Germany’s Indo-Pacific Turn: Towards a Contribution to the Rules-Based Order?

Abstract

Germany has shown significant interest in the Indo-Pacific region since around 2020, when it published policy guidelines focused on this region. In that context, one of Berlin's professed objectives has been to contribute to the rules-based international order. Whereas its policy was dominated by economic and trade issues in the past, Berlin has shifted more attention to security issues. The deployment of a frigate to the Indo-Pacific in 2021-2022 underlined the Federal Republic's growing interest in the region, although it is questionable as to what extent it contributed to the rules-based order. Germany's Indo-Pacific policy goes beyond this deployment, however, covering a broad range of issues encapsulated by a whole-of-government approach. Disaggregating the concept of liberal international order into the three major elements-security order, economic order, and human rights order-this chapter shows that Germany's policy reflects support for all three dimensions in the region. Nevertheless, Berlin will need continued refinement of its approach, such as determining the extent of policy cooperation with Washington or engagement with minilateral frameworks in the region.European interest in the Indo-Pacific has grown over recent years, with Germany among the countries at the forefront of this trend. The Federal Republic was the second European country after France to issue policy guidelines on this region in September 2020, two months before the Netherlands followed suit. Those three countries furthermore served as driving forces behind the process that led to the announcement of the European Union's Indo-Pacific Strategy in September 2021. As a sign of its growing engagement, the Federal Republic deployed a frigate to the region between August 2021 and February 2022, the first time in almost two decades that one of its warship cruised the Indo-Pacific. In the summer of 2022, the German Air Force also deployed to the Indo-Pacific, taking part in multinational exercises in Australia.