Concept of East Asian Community

The East Asian Community concept proposed by Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama recently has aroused heated discussions in the media, it has also become an official agenda in a number of recent regional summits. In theory, the East Asian Community is, indeed an attractive concept. It is also in line with the trend of economic regionalization. But I believe countries in the region should not hastily echo the pursuit of this East Asian Community idea blindly when we consider its practical operation level.
The "East Asian Community" concept comes from the European Community or the EU. As such its meaning and application naturally need to copy the EU's experiences and practices. In the author's many years of observation and experience, the EU on the whole is a success; but the shortcomings and disadvantages are also obvious; and these shortcomings will constantly be exposed in the future as well. Apparently, Japanese Prime Minister Hatoyama's reason for advocating the establishment of this "East Asian Community," with some very enthusiastic support coming from academicians is because they are aware of the EU's success, while they may not have a profound understanding of the many problems faced by the EU.

East Asian Community Premature; Likely To Be Shelved
Some people think that Hatoyama made this East Asian Community initiative is based on Japan's internal consideration. Some people even thought that it was a political gimmick of the new Japanese prime minister as he began his new role as the Japanese national leader. But I prefer to believe that this is Hatoyama's serious concept after he has gone through deep thinking process and reflected on it. However, in my opinion, the way Hatoyama presented this proposal really lacked the seriousness the concept entailed. In fact, the initial concept of Hatoyama in forming the East Asian Community was to establish a community comprising three important countries namely China, Japan, and South Korea only. But before Hatoyama announced his initiative publicly, he did not seem to have engaged in proper communication or established proper channel to facilitate exchange of views with the other two important countries. Because of the lack of consultations, and under the condition that both China and South Korea have not been informed or prepared for it, the sudden unilateral announcement made by Hatoyama over his proposal for an East Asian Community has inevitably made the Chinese and South Korean national leaders feeling awkward and embarrassed. This shows that the new Japanese Government led by Hatoyama is still relatively crude in handling foreign affairs. This can also be observed through his statement that resulted in strong rebound when he announced that "Japan will leave the United States and enter Asia."
Is Hatoyama's "East Asian Community" concept feasible? This is of concern to many people. In response, many politicians and scholars have put forth various ideas and recommendations, but mostly are mere discussions. This is because the initiative itself is just a grand and empty concept. Although the thought behind the concept is good, in reality, this concept lacks the reliability that actual situation warrants. Thus, amid the current progress of regional integration, there is a need that all countries should shelve this East Asian Community proposal aside first in order to allow each and every country to concentrate on what they should do as priority.
Why should Japanese Prime Minister Hatoyama's East Asia Community proposal be shelved? The reason is very simple, and this is because the time to concretely implement such a proposal has not yet arrived. This proposal is premature. In other words, in East Asia, conditions for the establishment of such a pan-regional community cannot be met. Moreover, there is no urgency for the region to rush for the same.
What are the conditions in East Asia that still do not process for the formation of an East Asia Community as proposed by Hatoyama? In terms of economic, social, cultural, political, perception of values, and many others, we can safely say that East Asian countries, including Northeast Asian and Southeast Asian countries, the differences between one another on the above mentioned values are just too large and too complex as well. For a long period of time in the future, these differences cannot be reduced through any form of regional mechanism. But instead, these differences can even become more acute with the formation of such an East Asian Community mechanism. It can lead to more frictions when there are conflicts of national interests among different countries. Such a scenario is quite well-known and there is no need for me to elaborate on it here.
But I would like to emphasize just one point; that is, all East Asian countries, including Japan, currently do not have a firm conviction and determination to pursue this long-term goal of forming an "East Asian Community." In particular, Japan's conviction and determination on such a formation mooted by its national leader is not enough.
Let us look at Japan first. Japan is East Asia's largest economy. Japan is the country that initiated this "East Asian Community" concept. Logically, one should expect Japan to wholeheartedly go all the way out to take the lead in promoting this objective as this is its most basic responsibility. Japan is also duty-bound to do so. But it remains a big question mark to gauge if Japan can get this basic responsibility done. I do not doubt the willingness and sincerity of the new Japanese Government led by Hatoyoma in wanting to form the East Asian Community. But having the political willingness and sincerity in wanting to form an East Asian Community is not enough. Japan must have unshakable belief in its ideal to go for it with duty-bound resolve and indomitable perseverance.
For now, Japan does not have these conditions also. Since the Second World War, Japan's foreign policy in Asia has never been one that can allow Asian countries to feel a sense of its closeness. When Japan positions its national identify, Japan also does not express its sense of belonging to Asia. Having a strong sense of Asian identity is the powerful spirit that can push its East Asian Community proposal ahead. But Japan lacks such spiritual motivation. When Prime Minister Hatoyama came to power, he did try to adjust Japan's diplomatic strategy and to reposition its national identity. But the habitual behavior of past decades is not something that one can turn it over within few days. What is more: the societal consensus of "leaving the United States behind to enjoy Asia" mentality has not yet been formed in the Japanese society.
As the initiator of this "East Asian Community," Japan should play the role similar to what France plays in Europe. The present and future Japanese Government must emulate what the present and past French Government has done in unceasingly taking up the initiative to promote regional integration process in EU. But what we see developing in Japan's foreign policy is contrary to what the new Japanese Government should be doing if he wants to form an East Asian Community using EU as a model. Japan's foreign policy lacks a sense of independency because over a period of time, Japan has become over-dependent on the United States. Japan has also been distancing itself from Asian countries for too long. As such Japan is being called "the Asian United Kingdom."
In addition to this, even if the Japanese Government led by Hatoyama is obsessed with the promotion for the formation of its "East Asian Community," there is no guarantee that if there is a sudden national leadership transition in Japan in the near future, the new Japanese government will want to follow through the East Asian Community initiative started by Hatoyama and the present government he leads. This also means that Japan's commitment to seeing thorough the formation of the East Asian Community initiative lacks sustainability and stability. This proposal to form the East Asian Community also lacks the crucial sustainable political assurance to carry it through when there is a change in government. Moreover, if Hatoyama's East Asian Community proposal does not get full support from his people, the policies set by the present Japanese Government is bound to receive interference coming from different directions. As a consequence, Prime Minister Hatoyama's enthusiasm, energy and, momentum to promote his East Asian Community concept will also be affected.

China Need Not To Form East Asian Community Urgently
There is no doubt that the main focus of Hatoyama's proposal to form this "East Asian Community" is to expect China positive reaction and response. Without China's whole-hearted participation, there is no need for other East Asian countries to talk about the formation of an East Asian Community. But after Prime Minister Hatoyama announced his East Asian Community initiative, the Chinese leader was a little bit puzzled and not knowing for sure what Hatoyama was aiming at. But finally China still gave Japan a positive response. The reason is not because China was absolutely in agreement with what Hatoyama has proposed, but because Hatoyama's attitude toward China was friendly; and so the Chinese leaders did not want to give Hatoyama a cold hand.
The question is: Will China really have the will power and determination to promote the formation of this East Asian Community? The writer of this article's opinion is "not necessarily."
Over the past three decades, through internal dynamics and with the help of financial resources, market and technology coming from developed countries; China has achieved a sustainable rapid economic growth. The rapid economic growth of China has also helped China walk into the center of the global economic order with confidence. China has finally reached a stage that the county can join the United States and other countries to begin exploring ways to jointly deal with major international economic and political issues of concerned to the world community. This is what people talked about as the G20 strategic dialogue mechanism, and the G20 mechanism. At this stage, China, of course will not give up such opportunities, and to restrict such opportunities for broader expansion of international cooperation. China is playing an active role in world affairs at this moment. It is the best and the most appropriate time for China to show its best at the international platform. As such China will not want to allow such vague East Asian Community to narrow its global framework, to reduce its global goal.
Will Japan's "East Asian Community" impede the implementation of China's global strategy? To deal with this question, perhaps it is better to say that any regional mechanism has limitations and exclusiveness, although they all claim to be open. Take the EU for example: Many of the bilateral cooperation issues between EU members and non-EU members are subject to restrictions and limitations as governed by the EU policy, rule, and regulation. Such limitation and restriction are perhaps acceptable to small countries, but for big country with global strategy ambition such as China, it might feel that such a regional community formation as rather burden and cumbersome.
One of the reasons why the European countries like Germany and France are firmed to pursue the unification of Europe is because these smaller countries cannot use their own power to pursue bigger global strategic goal. But China is different. It does not need to use the formation of regional grouping to boost its international status. This is because as a country, China processes the power to influence the world and can pursue much broader global interest without the help of others. From this perspective alone, Japan's East Asian Community proposal will not be very attractive to China.
From China's development strategy point of view, "East Asian Community" is not the only choice China must take to walk its path. After the global financial crisis, China's economic growth model has begun to move toward a substantive transformation. China's economic goal now is to expand domestic demand to move away from the old economic model of depending too excessively on external markets. China's ultimate economic goal is to allow the country to attain self-contained economic development.
In term of population, geographical dimension, market potential, and labor resources, China has more than the total sum of all EU countries; and its degree of inter diversification and inter complementary ability in internal development is not less than EU. In other words, China can, through its own internal strengths, supplement its weaknesses in many fields. China, of course, requires outside help to supplement its own advantage, but China does not have to get bogged down to start all over again in the setting up an "East Asian Community," which has an uncertain future. In fact, within East Asia, we already have quite a number of bilateral and multilateral cooperation mechanisms in existence and with some that are undergoing construction. The potential and function of these regional mechanisms have not even been fully utilized and exploited.

Southeast Asian Nations Need To Complete Internal Integration
From ASEAN point of view, Japan's "East Asian Community" concept is clear, but without very much substance. Such a proposal is also not ASEAN member countries national priority either. So far, ASEAN and the three Northeast Asian countries namely China, Japan and South Korea have also already established bilateral or multilateral mechanisms. These mechanisms such as "ASEAN Ten Plus One." "ASEAN Ten Plus Three" and "ASEAN East Asia Summit" are already been put into practice for many years. These regional bilateral and multilateral free trade mechanisms will require more effort and resources to consolidate. In time to come, the integrated role these existing trade mechanisms can play in regionalization can become increasingly more obvious.
Nevertheless, there are still many difficulties facing ASEAN's integration process. These difficulties will take time to melt down and as such ASEAN's integration effort has to take the form of a gradual integration pattern. If ASEAN's regional integration goal becomes too many and too large, it will add unnecessary duplication on top of the already functioning one. As such, adding the goal of "East Asian Community" formation will weaken the cohesiveness of ASEAN's internal power as a regional grouping. This will lead to some ASEAN member countries having a sense of loss not knowing how to adjust to such a new thought. In addition to that, the debate on the formation of such an East Asian regional cooperation will add unnecessary troubles and disputes to ASEAN member countries. As it stands, the recent issue of who should be the players in Japan's "East Asian Community" proposal has already emerged.
Driven by the process of economic globalization, it is important for all East Asian countries to expand regional cooperation. But in so doing, East Asian countries must show farsightedness and also focus on what they are doing now. East Asian countries must adopt pragmatic and down to approach to handle regional cooperation affairs with solid steps. The most important first task for the countries in the East Asian region to do is to consolidate and strengthen the existing cooperation mechanism between Southeast Asian and Northeast Asian countries. The second task the region must do is for the three Northeast Asian countries namely China, Japan and South Korea to strength their bilateral free trade ties as soon as possible. These two tasks are necessary foundations for East Asian countries to push toward the goal of East Asian regional unification later. It is only when such solid basic foundations have been built that the time is then ripe for us to talk about Japanese Prime Minister Hatoyama's East Asian Community proposal.