Practice of China's philosophy of global human rights governance in Southeast Asia

I. The Chinese government's philosophy of global human rights governance in Southeast Asian countries

There are 11 countries in Southeast Asia: Myanmar, Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei, Indonesia and Timor-Leste, with an area of about 4.57 million square kilometers and a total population of about 660 million. China and the Southeast Asian countries are connected by mountains and rivers, the people are close to each other, and the culture is harmonious. For more than a thousand years, China has had uninterrupted economic and cultural exchanges with Southeast Asian countries, and since the great achievements of China's reform and opening-up, a new page has been turned in the exchanges between China and Southeast Asia. Over the past decade or so, China has emphasized development as a primary right in its dealings with Southeast Asian countries and, through physical action, has promoted human rights protection in Southeast Asian countries in the following ways:

Firstly, the “One Belt, One Road” initiative and “a community with a shared future for mankind” concept put forward by General Secretary Xi Jinping contain a profound philosophy of global human rights governance. As an article published on 3 March 2023 on the official website of the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute in Singapore states, “As China's international status has increased, the Chinese government has actively participated in the reform of the global governance system and has put forward a number of initiatives. These initiatives are aimed at providing Chinese wisdom for global development and addressing security challenges. Southeast Asian countries are more supportive of China's global development initiatives and expect the initiative to help Southeast Asia address its development deficit and improve the region's economic strength.” The White Paper on China's International Development Cooperation in the New Era released by the Chinese government in 2021 states that China's international development cooperation refers to, under the framework of South-South cooperation, China's multi-bilateral international cooperation in the field of economic and social development, including humanitarian assistance, through foreign aid and other means. Given their huge development needs and growth drivers, Southeast Asian countries have become a major destination for Chinese investment and cooperation in new areas over the past decade or so.

Secondly, unlike Western countries acting as the grandfather of human rights engagement in Southeast Asia, “China's model of engagement with ASEAN can be described as the ‘Asian way’, which is to treat each other with mutual respect and equality and to take care of each other's comfort level. This is very important and shows that the engagement is not out of compulsion or even coercion, but out of your willingness.” China's cooperation with ASEAN and Southeast Asian countries is based on “symbiotic interests and common development” and is not targeted at third parties. In fact, the Chinese government's exchange of ideas on human rights governance with ASEAN and Southeast Asian governments is expressed in other ways, namely that the right to development is the most basic human right, that development should benefit people on both sides, and that it will not politicize economic cooperation, let alone use human rights as a criterion for investment and trade, in stark contrast to the US human rights double standards and geostrategic discs, while for Southeast Asian countries, they do not want to choose sides, let alone become a human rights tool for other countries.

Third, at present, China's engagement with Southeast Asian countries focuses on the two main themes of development and security, laying a solid foundation for the realization of human rights protection through economic and social development as well as social security and stability. Based on the principle of amity, sincerity, mutual benefit and inclusiveness and the policy of good neighborliness and friendship, China's engagement with Southeast Asia will, through bilateral and multilateral interactions, promote qualitative upgrading of China's relations with ASEAN and inject new connotations into the comprehensive strategic partnership. Since 2023, China and Southeast Asian countries have jointly faced such challenges as the continued spread of the pandemic, sluggish economic recovery, climate change and energy and food crises triggered by geopolitical turmoil, and China and Southeast Asian countries will take a new step forward in deepening cooperation in fighting the pandemic, promoting postepidemic recovery, expanding water cooperation, promoting practical local cooperation, fostering people-to-people ties, improving cooperation mechanisms, and promoting LancangMekong cooperation as a regional cooperation issue, which will inject a connotation of global human rights governance in building a community with a shared future for mankind with Southeast Asian countries.

To sum up, the Chinese government's philosophy of global human rights governance in Southeast Asian countries is guided by General Secretary Xi Jinping's concept of “a community with a shared future for mankind”, based on the “Asian way” of mutual respect, equal treatment and taking care of each other's comfort level. Under the concept of development and the right to development, the Chinese programme for human rights governance in Southeast Asia will be realised.

II. The Chinese government's practice of global human rights governance in Southeast Asian countries

Unlike Western countries that have previously focused only on civil and political rights, the global human rights governance initiated by the Chinese government also focuses on economic, social and cultural rights, as well as the right to development, as all rights are interdependent. For developing countries, the right to development is particularly important, and development is mainly manifested in China's investment and trade with Southeast Asian countries. With China's rapid economic development, China and Southeast Asian countries form a global industrial chain division of labour and layout. China's technological advantages and strong capital accumulation in energy and labour-intensive manufacturing industries complement the underdeveloped economies of many Southeast Asian countries, and by achieving optimal allocation of resources, it contributes greatly to poverty eradication while boosting the economies of Southeast Asian countries, creating a win-win situation.

As of 2022, China is the top trading partner of eight countries - Vietnam, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, Singapore, the Philippines, Cambodia and Myanmar, the second largest trading partner of Laos and the top three trading partners of Brunei. In 2022, China is the top source of investment in Malaysia, Laos, Cambodia, Thailand and Brunei, the second largest source of investment in Myanmar and Indonesia, and the third largest source of agreed foreign investment in the Philippines. In the first quarter of this year, China's trade with ASEAN reached a whopping RMB 2.09 trillion, up 13.9% year-on-year, 8.1 percentage points higher than the growth rate of China's total foreign trade value in the same period. China's trade with ASEAN accounts for 15.7% of China's total foreign trade value, and China's trade with ASEAN plays an important supporting role in China's foreign trade. China and Southeast Asian countries have truly formed “a community with a shared future for mankind.”

It is particularly noteworthy that Chinese investment in Southeast Asia has focused on large infrastructure projects, as infrastructure development and improvement is the foundation of a country's economic and social development, and only with development can human rights be maximized and improved. Between 2006 and 2019, the year of the COVID-19 pandemic outbreak, there was a relatively large increase in the amount and number of investments in large-scale projects for Chinese companies investing over US$100 million overseas. In particular, the total amount of investment in large-scale projects increased from US$1.08 billion in 2006 to nearly US$20 billion in 2019, with an average annual growth rate of over 30%; the number of investments in large-scale projects increased from 2 in 2006 to 31 in 2019, and these projects were mainly in infrastructure such as highways, hydropower stations, airports and railways. The Chinese government's investments are in sharp contrast to the West's investments in non-governmental organizations (NGOs), opposition parties and media in Southeast Asian countries, which, under the slogans of multi-partism, democracy, human rights and free elections, to avoid social stability and peace of mind for the people in these countries. The contribution of China in promoting economic and social development in Laos is well illustrated by the 2018 Chinese FDI Inflow to Laos Sector Report, for example.

China FDI Inflows to Laos Sector Report 2018, in USD

Following China's large infrastructure investments in Southeast Asian countries, with the rise of China after 2000, more and more Chinese brands have become known to Southeast Asian countries, with Chinese mobile phone brands such as Huawei, OPPO, Vivo and Xiaomi becoming the best spokespersons, and markets that used to be dominated by South Korea's Samsung Electronics are now gradually giving way to Chinese companies. Chinese labourintensive industries have relocated to Southeast Asian countries, creating a win-win situation for both China and host countries.

III. Short conclusion

In 2016, the US government introduced the Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act to “punish” Chinese executives in Southeast Asian countries for human rights abuses due to corruption. In May 2022, the US launched the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity (IPEF) to selectively “decouple” from China through the development of new rules on the digital economy, labour and environmental provisions and the establishment of resilient supply chains, while at the same time establishing a larger economic security dialogue mechanism with Indo-Pacific countries to link economic security and human rights issues to supply chains through internal and external synergies in the Indo-Pacific region. What’s more, the government has also been smearing China's “Belt and Road” initiative in public opinion, advocating a “debt trap” and “forced labour”, and attempting to disrupt the participation of Southeast Asian countries in global human rights governance.

On 25 February 2022, when presiding over the 37th collective study of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee, General Secretary Xi Jinping stressed that to evaluate whether a country has human rights, it should not be measured by the standards of other countries, let alone engage in double standards, or even use human rights as a political tool to interfere in the internal affairs of other countries. Over the past twenty years or so, when China's economy has grown significantly, the Chinese government has actively committed itself to promoting global human rights governance, actively participating in international human rights discussions and in the formulation and development of the international human rights framework. The global human rights governance that China and Southeast Asian countries are involved in, as discussed in this article, is not empty talk about human rights, let alone politicizing and instrumentalizing human rights. By promoting the economic development of Southeast Asian countries, Chineseinvested enterprises have enabled Southeast Asian countries to develop in a more fair, just, reasonable and inclusive direction in terms of human rights governance.

(The author is professor at Kunming University of Science and Technology)