Marcos Jr.’s Philippine foreign policy: What it means for the Indo-Pacific
Marcos Jr.’s Philippine foreign policy: What it means for the Indo-Pacific
WRITTEN BY JOSHUA BERNARD ESPEÑA
13 May 2022
Foreign policy was one, if not the most, hotly contested of issues during the 2022 national elections. Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr, who won the Philippine presidential election this week, has said he rejects the “Cold War” geopolitical model of carving spheres of influence between contending regional powers, the US and China. But there’s reason to question his foreign policy acumen. While some think Philippine foreign policy under Marcos Jr will be a continuation of outgoing President Rodrigo Duterte’s “Independent Foreign Policy”, which is pro-Filipino, others are sceptical and contend that Marcos Jr’s foreign policy will instead be pro-Chinese. The Marcos family routinely visits the Chinese embassy in Manila to commemorate the opening of Manila-Beijing relations in 1975, a policy undertaken by Marcos Jr’s father and namesake, Marcos Sr, a dictator until he was ousted by a popular uprising in 1986.
Marcos Jr faces pressure from a highly-charged, anti-Chinese electorate. His campaign platforms and promises are likely to be tested against the pressures and realities of domestic and international politics. Such was the case for Duterte, whose early ambitions to distance the Philippines from Washington by moving closer to Beijing failed in the end, thanks to the combined efforts of Philippine defence and foreign affairs institutions. Instead, the Duterte presidency gave rise to the concept of “Philippinedisation”. This can be defined as a “process whereby a weaker state, backed by a powerful country, goes through great lengths in temporarily refraining from opposing a neighbouring great power by resorting to economic and diplomatic rapprochements at the strategic level but strengthening its national security infrastructure on the operational level with an eye for potential conflict in the foreseeable future”. Whatever Marcos Jr intends to do as the country’s chief foreign policy architect, it is unlikely he can undo Duterte’s path that led to Philippinedisation. In this regard, President-elect Marcos Jr would have to give in to the dictates of Philippinedisation sooner or later.
Seismic shift in the Indo-Pacific
The Indo-Pacific region is currently decoupling into two politico-economic blocs: the United States, its allies and like-minded partners on the one hand, and on the other hand China and its economic benefactors, such as Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Pakistan, and recently, the Solomon Islands. In the past decade, China has boldly flexed its diplomatic, military, and economic muscles in the region by launching the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), constructing artificial islands and harassing fisherfolks in the South China Sea (SCS), militarily intimidating Taiwan, and economically warring with Australia. These efforts are part of Beijing’s effort to replace the US as the regional hegemon. In response, Washington has counter-positioned itself via strategic and economic arrangements such as the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (Quad), the Australia-United Kingdom-US (AUKUS) partnership, the Build Back Better World initiative, joint naval exercises, and other bilateral arrangements.
It is unlikely that Manila will join Washington in balancing against Beijing — Marcos Jr has already made this clear. Neither will the country bandwagon with Beijing given domestic pressures driven by fears over creeping Chinese influence.
The Philippines is squarely in the middle of the US-China rivalry in the Indo-Pacific. Manila contests control of certain territory in the South China Sea with Beijing. Manila has sought Washington’s commitment to back its maritime claims there, which it did in 2020, stating that Beijing intends to establish a ‘maritime empire’ in the SCS. As the trend shows, the rising powers’ militaries, one of which is China, are likely to mature in the 2030s, which suggests that they may be much more willing to use conventional military means to achieve foreign policy objectives in this shifting balance of power. Manila may have to face a difficult choice between Beijing and Washington in the future.
Diplomatic and economic outreach to China
In the short term, Marcos Jr will likely insist on translating his campaign narrative into policy reality. During the campaign, Marcos Jr strongly argued that tapping the US to resolve territorial disputes with China could be a “recipe for disaster” toward an all-out war and indicated a preference for engaging China bilaterally instead. Moreover, he supports Duterte’s decision to shelve the 2016 arbitral ruling for said bilateral talks, citing that it is the only option Manila is “left with”. These steps are necessary to secure China’s consent for Filipino fisherfolks’ continued access to the Spratly Islands and Scarborough Shoal.
Aside from bilateral talks, Marcos Jr is likely to support the Association of the Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) as another diplomatic channel to engage China concerning the dispute. In particular, he claimed that the ASEAN-China Code of Conduct (COC) of Parties in the South China Sea (SCS), which is currently a work in progress, can be a useful element to stage an agreement with Beijing. However, putting so much faith in the COC can be problematic as Beijing has repeatedly engaged in unlawful conduct. Manila reported in April this year that a Chinese Coast Guard (CCG) vessel conducted a “close distance manoeuvring” against a Philippine Coast Guard vessel in the Scarborough Shoal. This violated the 1972 International Regulations for Preventing Collisions at Sea (COLREGS) and is not an isolated incident.
Marcos Jr is also likely to welcome Chinese investments for generating employment and infrastructure, especially during the economic recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic. However, he would do well to remember that only a fraction of promised Chinese soft loans was actually delivered during the Duterte administration. Should Marcos Jr accept Chinese soft loans without considering other sources, he may likely experience a domestic backlash. This is due to fears of the Chinese ‘debt trap’, ie the takeover of critical infrastructure should a country be unable to pay back such loans. Such was the case with Sri Lanka’s Hambantota Port, which was formally taken over last year and was met with violent protests. With an infuriated political opposition that protests his electoral victory, Marcos Jr will need to look for compromises in the mid-term, if not long-term, for political survival by softening his stance on China and looking for other potential economic partners to boost his legitimacy.
An alliance in need
Given the difficulties regarding rapprochement with China, the security alliance with the US will stand. Although Marcos Jr has a legal issue in the US concerning his family’s ill-gotten wealth, Washington is likely to take a pragmatic, albeit not wholehearted, approach with Manila given the systemic challenge posed by China in the region. This resonates with US State Department Spokesperson Ned Price’s recent statement that Washington is willing to work with the next government, seeing that the 2022 elections were “conducted in line with international standards and without significant incident”.
Marcos Jr has described the bilateral ties with the US as a “special relationship” given their security alliance since 1951. The question, however, is if he would support the decision to institutionalise the Enhanced Defence Cooperation Agreement (EDCA) to allow rotational US forces to be stationed within the Philippine archipelago. The EDCA, if anything, would serve as the logistical-tactical-operational leg of the security alliance in case of external aggression. In 2014, Marcos Jr, then a senator, questioned the EDCA’s provisions, particularly over what benefits Manila would get if it granted Washington access to agreed Filipino bases without rental costs. It remains uncertain whether Marcos Jr would fully support the EDCA should he malign it as an American imposition of the ‘spheres of influence’ model back in the Cold War years.
Hard choices?
Due to international and domestic political pressures, Marcos Jr would have to give in to the dictates of Philippinedisation. Existing scholarly models such as balancing, bandwagoning, and hedging are unlikely to explain the full picture of the Philippines’ behaviour in the Indo-Pacific. It is unlikely that Manila will join Washington in balancing against Beijing — Marcos Jr has already made this clear. Neither will the country bandwagon with Beijing given domestic pressures driven by fears over creeping Chinese influence. Foreign observers have implied that Marcos Jr will hedge against both the US and China. However, the hedging model cannot account for the domestic and international drivers in Philippine foreign policy. Marcos Jr.'s administration is likely to bolster the Philippinedisation model — the Philippines is most likely to cordially deal with China for some time as it strengthens its national security infrastructure but would ultimately side with the US should there be a future conflict between Beijing and Washington.
It remains uncertain whether Marcos Jr himself is cognisant of this reality. Marcos Jr has stressed the need to consider “putting military presence” to defend the waters in the SCS, as a way of demonstrating to Beijing “that we are defending what we consider our territorial waters”. Whether or not observers consider this mere lip service to please the defence institution for political survival, Marcos Jr has much to prove about his understanding of defence and strategic affairs as part of his foreign policy. He cannot be considered a foreign policy genius. Lapses such as not realising that China’s People’s Liberation Army-Navy (PLAN) was harassing Filipino fishers in the SCS indicate his ignorance of the strategic environment and could damage the country’s international relations in the short to medium-term. Marcos Jr has expressed the need for a ‘well-versed’ foreign policy secretary respected by the diplomatic corps, although he has not yet indicated a possible appointee.
Will he be able to make hard choices? One can only hope that he has learned from Duterte’s foreign policy mistakes. The realities of domestic and international politics will likely test the statements he made during the campaign. Ignorance and indecision may produce an unfavourable strategic effect for Manila and put Marcos Jr in a politically awkward position. The challenge is to develop a viable grand strategy to carefully navigate the decoupling unfolding in the Indo-Pacific. From a systemic perspective, the region is still up for grabs, and Marcos Jr’s administration would do well to craft a realistic and well-suited national security strategy.
DISCLAIMER: All views expressed are those of the writer and do not necessarily represent that of the 9DASHLINE.com platform.
Author biography
Joshua Bernard Espeña is a senior global security analyst at the California-based Analyzing War and a resident fellow at the Manila-based International Development Security Cooperation (IDSC). He teaches political science and international relations at the Polytechnic University of the Philippines and University of the East, Manila. He is the co-author of Rise of Philippinedization: Philippinedization is not Finlandization (2021). Image credit: Wikimedia.