-Written by AJ Reibel, MIR program, New Zealand
Introduction
On the 28th of August 2008, the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) convened a regular meeting in Tajikistan’s capital to discuss, among other topics, the recent conflict in the Caucasus. The Kremlin had hoped to garner support from its SCO partners. However, China voiced concern over Russia’s recent support for Southern Ossetia and Abkhazian independence.[1] Despite the smiles, handshakes, and talk of ‘traditional friendship and understanding’, there was an underlying tension between the Russian and Chinese parties.
The Kremlin’s ties with Central Asia and China are coming under scrutiny as the West responds to growing Russian assertiveness. Until recently, Western pundits and policymakers had downplayed the SCO’s development while their military strategists had been more vocal in displaying unease at growing ties between the Kremlin and Beijing.
The SCO has emerged as an impressive sounding regional organisation. What is less clear, however, is what the SCO is and what it will be in the future. Is the SCO a treaty organisation meant to counter NATOC expansion or is it, instead, an attempt to better integrate the economies, resources, and norms of its member and observer states? Ultimately, does the SCO more closely mirror ASEAND or NATO? Or, is it a little bit of both organisations rolled up into one?
To determine whether the SCO resembles either NATO or ASEAN, we must examine the aims and differences of both organisations. Secondly, it is important to decide if the SCO’s structure and objectives closely resemble a particular institution’s. If it is determined that the SCO does not closely resemble either organisation, then identifying its similarities and differences will allow for a better understanding of the organisation’s current purpose and future geostrategic role.
Lastly, evaluating the SCO’s aims and actual policies will indicate the level of concord or dissension between its members. Consensus and a distinctive (or hybrid) set of aims and expectations signal that the SCO operates organisation within a constructivist framework. This may indicate that its future is tied to a common regional identity and values system. Incongruity, however signals that the organisation operates as a temporary neo-realist cooperative construct as defined by John J. Mearsheimer and Kenneth Waltz. If it is such an institution, its future may not necessarily be one of disintegration and apathy; interests change and strong identity-based bonds develop.
NATO and ASEAN: Regional institutions with distinct objectives
Despite being regional organisation, NATO and ASEAN are very different. According to NATO’s founding treaty, its members are committed to upholding common values – including democracy, individual liberty and the respect for the rule of law[2]. However, the organisation’s unique mandate has fashioned a security alliance that served the needs of the US and its Western European allies following the end of the Second World War. Conversely, ASEAN aims to ensure that absolute gains are achieved by focusing on regional stability and economic growth.
NATO’s strength comes from its members’ commitment to maintaining its defensive capabilities simply because they each benefit from its overarching security umbrella. To sustain such capabilities, its members have integrated their defensive resources in an example of organisational burden-sharing. Accordingly, the organisation exhibits a neo-realist symptom – that of a self-centred alliance constructed for relative-gains. Waltz points out that NATO has outlived its purported goals yet still remains; evidence that international institutions are tools through which states seek to pursue their interests.[3] Mearsheimer, expanding on Waltz’s idea, predicts that NATO will not prevent a “…move from …present bipolarity (with the United States and Russia as the poles) to unbalanced multipolarity.”[4]
ASEAN’s underpinnings are based on social constructivist assumptions. Mearsheimer explains that, to critical theorists, “…ideas shape the material world in important ways, and thus the way to revolutionize international politics is to change drastically the way individuals think and talk about world politics.”[5] Amitav Acharya, agreeing with Wendt’s observation that “…[state] actors' social identities [can] generate self-interests or collective interests,” insists that regional institutions aimed at addressing issues of collective security may be more successful if the states involved exhibit ‘collective interests’.[6] Acharya explains that identities are important since regional organisations can seem similar, however be different. He explains that “…local agents reconstruct foreign norms to ensure the norms fit with the agents’ cognitive priors and identities.”[7]
In order to make the assertion that the SCO more closely resembles a regional security alliance or a cooperative regional institution it is useful to contrast NATO and ASEAN.
NATO
NATO’s foundation, the 1941 Atlantic Charter, was conceived of by American President Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Churchill at a time when Europe was the scene of the century’s most devastating war and its generation held hopes for a more stable future.[8] The Charter declared that the US and the UK held common values and world views that included a desire for self-determination and sovereignty, free-trade and economic cooperation, and a hope for a future free of war.[9]
In the years following the end of the Second World War, the Free World felt challenged by three monumental tasks: rebuilding Western Europe; ensuring that another cataclysmic war on the scale of the Second World War did not re-occur; and, halting spread of Communism. As Western strategists and policymakers felt that a quick Soviet invasion into Western Europe would be nearly impossible to repel individually, they aimed to create a regional security community made up of the democratic states that agreed that “…an attack on any one member [would] be regarded as an attack against all…”[10]
From its inception, NATO emerged principally as a regional security construct. Although the organisation’s central document contained idealist concepts – such as the assertion that it aims to uphold freedom, democracy, individual liberty and the rule of law – it stressed the need for its members to retain their self-help defences while also working to coordinate a regional defence.[11]
NATO’s aims were, in fact, two-fold. Not only did the organisation aim to resist the perceived Soviet threat, it was also intended to strengthen ties between its members in order to diffuse a future European power struggle. To foster greater stability, NATO’s founding members expected the organisation to integrate Western European economic relationships and to promote great stability, cohesion, and democratization. [12] The Atlantic Treaty, after all, had set the stage, calling for a “…[elimination of] conflict in …international economic policies and…encourage economic collaboration.”[13]
Despite NATO’s split aims, its greatest success has been its military alliance aimed at shielding Western Europe, Canada, and the United States from the threat of Soviet expansion. Nonetheless, James Warburg, co-founder of the Institute for Policy Affairs, criticised NATO’s rigidity and limited scope. He maintained that it was an “outmoded instrument” in a world of increasing free-market interests.[14] In his disparagement of the organisation, Warburg seemed to miss the organisation’s underlying neo-realist assumption. It is, after all, an organisation that remains necessary only as long as it offers stability as a defence alliance.[15]
NATO’s intrinsic raison d’être remains consistent, despite the end of the Cold War, as it emphasizes cooperative security in the face potential external threats. It was concerned with the following: how to protect and accommodate future members; how to manage tensions between current and potential members and Russia; how to combat terrorism aimed at its members; how to mitigate the effects of political instability; and, how to navigate economic uncertainty.[16]
Like NATO, the SCO states that its primary goals are: to build confidence between its respective members; to encourage effective cooperation on key issues; to safeguarding regional peace and security; and, to establish a “…democratic, fair and rational new international political and economic order."[17] Similarly to NATO’s, the SCO’s aims seem to be overarching; nevertheless, the organisation has primarily focused on terrorism, separatism, and the trafficking of illicit drugs. Further mirroring NATO, the SCO has conducted several significant joint military exercises.[18]
ASEAN
Like NATO, ASEAN is a regional organisation that grew from a perceived security threat. However, tin has distinct objectives to those of NATO. Its aims are to work towards a) economic development, cultural growth, and social advancement, and b) regional harmony and stability.[19] Furthermore, its members have affirmed their commitment to cooperating in order to promote a shared vision based on: “…outward looking, living in peace, stability and prosperity, [and] …partnership in dynamic development and in a community of caring societies.”[20]
The organisation grew at a time when communist insurgencies threatened the internal systems of various Southeast Asian states and tension was building between Indonesia and Malaysia.[21] By stressing the idea of regional stability and the importance of non-intervention, it served to eclipse but not threaten SEATO’s aims.
The ‘ASEAN Way’s, which involves “…postponing difficult problems, [and] compartmentalizing an issue, so that it does not interfere with other areas of cooperation, and quiet diplomacy,”[22] proved inadequate in the face of the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis. Unfortunately, this policy of indefinite postponement compromised the organisation’s effectiveness during 1997-1998 economic crisis.[23] During the period of economic woes, each ASEAN member pursued internal policies – aimed at mitigating the effects of the economic crisis – without conducting the usual consultations with other respective members.
As a result of the experience gained during the turbulent years between 1996 and 1997, ASEAN has augmented its security focus. In its ‘New Security Concept’, the organisation has emphasised economic security along with its aim of regional stability. In order to better achieve economic security, the organisation stresses “enhanced interaction” between its members.[24] In the face of future crises, this ‘enhanced interaction’ will “…[a)] allow ASEAN to respond to the increasing interdependence faced by the region [and, b)] confront new security threats such as economic disruption.”[25]
Most importantly, the new concept of ‘enhanced interaction’ treads the line between ASEAN’s previous insistence on sovereign equality and non-interference and a new need for the organisation’s members to be mindful of each other’s economic stability (since a sudden internal financial crisis in one member could affect the economies of the other members).
The SCO, like ASEAN, maintains that its goals are to promote trust, friendship, and cooperation while encouraging cooperation aimed at achieving economic growth and stability among its member states. Moreover, just as ASEAN credits its success to its unique ‘ASEAN Way’, the SCO talks of its ‘Shanghai Spirit’ based on similar principles.[26] The parallels in purported aims are not surprising given that both Russia and Chinas form integral parts of the SCO and are active in the ARFT. Dmitry Kosyrev, a political commentator for the Moscow-based RIA Novosti, insists that, although ASEAN and the SCO are different organisations, their underlying aims are similar.[27] He explains that both insist that regional solutions, based on regional identities and experiences, are the most effective means of addressing regional issues.
Another second major similarity between ASEAN and the SCO is that the latter relies on persuasive consensus-building and has channelled efforts to achieve its aims by taking advantage of its members’ shared norms, interests, and outlooks. Qingguo Jia, a professor and dean at the School of International Studies of Peking University, explained in a report that the Shanghai Five (and its successor) was successful in achieving its three major above-mentioned goals due to the fact that its organisation was based on mutual interests, shared norms, and a realistic and gradualist approach to accomplishing its aims.[28]
Shanghai Cooperation Organisation: Its aims and perspectives
In 1997, Russia and China, along with the other three ‘Shanghai Five’s states, delineated and demilitarised their mutual borders.[29] Four years later, as the grouping of five (in addition to Uzbekistan) began cooperating more closely on issues of security and trade and the SCOX replaced the Shanghai Five.[30]
The SCO’s initial objectives included settling outstanding territorial disputes, guaranteeing territorial integrity, cooperating on the extradition of ‘terrorists’, and, collaborating on trade and security matters. In his article entitled “The SCO and the Shanghai Spirit” Dr. Pan Guang explains that organisation has evolved from its beginnings as merely a forum for Sino-Russian rapprochement to an important organisation for Chinese power, Central Asian stability, and general regional security.[31] Analysts, like Pan Guang, have argued that the organisation has largely transformed itself from a primarily defensive institution, whose first goal was to diffuse any potential tensions between Beijing and Moscow, to an organisation with a greater emphasis on trade concerns, common security interests, and the dissemination of norms and values between its member states. As such, the organisation’s major present objectives include combating terrorism and “jointly [searching] for solutions to the problems that would arise in the 21st century.”[32]
The SCO’s new direction has alarmed a number of strategists in Washington. Such alarmists point to increasingly cooperative relations between Moscow and Beijing (along with limited involvement of Islamabad, New Delhi, and Tehran) as a sign of an emerging anti-Western bloc – dubbed the ‘World Without the West’ (WWW).[33] The fact that the SCO comprises four nuclear powers and a nuclear aspirant serves as evidence for alarmists in Washington and London.
More moderate alarmists point out that, although a Eurasian NATO-esque security alliance is observable, it is NATO’s expansion that is pushing Russia into China’s arms and is transforming the SCO into a counterweight to NATO’s power. In an article entitled “Courting Disaster: An Expanded NATO vs. Russia and China”[34], Bruce Russett and Allan Stam criticise NATO’s policy of expansion into areas once in the orbit of Soviet influence.[35]
Both moderate and zealous alarmist rhetoric may seem delusionary. Nonetheless, their ideas draw from Kenneth Waltz’s realist explanation of NATO’s true objective.
[The] point of extending NATO eastward [is] not to save money by reducing transaction costs but to expand the reach of America; …[therefore, the] explanation of NATO’s expansion is not found in NATO as an institution but in America’s power and purpose.”[36]
As a result, Waltz argues that “…interdependence [has been] an idea used by Americans to camouflage the great leverage that the United States enjoys in international politics by making it seems that strong and weak, rich and poor nations are similarly entangled in a thick web of interdependence.”[37]
Although it is plausible that the SCO has been supported by the Kremlin in order to provide itself with a Eurasian bulwark against NATO encroachment, it is highly unlikely that the organisation is as Russett and Stam suggest. Yu Bin, a senior fellow for the Shanghai Institute of American Studies and political science professor at Wittenberg University, maintains that claims that military ties between China and Russia – aimed at challenging American hegemony – are strengthening is somewhat misguided. He asserts that suggestions that “Moscow and Beijing are not merely creating their own ‘space,’ separate from that of the West, but are poised to shape this regional security group into a military alliance... [are] rash.”[38]
His rejection of claims that the SCO is growing in power and threatens NATO is centred on the reality that the organisation comprises members with dissimilar religious backgrounds, varying levels of development, and unlike political systems. In addition to religious and political issues, increased collaboration may be hampered by the spread of strong nationalist sentiment in both Russia and China. The Chinese public demonstrated its rising nationalist fervour as anti-West and anti-Tibet protests swept the country earlier this year.[39] Similarly, Russia has a significant and growing ultranationalist population that tends to see China as a threat rather than an ally.
What's more, China and Russia have distinct core interests that result in their not seeing eye-to-eye on the future path of the SCO. China is interested in using its burgeoning relationship with vital Central Asian allies to gain access to crucial hydrocarbon reserves and potential markets for its products.[40] Russia, on the other hand, is more interested in security-based relationship that will allow it to stand firm against, what it perceives to be, NATO’s eastward march.41 Religious and political conditions, in addition to divergent geostrategic interests, hamper the SCO’s aim to construct a strong regional identity.
Nevertheless, there is hope for the development of an identity-based organisation. For, in order to maintain the SCO alive, China must work to “…[preserve] and [promote] Russia’s credentials as a co-leader in the organization, presenting it (whether correctly or not) as playing a role on a par with China’s in defining the SCO’s mission and goals.”[42] This necessary Chinese support of the Kremlin may cause their relationship in the SCO to evolve from that of temporarily allied and self-interested states to states involved in a collective partnership that produces a common institutional identity. Although Wendt contrasts the neo-realist to the constructivist regional institutional framework, he stresses that a recalibration of identity can lead to a shift from the neo-realist to the constructivist construct.[43]
In fact, the transition from a neo-realist to constructivist institution, or vice-versa, does not have to be uni-directional. A regional institution can include both a neo-realist temporary alliance construct and work towards developing a common identity among its members with the aim of strengthening a mutually self-interested security alliance. Guang suggests that the SCO exhibits traces of both a collective partnership and a security alliance. He explains that the “… maintenance of regional security and stability is both a precondition and a guarantee for the facilitation of regional economic and cultural cooperation, while economic and cultural cooperation can, in turn, provide a solid basis for political and security cooperation.”[44]
Verdict
Despite the SCOs interest in spurning regional economic development while working to halt the spread of forces that may undermine its members’ governments, its members do not yet share a common identity or a clear set of interests. This was confirmed by Russia’s recent recognition of Southern Ossetia and Abkhazia as independent states. China is troubled by Russia’s recognition of the two break-away Georgian enclaves as it continues to struggle to quell separatist movements in Xianjiang Province and in Tibet.[45] What’s more, the other SCO members do not all consider non-regional powers to be detrimental to regional interests. Kyrgyzstan’s President Kurmanbek Bakiev has repeatedly called for the SCO to increase its cooperation with the EU and other "European structures”[46] – a far cry from the unified regionalist view that Kosyrev refers to in his op-ed.
The organisation functions as a loose alliance in the sense that its founding documents clearly state that all its members must not infringe on each other’s sovereign integrity. Such an underlying concept seems to prove what realists have said about international institutions – that they can’t “…grow to exert sustainable policy-making pressure and exhibit systematic effects on nation states.”[4]7 As a result, Alexander Siedschlag insists that stressing sovereignty limits the integration and cohesive potential of a regional or international organisation.
Furthermore, Federico Bordanaro explains that truly collective regional relations – perhaps more akin to those exhibited by ASEAN’s members – are made difficult due to the fact that the region holds vast hydrocarbon resources that are coveted by its major powers. He states that in “...Central Asia, we are witnessing a zero-sum game because if the resources will flow toward China, they won’t flow toward Russia and Europe”[48] For this reason, he predicts that truly transparent cooperation between Moscow and Beijing will become increasingly difficult as China’s economy demands more energy resources and Russia’s struggles to increase its gas supplies to Europe.
Nonetheless, simply because the SCO has not more closely mirrored ASEAN, does not mean that identity formation will not produce a transparent collective stability and security organisation that serves to enshrine its ‘Shanghai Spirit’ identity on all of its members. Although the SCO more closely resembles the self-interested power politics that may be evident in NATO, it is not condemned to remain a security alliance with neo-realist assumptions. Perhaps, following the recent fissure that emerged between the two, Russia and China will work to better integrate interests and values.
Regardless, the SCO should be supported by both NATO and ASEAN as it will increasingly serve to temper antagonistic Russian policies and encourage Chinese regional helmsman-ship. While the Kremlin seeks to solidify its security arrangements with Beijing, the West should work to strengthen its economic and diplomatic ties with China. Beijing has long come in from the cold and does not seek to upset the burgeoning economic and diplomatic relationship that it is developing on the international stage. The SCO should be seen as a useful partner that will eventually integrate the economies and values of its members rather than a sign of a growing anti-West block.
The Kremlin’s ties with Central Asia and China are coming under scrutiny as the West responds to growing Russian assertiveness. Until recently, Western pundits and policymakers had downplayed the SCO’s development while their military strategists had been more vocal in displaying unease at growing ties between the Kremlin and Beijing.
The SCO has emerged as an impressive sounding regional organisation. What is less clear, however, is what the SCO is and what it will be in the future. Is the SCO a treaty organisation meant to counter NATOC expansion or is it, instead, an attempt to better integrate the economies, resources, and norms of its member and observer states? Ultimately, does the SCO more closely mirror ASEAND or NATO? Or, is it a little bit of both organisations rolled up into one?
To determine whether the SCO resembles either NATO or ASEAN, we must examine the aims and differences of both organisations. Secondly, it is important to decide if the SCO’s structure and objectives closely resemble a particular institution’s. If it is determined that the SCO does not closely resemble either organisation, then identifying its similarities and differences will allow for a better understanding of the organisation’s current purpose and future geostrategic role.
Lastly, evaluating the SCO’s aims and actual policies will indicate the level of concord or dissension between its members. Consensus and a distinctive (or hybrid) set of aims and expectations signal that the SCO operates organisation within a constructivist framework. This may indicate that its future is tied to a common regional identity and values system. Incongruity, however signals that the organisation operates as a temporary neo-realist cooperative construct as defined by John J. Mearsheimer and Kenneth Waltz. If it is such an institution, its future may not necessarily be one of disintegration and apathy; interests change and strong identity-based bonds develop.
NATO and ASEAN: Regional institutions with distinct objectives
Despite being regional organisation, NATO and ASEAN are very different. According to NATO’s founding treaty, its members are committed to upholding common values – including democracy, individual liberty and the respect for the rule of law[2]. However, the organisation’s unique mandate has fashioned a security alliance that served the needs of the US and its Western European allies following the end of the Second World War. Conversely, ASEAN aims to ensure that absolute gains are achieved by focusing on regional stability and economic growth.
NATO’s strength comes from its members’ commitment to maintaining its defensive capabilities simply because they each benefit from its overarching security umbrella. To sustain such capabilities, its members have integrated their defensive resources in an example of organisational burden-sharing. Accordingly, the organisation exhibits a neo-realist symptom – that of a self-centred alliance constructed for relative-gains. Waltz points out that NATO has outlived its purported goals yet still remains; evidence that international institutions are tools through which states seek to pursue their interests.[3] Mearsheimer, expanding on Waltz’s idea, predicts that NATO will not prevent a “…move from …present bipolarity (with the United States and Russia as the poles) to unbalanced multipolarity.”[4]
ASEAN’s underpinnings are based on social constructivist assumptions. Mearsheimer explains that, to critical theorists, “…ideas shape the material world in important ways, and thus the way to revolutionize international politics is to change drastically the way individuals think and talk about world politics.”[5] Amitav Acharya, agreeing with Wendt’s observation that “…[state] actors' social identities [can] generate self-interests or collective interests,” insists that regional institutions aimed at addressing issues of collective security may be more successful if the states involved exhibit ‘collective interests’.[6] Acharya explains that identities are important since regional organisations can seem similar, however be different. He explains that “…local agents reconstruct foreign norms to ensure the norms fit with the agents’ cognitive priors and identities.”[7]
In order to make the assertion that the SCO more closely resembles a regional security alliance or a cooperative regional institution it is useful to contrast NATO and ASEAN.
NATO
NATO’s foundation, the 1941 Atlantic Charter, was conceived of by American President Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Churchill at a time when Europe was the scene of the century’s most devastating war and its generation held hopes for a more stable future.[8] The Charter declared that the US and the UK held common values and world views that included a desire for self-determination and sovereignty, free-trade and economic cooperation, and a hope for a future free of war.[9]
In the years following the end of the Second World War, the Free World felt challenged by three monumental tasks: rebuilding Western Europe; ensuring that another cataclysmic war on the scale of the Second World War did not re-occur; and, halting spread of Communism. As Western strategists and policymakers felt that a quick Soviet invasion into Western Europe would be nearly impossible to repel individually, they aimed to create a regional security community made up of the democratic states that agreed that “…an attack on any one member [would] be regarded as an attack against all…”[10]
From its inception, NATO emerged principally as a regional security construct. Although the organisation’s central document contained idealist concepts – such as the assertion that it aims to uphold freedom, democracy, individual liberty and the rule of law – it stressed the need for its members to retain their self-help defences while also working to coordinate a regional defence.[11]
NATO’s aims were, in fact, two-fold. Not only did the organisation aim to resist the perceived Soviet threat, it was also intended to strengthen ties between its members in order to diffuse a future European power struggle. To foster greater stability, NATO’s founding members expected the organisation to integrate Western European economic relationships and to promote great stability, cohesion, and democratization. [12] The Atlantic Treaty, after all, had set the stage, calling for a “…[elimination of] conflict in …international economic policies and…encourage economic collaboration.”[13]
Despite NATO’s split aims, its greatest success has been its military alliance aimed at shielding Western Europe, Canada, and the United States from the threat of Soviet expansion. Nonetheless, James Warburg, co-founder of the Institute for Policy Affairs, criticised NATO’s rigidity and limited scope. He maintained that it was an “outmoded instrument” in a world of increasing free-market interests.[14] In his disparagement of the organisation, Warburg seemed to miss the organisation’s underlying neo-realist assumption. It is, after all, an organisation that remains necessary only as long as it offers stability as a defence alliance.[15]
NATO’s intrinsic raison d’être remains consistent, despite the end of the Cold War, as it emphasizes cooperative security in the face potential external threats. It was concerned with the following: how to protect and accommodate future members; how to manage tensions between current and potential members and Russia; how to combat terrorism aimed at its members; how to mitigate the effects of political instability; and, how to navigate economic uncertainty.[16]
Like NATO, the SCO states that its primary goals are: to build confidence between its respective members; to encourage effective cooperation on key issues; to safeguarding regional peace and security; and, to establish a “…democratic, fair and rational new international political and economic order."[17] Similarly to NATO’s, the SCO’s aims seem to be overarching; nevertheless, the organisation has primarily focused on terrorism, separatism, and the trafficking of illicit drugs. Further mirroring NATO, the SCO has conducted several significant joint military exercises.[18]
ASEAN
Like NATO, ASEAN is a regional organisation that grew from a perceived security threat. However, tin has distinct objectives to those of NATO. Its aims are to work towards a) economic development, cultural growth, and social advancement, and b) regional harmony and stability.[19] Furthermore, its members have affirmed their commitment to cooperating in order to promote a shared vision based on: “…outward looking, living in peace, stability and prosperity, [and] …partnership in dynamic development and in a community of caring societies.”[20]
The organisation grew at a time when communist insurgencies threatened the internal systems of various Southeast Asian states and tension was building between Indonesia and Malaysia.[21] By stressing the idea of regional stability and the importance of non-intervention, it served to eclipse but not threaten SEATO’s aims.
The ‘ASEAN Way’s, which involves “…postponing difficult problems, [and] compartmentalizing an issue, so that it does not interfere with other areas of cooperation, and quiet diplomacy,”[22] proved inadequate in the face of the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis. Unfortunately, this policy of indefinite postponement compromised the organisation’s effectiveness during 1997-1998 economic crisis.[23] During the period of economic woes, each ASEAN member pursued internal policies – aimed at mitigating the effects of the economic crisis – without conducting the usual consultations with other respective members.
As a result of the experience gained during the turbulent years between 1996 and 1997, ASEAN has augmented its security focus. In its ‘New Security Concept’, the organisation has emphasised economic security along with its aim of regional stability. In order to better achieve economic security, the organisation stresses “enhanced interaction” between its members.[24] In the face of future crises, this ‘enhanced interaction’ will “…[a)] allow ASEAN to respond to the increasing interdependence faced by the region [and, b)] confront new security threats such as economic disruption.”[25]
Most importantly, the new concept of ‘enhanced interaction’ treads the line between ASEAN’s previous insistence on sovereign equality and non-interference and a new need for the organisation’s members to be mindful of each other’s economic stability (since a sudden internal financial crisis in one member could affect the economies of the other members).
The SCO, like ASEAN, maintains that its goals are to promote trust, friendship, and cooperation while encouraging cooperation aimed at achieving economic growth and stability among its member states. Moreover, just as ASEAN credits its success to its unique ‘ASEAN Way’, the SCO talks of its ‘Shanghai Spirit’ based on similar principles.[26] The parallels in purported aims are not surprising given that both Russia and Chinas form integral parts of the SCO and are active in the ARFT. Dmitry Kosyrev, a political commentator for the Moscow-based RIA Novosti, insists that, although ASEAN and the SCO are different organisations, their underlying aims are similar.[27] He explains that both insist that regional solutions, based on regional identities and experiences, are the most effective means of addressing regional issues.
Another second major similarity between ASEAN and the SCO is that the latter relies on persuasive consensus-building and has channelled efforts to achieve its aims by taking advantage of its members’ shared norms, interests, and outlooks. Qingguo Jia, a professor and dean at the School of International Studies of Peking University, explained in a report that the Shanghai Five (and its successor) was successful in achieving its three major above-mentioned goals due to the fact that its organisation was based on mutual interests, shared norms, and a realistic and gradualist approach to accomplishing its aims.[28]
Shanghai Cooperation Organisation: Its aims and perspectives
In 1997, Russia and China, along with the other three ‘Shanghai Five’s states, delineated and demilitarised their mutual borders.[29] Four years later, as the grouping of five (in addition to Uzbekistan) began cooperating more closely on issues of security and trade and the SCOX replaced the Shanghai Five.[30]
The SCO’s initial objectives included settling outstanding territorial disputes, guaranteeing territorial integrity, cooperating on the extradition of ‘terrorists’, and, collaborating on trade and security matters. In his article entitled “The SCO and the Shanghai Spirit” Dr. Pan Guang explains that organisation has evolved from its beginnings as merely a forum for Sino-Russian rapprochement to an important organisation for Chinese power, Central Asian stability, and general regional security.[31] Analysts, like Pan Guang, have argued that the organisation has largely transformed itself from a primarily defensive institution, whose first goal was to diffuse any potential tensions between Beijing and Moscow, to an organisation with a greater emphasis on trade concerns, common security interests, and the dissemination of norms and values between its member states. As such, the organisation’s major present objectives include combating terrorism and “jointly [searching] for solutions to the problems that would arise in the 21st century.”[32]
The SCO’s new direction has alarmed a number of strategists in Washington. Such alarmists point to increasingly cooperative relations between Moscow and Beijing (along with limited involvement of Islamabad, New Delhi, and Tehran) as a sign of an emerging anti-Western bloc – dubbed the ‘World Without the West’ (WWW).[33] The fact that the SCO comprises four nuclear powers and a nuclear aspirant serves as evidence for alarmists in Washington and London.
More moderate alarmists point out that, although a Eurasian NATO-esque security alliance is observable, it is NATO’s expansion that is pushing Russia into China’s arms and is transforming the SCO into a counterweight to NATO’s power. In an article entitled “Courting Disaster: An Expanded NATO vs. Russia and China”[34], Bruce Russett and Allan Stam criticise NATO’s policy of expansion into areas once in the orbit of Soviet influence.[35]
Both moderate and zealous alarmist rhetoric may seem delusionary. Nonetheless, their ideas draw from Kenneth Waltz’s realist explanation of NATO’s true objective.
[The] point of extending NATO eastward [is] not to save money by reducing transaction costs but to expand the reach of America; …[therefore, the] explanation of NATO’s expansion is not found in NATO as an institution but in America’s power and purpose.”[36]
As a result, Waltz argues that “…interdependence [has been] an idea used by Americans to camouflage the great leverage that the United States enjoys in international politics by making it seems that strong and weak, rich and poor nations are similarly entangled in a thick web of interdependence.”[37]
Although it is plausible that the SCO has been supported by the Kremlin in order to provide itself with a Eurasian bulwark against NATO encroachment, it is highly unlikely that the organisation is as Russett and Stam suggest. Yu Bin, a senior fellow for the Shanghai Institute of American Studies and political science professor at Wittenberg University, maintains that claims that military ties between China and Russia – aimed at challenging American hegemony – are strengthening is somewhat misguided. He asserts that suggestions that “Moscow and Beijing are not merely creating their own ‘space,’ separate from that of the West, but are poised to shape this regional security group into a military alliance... [are] rash.”[38]
His rejection of claims that the SCO is growing in power and threatens NATO is centred on the reality that the organisation comprises members with dissimilar religious backgrounds, varying levels of development, and unlike political systems. In addition to religious and political issues, increased collaboration may be hampered by the spread of strong nationalist sentiment in both Russia and China. The Chinese public demonstrated its rising nationalist fervour as anti-West and anti-Tibet protests swept the country earlier this year.[39] Similarly, Russia has a significant and growing ultranationalist population that tends to see China as a threat rather than an ally.
What's more, China and Russia have distinct core interests that result in their not seeing eye-to-eye on the future path of the SCO. China is interested in using its burgeoning relationship with vital Central Asian allies to gain access to crucial hydrocarbon reserves and potential markets for its products.[40] Russia, on the other hand, is more interested in security-based relationship that will allow it to stand firm against, what it perceives to be, NATO’s eastward march.41 Religious and political conditions, in addition to divergent geostrategic interests, hamper the SCO’s aim to construct a strong regional identity.
Nevertheless, there is hope for the development of an identity-based organisation. For, in order to maintain the SCO alive, China must work to “…[preserve] and [promote] Russia’s credentials as a co-leader in the organization, presenting it (whether correctly or not) as playing a role on a par with China’s in defining the SCO’s mission and goals.”[42] This necessary Chinese support of the Kremlin may cause their relationship in the SCO to evolve from that of temporarily allied and self-interested states to states involved in a collective partnership that produces a common institutional identity. Although Wendt contrasts the neo-realist to the constructivist regional institutional framework, he stresses that a recalibration of identity can lead to a shift from the neo-realist to the constructivist construct.[43]
In fact, the transition from a neo-realist to constructivist institution, or vice-versa, does not have to be uni-directional. A regional institution can include both a neo-realist temporary alliance construct and work towards developing a common identity among its members with the aim of strengthening a mutually self-interested security alliance. Guang suggests that the SCO exhibits traces of both a collective partnership and a security alliance. He explains that the “… maintenance of regional security and stability is both a precondition and a guarantee for the facilitation of regional economic and cultural cooperation, while economic and cultural cooperation can, in turn, provide a solid basis for political and security cooperation.”[44]
Verdict
Despite the SCOs interest in spurning regional economic development while working to halt the spread of forces that may undermine its members’ governments, its members do not yet share a common identity or a clear set of interests. This was confirmed by Russia’s recent recognition of Southern Ossetia and Abkhazia as independent states. China is troubled by Russia’s recognition of the two break-away Georgian enclaves as it continues to struggle to quell separatist movements in Xianjiang Province and in Tibet.[45] What’s more, the other SCO members do not all consider non-regional powers to be detrimental to regional interests. Kyrgyzstan’s President Kurmanbek Bakiev has repeatedly called for the SCO to increase its cooperation with the EU and other "European structures”[46] – a far cry from the unified regionalist view that Kosyrev refers to in his op-ed.
The organisation functions as a loose alliance in the sense that its founding documents clearly state that all its members must not infringe on each other’s sovereign integrity. Such an underlying concept seems to prove what realists have said about international institutions – that they can’t “…grow to exert sustainable policy-making pressure and exhibit systematic effects on nation states.”[4]7 As a result, Alexander Siedschlag insists that stressing sovereignty limits the integration and cohesive potential of a regional or international organisation.
Furthermore, Federico Bordanaro explains that truly collective regional relations – perhaps more akin to those exhibited by ASEAN’s members – are made difficult due to the fact that the region holds vast hydrocarbon resources that are coveted by its major powers. He states that in “...Central Asia, we are witnessing a zero-sum game because if the resources will flow toward China, they won’t flow toward Russia and Europe”[48] For this reason, he predicts that truly transparent cooperation between Moscow and Beijing will become increasingly difficult as China’s economy demands more energy resources and Russia’s struggles to increase its gas supplies to Europe.
Nonetheless, simply because the SCO has not more closely mirrored ASEAN, does not mean that identity formation will not produce a transparent collective stability and security organisation that serves to enshrine its ‘Shanghai Spirit’ identity on all of its members. Although the SCO more closely resembles the self-interested power politics that may be evident in NATO, it is not condemned to remain a security alliance with neo-realist assumptions. Perhaps, following the recent fissure that emerged between the two, Russia and China will work to better integrate interests and values.
Regardless, the SCO should be supported by both NATO and ASEAN as it will increasingly serve to temper antagonistic Russian policies and encourage Chinese regional helmsman-ship. While the Kremlin seeks to solidify its security arrangements with Beijing, the West should work to strengthen its economic and diplomatic ties with China. Beijing has long come in from the cold and does not seek to upset the burgeoning economic and diplomatic relationship that it is developing on the international stage. The SCO should be seen as a useful partner that will eventually integrate the economies and values of its members rather than a sign of a growing anti-West block.
___________
[1] Daniel Schearf, “China Expresses Concern about Russia’s Stance on Georgian Relations,” Voice of America online, 28 August 2008, http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/news/2008/08/mil-080828-voa02.htm [viewed 29/08/08].
[2] __, “The North Atlantic Treaty: Washington DC – 4 April 1949,” NATO website, updated 29 November 2007, http://www.nato.int/docu/basictxt/treaty.htm [viewed 22/08/08].
[3] Kenneth N. Waltz, “Structural Realism after the Cold War,” International Security, Vol. 25, No. 1 (Summer, 2000): 18.
[4] John J. Mearsheimer, “The Future of the American Pacifier,” Foreign Affairs, Vol. 80, No. 5 (September/October 2001): 47.
[5] John J. Mearsheimer, “The False Promise of International Institutions,” International Security, Vol. 19, No. 3 (Winter, 1994-1995): 15.
[6] Alexander Wendt, “Collective Identity Formation and the International State,” The American Political Science Review, Vol. 88, No. 2 (Jun., 1994): 386.
[7] Amitav Acharya, “How Ideas Spread: Whose Norms Matter? Norm Localization and Institutional Change in Asian Regionalism,” International Organization, Vol. 58, No. 2 (Spring, 2004): 239.
[8] __, “The Atlantic Charter – 14 August 1941,” NATO website, updated 10 April 2000, http://www.nato.int/docu/basictxt/b410814a.htm [viewed 22/08/08].
[9] Ibid.
[10] Herman Beukema, “The Military Organization of the Free World,” Proceedings of the Academy of Political Science, Vol. 24, No. 2, The Defense of the Free World (Jan., 1951): 7.
[11] __, “The North Atlantic Treaty: Washington DC – 4 April 1949,” NATO website.
[12] Anne-Else Højberg, “The European Security Structure: A Plethora of Organizations?,” NATO Review online, Web Edition, No. 6, Vol. 43(Nov., 1995): 30-35, http://www.nato.int/docu/review/1995/9506-7.htm#s2 [viewed 04/09/08].
[13] James P. Warburg, “How Useful Is NATO?,” Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, Vol. 330, Whither American Foreign Policy? (Jul., 1960): 138.
[14] Ibid., 133.
[15] Major C. A. McNerney, NATO: Anachronism or Answer – An Argument for Collective Self-Defense, Unpublished master's thesis, USMC Command and Staff College, United States Army, Conference Group 5, http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/report/1995/MCA.htm [viewed 04/09/08].
[16] Ibid., Part V.
[17] __, “Declaration on Establishment of Shanghai Cooperation Organisation,” the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation website, Archive 2001, http://www.sectsco.org/html/00088.html [viewed 31/08/08].
[18] Edward Lucas, The New Cold War: How the Kremlin Menaces Both Russia and the West (London, New York, Berlin: Bloomsbury Publishing, 2008), 265.
[19] __, “Overview: Association of Southeast Asian Nations,” Association of Southeast Asian Nations website, http://www.aseansec.org/64.htm [viewed 04/09/08].
[20] Ibid.
[21] Yongwook RYU, “The Asian Financial Crisis and ASEAN’S Concept of Security,” S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), Singapore, 2 January 2008, Working Paper, 6, http://se1.isn.ch/serviceengine/FileContent?serviceID=ISN&fileid=5067C927-E8B2-B373-0EAD-1397391461D3&lng=en [viewed 04/09/08].
[22] Shaun Narine, Explaining ASEAN: Regionalism in Southeast Asia (Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2002), 31.
[23] RYU, “The Asian Financial Crisis and ASEAN’S Concept of Security,” 8.
[24] Ibid., 7. Taken from: Jurgen Haacke, “The Concept of Flexible Engagement and the Practice of Enhanced Interaction,” Pacific Review, Vol. 12, No. 4 (1999): 584.
[25] Ibid.
[26] Matthew Oresman, “Catching the Shanghai Spirit,” Foreign Policy, No. 142 (May - June, 2004): 79.
[27] Dmitry Kosyrev, “ASEAN shows the way to SCO,” RIA Novosti online, 28 July 2008, http://en.rian.ru/analysis/20080728/115078932.html [viewed: 17/08/08].
[28] Qingguo Jia, “The Success of the Shanghai Five: Interest, Norms, and Pragmatism,” the Commonwealth Insitute website, Project on Defense Alternatives, http://www.comw.org/cmp/fulltext/0110jia.htm [viewed 04/09/08].
[29] Oresman, “Catching the Shanghai Spirit,” 78..
[30] Ibid.
[31] Ibid., 79.
[32] __, “Charter of Shanghai Cooperation Organisation,” the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation website, Archive 2002, http://www.sectsco.org/html/00096.html [viewed 31/08/08].
[33] Lucas, The New Cold War: How the Kremlin Menaces both Russia and the West, 265.
[34] Bruce Russett and Allan C. Stam, “Courting Disaster: An Expanded NATO vs. Russia and China,” Political Science Quarterly, Vol. 113, No. 3 (Autumn, 1998): 363.
[35] Ibid.
[36] Robert O. Keohane and Kenneth N. Waltz, “The Neorealist and His Critic,” International Security, Vol. 25, No. 3 (Winter, 2000-2001): 205.
[37] Waltz, “Structural Realism after the Cold War,” 16. Taken from: Kenneth N. Waltz, “The Myth of National Interdependence,” in Charles P. Kindleberger, ed., The International Corporation (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1970).
[38] Yu Bin, “Crouching Alliance, Hidden Angst?” YaleGlobal Online, 10 October 2007, found at: http://yaleglobal.yale.edu/article.print?id=9793 [viewed 21/05/08].
[39] __, “Angry China,” The Economist Print Edition online, 1 May 2008, http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11293645 [viewed 05/05/08].
[40] Mark Leonard, What Does China think? (London: Fourth Estate, 2008), 101.
[41] Ibid.
[42] Mikhail Troitskiy, “A Russian Perspective on the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation,” in The Shanghai Cooperation Organization - SIPRI Policy Paper No. 17, ed. Alyson J. K. Bailes, Pál Dunay, Pan Guang, and Mikhail Troitskiy, Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) (Sweden: CM Gruppen Bromma, 2007) , 31.
[43] Alexander Wendt, “Collective Identity Formation and the International State,” The American Political Science Review, Vol. 88, No. 2 (Jun., 1994): 387.
[44] Pan Guang, “A Chinese perspective on the Shanghai Cooperation Organization,” in The Shanghai Cooperation Organization - SIPRI Policy Paper No. 17, ed. Alyson J. K. Bailes, Pál Dunay, Pan Guang, and Mikhail Troitskiy, Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) (Sweden: CM Gruppen Bromma, 2007) , 58.
[45] __, “After Georgia: Europe stands up to Russia,” The Economist Print Edition online, 4 September 2008, http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm?story_id=12060201 [viewed 06/09/08].
[46] Farangis Najibullah, “SCO Fails To Back Russia Over Georgia,” Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 28 August 2008, http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/news/2008/08/mil-080828-rferl03.htm [viewed 29/08/08].
[47] Alexander Siedschlag, “Neorealist contributions to a theory of ESDP,” Presentation at the II. European Security Conference Innsbruck, Panel on Contemporary Analytical Approaches to European Security and Effective Multilateralism, 30 September 2006, European Security Conference Initiative website, 3. http://www.esci.at/papers/NR-ESDP.pdf [viewed 31/08/08].
[48] Brian Whitmore, “Central Asia: Behind The Hype, Russia And China Vie For Region’s Energy Resources,” Radio Free Europe, 22 March, 2008, http://www.netnewspublisher.com/behind-the-hype-russia-and-china-vie-for-region-energy-resources/ [viewed 24/04/08].
[1] Daniel Schearf, “China Expresses Concern about Russia’s Stance on Georgian Relations,” Voice of America online, 28 August 2008, http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/news/2008/08/mil-080828-voa02.htm [viewed 29/08/08].
[2] __, “The North Atlantic Treaty: Washington DC – 4 April 1949,” NATO website, updated 29 November 2007, http://www.nato.int/docu/basictxt/treaty.htm [viewed 22/08/08].
[3] Kenneth N. Waltz, “Structural Realism after the Cold War,” International Security, Vol. 25, No. 1 (Summer, 2000): 18.
[4] John J. Mearsheimer, “The Future of the American Pacifier,” Foreign Affairs, Vol. 80, No. 5 (September/October 2001): 47.
[5] John J. Mearsheimer, “The False Promise of International Institutions,” International Security, Vol. 19, No. 3 (Winter, 1994-1995): 15.
[6] Alexander Wendt, “Collective Identity Formation and the International State,” The American Political Science Review, Vol. 88, No. 2 (Jun., 1994): 386.
[7] Amitav Acharya, “How Ideas Spread: Whose Norms Matter? Norm Localization and Institutional Change in Asian Regionalism,” International Organization, Vol. 58, No. 2 (Spring, 2004): 239.
[8] __, “The Atlantic Charter – 14 August 1941,” NATO website, updated 10 April 2000, http://www.nato.int/docu/basictxt/b410814a.htm [viewed 22/08/08].
[9] Ibid.
[10] Herman Beukema, “The Military Organization of the Free World,” Proceedings of the Academy of Political Science, Vol. 24, No. 2, The Defense of the Free World (Jan., 1951): 7.
[11] __, “The North Atlantic Treaty: Washington DC – 4 April 1949,” NATO website.
[12] Anne-Else Højberg, “The European Security Structure: A Plethora of Organizations?,” NATO Review online, Web Edition, No. 6, Vol. 43(Nov., 1995): 30-35, http://www.nato.int/docu/review/1995/9506-7.htm#s2 [viewed 04/09/08].
[13] James P. Warburg, “How Useful Is NATO?,” Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, Vol. 330, Whither American Foreign Policy? (Jul., 1960): 138.
[14] Ibid., 133.
[15] Major C. A. McNerney, NATO: Anachronism or Answer – An Argument for Collective Self-Defense, Unpublished master's thesis, USMC Command and Staff College, United States Army, Conference Group 5, http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/report/1995/MCA.htm [viewed 04/09/08].
[16] Ibid., Part V.
[17] __, “Declaration on Establishment of Shanghai Cooperation Organisation,” the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation website, Archive 2001, http://www.sectsco.org/html/00088.html [viewed 31/08/08].
[18] Edward Lucas, The New Cold War: How the Kremlin Menaces Both Russia and the West (London, New York, Berlin: Bloomsbury Publishing, 2008), 265.
[19] __, “Overview: Association of Southeast Asian Nations,” Association of Southeast Asian Nations website, http://www.aseansec.org/64.htm [viewed 04/09/08].
[20] Ibid.
[21] Yongwook RYU, “The Asian Financial Crisis and ASEAN’S Concept of Security,” S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), Singapore, 2 January 2008, Working Paper, 6, http://se1.isn.ch/serviceengine/FileContent?serviceID=ISN&fileid=5067C927-E8B2-B373-0EAD-1397391461D3&lng=en [viewed 04/09/08].
[22] Shaun Narine, Explaining ASEAN: Regionalism in Southeast Asia (Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2002), 31.
[23] RYU, “The Asian Financial Crisis and ASEAN’S Concept of Security,” 8.
[24] Ibid., 7. Taken from: Jurgen Haacke, “The Concept of Flexible Engagement and the Practice of Enhanced Interaction,” Pacific Review, Vol. 12, No. 4 (1999): 584.
[25] Ibid.
[26] Matthew Oresman, “Catching the Shanghai Spirit,” Foreign Policy, No. 142 (May - June, 2004): 79.
[27] Dmitry Kosyrev, “ASEAN shows the way to SCO,” RIA Novosti online, 28 July 2008, http://en.rian.ru/analysis/20080728/115078932.html [viewed: 17/08/08].
[28] Qingguo Jia, “The Success of the Shanghai Five: Interest, Norms, and Pragmatism,” the Commonwealth Insitute website, Project on Defense Alternatives, http://www.comw.org/cmp/fulltext/0110jia.htm [viewed 04/09/08].
[29] Oresman, “Catching the Shanghai Spirit,” 78..
[30] Ibid.
[31] Ibid., 79.
[32] __, “Charter of Shanghai Cooperation Organisation,” the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation website, Archive 2002, http://www.sectsco.org/html/00096.html [viewed 31/08/08].
[33] Lucas, The New Cold War: How the Kremlin Menaces both Russia and the West, 265.
[34] Bruce Russett and Allan C. Stam, “Courting Disaster: An Expanded NATO vs. Russia and China,” Political Science Quarterly, Vol. 113, No. 3 (Autumn, 1998): 363.
[35] Ibid.
[36] Robert O. Keohane and Kenneth N. Waltz, “The Neorealist and His Critic,” International Security, Vol. 25, No. 3 (Winter, 2000-2001): 205.
[37] Waltz, “Structural Realism after the Cold War,” 16. Taken from: Kenneth N. Waltz, “The Myth of National Interdependence,” in Charles P. Kindleberger, ed., The International Corporation (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1970).
[38] Yu Bin, “Crouching Alliance, Hidden Angst?” YaleGlobal Online, 10 October 2007, found at: http://yaleglobal.yale.edu/article.print?id=9793 [viewed 21/05/08].
[39] __, “Angry China,” The Economist Print Edition online, 1 May 2008, http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11293645 [viewed 05/05/08].
[40] Mark Leonard, What Does China think? (London: Fourth Estate, 2008), 101.
[41] Ibid.
[42] Mikhail Troitskiy, “A Russian Perspective on the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation,” in The Shanghai Cooperation Organization - SIPRI Policy Paper No. 17, ed. Alyson J. K. Bailes, Pál Dunay, Pan Guang, and Mikhail Troitskiy, Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) (Sweden: CM Gruppen Bromma, 2007) , 31.
[43] Alexander Wendt, “Collective Identity Formation and the International State,” The American Political Science Review, Vol. 88, No. 2 (Jun., 1994): 387.
[44] Pan Guang, “A Chinese perspective on the Shanghai Cooperation Organization,” in The Shanghai Cooperation Organization - SIPRI Policy Paper No. 17, ed. Alyson J. K. Bailes, Pál Dunay, Pan Guang, and Mikhail Troitskiy, Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) (Sweden: CM Gruppen Bromma, 2007) , 58.
[45] __, “After Georgia: Europe stands up to Russia,” The Economist Print Edition online, 4 September 2008, http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm?story_id=12060201 [viewed 06/09/08].
[46] Farangis Najibullah, “SCO Fails To Back Russia Over Georgia,” Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 28 August 2008, http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/news/2008/08/mil-080828-rferl03.htm [viewed 29/08/08].
[47] Alexander Siedschlag, “Neorealist contributions to a theory of ESDP,” Presentation at the II. European Security Conference Innsbruck, Panel on Contemporary Analytical Approaches to European Security and Effective Multilateralism, 30 September 2006, European Security Conference Initiative website, 3. http://www.esci.at/papers/NR-ESDP.pdf [viewed 31/08/08].
[48] Brian Whitmore, “Central Asia: Behind The Hype, Russia And China Vie For Region’s Energy Resources,” Radio Free Europe, 22 March, 2008, http://www.netnewspublisher.com/behind-the-hype-russia-and-china-vie-for-region-energy-resources/ [viewed 24/04/08].
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