Security co-operation in ASIA: Phil Goff comments on the problems of managing alliances and partnerships.

• Author: Goff, Phil

The security needs of the 21st century are qualitatively different from those of a generation ago. Traditional inter-state conflict has increasingly taken second place to conflict within states. And unlike the Cold War, where conflicting parties were often proxies for ideological battles between great powers, today by and large outsiders cannot be blamed for the violence. While the Asia-Pacific region may be less affected by such conflicts than some other parts of the world, one test of regional institutions is the ability to respond to such situations.

Internal conflicts occurring where state institutions and national cohesion are weak require new international responses. Collectively we need to find solutions to instability which arises out of the inadequacy of local social and political institutions. The prevalence of, and increase in, situations of this nature is reflected in the growing demand for UN peacekeeping operations. Deployments reached an historic high at the end of October 2000 with nearly 40,000 military and police personnel and some 15,000 civilians serving in 16 peacekeeping operations around the world.

There will be a real challenge in finding countries prepared to contribute to meeting this demand. However, I believe there are two key reasons why we must collectively endeavour to meet these needs.

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The first is the acceptance by the United Nations of the responsibility to protect. This acknowledges our shared responsibility to act in response to humanitarian crises which threaten human survival and well-being. The world is hopefully less willing today to stand back and do nothing in the face of tragedies like Rwanda and Bosnia-Herzegovina, where thousands were murdered in cold blood.

The second reason is our shared self-interest in dealing with threats to local security and stability which have consequences for our own and wider regional well-being. Failed states can become havens for terrorists and criminals. The Taliban's hosting of al-Qaeda in Afghanistan, leading to 9/11, was a dramatic example of this.

In the first instance, a military intervention may be necessary to control and stabilise a situation which poses a threat. But for the resolution of conflict to be sustainable we need more wide ranging interventions to deal with the causes of state failure--initiatives to build state capacity and social services, nation-building.

Mutual dependence

Stability and development are mutually dependent. Stability requires addressing poverty, under-development, economic crisis, weak or corrupt central government and ethnic, tribal and religious conflict. The challenge may, for example, be about how tribal or district loyalties can become loyalty to a nation, or how to inculcate conventions that groups do not take by force what they are unable to achieve through the ballot box.

In this article, I shall draw on New Zealand's experience and involvement in recent peacekeeping missions to assess how these challenges might be met--in Bougainville, Solomon Islands, East Timor and Afghanistan.

The focus of much of New Zealand's activities has been in the South Pacific where we have close family...