Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, April 23, 1994 TAG: 9404250161
SECTION: NATL/INTL PAGE: A-8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: The Washington Post
DATELINE: SINGAPORE LENGTH: Medium
Walter Woon, a law professor and nominee of Singapore's Parliament, was visiting Florida's Disney World with his wife and two children last year when he was robbed at gunpoint at a bus stop in broad daylight.
The robber also held up two other groups of tourists along the same road and got away. But it was the use of a gun, the randomness and the commonplace nature of the crime that most shocked Woon and his family. ``We never had the feeling of security again,'' he said. ``People in this part of the world feel the United States should not be lecturing anybody about crime and punishment until it can get its own crime situation under control.''
In Singapore, international attention has focused on the case of an American teen-ager sentenced to be caned for vandalism. Behind the controversy surrounding the plight of Michael Fay, 18, are larger issues of America's standing in the world these days and unprecedented divergences with Asian countries over such issues as human and labor rights, democracy, trade, the environment and relations with China.
For many Asians, the United States has lost the moral authority to take their countries to task for policies and practices that it finds objectionable. Asian states generally still appreciate the U.S. regional security presence that has allowed their countries to prosper. But they have become increasingly strident in rejecting U.S. moral guidance, particularly on human rights and democratic values.
``For the first time, there is an open debate going on between Asia and America'' on these issues, said Chan Heng Chee, director of Singapore's Institute of Southeast Asian Studies. ``Human rights is used to justify so many other fights that it's beginning to lose its validity as an argument.''
The underlying fear in Asia is that this clash of cultures, which pits the American emphasis on individual rights against Confucian respect for authority and the importance of community welfare, could ultimately lead to a new cold war with China.
Any U.S. attempt to impose trade sanctions on China to force improvements on human rights could provoke ``retaliation'' by Beijing, destabilize the region politically and curtail East Asian economic growth, Singaporean Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew warned in Australia this week.
``You will end up with a very hostile China, one which you'll have to live with as an adversary and will not be your partner in keeping the world peaceful and stable,'' Lee told Australia's Financial Review newspaper.
The perceived dangers for the region of a U.S. policy that links human rights with trade issues have also become a favorite theme of other Southeast Asian leaders. Many Southeast Asians see the linkage as an indirect way for the United States to pursue protectionist trade policies.
While this U.S. foreign policy thrust clearly worries the region's economically booming states, it is the perception that American society has gone fundamentally wrong that most troubles many.
``In the very marrow of our bones, the concept is supremacy of society over the individual,'' said David Marshall, 86, a lawyer and Singapore's elected chief minister in the 1950s. ``But with the emphasis on the individual, tragically in the United States it has meant fragmentation and the loss of moral values.''
by CNB