Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020. xx, 326 pp. (Tables, maps, figures, B&W photos.) US$29.95, cloth. ISBN 978-0-19-091497-4.
David Shambaugh’s Where Great Powers Meet is a fine contribution to a spate of recent books focusing on China, Southeast Asia, and the US. His work is arguably the most policy and foreign policy (narrowly defined) oriented.
The central theme of the book is US-China competition for influence in Southeast Asia. Shambaugh organizes the book into seven chapters, with the real heart of the book to be found in chapters 3, 5, and 6, examining contemporary US and Chinese roles in Southeast Asia (3 and 5 respectively) and Southeast Asian encounters with the US and China (6). As the author notes, chapters 3 and 5 provide an analysis of Southeast Asia from an outside-looking-in perspective, whereas chapter 6 offers an inside-looking-out perspective. The book is based on extensive interviews covering almost all of Southeast Asia and relies on an exhaustive use of written materials. The basic argument is that while China’s position in Southeast Asia has notably strengthened in recent years, the US still has a significant presence in the region. Each great power has unique strengths and weaknesses that it brings to the new “great game” in Southeast Asia. At least at the time of the book’s writing, neither the US nor China was engaged in a direct tit-for-tat relationship with the other in Southeast Asia.
Among the strengths of the book are Shambaugh’s extensive discussion of the full range of US security engagement with Southeast Asia (82–98) and his examination of the seeming failure of Chinese influence campaigns to increase trust towards China among Southeast Asians (159–162). Shambaugh concludes the book by arguing that in recent years, there has been a notable shift on the part of Southeast Asian states towards a (relatively) pro-Chinese position. He offers four scenarios for future patterns of US-China-Southeast Asian relations: further bandwagoning towards China; continued competitive coexistence; hard rivalry and polarization; and more neutral hedging. He makes recommendations for China and the US. China needs to sincerely listen and be attuned to what Southeast Asians want and are concerned about. The US needs to end its episodic engagement with Southeast Asia. It must pay attention and show up regularly.
There are many more insights Shambaugh brings out that make the book a significant source of information on the US-China-Southeast Asia relationship. There are also elements of his analysis that bear further inquiry. If there are in fact very low levels of trust towards China by Southeast Asian countries, why then have most Southeast Asian states moved to more favourable policies towards China? Presumably this says something about the nature of state-society relations in Southeast Asian states, but how might this affect Southeast Asian states’ policies towards China going forward? With his extensive discussion of US security ties with Southeast Asia and his statement that “China would need to substantially step up its game in the security and defense realm to begin to provide regional states with real alternatives to American weapons and training” (248), Shambaugh makes clear his view about the primacy of security (a realist approach to foreign policy). But this raises two issues. Many scholars (including at times Shambaugh himself) argue that the US approach to the world (and Southeast Asia) is too security- (and Pentagon-) focused. Are American security foci a reflection of the problem with US relations with Southeast Asia and not a source of strength? Moreover, as the quotation above indicates, Shambaugh envisions Southeast Asia dealing with considerable security threats. If the US does not help Southeast Asian states address these, China must do so. But are there threats? China’s actions in the South China Sea and towards Vietnam in the past make China a security concern. But how serious is this concern? Is it all that pressing an issue for many Southeast Asian states? Even with US help, do they want to confront China? It seems that relative free-riding on the US will continue to be the default mode in Southeast Asian security affairs.
While there is much to learn from this book, there are some glaring factual errors. The two million Cambodians killed in the Khmer Rouge ethnocide were not half the population (47); the US bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade took place in 1999 and not 1997 (56); the EP-3 incident took place in April 2001, not May 2000 (58); Guangxi is not a landlocked Chinese provincial-level unit (220). The full dimensions of some of the facts presented are also not brought out. Shambaugh argues that the US investment presence in Southeast Asia is huge and an underappreciated asset for US influence in the region, with a cumulative stock of US$334 billion (78). But on page 226 we are told that US investment in Singapore is $288 billion. In other words, almost seven-eighths of US investment in Southeast Asia is in Singapore, suggesting that while the $334 billion dwarfs China’s approximately $85 billion investment (168), China may be a larger investor in many Southeast Asian nations than the US. The US advantage in overall investment is somewhat deceptive. Similarly, while emphasizing poll findings that point to very low levels of trust for China in Southeast Asia (19.6 percent trust China, 162), Shambaugh fails to also emphasize that the US isn’t all that much better regarded (27.3 percent trust the US). Again, this may suggest Southeast Asians may have trouble trusting great powers in general, simply because they are great powers and act according to the power’s interests.
Events since the publication of this book support Shambaugh’s argument for seeing US-China competition in Southeast Asia as a long-term situation. How will COVID-19, the Philippine presidential election, China’s seeming partial retrenchment on aspects of the Belt and Road Initiative, and Southeast Asian perceptions of the January 6, 2021 near coup in the United States affect that competition? It is to be hoped that Shambaugh continues to update us.
David Bachman
University of Washington, Seattle