Dispute cases that occur in the South China Sea region are one of the most complicated cases of territorial disputes that have ever occurred in the Southeast Asia region. This dispute not only involved several parties at once, namely Brunei Darussalam, the Philippines, Malaysia, China, Taiwan and Vietnam but also included several issues related to overlapping territorial claims and the withdrawal of sea boundaries in the region. Although at present the dispute in the South China Sea is relatively peaceful, the fact that the dispute has not been resolved completely enables the occurrence of frictions or even military confrontation in the future. Even if we look at the trends that have occurred over the past five years, the tension that arises between the disputing parties shows a higher level than in the previous decade. Therefore it is very necessary for a clear peace settlement framework to avoid the situation worsening in the future.
Nonetheless, the peaceful solution approach that has been pursued so far has not been able to resolve the dispute that has existed since four decades ago. On first track diplomacy, the regional approach by ASEAN, despite having successfully agreed to the Declaration of the Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea, which was quite successful in managing disputes, this approach could not support the settlement. ongoing disputes. In addition to the difficulties in mediating conflicts, as some ASEAN members are also disputing parties, regional approaches in the ASEAN region are hampered by several other factors, such as the division of member countries that want ASEAN’s role in resolving the conflict and countries that want bilateral settlement as initiated by China. At the other extreme on the level of first track diplomacy, the bilateralism approach initiated by China also has limitations. First and foremost, the strategy that tends to lead to “devide et impera” for countries in this region will not be in China’s interest in the long run. Secondly, the increasingly assertive policies of China in this dispute will be counterproductive with the bilateral approach.
Reflecting on the limitations of first track diplomacy carried out by ASEAN and China, a sustainable peaceful settlement approach, when referring to the theory of multi track dilomacy, will be more likely to be achieved if it involves and empowers other potentials at all levels of existing diplomacy. In this case, second track diplomacy is one of the potentials that need to be explored to support and cover the limitations of first track diplomacy. The workshop “Managing the Potential of Conflicts in the South China Sea” initiated by Indonesia is one example of the second track diplomacy that has been carried out so far and has the potential to support sustainable dispute resolution carried out on first track diplomacy. At least there are two important things that are the reasons for the second track diplomacy effort in resolving this conflict. First, in terms of diplomacy and as always emphasized in this workshop that informal track second diplomacy provides an opportunity for disputing parties to be able to be present in personal capacity and express their opinions more openly without any pressure as happened in first track diplomacy. The second reason for the importance of this workshop as a potential supporter of sustainable peaceful dispute resolution is related to Indonesia itself as the host country. In addition to the factors that Indonesia has so far not been part of the disputing parties that make its position as a mediator more acceptable to all parties, Indonesia is also known as a normative leader in the region which is often trusted to mediate disputes.
Based on the facts and considerations above, this study aims to look at the mechanism of management and resolution of the South China Sea dispute that Indonesia has conducted on the second track diplomacy, mainly through the Workshop on Managing the Potential Conflicts in the South China Sea (WMPC-SCS) carried out by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’s Research and Development Policy (BPPK) for the past 24 years. More specifically, this research will try to answer two main questions, namely how the second track diplomacy mechanism that has been implemented by Indonesia through the WMP-SCS so far, and how the effectiveness of the diplomacy.