writings on the US–Australia alliance. Indeed, Bell was present at the signing of the ANZUS Treaty in 1951. Her best known work addressing the US–Australia alliance is Dependent Ally, which examines this and also Australia’s relationship with the United Kingdom from a historical perspective and which has subsequently been published in three editions.^[16] Her more recent Australian Strategic Policy Institute paper, Living with Giants: Finding Australia’s place in a more complex world, traverses similar analytical terrain, but takes a longer term view as to how Australia might best balance its regional commitments and global alliances in a neighbourhood that will almost inevitably be characterised by an increasingly populous, economically powerful and technologically sophisticated set of societies.^[17] Albeit from a completely different perspective, Desmond Ball’s path-breaking work on US strategic installations in Australia should also be noted for the impact it has had in terms of markedly expanding the contours of public debate on this subject.^[18] Other SDSC members who have made useful intellectual contributions to explaining and better understanding America’s Asia-Pacific alliances include Paul Dibb and Ron Huisken.^[19]

Since the early 1990s, the contribution of SDSC members to the scholarship and actual practice of multilateral security cooperation in the Asia-Pacific has been equally important and influential. We might like to reflect upon the fact, for instance, that three out of the five Australian representatives on the ARF’s register of experts and eminent persons have a very close association with the SDSC—Paul Dibb, Alan Dupont and Hugh White. Paul Dibb has been an active participant in a number of other regional security dialogues, including as Chair of the first security dialogue between China and Australia in 1993 and as Chair of an informal meeting of 18 ARF countries on practical measures for military and security cooperation in 1994. Likewise, in comparison to any other Australian figure, Desmond Ball’s contribution to regional second track diplomacy is unparalleled and, for this reason, he is identified by Brian Job as part of an Asia-Pacific Track 2 elite that also includes the likes of Jusef Wanandi, Carolina Hernandez, Ralph Cossa, Paul Evans and the late Noordin Sopie.^[20] A number of others, including Ron Huisken and Ross Babbage, have been active participants and contributors to the IISS Shangri-la Dialogue. The SDSC itself has produced an impressive number of monographs and papers addressing regional security cooperation.^[21] Last, but not least, it has also been directly involved in the training and education of a number of scholars who have gone on to become leading international authorities on regional security cooperation, including David Capie and Herman Kraft.^[22]