The Hard-Won Benefits of Soft Diplomacy
Culture
matters for diplomacy, and Indonesian President Joko Widodo embodies
the “soft” and sophisticated elements of Indonesia’s dominant Javanese
values, which emphasize consultation and consensus. The rest of the
world would benefit by learning a lesson or two from the success of the
recent G20 summit in Bali.
By KISHORE MAHBUBANI
Published by Project Syndicate, 8 December 2022
https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/soft-diplomacy-why-g20-bali-summit-went-better-than-expected-by-kishore-mahbubani-2022-12?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=organic-social&utm_campaign=page-posts-dec22&utm_post-type=link&utm_format=16:9&utm_creative=link-image&utm_post-date=2022-12-08
SINGAPORE – The world seems like a calmer place after the G20 meeting in Bali in mid-November. The question is why.
We
know that US President Joe Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping held a
three-hour in-person meeting that went well, despite their many policy
differences and their countries’ growing antagonism. It was also helpful
that Russian President Vladimir Putin didn’t show up, and that Russia’s
war in Ukraine didn’t overshadow the Sino-American discussions. In
fact, the G20 issued a statement declaring that, “Most members strongly condemned the war in Ukraine.”
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Xi also had a relatively successful meeting in Bali. The two leaders smiled and shook hands, which was a significant improvement from the Shanghai Cooperation Organization meeting in September, when they could barely make eye contact.
So,
the conditions in Bali were amenable to serious diplomacy, which was
more than most observers had hoped for. But how did this atmosphere come
about, and does it portend positive results and agreements?
The
first question is relatively easy to answer. Indonesia, the host,
worked steadfastly – both visibly and behind the scenes – to ensure that
the summit would not fail.
Culture
matters for diplomacy, and Indonesian President Joko Widodo embodies
the “soft” and sophisticated elements of Indonesia’s dominant Javanese
culture, which prizes musyawarah and mufakat (consultation and
consensus). To prevent the Ukraine war from derailing the summit, he
visited both Putin and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in their
capitals. In the event, this show of respect paid off: by not turning up
in Bali, Putin demonstrated a willingness not to make life more
difficult for Jokowi.
Western
diplomats, too, often fail to grasp or appreciate this intangible side
of diplomacy, reflecting a strong tendency toward black-or-white
judgments. Zelensky is virtuous, Putin is evil, and all other
considerations must follow from those premises. At a time when the West
is shunning and isolating Putin, Jokowi gave him the respect that he so
clearly craves. Likewise, while Western diplomats tend to draw clear
lines between political systems (democracies are virtuous, and
autocracies are wicked), Jokowi treated Biden and Xi with equal respect.
Does
this softer Javanese approach hold broader lessons for international
affairs? The answer depends on our judgments about the world order that
appears to be emerging. Since the “End of History” in 1989, the West has
assumed that global developments generally flow in only one direction:
toward Western-style democracy with Western-style market economies. In
fact, we are entering an era that will be multipolar,
multi-civilizational, and thus multilateral.
In
such a complex world, black-or-white descriptions will almost always
prove to be too simplistic. India, for example, is an important ally of
the West, even though Modi will never be seen in a Western business suit
and complains about the “slave mentality” surrounding use of the English language in India.
It
is telling that Javanese shadow plays (which borrow from Hindu
mythology) feature a wide range of characters who do not fit neatly into
categories like good and evil. One major advantage of this worldview is
that it creates more opportunities for rival sides to seek peace or
find common ground.
As
matters stand, it is politically inconceivable that US Secretary of
State Antony Blinken would visit Tehran or Pyongyang to talk directly
with Iranian or North Korean leaders, and Europeans are becoming equally
allergic to the idea of visiting Moscow. Yet that is precisely the kind
of flexibility we need if we are going to maintain relative peace and
stability in the twenty-first century.
Beyond
the recent G20 summit, the open-minded Javanese approach has also
proven effective in the smaller multi-civilizational laboratory of
Southeast Asia. No other region on Earth boasts such diversity.
Southeast Asia’s population of 685 million has 240 million Muslims, 140 million Christians, 200 million Buddhists,
and so on. Yet, owing to the intangible contributions of the Javanese
ethos within the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), the
region has remained peaceful.
By
and large, the principles of musyawarah and mufakat have prevailed.
While one can easily imagine Indonesia treating Timor-Leste as a kind of
“Kosovo” – a national territory that has been “lost” – it instead
champions that country’s application for ASEAN membership. Such
magnanimity is in short supply in our deeply fractured international
community. We could all benefit from learning a lesson or two from
Javanese culture and heritage. Doing so would help soothe a troubled
world, just as Jokowi did in Bali.
Kishore
Mahbubani, a distinguished fellow at the Asia Research Institute at the
National University of Singapore, is the co-author of The ASEAN Miracle: A Catalyst for Peace (National University of Singapore Press, 2017) and the author of Has China Won? (PublicAffairs, 2020).