Asia is becoming a regional system but it won’t be another EU: futurologist Parag Khanna

Renowned author, strategic affairs expert, and futurologist Parag Khanna shares his views on the post-novel coronavirus world order in an exclusive interview with India Today TV News Director Rahul Kanwal.

Time and again, experts have seen the Asia-Pacific region assume a leading role in the global order. With the recent India-China military standoff in eastern Ladakh and trouble brewing between the US and the Chinese in the South China Sea has only strengthened the assumption that the 21st century is witnessing the baton of civilisational leadership pass from a Western ‘global rules-based order’ to an Asia-led ‘community of common destiny’.

The question on everyone’s mind remains — is this just a temporary rupture linked to the pandemic or is a new emerging faultline that is unlikely to go away anytime soon?

“The world can be led by Asian powers but that doesn’t necessarily mean it would be peaceful too. An Asia-led world order and peace in Asia are two different things,” says futurologist Khanna, who is also the founder of global advisory firm FutureMap. He adds that there are scholars who confuse the two with each other.

Khanna asks, “Was the 20th-century Europe-led world order was peaceful? Europe became peaceful with itself only in the last 75 years. The world can be led by Asian powers without Asia necessarily being peaceful. It would be wonderful if Asian powers are peaceful with each other.”

“Asia is becoming a regional system, meaning an intense set of relations in trade, investment, commerce, and tensions are also rising. There is never going to be an Asian Union like the EU. China has been flexing its muscles for about over 20 years in the Himalayas since the 1950-60s,” Khanna tells India Today TV.

He goes further to add, “China is portraying this incident (eastern Ladakh face-off) as a response to India’s unilateral building of roads and other infrastructure in Ladakh but let’s remember that China is known to be an abuser of such infrastructure to dictate boundaries for much much longer. I disagree with the proposition that Xi Jinping is resorting to this external expansion to deflect attention from domestic troubles.”

Responding to India’s handling of the current crisis, Khanna says, “India is far more obsessed with China than the other way. If you see the Chinese media, they are not discussing this issue much or deflecting internal issues using this conflict and blaming India.”

Khanna, who is also a strategic affairs expert, adds, “Historically and theoretically, PM Narendra Modi is correct that the era of expansionism is over. But we need to look deeper to understand how China carries out its expansionism.

China is much of a supply chain empire. It is much like the Dutch Empire of the 16-17th century. Unlike the British, the Chinese are not actually trying to govern the internal politics of countries. So it is possible for China to economically expand at the global scale with its neo-mercantile policies and while also carrying out territorial expansion with these very localised disputes.”

“There are 7-8 such disputes. In the short term, this may play out to be another example similar Doklam where China underestimated India’s resolve. What might be a smart strategy for India, not perhaps unilaterally, to effectively suggest or propose a formal demarcation of the boundaries and settle the dispute,” Khanna says.

He tells India Today, “India has once again reminded China that such disputes will not help solve the issue.”