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CHAMBER REPORTS ON RECENT DEVELOPMENTS Ninth APEC Economic Leaders Meeting in Shanghai: What Does It Tell Us About China? 23
October 2001 CONTENTS What are the
specific tasks of the host member? Have the
APEC meetings acquired a “show business” appearance? What substantial economic outcomes emerged? APEC Leaders Statement on Countering Terrorism |
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In the lead-up to China’s entry into
the World Trade Organisation, that nation’s role as host for the recently
concluded APEC meetings gives an indication of what might be expected when
China becomes an integral part of the rules-based trading regime. It also provides an opportunity
to comment more generally on APEC objectives and to consider the extent to
which those objectives have been achieved. |
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Its stated goal is to advance economic dynamism and sense
of community within the Asia-Pacific region.
According to the Website of the APEC Secretariat in Singapore, APEC
has established itself as “the primary regional vehicle for promoting open
trade and practical economic and technical co-operation”. The organisation began in 1989 as an informal dialogue
group with 12 members and was subsequently expanded to 21 members comprising
about 2.5 billion people with a combined gross domestic product of over US$18
trillion in 1999. Its members account
for over 47 per cent of world trade. The focus of each annual dialogue, or Annual Economic
Leaders’ Meeting as it has been called since 1993, is characterised by a
theme and conveys specific objectives:
Blake Island 1993 (near Seattle, USA): To promote the free
exchange of goods, services and investment and work toward broadly based
economic growth. Bogor 1994 (Indonesia): To achieve free and open trade and
investment in the Asia-Pacific region by 2010 for developed member economies
and 2020 for developing member economies. Osaka 1995 (Japan): To establish “three pillars” of APEC activities: (a) liberalisation
of trade and investment, (b) business facilitation and (c) economic and
technical co-operation. Manila 1996
(Philippines): To develop human capital, foster safe and
efficient capital markets, strengthen economic infrastructure, harness
technologies of the future, promote environmentally sustainable growth and
encourage the growth of small and medium-sized enterprises. This is referred to as the “Manila Action
Plan”. Vancouver 1997
(Canada): To initiate voluntary liberalisation in 15 sectors
and to endorse the “Vancouver Framework for Enhanced Public-Private
Partnership for Infrastructure Development”. Kuala Lumpur 1998
(Malaysia): To pursue a co-operative growth strategy to end
the regional financial crisis and to strengthen social safety nets, financial
systems, trade and investment flows, scientific and technological progress,
human resources development, economic infrastructure and business and commercial
links. The meeting endorsed the “Kuala Lumpur Action
Program on Skills Development”. Auckland 1999 (New Zealand): To strengthen markets
and improve the international framework governing trade and investment
flows. Bandar Seri Begawan 2000 (Brunei): To sustain economic
recovery in the Asia Pacific region by reinvigorating APEC’s programs in
economic and technical co-operation and to continue the work in international
forums to help shape the global economy. Shanghai 2001 (China): The announced theme
was “ Meeting New Challenges in the New Century: Achieving Common Prosperity
through Participation and Co-operation". The theme embodied three
sub-themes (a) sharing the benefits of globalisation and the new economy, (b)
advancing trade and investment and (c) promoting sustainable economic growth.
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The principal characteristic of
APEC is that it operates by consensus.
This means that any agreement reached, or public statement that is
made, must be accepted by all members.
Disagreement by any one member will necessarily result in a change in
the wording of the agreement or statement. Does this tend to produce the
“lowest common denominator”? It does
to an extent, but for many of the issues raised by the theme and sub-themes
it may be informative to know what the “lowest common denominator” is and, if
that is insufficient to “advance economic dynamism and sense of community”, to
determine the precise source of the insufficiency. Dialogue may be effective in overcoming limitations to
further progress, but is necessary to know what those limitations are. This is arranged with particular meetings: APEC Ministerial Meetings consist of discussions
among foreign and economic ministers. Other Ministerial-Level Meetings are convened in
education, energy, environment and sustainable development, finance, human
resources development, regional science and technology co-operation, small
and medium enterprises, telecommunications and information industry, trade
transport and women. A meeting of senior government
officials is held prior to each ministerial meeting for the purpose of making
recommendations to the respective ministers and to oversee the normal
organisational tasks of APEC in convening the meetings. This includes a wide range of committees
and working groups that are described in the Website: http://www.apecsec.org.sg. |
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In a document entitled
“Guidelines for Hosting APEC Meetings”, APEC is specifically defined as a
grouping of economies, not as a grouping of nations. This was of course agreed upon in order to
allow Hong Kong and Taiwan to become members. Other than the APEC logo, it is
inappropriate for any member to use anything, such as flags, emblems or
anthems, which may imply the “political status” of any member economy and/or
to identify participants or delegations in conjunction with the meeting. Furthermore, It is essential to use “accepted APEC
nomenclatures (both spoken and written)”, during the course of the meeting
and in all related documents, including the preparation phase. The members of APEC should be referred to
as "member economies" or "members" or
"economies". This protocol helps to explain
the nature of the clash between mainland China and Taiwan during the Shanghai
meetings. Taiwan had earlier proposed
that Li Yuan-zu, one of President Chen Shui-bian’s senior advisers and a
former vice president to represent Taiwan.
China refused to send an invitation addressed specifically to Mr Li,
saying that the protocol requires an economics leader. Taiwan's Economics Minister, Lin Hsin-yi, was already in
Shanghai and was present at a media briefing chaired by China’s Foreign
Minister Tang Jiaxuan, during which a Taiwanese reporter asked a question
about the invitation and used the term “communist China”. Mr Tang ruled the question improper in not
following the protocol about member economies and did not allow Mr Lin to
answer it. The Taiwanese delegates boycotted the remaining meetings
and left a statement from Chen Shui-bian expressing ''profound disappointment
and great rage'' and calling on APEC members to condemn the mainland. According to reports, no APEC member
issued a condemnation and the APEC Secretariat indicated that proper
procedures had been following by the Chinese. This indicates, firstly, that China was determined to
follow rigidly the protocol established in the original APEC Memorandum of
Understanding. With one exception
(mentioned below in reference to the APEC
Leaders’ Statement on Countering Terrorism) all documents and media releases
for this set of meetings used the word “economies” rather “nations”. It also indicates that China
took advantage of the opportunity to have discussions with American President
George Bush with no “back of the room” pressure from the Taiwanese. |
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We could be forgiven for saying
yes. The official banquet in the
Shanghai International Convention Centre on 20 October had 1,000 guests with
an hour of entertainment including 10 segments of Chinese dance, folk songs
and acrobatics. The official photographic session,
which the media refer to as the “silly shirt session”, made use of
traditional Chinese garments, but this time with a choice of colours. The People’s
Daily reported that several kinds of souvenirs were presented to the
APEC leaders. One was a mahogany box
containing a “brocade bag holding a pen”.
The small box is designed in an antique style and is decorated with a
small bronze abacus on top. The
atricle reported that the cost of the box is about 100 yuan (US$12). Another gift is a mahogany paperweight that is decorated with a small compass and an APEC logo. "The compass is an ancient Chinese invention and implies economic direction in the 21st century," according to the report. The gift to be given to the top leaders of APEC economies was kept secret. We hasten to add this “fashion
show” description that, as many readers would know, the Chinese are very good
with formal ceremonies and presentations.
This part of the APEC meetings undoubtedly went well and the Chamber
has always been a strong supporter of exchanges of people with a mixture of
“culture and business”. |
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The full text of the APEC
Economic Leaders’ Declaration, which is referred to as the “Shanghai Accord”
is available online from the People’s Daily (http://www.peopledaily.com.cn). The preamble contains the following
statement: We wish
to send a clear and strong message on the collective resolve of the
Asia-Pacific community to counter terrorism.
We are determined to reverse the current economic downturn and
maintain public confidence at a time of uncertainty by fighting protectionism
and committing to the launch of the new WTO round at the upcoming WTO
Ministerial Conference. These efforts
are consonant with and contribute to the pursuit of the APEC vision of peace,
harmony and common prosperity. Most of the remaining part of
the document is a reaffirmation of previous commitments, but the choice of
language in this reaffirmation is instructive, particularly since the Chinese
authorities had a direct role in drafting it. Specifically, Item 7 states: In this
context, we pledge to accelerate our domestic efforts to build capacity and
deepen structural reform so as to strengthen the market fundamentals across
the region. To this
end, we emphasise the importance of sound economic policies and corporate
governance as well as the important role and responsibility of governments in
shaping the legal and regulatory framework that encourages competition and
innovation, with an increased emphasis on capacity building. Developing
the social safety net is a high priority, as it can make an important
contribution to reducing the harmful effects of economic shocks on vulnerable
groups. As noted
in the 2001 Economic Outlook, enhancing financial efficiency is also
essential to promoting growth. We
thus welcome efforts made in these areas in APEC, including strengthening
economic legal infrastructure, supervision of capital markets, corporate
governance, and implementation of international financial standards, as
exemplified by the work done through the Finance Ministers' process. Items 10 and 11 contain the
following: We
emphasise the importance of capacity building, both human and institutional,
as a key answer to the challenges and opportunities of globalisation and the
New Economy. Capacity building
constitutes a key element of the balanced approach essential to the success
of APEC along with market opening and full participation. In this
context, we reiterate that human capacity building (HCB) remains a central
theme this year and the years ahead.
We commend the success of the High-Level Meeting on Human Capacity
Building, and welcome the Beijing Initiative as a comprehensive set of principles
for human capacity building, which also provides opportunities for further
work in the New Economy. These and related items did not
receive much attention from the media.
This is not surprising since interest was focused on the announced
intention of US President George Bush to seek support for the War on
Terrorism (which is mentioned in the following section). It is nevertheless important to
note that the practice of rotating the APEC Chair annually results in a
specific commitment that is linked to each host member. China is thus committed to the Shanghai
Accord and, additionally, is committed to having it reaffirmed at future
meetings. Perhaps more than anything else,
this link and its related obligations can result in a more workable Asia-Pacific
economic community. |
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Item 1
and 2 state, respectively: Leaders unequivocally condemn in the strongest terms the terrorist
attacks in the United States on September 11, 2001, and express their deepest
sympathy and condolences to the victims of a large number of nationalities
and their families and to the people and Government of the United States of
America. Leaders consider the murderous deeds as well as other terrorist acts
in all forms and manifestations, committed wherever, whenever and by
whomsoever as a profound threat to the peace, prosperity and security of all
people, of all faiths, of all nations.
Terrorism is also a direct challenge to APEC's vision of free, open and
prosperous economies, and to the fundamental values that APEC members hold. This is the only instance for
which Shanghai Meeting documents carried the word “nations”, and in this
instance it applies to a situation that extends beyond the Asia-Pacific
region. The media noted that the
statement fell short of a commitment to direct military action in countering
terrorism. It did, however, contain
the following, in Item 5: Leaders commit to prevent and suppress all forms of terrorist acts in
the future in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations and other
international law, pledge to implement the UN Security Council Resolution
1368 and 1373 faithfully and immediately, strongly support all efforts to strengthen
the international anti-terrorism regime, call for increased co-operation to
bring perpetrators to justice, and also call for early signing and
ratification of all basic universal anti-terrorist conventions including the
International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism. |
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China’s membership in a
regional, trade-related organisation was an important selling point for
APEC. It was known since the 1980s
that China wanted to participate in the General Agreement on Tariffs and
Trade, which was subsequently reconstituted as the World Trade Organisation,
but it was not known how China would participate in such an organisation. Would the Chinese authorities
work consistently within the objectives of GATT, and later WTO, or, after
becoming a member, would they use their influence to modify the objectives
according to specific national interests or advantages? The answer cannot be known with certainty
before the event, but the conduct of the Chinese in hosting the Ninth APEC
Economic Leaders’ Meeting suggests that they will collectively be a strong
advocate of that which was formally agreed upon. Perhaps more importantly,
China’s foreign policy recently acquired a quality of consistency that is
becoming increasingly scarce in the rest of the world. As stated by Zhang Tianguang in the title
of his article published in the South China Morning
Post (19 October 2001), China’s foreign policy finally comes of age. Hopefully circumstances in the
near future will add to that maturity, rather than take it a step backward. |
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China Daily: http://www.chinadaily.com.cn ChinaOnline: http://www.chinaonline.com People’s Daily: http://www.peopledaily.com.an South China Morning
Post: http://www.scmp.com All sources have a special
section devoted to the Shanghai meetings, though it is difficult to be
certain how long that will be retained.
From past experience, the People’s Daily
will keep it online for some time and it is also the only source that published
the full text of the Leader’s Statements. The analyses and commentaries
published in the South China Morning Post are
particularly good. |
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