(iPoster) Governing Competition: U.S. Foreign Policy in Southeast Asia

• In Event: Poster Sessions: Political Methodology & Foreign Policy I – Great Power Competition and Strategic Rivalry
  In Poster Session: Poster Session: Foreign Policy I – Great Power Competition and Strategic Rivalry

Abstract

This paper analyzes the evolution of U.S. foreign policy toward Southeast Asia under the Indo-Pacific Strategy, focusing on how strategic competition with China has reshaped American policy objectives, instruments, and modes of engagement in the region. Rather than treating the Indo-Pacific Strategy as a fixed grand design, the paper conceptualizes it as a dynamic and adaptive policy framework through which the United States seeks to reconfigure the political, economic, and technological environments in which Southeast Asian states make foreign policy choices.
The central argument is that U.S. policy toward Southeast Asia has shifted from a traditional emphasis on influence accumulation—measured through trade, aid, and military presence—toward a deeper form of systemic competition aimed at shaping regional “operating systems.” This competition increasingly centers on digital standards, artificial intelligence governance, supply chain traceability regimes, export control frameworks, and regulatory norms that operate below the level of overt diplomacy. By embedding these standards into regional cooperation mechanisms, the United States seeks to constrain future policy options available to Southeast Asian states while reducing China’s structural leverage.
Empirically, the paper examines U.S. policy from the late Trump administration through the Biden presidency and into the early phase of Trump’s second term. While domestic political transitions have produced visible shifts in rhetoric and multilateral posture, the paper demonstrates strong continuity in the underlying competitive logic. Even as the Trump administration places renewed emphasis on transactional gains, unilateral leverage, and “America First” priorities, U.S. policy continues to rely on the functional linkage of economic, technological, and security issues to apply targeted strategic pressure. This suggests that the systemic orientation of U.S. competition in Southeast Asia is not administration-specific but structurally embedded in contemporary American foreign policy.
The paper further argues that Southeast Asian responses are evolving from relatively simplified forms of hedging toward more differentiated strategies of layered alignment. Rather than balancing China and the United States along a single economic–security axis, regional states increasingly disaggregate their policy choices across issue areas. In infrastructure development, manufacturing, and consumer markets, many continue to deepen economic integration with China. In contrast, in sensitive domains such as critical minerals, advanced technologies, digital governance, and maritime domain awareness, selective alignment with U.S.-led frameworks has become more pronounced. This layered approach reflects an effort to preserve strategic autonomy under conditions of intensifying great power pressure and policy uncertainty.
Finally, the paper highlights the diffusion of security risks in Southeast Asia, with the South China Sea and Myanmar constituting potential dual epicenters of instability. The strengthening of U.S. alliances and minilateral security arrangements in maritime Southeast Asia raises the likelihood of low-intensity but frequent frictions, while the protracted crisis in Myanmar exposes the limits of U.S. values-based diplomacy and sanctions. Together, these dynamics risk eroding ASEAN’s internal cohesion and complicating regional crisis management.
By integrating security, economic, and technological dimensions, this paper contributes to Foreign Policy Analysis by demonstrating how contemporary U.S. foreign policy increasingly operates through system-shaping mechanisms rather than direct coercion, and how recipient states actively adapt to, rather than simply absorb, external strategic pressure.

Author

• Yichen Wang, Nanjing University