I suppose it’s self explanatory. Philippines and Vietnam, two countries with serious issues with China on the South China Sea conflict are among key trade partners with China.
I don’t remember seeing any articles where they are even trying to import less from China as a means of putting pressure on China. India has tried to do so, but I don’t think their imports have really gone down. Anyway, China gets to benefit from trade even while being adverse to its neighbours.
Is the answer just manufacturing prowess? Or is there more to it than meets the eye? What am I missing?
https://asiasociety.org/policy-institute/balancing-act-assessing-chinas-growing-economic-influence-asean
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Submission Statement:
The article talks about the tricky nature of US – China – ASEAN triangle of trade and military relations. The ASEAN nations see increasing influence of China through trade and investments, although they do not always have bonhomie. Border disputes and disputes regarding South China Sea area important factors in the relationship. Why then do the ASEAN nations not use economic means of response by trying to trade less with China, remains an important question. In fact, they even became part of the RCEP with fervour
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I think the question you are really asking is does China need Philippines more than Phillipines needs China.
The answer is… roughly, the global trade system… “US dominated world order” or whatnot.
Basically, the agreements, precedents and norms of trade and conflict. They tend to work well and it’s risky/costly to mess with them. ASEAN countries have in large part done well from the system.
Getting into trade conflict will just result in a weakening of the trade system and assuming or co-owning the US role… a difficult act to proceed.
Naval peace is extremely delicate at present. Trade peace too. These nations are aware of these dangers.
ASEAN as a whole is a big market for Chinese exports, but the individual countries are not so significant.
China has invested heavily in the politicians of Laos and Cambodia, so can block any collective action against China through these vassal states.
That leaves individual action, which would not affect China much, but would affect the indivudual countries greatly, as there is no alternative source of cheap consumer products that can replace China, so they would suffer very high inflation.
Because contrary to popular beliefs The ASEAN nations have competing south china sea claims not with China alone but with each other too e.g. Couple days ago you have Philippines laying claims to Sabah(a state of malaysia) so do they reduce import from each other too? The situation gets even worse when you considers Taiwan’s claim. In short it’s a massive clusterfck.
Imho all these dramas over the past few months is nothing more than both sides applying pressure to get more compromise for the ‘Code of Conduct in South China Sea’ which is in negotiations since 2018.
1. They both have tiny economies compared to China, hard to exert pressure when the impact on China will be small – empty threat.
2. They both do a lot of trade with China, both buying and selling, and China is the biggest trading partner for both. Any moves will have a huge impact on their economies, even if it’s just restricting imports (inflation, shortage of specific goods in the short term etc.), not to mention the loss of exports when China retaliates.
3. For Vietnam at least, a lot of the Chinese imports go on to the US as exports (whether as inputs or even just relabelled), and they’re making a lot of money from this.
4. China does not need to use economic means alone to respond to any actions. There is no winning hand if things escalate.
5. They are both pretty poor countries (lower middle income <5k gdp/capita) and will do what most rational actors will do – bide their time and suck it up while trying their best to grow.
If your question is about asean as a group, it’s kinda similar really. But also note that asean is a pretty loose grouping and nowhere near as unified as the EU.