Jan Kliem

Jan Kliem

Senior Research Fellow, German-Southeast Asian Center of Excellence for Public Policy and Good Governance (CPG), Thammasat University

Jan Kliem is Senior Research Fellow at the German-Southeast Asian Center of Excellence for Public Policy and Good Governance (CPG), Faculty of Law, Thammasat University.

People at Schlossstrasse shopping boulevard, amid the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic during lockdown in Berlin, Germany, 25 January 2021. (Fabrizio Bensch/REUTERS)

Germany's Indo-Pacific vision: Building a multilateral world order with ASEAN

German academic Jan Kliem says the Indo-Pacific that Germany envisions is neither unipolar nor bipolar, but led by multilateralism, which forms the key principle throughout its Indo-Pacific policies, from climate cooperation to security. However, while implicitly repudiating much of China’s behaviour regarding the international rules-based order, Germany is not directly criticising or shutting the door on China. This is good news for Southeast Asia and ASEAN, signalling increasing cooperation and support by both Germany and the EU for ASEAN’s multilateral (security) architecture.