AT THE TIME of this article’s writing, the Asia-Pacific Parliament announced that they have failed to reach a consensus regarding the West Philippine Sea.
I am not the least bit surprised by the outcome. There can be no consensus without de-escalation, and I just don’t see how that is possible at this point outside of cataclysmic changes in China or the US.
But I think that this situation is not unique to our region. This coming apart is a global phenomenon, and not necessarily between countries or group of countries. It’s like we are entering the age of de-globalization and it’s all coming apart. Maybe this is a mistake, and the situation will eventually settle down, but I doubt it.
When viewed from a wider timescale, what China is doing in the West Philippine Sea is to try and widen its borders while the situation is still relatively stable. And they are doing this not out of strength, but out of insecurity.
The People’s Republic of China knows they are vulnerable in terms of food and energy if they cannot secure their logistics. Much of their belligerence is an attempt at rectifying that.
And they’re not the only ones. Whether it’s the war in Ukraine, the de-legitimization of liberal democracy, the tensions in Asia or all the tiny wars happening all over the world, this polarization is part of a larger trend of de-Globalization and de-Westernization. Essentially, countries are drawing lines around their areas of control.
This is happening with Russia in Ukraine, what Hamas had tried (and failed) to do in Palestine, what the Azerbaijanis have done to former Armenian territory, etc.
We are in a time where borders are being changed, but these changes are being done out of deeper social stresses.
And these social stresses are the result of the West, and the United States in particular, no longer being able and willing to sustain the global system they have originally pioneered.
This does not necessarily mean that there will be world war, but it does mean we are heading towards an increasingly desperate and multi-polarized world./PN
