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Comment by eunos | Hacker News Reader

As a citizen of a SEA nation, really excited with the trade agreement.

However one thing that bug me is that a number of media/opinion tend to characterize the deal as some kind of China nefarious plot even though the initiative came from South East Asia.

That also includes the discussion of some detail of the trade for example as explained in the article lack of focus on "environmental , labour standards, and rules for state-owned enterprises.". Again those commonly regarded as a poison pill from Beijing, instead of considering that maybe nations in the South East Asia preferred it that way irrespective of what Beijing thinks.

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> However one thing that bug me is that a number of media/opinion tend to characterize the deal as some kind of China nefarious plot even though the initiative came from South East Asia.

I would guess it's a huge win for smaller SEA countries. China could dictate the rules before anyway (big = important) but now they're all supposedly going to play on a level field.

And ASEAN being behind this project, it probably benefits Singapore greatly.

Japan, South Korea, Australia and NZ are also part of this pact.

In the absence of US leadership in the region it was only a matter of time before some other treaty came into being.

Maybe the region doesn't need US leadership ... just a thought ...

Somehow, this has become a controversial opinion. Trump had a hands-off policy to foreign affairs except where America was directly involved (tariffs, etc). I couldn’t believe that his policies were voted down this month.

I wouldn’t be surprised if Biden/Harris lands us in another Vietnam for some other moral mandate. We went to Vietnam under the pretense of stopping Communism. Just replace Communism with slavery, climate change, sexism, and it becomes plausible based on his rhetoric.

Or oil in Kuwait or WMDs in Iraq, or ethnic cleansing in Bosnia.

This comment runs too close to slippery slope. Involvement does not equal war. Besides, If you survey the country about the US role in the world I’m sure many people would say they would like the US to be world leader. I personally disagree but not everyone does.

I don’t disagree with your implication though. Even if there had been WMDs in Iraq, it would still be a case of US interventionism, which I am opposed to as previously indicated.

Actually US had just shown the world its leadership.

If the US had used the TPP to demonstrate some actual leadership in, for example, upholding environmental and labor Standards rather than trying to shoehorn ways for US corporations to sue foreign governments for lost profits it might still exist.

As it was it was dictated by US corporations and negotiated in secret and killed by a dedicated lobbying effort by concerned citizens.

Is Japan going to basically rearm and formally acquire nuclear deterrent soon?

I am from NZ. We know nothing about this. Done in secret.

Something an individual doesn't know doesn't mean it's done in secret.

No it's quite literally done behind closed doors and we have no say in it. The last time a deal was proposed this way, it only came out when it was leaked - as it weakened our IP laws to that so they're comparable with the USA.

If we're able to be sued by US patent trolls or Apple for round corners, there's not a single company in this country that could afford to fight it. Singing happy birthday was never an issue in this part of the world.

No thanks.

There has been many rounds of talks since 2014 when ASEAN countries proposed this. There must be some exposures during the past 6 years. The agreement now needs each country's domestic approval, so you can still have a say in it. The agreement is not in effect yet.

> it weakened our IP laws to that so they're comparable with the USA.

This statement literally makes no sense to me. Care to elaborate? As it stands, I have to admit that your statement suggests to me that you haven't the vaguest idea about U.S. versus NZ IP laws and perhaps have also gotten the idea of strong vs. weak IP laws entirely backwards. Enlighten me, please.

This is how negotiations work everywhere for any kind of deal. Think of some successful past legislation you support - I guarantee that it was negotiated behind closed doors.

Negotiation requires fluidly proposing alternatives in a give-and-take that ultimately leads to an agreement. When the items being given or taken are policies supported or opposed by members of the public, it would be self-sabotage for one half of the negotiation to expose its deliberations to public debate.

Imagine you’re a couple making an offer to buy a house. Do you think it would be smart to expose all your internal discussions about the purchase to the seller along with the offer? Do you think you’d ever succeed at buying a home at a good price if you always made such a disclosure?

I think this argument that a treaty was secretly negotiated is better understood as a general-purpose process argument that can be applied against any treaty or law, not as a meaningful criticism of any in particular. It’s just how the sausage is made.

wtf are you talking about? most laws are proposed, debated in public with riders attached, provisions added/removed, etc. in public.

If FTAs were too and if citizens groups were to have a say we'd be putting provisions for putting tariffs on if environmental and worker provisions are not respected rather than a semi private court process where corporations can sue governments for lost profits.

You do have a say, after the negotiations are complete. If you don't like it, call your representatives, vote, etc. If they have to go back and renegotiate, then that is what it is.

There’s a public process when provisions are added to the laws, but the discussions where each side figures out whether their proposal is going to pass happens in private before the actual votes.

This treaty been publicly listed on the under negotiation treaty page on NZ Gov website for years [1] (Internet Archive link as its now obviously moved to a different page). This includes the guiding principles/objectives for NZ, key outcome targets, various status updates and the ability for the public to make submissions regarding the treaty. This is more than enough to understand the context and purpose of the treaty -- the actual text is generally not publicly available until it has been agreed (there would be little point, there are near continuous changes as the negotiations occur).

I'm not from NZ, but once the treaty text has been concluded the ratification process looks similar to Australia and involves fairly extensive public review (NZ process detailed [2]). You're welcome to read the couple hundred pages national interest analysis, economic analysis and cabinet papers on the treaty as well [3].

[1] https://web.archive.org/web/20200122083058/https://www.mfat.... [2] https://www.mfat.govt.nz/assets/About-us-Corporate/Treaties-... [3] https://www.mfat.govt.nz/en/trade/free-trade-agreements/free...

"We". FUD.

Totally. Wtf. TPPA was headlines for years, now this is signed and I've never heard of it. And I follow the news pretty closely. (kiwi here)

I'm an Ozzie. When the TPAA died it was pretty clear the Chinese were rubbing their hands in glee. Trump had handed them the Trump card in trade negotiations, as it were. This is from 2017:

https://rymndp.wordpress.com/2017/01/26/us-withdrawal-on-tra...

It's funny how it's all turned out. Trump ditched the TPAA, and along with it all those onerous copyright laws everybody hated. So we got a nicely watered down version. China steps into the void. But now on the day the RCEP they championed is signed, China ups the ante on the trade war it's having with Australia. They've banned just our wine imports, and threatening iron ore is next.

https://www.msn.com/en-au/money/markets/r/ar-BB1b2NMT

The trigger for this trade war? Our prime minister called for an investigation into the origins of COVID-19, right after Trump intimated it was bio-engineered by China and they were engaged in a cover up. Right now China is engaged in what looks to be genocide against their Muslim population, the Uighurs, egregious breaking of agreements with the UK over Hong Hong, threats to Taiwan, destabilising "Island Building" in the South China Sea, and we choose to take a principled stand over a ... conspiracy theory.

I don't know what it feels like in NZ, but we Ozzies feel like we are living in interesting times.

You have a government which seems to try to out-Trump Trump on China, not recognising that the US-China policies are about to do a 180 and you guys will be left holding the bag - the bag of having pissed off your biggest export market.

There will be no 180 so long as china’s reckless belligerence in the region continues. In a time when china could have consolidated its soft power, it ends up pissing off nearly every neighbor and starts a land war with India. The Quad is likely to be more influential in the region than this trade agreement.

> Right now China is engaged in what looks to be genocide against their Muslim population, the Uighurs

Enlighten me, please.

Utter suprise here too. Media has done an amazing job of keeping quiet about this one.

We got Murdoch owning 90% of the news and the other 10% too scared to piss him off.

What's your excuse?

- Straya

...

More seriously though, my guess is this is normally the thing that would hit the news cycle a month or two out but because of covid and every media outlet in the world cashing in on the last few rounds of trump derangement I'm not surprised it was missed.

China will of course use this treaty and every other tool to obtain their foreign policy goals, as do most countries (it's the goals and tools that vary). Among their current goals is to become the dominant power in East and Southeast Asia, displacing the U.S., and to become the dominant power in the world.

Trade treaties have long been used by countries for those ends. China in particular has heavily used economic power and arrangements to expand political influence. For example, loans to many countries are used to create leverage and sometimes seize valuable strategic assets when the debtors, which most observers knew were not creditworthy, cannot pay them back. For example, China has acquired ports that way (IIRC, the one in Sri Lanka?).

Also, regardless of the situation, China will have the most leverage in any negotiation of an economic treaty (as does the U.S., despite the disinformation that those treaties are to the U.S.'s disadvantage).

The source of the initiative, if that's the case (do you have evidence?) doesn't restrain China or protect the other countries.

Fellow citizen of another SEA nation here, also looking forward to this trade agreement.

It seems to me that over the last four years the Trump administration's increased isolationist attitude further incentivized a free trade agreement between ASEAN nations and their partners.

As the article says this should be viewed more as an economic unification of ASEAN and FTA partners, rather than China completely dominating Asia altogether.

What SEA countries has the Trump administration had a isolationist attitude towards?

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