ABSTRACT
The US-China strategic contest has cast a long shadow over the changing regional order in Asia. Since the early 1990s, Vietnam has steadfastly adhered to omni-directional diplomacy and international integration, diversifying its external relations to avoid over-reliance on a single foreign power, and thereby preserve its independence and strategic autonomy. This chapter examines Vietnam-Korea relations from the lens of middle-power agency in the age of US-China strategic competition. By examining the qualities and constraints of Korea in exercising its middle-power statecraft through its relations with Vietnam, this chapter seeks to understand (i) the nature and extent of Korean contributions to addressing Vietnam’s economic, developmental and geopolitical concerns, including in the Mekong sub-region; and (ii) how Korea’s diplomatic activism and its deliberate focus on economic development through the New Southern Policy (NSP) interact with structural factors such as its size limit, its geopolitical constraints on the Korean Peninsula and its different threat perception from Vietnam’s vis-à-vis China. These factors of both agency and structure continue to define the broad directions of Vietnam-Korea relations and Korean engagement in the Mekong going forward. It will be shown that Vietnam-Korea’s strong economic cooperation has strategic dividends for both countries, as it contributes to their diversification strategy and enhances their economic security against over-concentration in a single external power. The strength of Vietnam-ROK relations illustrates the positive effect of middle-power cooperation that serves to strengthen their mutual resilience in the face of the growing US-China strategic competition.
