Second, it is notable that Clinton took the trouble to make a 6,000 km detour to the south across the equator to visit Indonesia next. Exactly why the visit to Indonesia was given this priority is hard to say. The other three countries are all conveniently located close to each other so clearly a judgement was made that it was symbolically important to travel to Southeast Asia. U.S. Indonesia-watcher Lex Rieffel remarked last week that ‘the agenda for Jakarta is harder to bring into focus’ than the topics to be addressed in Northeast Asia.
Rieffel suggested that issues of regional architecture need attention, particularly the U.S. role in ASEAN and Indonesia’s role in the G-20. As Rieffel sees it, ‘ASEAN is at the centre of Asia-wide regional cooperation’ while ‘for many Asians, the Pacific-oriented APEC forum is a Cold War relic that stands in the way of a more mature relationship between the United States and Asia.’
Third, the U.S.-Indonesia bilateral relationship is a tricky one. Both sides are keen to have good relations. However, priorities on each side differ markedly. The relationship is essentially a North-South one. During her visit to Indonesia, Secretary Clinton emphasised northern topics such as support for democracy, human rights, and environmental issues. On the Indonesian side, interests reflect Indonesia’s strong links with the Muslim world and with resource transfers from the North. U.S. policy in the Middle East is of much concern to Indonesia as is the likely impact of the global financial crisis. Indonesian policy makers are currently working to put together a $US5 billion line of international credit for Indonesia to draw on if needed. The matter was apparently raised by the Indonesian side during the Clinton visit.
The Clinton visit was seen as very successful on both sides. But the visit was just the first step in the U.S.-Indonesian bilateral relationship in a post-Bush world.
Very astute analysis. A pleasure to read your blog, as always.
It’s slightly disingenuous to say that environmental issues were only raised on Clinton’s side. In particular the Indonesian President demanded leadership from the US on climate change, especially, I suspect the REDD scheme
Thanks to Rachel Bannikoff and Nick Dommett for these comments. In response to the helpful comment from Nick Dommett, what I said was that “Clinton emphasised northern topics such as … environmental issues.” I presume that there was a response from the Indonesian side although I don’t, of course, know any of the details.
Officially. the US seems keen to demonstrate how Islam, democracy and modernisation can co-exist and holding Indonesia up as a model state. Although Indonesia appears keen to assist US efforts in the Middle-East especially in regard to Palestine, it is hard to see what Indonesia could contribute meaningfully in that regard without economic power or political leverage.
The US should strive to ensure continuing stability in Indonesia by providing some degree of economic certainty in the context of the current global downturn. Developing closer counter-terrorism linkages and efforts could also be a part of that equation.
What was especially reassuring about the Clinton visit and its dynamics was that Obama’s elevation to the Presidency has obviously generated enormous goodwill to the US amongst ordinary Indonesians. Hopefully Obama’s advisors will help him do more to build on this reservoir of goodwill.
I agree entirely with these comments from Exmond DeCruz. In the interests of keeping the blog comment brisk, I did not elaborate in detail on these points. But the emphasis that Exmond puts on the the aim of the US to demonstrate how Islam, democracy and modernisation can co-exist seems entirely correct. And so, I think, is his important observation that it is hard to see how Indonesia can really contribute meaningfully in this area. While the U.S. is a key player in the Middle-East, Indonesia is not. Nevertheless, it can do no harm on the global chess board for the U.S. to work to foster relations with a large and moderate Muslim nation like Indonesia so Clinton’s visit to Indonesia was very welcome from this point of view.