Challenges for global economic security

Extract:
Global economic security will be defined in the coming decades by two concurrent forces in international relations: the quest for energy and the rise of strategic regions. Pivotal to both will be the East, a hemisphere that spans Eurasia through to the Western Pacific and South Asia through to the Indian Ocean. East Asia, comprising China, Japan, Korea and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), is the most dynamic region of the East. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) projects that in 2015 East Asia will account for over a quarter of global output (26.3%) compared to the USA's declined share of 22% (IMF cited in Rudd, 2010). The People's Republic of China (PRC or China), the world's biggest energy consumer in terms of a range of energy sources (oil, natural gas, nuclear power and renewable energy), may be viewed as the core state of the emerging global markets of East Asia and a core contributor to trade and investment in Africa and Latin America. With its growing resource needs, China represents a key determining factor in the way in which the quest for energy is handled. Its economic weight, especially when augmented by its regional associations, is such that its mode of international interaction will be setting standards rather than following them from the West. Its cross regional energy diplomacy will strongly influence the competition cooperation calculus: whether hedging or harmonising strategies become dominant in the geopolitics of the future. This chapter explores the challenges for global economic security at a time of transition from West to East. It concludes with a 'mandalic' recommendation that includes social policy for a more comprehensive security.