EAI MPDI Working Paper No. 11

Author

Andrew F. Cooper is Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Waterloo and the Balsillie School of International Affairs, and the former Associate Director of the Centre for International Governance Innovation (CIGI). He is currently also Associate Senior Fellow, Centre for Global Cooperation Research, Duisburg, Germany, and Associate Research Fellow, UNU-CRIS (Institute on Comparative Regional Integration), Bruges, Belgium. He received his Doctorate from Oxford University, and has been a Visiting scholar at Harvard University, Australian National University, Stellenbosch University, SAIS John-Hopkins, and the Léger Fellow, Policy Staff, Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, Canada. In 2009 he was the Canada-US Fulbright Research Chair, Center on Public Diplomacy, University of Southern California. Among his books either authored/co-authored, edited/co-edited are the Oxford Handbook of Modern Diplomacy (2013), Group of Twenty (2012), The Diplomacies of Small States: Between Vulnerability and Resilience (2012), Rising States, Rising Institutions: Challenges for Global Governance (2010), Canadian Foreign Policy: Old Habits and New Directions (1997) and Relocating Middle Powers: Australia and Canada in a Changing World Order (1993). His scholarly publications also include articles in leading journals such as International Organization, International Affairs, World Development, International Studies Review, International Interactions, Political Science Quarterly, Global Policy Journal, Washington Quarterly, Journal of Democracy, Global Governance, and New Political Economy.

I. Introduction

The re-shaping of the global sys-tem requires a fundamental re-thinking of what middle powers need to do to navigate the fast-shifting global geometry of power. In a world that privileges scaling up, across the spectrum from big emerging countries to an over-arching concert of powers with an extended scope of regulatory authority, and elaborate and well-resourced public-private transnational networks, secondary players could well be marginalized. However, the middle power model exhibits an impressive, albeit not unchallenged, capacity for revitalization as in past eras of transition with a shift away from a unipolar locus of power. Moreover, there is a strong evidence that this trajectory of re-location can move towards an extension as opposed to a contraction, beyond the model of traditional middle powers. What can be described as an extended ‘rising middle’, encompassing both established and non-traditional middle powers, if still structurally constrained in many ways, exhibits a capacity for innovation as both receptors and agents of change.

No where is this ‘rising middle’ more visible than in East Asia. The Republic of Korea (South Korea) in particular has gone to great lengths to brand itself as a middle power that combines a presence within the G20 with an abundance of intellectual, entrpreprenurial and technical soft power capacity. The fundamental theme of this chapter is that South Korea not only has importance as a specific case, but as the leader in a wider East Asian wave. In doing so, South Korea has built on, but also diverged from, the the brand projected by tradtional middle powers, notably Canada. Given this context, a comparison betweeen South Korea as a stand out in East Asia with Canada as the exemplar of the tradtional middle power model merits attention.

From the late 1960s, Canada built up a distinctive brand in the use of soft power, building on an instiutional platform associated with middle power status, privileging the United Nations (UN) in particular and the use of functional initiatives ranging from peacekeeping and forms of mediation. The embedded nature of this approach can be seen as late as 1995, when in a Canadian foreign policy review, the promotion of culture and values was recognized as a ‘third pillar’ of Canada’s foreign policy; in theory, it was equal to the first two pillars of promoting economic growth and international peace and security. Yet, in more recent years, Canada has become more instrumental, shifting the emphasis away from symbolic representation to concrete delivery, privileging the economic and security domains. South Korea at the head of an East Asian wave, by comparison, has expanded its brand away from traditional notions of economic-oriented developmental states to countries that possess cultural dynamism.

Although explanations for these shifts necessitate explorations into domestic politics that go beyond the purview of this chapter, the reversal in branding – with Canada moving from soft power to focused forms of delivery and Korea becoming more identified with a more comprehensive approach, also relates to global structural transformation. The rise of Canadian soft power came in tandem with enhanced space for Canada in the global arena. In the late 1960s there was not much competition for Canada as a middle power outside of Australia and some small albeit significant European countries such as the Netherlands and Sweden. In its revived form in the late 1990s, Canadian niche diplomacy caught the wave of post-Cold War globalization of norms. Canada could stand out as a middle power without considerations of downward mobility. As will be detailed in the next sections of the paper, however, the structural changes in global politics over the past decade have restricted space for this branding. Even before the government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper came into office in 2003, a backlash developed against the traditional Canadian ‘soft’ brand. What Canada needed to do was not showcase symbolic attributes concerning its middle power status, but leverage in tangible fashion forms of activity that could allow Canada to gain recognition in the global sys-tem.

Paradoxically, this sense of insecurity was reinforced by the creation of new forums, whether the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) or indeed the G20 in which Canada was a member. Both crowded space for Canada. Rather than viewing the G20 as an upgrade, and certainly a platform by which it could ratchet up a reinvigorated form of soft power, Canada kept its involvement in the G20 in as parsimonious manner as possible. Unlike South Korea, the G20 did not represent the main game of Canadian diplomacy. Rather Canada accented its role as a core member of the G7, with a focus on both the unique and generic qualities that were embedded in its membership in this core forum.

The creation of the G20, by way of comparsion, provided South Korea with a signifcant new platform by which to project its brand on the global stage. Akin to Canada, South Korea was a member of the OECD. But beyond this connection, until the creation of the G20, South Korea did not have a presence in any hub informal institutions. Beyond the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), South Korea was restricted to a presence in regional forums such as Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) and Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Plus Three.

The G20 acted as game changer. Notwithstanding a structural weight below that of not only China but Japan and India, Korea raced ahead to grab the right to host the first G20 outside the West. In doing so, it sought to magnify its ‘bridging’ role with respect to its evolution from a developing country to a developed (OECD) state. Although not alone in its ambitions, Korea’s unique brand is important here. As President Lee Myung-bak stated in the run-up to the Seoul G20, ‘The world can be split into two groups: One group sets global rules, the other follows. South Korea has successfully transformed itself from a passive follower into an active agenda-setter’.

In this vision, however, Korea moved to diversify its brand away from a self-help entrepreneurial developmental state (associated with the success of the large business groupings or Chaebols, and the close relationship between the Korean state and corporate giants such as Samsung) to one that possessed an attractive cultural, social as well as economic model.

One way by which South Korea shifted its brand was to directly project itself as a country that had moved from developing to developed country status. Korea is not only a middle power but also a newly developed economy, a trajectory that gives it a huge amount of credibility in projecting its brand to developing countries. A crucial component in this projection has been the emphasis on the Knowledge Sharing Program that fully takes into consideration the political and socio-economic condition of partner countries. In the context of the 2010 Seoul G20 meeting, the leaders, in the finalized document called the ‘Seoul Development Consensus for Sharing,’ agreed to work towards allowing low income countries to enhance their growth potential for global balance and manage risks, and the Korean government made an effort to include knowledge sharing as one of nine pillars.

However, in an indirect fashion, there was also an attempt to ride the ‘hallyu’ or ‘Korean Wave’ as part of a wider approach of soft power branding. Such an approach could to some extent be promoted by the government, through programs supported by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism. However, unlike other areas of soft power branding, notably the Knowledge Sharing Program, the utilization of the Korean Wave moved beyond government control.

II. Pressures from Hierarchical Change in the Global Order

As laid out in a rich body of literature, the global hierarchy in state-centric terms is being re-shaped in the 21st century. The ascent of China, India and Brazil, commonly viewed both individually and collectively through the BRICS model, has served to address imbalances in the globalization process, one which up until now has mainly reflected the greater influence of long-standing powerful states in the core regions of the ‘trilateral world’: North America, Europe and Japan. Yet, it is not only at the top layer of the global sys-tem that signs a fundamental transition is underway. In an unanticipated fashion, a number of secondary states possess considerable ability to influence the global ability on an issue-specific basis.

Such a transformation has many positive attributes for global political and economic life. It reverses the historically weak mechanisms of collective action associated with forums such as the Group of 77 and the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), and it counteracts the splintering effects of the ‘policy competition’ that has been associated with the diplomatic behavior of developing states. Furthermore, it allows greater latitude to these rising powers to forge lessons-learned for overcoming developmental vulnerability.

At both the sys-temic and national level, these dynamics are commonly depicted as game-changers. This presumption, however, leaves moot what the motivation, site, and means of this game is about in the first place. Sys-tematically, the global financial crisis of 2008 has enhanced the position of selective multilateralism as the global main game, with some momentum towards thicker, albeit still domain-restricted, modes of governance. Nonetheless, a serious interrogation must be conducted around questions about why, how, and to what degree, countries from both the old trilateral core states and the cluster of rising powers are committed to this form of reconfigured multilateralism.

The image of shift changing for middle powers is accentuated by two other important factors. In a world of diminished U.S. hegemony, it is much harder for middle powers to take on a repertoire of familiar activities beyond mediation. At the end of the Cold War, middle powers could relocate themselves as both supporters and occasional counterfoils to the dominant power. Within some basic boundaries and guidelines, middle powers held key roles both as loyalists and issue-specific dissenters. The pathway forward appeared to contain dualistic and even paradoxical components, although both had functional features. On the one hand, in a unipolar world, middle powers were pushed to play the role of followers whether in the core security domain (the first Gulf War), the economic arena (the move from the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) to the World Trade Organization (WTO)) and on social issues (human rights, democratization). On the other hand, in select niches, middle powers had considerable space and incentive form coalitions that took on the U.S., whether on land mines, the International Criminal Court (ICC) or child soldiers...(Continued)