{"id":84355,"date":"2023-12-22T10:30:40","date_gmt":"2023-12-21T23:30:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/?p=84355"},"modified":"2023-12-22T10:14:36","modified_gmt":"2023-12-21T23:14:36","slug":"vietnam-isnt-north-korea-and-50-years-of-australian-aid-has-helped","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/vietnam-isnt-north-korea-and-50-years-of-australian-aid-has-helped\/","title":{"rendered":"Vietnam isn\u2019t North Korea\u2014and 50 years of Australian aid has helped"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/figure>\n

There\u2019s growing awareness that Australia\u2019s international development program is one of the tools of national power that Australia can use to shape the world around it.<\/p>\n

The danger is that if \u2018influence\u2019 becomes an unstated way<\/a> of judging the success of Australia\u2019s aid, the focus may become short term and transactional. While development experts may be pleased about increased recognition of the importance of the development program\u2014for example, in building relationships with neighbours\u2014they\u2019re concerned<\/a> that the performance metric shouldn\u2019t be whether, say, a country\u2019s politicians and elites are positively disposed towards Australia.<\/p>\n

The key to resolving this is to be clear about the type of influence that development partnerships can create. Australia\u2019s 50-year investment in Vietnam is an instructive lesson on what a successful development partnership can achieve\u2014and a realistic idea of what it cannot. It demonstrates that development cooperation is a long-term tool of influence.<\/p>\n

I was in Hanoi to hear Foreign Minister Penny Wong celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Whitlam government\u2019s recognition of Vietnam. Fifty years ago it would have been fanciful to imagine a foreign minister from a wartime enemy extolling the level of strategic trust and the people-to-people links between the two countries. It would have been even more difficult to imagine the location for the speech: the Ho Chi Minh National Academy of Politics, the literal heart of the Communist Party of Vietnam.<\/p>\n

So how have two countries with extremely different political systems built this kind of relationship? It was done through long-term investment<\/a> across all the tools of statecraft\u2014including diplomacy, trade and defence\u2014with development cooperation as a key element. This enabled a progression<\/a> from battlefield enemy to major economic and development partner in a surprisingly short period.<\/p>\n

Australia is still remembered for many \u2018firsts\u2019<\/a> in Vietnam. Crucially, Australia was among the first to recognise Vietnam and support its membership of the United Nations. For a time, the Australian diplomatic mission in Hanoi became the only bridge of communication between Vietnam and many Western nations.<\/p>\n

Australia built<\/a> Vietnam\u2019s first undersea cable, satellite ground stations and high-voltage transmission lines. Many of the first foreign banks and law firms in Vietnam were also Australian. RMIT was the first international university<\/a> to be invited into Vietnam.<\/p>\n

Australia constructed the first bridge across the Mekong River in Vietnam in 2000, Australia\u2019s largest development project to that time. Colloquially known as the \u2018Australian bridge\u2019, it remains a very visible symbol of the depth of the relationship. Tertiary education has also been an important vector to build people-to-people ties, including through scholarships provided under the development program.<\/p>\n

As Vietnam\u2019s needs and objectives have changed, so too has the nature of Australia\u2019s cooperation. Today the centrepiece is the Vietnam Australia Centre<\/a> embedded within the Ho Chi Minh National Academy. The centre draws on Australian expertise to provide training, capacity building, research activities and policy input to support Vietnam\u2019s national and provincial leadership.<\/p>\n

Australia has not shied away from difficult topics. One focus of Australia\u2019s development support<\/a> is on women\u2019s equality and leadership. Since 2002, Australia and Vietnam have regularly held human rights discussions<\/a>, with the 18th Human Rights Dialogue taking place in Hanoi earlier this year. Australia has adopted a peer support model in which each country shares its human rights challenges and encouragement is given to meeting international human rights commitments. While this isn\u2019t as cathartic as condemning Vietnam for its human rights abuses, of which there can be no doubt<\/a>, it does provide an opportunity to influence thinking and approaches over the long term.<\/p>\n

All of this shows that Australia has been a genuine partner in helping Vietnam meet its development goals despite significant ideological differences. Australia\u2019s pioneering engagement with Vietnam has built huge reservoirs of goodwill. It has helped Australia develop a significant profile in Vietnam, which is useful for trade and other links, and an outsized level of access to Vietnamese policymakers.<\/p>\n

So does this mean that Australia can tell Vietnam what to do? That is neither realistic nor desirable.<\/p>\n

Influence is about creating a region that Australia wants to live in, where neighbours are meeting their development goals. This means that the focus of the development partnerships shouldn\u2019t be on short-term, transitory outcomes or benefits.<\/p>\n

The measure of success is that Australia has helped shape Vietnam in a way that suits Australia\u2019s broad long-term interests in fostering a peaceful, stable and predictable region.<\/p>\n

Perhaps the best argument in favour of a long-term investment in development, diplomacy, trade and defence is the counterfactual one. Imagine Vietnam had developed in the way that North Korea did. That\u2019s actually not hard to conceive. Not only would it be a negative for Vietnamese people, it would be devasting for the region.<\/p>\n

For those who are inclined to be fatalistic about Australia\u2019s ability to impact international affairs, the Australia\u2013Vietnam relationship is an object lesson in what can be achieved with a commitment to shaping a shared future and the intelligent, long-term use of Australia\u2019s tools of statecraft, including its aid program.<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t judge Australia\u2019s development program by whether a country\u2019s current political leader is pro-Australia. Judge it by the trajectory of 50 years.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There\u2019s growing awareness that Australia\u2019s international development program is one of the tools of national power that Australia can use to shape the world around it. The danger is that if \u2018influence\u2019 becomes an unstated …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":201,"featured_media":84356,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[416,123,294,142,540],"class_list":["post-84355","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general","tag-australian-government","tag-development-aid","tag-diplomacy","tag-regional-security","tag-vietnam"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nVietnam isn\u2019t North Korea\u2014and 50 years of Australian aid has helped | The Strategist<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.aspistrategist.ru\/vietnam-isnt-north-korea-and-50-years-of-australian-aid-has-helped\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Vietnam isn\u2019t North Korea\u2014and 50 years of Australian aid has helped | The Strategist\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"There\u2019s growing awareness that Australia\u2019s international development program is one of the tools of national power that Australia can use to shape the world around it. 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