The Shanghai Cooperative Organization and Transformation of Asia

Abstract

Since the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War, many transformations of systems, regimes or orders occurred at various levels of world politics. The aim of this paper is to clarify trends for transformation of regions and security in Asia by analyzing the Shanghai Cooperative Organization (SCO). In the post-Cold war era, the character and functions of regions have experienced major transformations such as the growing differentiation between “physical regions” and “functional regions.” With the dissolution of the bipolar system of the Cold War, security systems have changed from antagonistic ones to cooperative ones.

In the first decades of rapid independence, Central Asian countries reinforced the frame work of the modern nation-state while they sought new economic and political ties to replace those with the Soviet Union. For regional powers China and Russia, a new security system or regional cooperation is needed for their security in the post-Cold War era. Since 1987, China and Russia have been negotiating a new cooperative relationship regarding the Russo-Chinese border, which stretches 7000 km. With the break up of the Soviet Union, this bilateral negotiation changed to multilateral negotiation among China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan in 1992, and this multilateral agreement came to be called the “Shanghai Five.” With the addition of Uzbekistan to the Shanghai Five, the SCO was established in 2001. As Uzbekistan does not share a border with China, this multilateral forum changed its character and function. In addition, the emerging SCO suggests trends for transformation of regions and security in post-Cold War Asia.