By Wang Qin

Cultural Exchanges Play a Key Role in Regional Development

By Wang Qin

About the author: Prof. Wang Qin is the director of the Center for Southeast Asian Studies at Xiamen University.

In March 2015, several arms of the Chinese central government issued the Vision and Actions on Jointly Building Silk Road Economic Belt and 21st Century Maritime Silk Road. At the end of the year, ASEAN members announced the establishment of the ASEAN Community (the Community). Its development blueprint has much in common with that of the Belt and Road Initiative (the Initiative) in regards to pivotal cooperative fields, setting the stage for future industrial connection and regional cooperation between China and the regional bloc. This author believes that China and ASEAN countries should advance common development by way of multi-tier cooperation in the areas of production capacity and people-to-people and cultural exchanges.

The Community is comprised of three pillars, namely the ASEAN Economic Community, ASEAN Political-Security Community and ASEAN Socio-Cultural Community. Similarly, the Initiative aims to establish a community of common interests and shared future and responsibilities that feature political mutual trust, economic integration and cultural inclusiveness. For this goal to be achieved, there is a need to improve regional infrastructure, build a safe and efficient land-sea-air transport network, boost regional connectivity and trade and investment facilitation to new levels and build a high-standard free trade network in the region.

ASEAN released the Master Plan on ASEAN Connectivity in October 2010, marking a strategic step in the creation of the Community. It vows to consolidate regional and national physical, institutional and people-to-people linkages. Under the Initiative proposed by China, regional cooperation focuses on policy communication, infrastructure linkage, trade flows, financing arrangements and friendly exchanges between the people. It hence has many similarities with the ASEAN plan.

As the plan for ASEAN Economic Community points out, all members of the association must participate in the global value chain before the region can build itself into a highly integrated and consolidated economy. Research by this author shows that ASEAN is diligently working on reshuffling and integrating certain industries across the region, and accelerating their regional cooperation. The sectors involved include transport, information and communication technology, electronic commerce and energy.

The industrial cooperation China is carrying out under the Initiative covers both conventional and emerging industries. It aims to optimize the distribution of industries and realize synchronized development of the upper and lower reaches of the industrial chain, as well as all related sectors. Again, the industrial cooperation spelled out by the ASEAN Economic Community and production capacity cooperation envisioned by the Initiative is similar or overlaps in many areas. For instance, both place a high premium on participation in regional and global value chains, which opens up broad space for cooperation between China and ASEAN.

Cultural and people-to-people cooperation is the social foundation for the Initiative, offering public support for bilateral cooperation. The plan for the ASEAN Socio-Cultural Community raises goals such as building a people-oriented community, offering life-long education, innovating higher education, enhancing regional educational cooperation and increasing the competitiveness of its human resources. All of these plans resonate with the cultural inclusiveness of the Initiative. Under the Initiative’s framework, China has proposed that participating countries promote student exchanges and deepen exchanges and cooperation in fields such as human resources, tourism, education, health care, as well as between political parties, parliaments and civic organizations. In building the Socio-Cultural Community ASEAN is poised to, among other things, rally the broadest possible participation of their citizens, allow them equal and wide access to opportunities, and protect the human rights of women. It also vows to eradicate poverty through social welfare and security, protect women’s rights, ensure gender equality and promote decent work opportunities.

In regards to cultural and people-to-people exchanges with ASEAN, an exchange mechanism has been set up between China and Indonesia, and the annual China-ASEAN Cultural Forum and China-ASEAN Theatre Week have both been great successes.

In the opinion of this author, the two sides should continue to build a friendly bond between their people, display their cultures to each other, and advance mutual understanding through substantive and engaging activities such as the Silk Road Film Festival and the ASEAN China Forum of Youth and Humanities. In addition, China and ASEAN countries, which are geographically, culturally and historically close, should strengthen their cooperation on issues of global recognition, such as pursuing sustainable and balanced development of society and the economy, sharpening response capacity and adaptive capacity for disaster prevention and humanitarian aid and establish and improve social security systems.