South China Sea: a China or a maritime issue?

The South China Sea dispute has been an ongoing discussion among scholars and politicians, but it is also a complicated issue.

One factor that causing the issue so topical is because it is a China issue. This is not so difficult to understand, because the international society has now perceived China as a geopolitical, strategic and security threat. Indeed, the PRC has become so assertive in various security issues in the last ten years — space security, cyber security, the cross-Strait relations etc. And China’s activities in South China Sea has been on the news regularly. For example, regular patrolling, the maritime militia, US-China naval competition, land reclamation. Objectively speaking, Beijing’s actions are beyond traditional understanding of sea power; these actions are indeed worth to investigate.

However, even if the China factor is not being considered, the South China Sea dispute is also complicated as a maritime issue. First and foremost, it is a grey area in international law. Sea border is a relatively new concept that was raised back in the 1980s. Technically speaking, the UNCLOS only defined maritime space, such as EEZ, islands, reefs and rocks. It is not supposed to resolve sea border disputes, especially when the geography in the South China Sea has been inherently complex.

Second, it is one of the black spots in blue crimes, including the infamous piracy in the Strait of Malacca, illegal fishing and sea dumping. Illegal fishing, in particular, has caused serious ecological problems in the region.

Third, the lack of maritime governance and law enforcement has increased the difficulty to regulate. This is partially due to the territorial disputes, causing each of the claimant states do not have full jurisdiction over the region. But more importantly, it has been lacking cooperation and mechanism to tackle blue crimes among developing countries in Southeast Asia.

In other words, the South China Sea dispute can also be seen as a complicated maritime security issue regardless the geopolitical debate, in terms of its legal debates, complexity of blue crimes and the lack of governance. While the China factor has what making everything so juicy, we may also consider the issue is also expanding our cognition of maritime security in a broader context. This is also what making the dispute so complicated to resolve — it is not simply a territorial dispute.

And of course, it is also a combination of both as well: a China’s maritime security issue.