Key facts
- Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jnr announced a new strategy for addressing South China Sea disputes.
- The strategy reframes the waterway as a shared vulnerability, moving away from territorial disputes.
- This approach aims to maintain dialogue on China's actions without triggering direct confrontation within ASEAN.
- Analysts believe ASEAN's principles of consensus and non-interference limit its ability to take collective action on territorial claims.
- Marcos Jnr referenced the ASEAN Maritime Leaders’ Declaration as a potential new avenue for the Philippines.
Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jnr has signaled a shift in strategy for addressing the South China Sea, moving away from focusing on territorial disputes and instead framing the waterway as a shared vulnerability. Speaking on the country's Independence Day, Marcos Jnr indicated a desire to keep China's actions within the regional conversation without provoking direct confrontation among the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) members.
Analysts suggest this new approach could provide Manila with an alternative route for discussion. Political analyst Sylwia Monika Gorska noted that ASEAN's core principles of consensus and non-interference significantly limit the bloc's capacity to adopt a unified stance on contested territorial claims. "Asean is unlikely to adopt a collective position on contested South China Sea claims," Gorska stated, adding that this is "not because the issue is unimportant, but because consensus, sovereignty and non-interference limit how far the bloc can go on territorial questions."