August 3, 2021

When people involved in international politics are portrayed in scholarly analysis, the focus is on how they engage in business actions such as negotiating, calculating, persuading, arguing, and representing. This practices leaves out the equally noteworthy social actions these political figures engage in. Such actions include how they greet, converse, and joke with each other, the way they shake hands, hug, and otherwise gesture, as well how they interact while smoking, drinking, dining, and at events such as photo shoots, saunas, and golf games.

In ‘Sociability in International Politics: Golf and ASEAN’s Cold War Diplomacy’ (International Political Sociology, 2019), NUS Political Science Assistant Professor Deepak Nair examines, in the context of international politics, the human impulse to socialize. In socialization, people interact with others not only out of specific interests, but because of the positive emotions evoked by being companionable with other people. Nair draws on the theories of sociologist Georg Simmel to characterize the concept of sociability as a structured way to interact playfully that is “pursued as if for its own sake”. He explains that sociability can contribute to identity formation, group maintenance, be a means of learning and socialization, boost social capital, and produce a less public space where people can manage their conflicts in a more relaxed manner. Thus, it has a strong effect on diplomacy.

Nair’s study focuses on how Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) leaders and diplomats play golf together, looking at the way it shapes international relations. In diplomacy, sociability plays a huge role, as political figures are frequently brought together for social events such as summits, banquets, cultural programs, and similar gatherings. A goal is for the bonding that occurs during these pleasurable activities to assist in conflict resolution.

Nair notes that while not all social interactions are sociable, any time an interaction is playful, sociability is in effect. People are naturally inclined to aim for sociability because it feels good, and can temporarily not pay excessive heed to ulterior motives for interacting with others. It also allows us a space to treat each other as equals regardless of our place on the social hierarchy. Sociability also influences us to restrain our individualistic tendencies to glean the maximum benefit from these interactions.

Activities involving sociability are often gendered, Nair adds, with many social activities being heavily participated in by either a majority of men or a majority of women (for example beer drinking in apartheid South Africa or ‘kitty parties’ in India). These activities are also frequently divided by social class; upper classes in Paris typically gather at expensive clubs, for instance, while working classes get together at no-frills cafés. In addition, they can be racialized, with elite United States golf clubs prohibiting Black membership during most of the previous century and earlier.

Nair identifies four effects of sociability: 1) fostering group identity and contributing to community maintenance; 2) chanelling social learning and socialization; 3) generating social capital, boosting personal and professional networks; and 4) providing a ‘backstage’ arena for social interaction that allows disagreements to be defused. For sociability to work (be pleasurable), it is necessary for us to be tactful, conceal our inner feelings and motivations, and make a good impression. Nair examines why golf became a means for Southeast Asia’s elites to practice sociability, particularly in ASEAN diplomacy, how it was integrated with the diplomatic profession, and golf playing’s sociability effects in carrying out diplomatic work.

ASEAN, founded on 8 August 1967 by Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand, aimed for regional reconciliation among its members in the wake of conflict. Its elites put together a means of conflict management that involved in person interactions rather than legal treaties and institutional power. These interactions have been key ways to ensure face-saving among leaders and diplomatic elites, which is important in diplomatic practice – especially in Asia. This was possible largely because of the authoritarian social environment in member countries.

Golf was an ideal means for this manner of informal diplomacy to occur in Asia. The sport became integrated into ASEAN meetings – an additional day devoted to golf and post-game conflict management was added onto these gatherings. On these days, mornings were spent golfing, afternoons were spent in meetings, and an informal dinner was held to end the event.

However, golf competed with other elite leisure activities in ASEAN member states. In the context of Cold War-era decolonization, ASEAN was split into three camps: nonaligned non-communist states like Burma, capitalist, counterrevolutionary, Western-aligned states like the Philippines, and communist states like Vietnam. As anti-capitalist culture typically considered golf too bourgeoisie, sociability in diplomacy among ASEAN elites in this camp tended to occur over feasts where alcohol was heavily consumed.

Nair argues that golf became popular in ASEAN diplomatic encounters in a large part because ASEAN’s founders were English-speaking, anti-communist, authoritarian, developmentalist (promoting a strong and varied domestic market with high tariffs on imports), and members of an elite social group that had collaborated with colonial leaders. These founders included the aristocratic leaders of Malaysia’s United Malays National Organisation (UMNO), the pro-military, royalist conservatives in Thailand, the US-aligned Filipino rulers (aka Cacique democrats), the pro-Western People’s Action Party (PAP) leadership in Singapore, and the pro-Western New Order leadership in Indonesia. As the US grew more influential than Europe in Asia, golf was further popularized. Moreover, golf is eminently suitable for cultivating business relationships because it is not as physically demanding as contact sports and the majority of the game time is spent socializing.

ASEAN diplomats were also able to institutionalize face-saving practices because the authoritarian character of its member states allowed for a behind-the-scenes method of conflict management to flourish. Because the media was tightly controlled in these authoritarian regimes, members of the public were neither able to seek transparency nor accountability for what went on when their leaders and their surrogates in the foreign ministries negotiated with each other.

Golf has notably lost some of its importance in the region’s diplomatic life as more women (atypical golfers) have become diplomats. Furthermore, its popularity has gone down somewhat among ASEAN member states that have enacted democratic reforms. The younger generation of leaders and their emissaries have sought to distance themselves to a certain extent from the elite cultural practices of their predecessors. As a result, karaoke and durian consumption have now become the most frequent means of practicing informal diplomacy at ASEAN gatherings.

Spotlighting the key role golf has played in sociability among ASEAN elites since even before the group came into being, Nair remarks that as time goes on, karaoke may produce a different character of diplomatic practice in Southeast Asia. Indeed, karaoke benefits from being less expensive, easier to learn, and in many other ways more egalitarian than golf. Finally, Nair emphasizes the importance of understanding how sociability itself, as demonstrated by political elites, has been extremely influential in shaping foreign relations.