QUAD, an example how Major World Democracies can collaborate to preserve Human Rights, Dignity and Freedom

The Quadrilateral Initiative – informally named the Quad – first began in May 2007 with a meeting between the US, Japan, India and Australia in the Philippine capital Manila. The informal grouping, championed by Japan’s then prime minister Shinzo Abe, was viewed by analysts as an attempt to step up co-operation in the face of a rapidly rising China. However when Beijing sent formal protests about the Quad, its members said their “strategic partnership” was only aimed at maintaining regional security and was not targeting any particular country. The Quad group then lost momentum and Mr Abe’s retirement in August once again threw the Quad’s future into some doubt. Mr Abe was replaced by Yoshihide Suga, and questions remained over whether the new Japanese prime minister will show the same enthusiasm for the strategic grouping. Mr Suga was focused on economic reform and has little experience of foreign policy.

However much has changed since Kevin Rudd unilaterally withdrew from the QUAD grouping in 2008. China’s assertive actions to extend and defend its territorial claims in the East and South China seas have undermined its own rhetoric about a peaceful rise. When the Quad was resurrected in 2017 on the sidelines of the then U.S. President Donald Trump’s visit to India, many observers had few expectations for it, thinking it may be a mere way for the countries to hold talk shop without accomplishing much. However less than two months into the tenure of U.S. President Joe Biden, his administration made clear its desire to tap into the potential of the “Quad” as a counterweight to China’s rise.

Therefore India, Australia, Japan and the US revived the QUAD in November 2017 as part of efforts to keep key sea routes in the Indo-Pacific free of any influence and, since then, has met regularly at the working and ministerial levels. The Quad countries, each of which has laid out its vision of a free, open, and inclusive Indo-Pacific, provide free and open Indo-Pacific and regional security, maritime security and counter terrorism.  The countries do not mention China explicitly, but their words and actions indicate a coalition of the willing and capable that seeks to ensure a favorable balance of power, deter Chinese aggression and other negative behaviour, and maintain a rules-based order that they see a rising China challenging through its actions.

Recently elaborating on unprecedented multiple references to China in the G7 communiqué, US President Biden, having launched a counter to Beijing’s Belt and Road Initiative with the so-called B3W (“Build Back Better World”) Partnership, said the US is not looking for a conflict with China but will respond to actions that is inconsistent with international norms.

Disclosing that Beijing tried to dissuade Washington from forming the Quad with India, Japan, and Australia, US President Joe Biden has outlined a two-front response to counter China and Russia, shoring up both Pacific and Atlantic partnerships during his recent trip to Europe. The intent to restore multi-lateral American primacy in the face of perceived twin challenges to the US from China and Russia was expressed in statements and communiqués that bluntly named the countries and the US response to what Washington sees as their not playing by global rules.

On September 24, President Biden hosted Prime Minister Scott Morrison of Australia, Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India, and Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga of Japan at the White House for the first-ever in-person Leaders’ Summit of the Quad. A free and open Indo-Pacific region was the common theme in brief remarks by the four leaders as they emphasized their respective country’s vision and priorities, suggesting that while the formation is reading from the same play book, they are not necessarily on the same page yet.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison said that liberal democracies believe in a world order that favours freedom and believe in a free and open Indo-Pacific because that’s what delivers a strong, stable and prosperous region so people can realise their hopes and dreams for their futures in a liberal, free society. He further added that the Quad is about demonstrating how democracies such as USA, Australia, Indian and Japan can get things done, they can deal with the big challenges that we face in the very complex and changing world and there is no part of the world that is more dynamic than the Indo-Pacific at this time.

While Prime Minister Modi went beyond the Indo-Pacific region and said Quad would be a “force for global good”.  Japan’s PM Suga brought a bilateral trade issue with the US, export of Japanese rice and food products to the table.

If you look at the big picture, the world today may seem no safer than it was 20 years ago when Al Qaeda terrorists brought down the Twin Towers, starting a US-led and US-named global war on terror. Taliban is back. The Washington-based Centre for Strategic and International Studies estimated in 2018 that the number of active terrorist groups was 67, the most since 1980. And as per a new report from the Costs of War project at Brown University, the US spent $8 trillion during its two-decade-long war on terror that also took 900,000 lives. So did terrorists win? Certainly not. Despite Taliban’s return in Afghanistan, the multiple terror groups in Africa, and the persistence of the Islamic State outfit, democracies haven’t been thrown off track. Neither terrorist movement nor any state that sponsors terrorism has been able to provide a better life for those they claim to represent. True, ISIS did briefly control territory in parts of Iraq and Syria, establishing its so-called caliphate. But it was short-lived, proving that nihilistic, violent movements can hardly build viable states or provide good governance.

Of course, terror groups do retain the capacity to disturb democracies. Their nuisance value has increased in the last 20 years, thanks in large measure to increasing globalisation and advent of new technologies. It’s precisely to counter this that some democracies have diluted some of their core principles. Post-9/11, Western governments reinterpreted their privacy laws, boosted surveillance and armed their security agencies with powers overriding legal checks. Parallelly, widespread Islamophobia and refugee fatigue in some countries became enablers for right-wing populism, in the West and India. But it’s clear that terrorists didn’t throw any democracy off track.

QUAD is an example of how the major liberal democracies of the World have recognised the need for collaboration to counter the influence of the terrorist groups and authoritarian regimes in order to preserve Human rights, dignity and freedom.