Shanghai, China – Photo: Aditya Agarwal
Asia's Role in Global Development and Peacebuilding: Progress and Priorities
Asia has transformed from a primarily aid-receiving region into one of the world’s most significant contributors to global development and peacebuilding. This shift reflects the region’s economic rise, expanding regional institutions, and growing geopolitical influence. Alongside these achievements, Asian approaches to development cooperation also face real challenges — this page looks at both.
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The Asian Development Landscape
Asia encompasses remarkable diversity in development models and approaches. Traditional donors like Japan and South Korea operate alongside emerging contributors such as China and India. These countries engage in development cooperation through:
- Bilateral government-to-government assistance
- Regional mechanisms and development banks
- South-South cooperation initiatives
- Private sector investments
- Technical cooperation programmes
Asian development priorities typically include infrastructure, industrial capacity building, technology transfer, human resource development, and agricultural modernisation.
China’s Belt and Road Initiative: Scale and Scrutiny
China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) is the most ambitious development programme in Asia. Launched in 2013, it spans more than 140 countries with investments potentially exceeding $1 trillion, focused primarily on ports, railways, highways, and energy infrastructure. For many recipient countries, BRI has filled infrastructure gaps that Western donors had largely neglected, delivering projects quickly and without political conditionality tied to governance reforms.
The initiative also draws real scrutiny. Many projects lack transparency in financing terms, and environmental and social safeguards are sometimes weaker than international standards. The case of Sri Lanka’s Hambantota Port — leased to a Chinese state company after Sri Lanka struggled with loan repayments — is often cited as “debt-trap diplomacy.” Researchers who have studied the case in depth note it is more complicated than that label suggests: Sri Lanka’s debt distress stemmed mainly from Western and international bond markets, not Chinese lending specifically, and the lease was as much a Sri Lankan fiscal decision as a Chinese strategy. BRI projects have also relied heavily on Chinese companies and workers, which limits local technology transfer and employment gains for host countries.
ASEAN: Regional Peace and Its Limits
The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) has one of the strongest track records of any regional bloc in preventing interstate conflict among its members, and it has built real frameworks for economic integration and connectivity across a hugely diverse set of economies.
At the same time, ASEAN’s non-interference principle limits its ability to address internal conflicts and human rights concerns — visible in its limited response to the Rohingya crisis in Myanmar and the aftermath of the 2021 coup. Development gaps also persist between members: Singapore ranks among the world’s wealthiest nations, while Cambodia, Laos, and Myanmar face more basic development challenges. ASEAN’s consensus-based model can slow progress on harder issues like transboundary pollution and labour migration — but it remains a significant platform for regional dialogue and cooperation.
BRICS: An Expanding Alternative
The BRICS grouping (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, and newer members) has built genuine institutional alternatives to Western-dominated finance, including the New Development Bank and a Contingent Reserve Arrangement. For many developing countries, BRICS has expanded the range of financing options and negotiating leverage available to them.
Critics point out that China’s economic weight gives it outsized influence within the grouping, and that members’ positions on climate, trade, and security often diverge, which can limit BRICS’ coherence as a unified development actor. Some NDB-financed projects have also drawn questions about environmental and social standards. These are real tensions for BRICS to work through as it grows.
Tax Policy: Progress and Remaining Gaps
Asia’s tax landscape is mixed. Singapore and Hong Kong remain major hubs for cross-border tax planning, and lower-income countries in the region — including Cambodia, Bangladesh, and Nepal — lose meaningful revenue to profit shifting each year. Tax competition between jurisdictions, through special economic zones and incentives, can also erode the resources available for public services.
There is movement in a better direction, too: a growing number of Asian jurisdictions have joined international transparency standards such as the OECD’s Common Reporting Standard and the BEPS Inclusive Framework, and beneficial ownership registries are gradually expanding. Stronger regional tax cooperation and minimum corporate tax standards would help close the remaining gaps.
Development Aid and National Interests
Asian donors often connect development assistance to their own economic and strategic interests — Japan and South Korea frequently direct aid toward markets where their companies operate, and China links financing to broader geopolitical goals. This is a common pattern among donor countries globally, not unique to Asia, but it does shape which projects get funded and how.
Asian development approaches also carry real strengths: they typically respect recipient country ownership, avoid intrusive policy conditionality, and deliver tangible infrastructure quickly. Donors with their own recent development experience often bring practical, contextual understanding that longer-established donors sometimes lack.
Peacekeeping and Conflict Engagement
Asian countries are the backbone of UN peacekeeping. Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, and Nepal rank among the largest troop contributors in the world — a substantial and often under-recognised contribution to global stability.
Diplomatic peace mediation beyond immediate neighbourhoods is less developed; Japan’s quiet diplomacy in Cambodia stands out as a notable exception rather than the norm, and regional bodies like the ASEAN Regional Forum have limited enforcement capacity. Arms exports from several Asian countries can also complicate conflicts elsewhere. These are areas where Asia’s growing economic weight has outpaced its diplomatic engagement — an opportunity as much as a shortfall.
Environmental Progress and Climate Action
China is now the world’s largest producer of renewable energy technology, and Japan and South Korea have both made ambitious carbon neutrality commitments — real, significant shifts in a region that also still relies heavily on coal. China, India, and several Southeast Asian countries continue building coal-fired capacity alongside their renewable investment, and deforestation, air pollution, and water stress remain serious issues in fast-growing economies.
Regional environmental cooperation, such as the Mekong River Commission and ASEAN’s work on transboundary haze, exists but often lacks enforcement power. The direction of travel — toward renewables leadership alongside continued industrial growth — is one of the more promising development stories in the region, even as the transition remains incomplete.
Looking Forward
Asia’s engagement in global development and peacebuilding continues to evolve rapidly, built on genuine strengths: economic dynamism, expanding institutions, and development experience that many donors elsewhere lack. Building on that foundation, a few areas stand out for continued progress:
- Greater transparency in development financing — publishing project terms and environmental assessments, and consulting affected communities
- Stronger regional coordination through ASEAN and BRICS on shared development priorities
- Continued expansion of tax transparency standards and beneficial ownership registries
- Faster transition of climate finance away from fossil fuels and toward renewables
- Expanded diplomatic engagement in peace mediation, building on Asia’s strong peacekeeping record
Asia’s development story is still being written — and its trajectory, from aid recipient to major global development actor in a single generation, is itself one of the more remarkable stories in modern development history.