News
Op-ed: Ignore Asian Research at Our Own Peril
18 May 2005
| Byline: | Yongjin Zhang |
|---|---|
| Source: | Humanities Research Network |
A reflection on the place of research on Asia in the New Zealand research landscape, in response to the Australian National Research Priorities.
In the last two decades, Asia has had a precarious presence in our consciousness and our policy landscape. In the 1980s and the early 1990s, Australia and New Zealand ventured, sometimes imaginatively, into engagement with Asia with the realization of geopolitical and geoeconomic realities of our region. But socially and politically, redefining our relations with Asia has never been easy, and has always been contentious and problematic. The 1997-98 Asian financial crises and the changes in the political landscape on the both sides of the Tasman in the late 1990s seriously disrupted this engagement. It is only in the last few years that both governments launched separate initiatives to re-engage Asia. In New Zealand, Prime Minister Helen Clark put considerable personal energy into the Seriously Asia initiative in 2003.
Precarious as it may be, this presence has unsettled our mindset about Asia and made the society in general more Asia-conscious. Asia remains foreign, but no longer exotic. Asia still looks remote, but no longer irrelevant. Like it or not, Asia no longer exists just in our imaginary. It is with us here in our society, culture and population. If apathy towards and ignorance of Asia are still present, they are certainly less prevalent.
Precarious or not, this presence continues to present uncompromising challenges that beset Australia and New Zealand.
What is more worrying is not the fact that Asia shrinks and grows in importance in our policy landscape often dictated by domestic politics. It is the precarious nature of our knowledge about Asia. This problem of knowing is profound in our understanding of Asia as the basis of our policy development and engagement. It is unfortunate that even when Asia ever looms larger on our horizon, and when the government rhetoric reiterates that Asia is vital for our 'national interest', no funding for research on Asia is forthcoming.
When the Australian government launched the National Research Priorities in 2002, Asia is hardly mentioned at all, even though one area identified is 'Safeguarding Australia'. It remains to be seen whether the forthcoming review by the National Research Priority (NPR) Standing Committee will put Asia into the document, and how. In New Zealand, Asia claims no presence in funding priorities of either the Marsden, or the FRST. With personal intervention of Prime Minister Helen Clark, Seriously Asia has managed miraculously to fund a limited number of projects, but offers no long-term commitment to Asian research.
There is of course the larger problem of whether social sciences and humanities should receive priority funding at all. Across the Tasman, social sciences and humanities were only added to the Australia's research priorities in March 2003, months after Prime Minister John Howard personally launched it as An Initiative of Backing Australia's Ability. It is a well-known fact that humanities were initially excluded from public good research funding in New Zealand, and it took serious lobbying before humanities 'were admitted to the Marsden Fund', not without controversies.
The underlining misconceptions here are not only about what is 'science', but also what kind research needs funding.
More despairingly, perhaps, the New Zealand government bum-on-seats funding policy for tertiary education institutions works detrimentally to the accumulation of research capacity on Asia. The only Indonesian studies program in the country offered at the University of Auckland had to be closed down a few years ago. We may find some comfort in knowing that we have a large number of language specialists in Chinese and Japanese. But we may need to have a search committee in order to identify any credible expertise on Japanese politics and political economy nationwide. None of our universities offer any Indian studies program, or that of Islamic studies.
Former Prime Minister Jim Bolger claimed recently at a business breakfast in Auckland that 'New Zealand is becoming brown'. This is not just telling of the coming demographic change. It is graphically indicative of the changing national identity. It is also suggestive of the nation's destiny.
To rehash today the conventional wisdom about how important Asia is as our trading partners, and for our national interest is increasingly backward looking. The unprecedented socio-political transformation and economic ascendancy of contemporary Asia is changing the nature of our engagement. If fifteen years ago, the Australian policy of 'merging with Asia was daringly imaginative, today it sounds condescendingly banal.
Can we (the government, the people and the society) afford to fly in the dark in such mutual engagement with the changing Asia? Of course not. If this is the consensus, we need to work on our knowledge base on Asia. This means to build up our research capacity and capability on Asia nationwide. Funding Asian research is the bare minimum for such national capacity building. The ultimate irony is that if anyone cares to do a meticulous cost and benefit calculation, this is where minimum funding is likely to achieve maximum return. But no one is prepared to do it.
Many among us may still find a sense of justification, and even temporary satisfaction in sliding over funding for research on Asia. But we can only ignore Asian research now at the peril of our own future.
Yongjin Zhang
School of Asian Studies
University of Auckland
(The Council for the Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences response tothe Australian Research Priorities can be found on their website:www.chass.org.au)
