Video Interview: Donald Emmerson on the Evolution of Great Power Competition in Southeast Asia
In a new interview, Southeast Asia Program Director Donald K. Emmerson discusses the history and politics that have shaped great power competition in Southeast Asia and how the intensifying rivalry between China and the United States might affect ASEAN member states.
As tensions continue to grow between China and the United States, Southeast Asian nations remain locked in the epicenter of an emergent geopolitical competition. Many questions remain as to how these countries will respond to the external pressures generated by this rivalry.
To address these questions, Southeast Asia Program Director Donald K. Emmerson recently joined ONE News Philippines host Richard Heydarian for an interview in an episode of the series The View From Manila. The full interview is available below:
Heydarian opened the conversation by asking whether great power competition between China and the United States constituted a new Cold War. According to Emmerson, this was not the case, and another Cold War in the region is unlikely to happen due in part to the economic interconnectedness between China and the United States.
Over the course of the conversation, Emmerson discussed the various challenges ASEAN member nations face as they balance their own domestic needs and desire for autonomy with the increasingly tenuous international political scene in the South China Sea.
Emmerson emphasized the potential vulnerability of ASEAN member states amidst clashes between superpower countries. “It's natural that the diversity of Southeast Asia would be an opportunity for large, powerful outsiders to come in and try to establish support that would further divide Southeast Asia,” he said of the potential for great power rivalry to continue and perhaps worsen the multiple divisions and distinctions that already exist within Southeast Asia.
