Germany vies for influence in Asia with ‘feminist’ development policy

As Germany released a new regional development strategy in Asia, emphasising sustainability and gender equity, its effectiveness in channelling Berlin’s foreign policy ambitions remains dubious, an expert told Euractiv.

As part of its first-ever National Security Strategy, launched earlier this year, the German government identified partnerships in Asia as key to safeguarding its interests.

The new focus was fleshed out further on Tuesday (12 December), as the Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) presented its Asia strategy for intensifying development partnerships in the region. 

The document places a particular emphasis on the ‘feminist foreign policy’ of Green Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock, asserting that Germany would “prioritise gender-transformative projects” when distributing funding and striking partnerships.

“Our goal is to jointly shape an ecologically sustainable transformation in a socially just way,” German Development Minister Svenja Schulze (SPD) said on Tuesday.

Other cornerstones include green development and social security. Beyond these sustainability goals, German officials have made it abundantly clear that they also see cooperation with Asian countries as a way to counter Russian and Chinese influence and secure resources for the green transition.

The Asia strategy is vital to provide a “common corridor of values and guidelines”, for the various actors in Germany’s development policy, Heiner Janus, a researcher at the German Institute of Development and Sustainability (IDOS) told Euractiv.

The BMZ has made the development of such high-level strategies a core part of its efforts to disburse its aid in a more targeted manner to further Germany’s objectives.

However, Janus pointed out that the Asia strategy lacked sufficient specificity to guide action.

“It does not prioritise between the various objectives, which cannot always be pursued simultaneously and with the same intensity,” he said.

There remain question marks on the funding side as well. Being the second-biggest provider of bilateral development aid overall behind the United States, Germany can leverage some economic heft to advance its goals in Asia. 

The region currently receives the greatest amount of Berlin’s total region-specific aid and about a third of the BMZ’s regional spending.

Still, the roughly €2 billion the BMZ spent in Asia in 2021 remain a fraction compared to China’s strategic spending through the government-orchestrated Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).

Sustainability vs Realpolitik

There are also concerns over whether the strategy’s socio-ecological aims can be realised in the way Berlin has conceived of them.

In a study of Sweden’s ‘feminist foreign policy’ approach, the Swedish government committee EBA found that such projects are indeed an effective mechanism to moderately boost and streamline foreign policy efforts on gender equity.

Notably, the share of Swedish development aid going on “activities that had gender equality as a ‘significant’ or ‘principal’ objective” increased somewhat with the introduction of the feminist approach.

Since co-opting the policy for Germany, Baerbock has also made a point of making female actors the primary dialogue partners on her travels, such as on a recent trip to Latin America where she met with the female Brazilian environment minister and Colombian vice-president.

While welcoming the focus on socio-ecological sustainability, Janus noted that “the question arises whether projects with this focus are wanted by recipient countries and whether it meets their perceived needs”.

“A focus on infrastructure projects is certainly more prominent internationally at the moment,” he said.

The contrast between Germany’s approach and the practicalities on the ground became evident on Tuesday.

Philippine Nobel Peace Prize laureate and investigative journalist Maria Ressa, who was invited to give the opening speech in the presentation of the strategy on Tuesday, praised the strategy as progressive but highlighted that it was silent on vital topics such as AI, data surveillance and the power of tech companies.

In response, Development Minister Schulze acknowledged the tension between the need to pursue partnerships despite value and interest disparities.

“We may not always share the same values, the same interests (…) [but] we should nevertheless listen to each other,” the minister stressed.

[Edited by Nathalie Weatherald]

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