The Quantum Collaboration Imperative: Rethinking Power and Progress in Asia-Pacific

Beyond addressing technical barriers, structured quantum collaboration in APAC carries strategic imperatives that extend well beyond technology itself. International scientific cooperation serves as one of the few practical mechanisms for lowering geopolitical tensions because science operates on neutral, evidence driven principles that transcend borders and politics. [41, 42] Historical precedents demonstrate this resilience: CERN’s post-war integration model, SESAME’s Middle East cooperation platform, Cold War space joint missions, and sustained US–China research during COVID-19 all show that scientific partnerships can survive political hostility or even outlast it. [43, 45, 46, 47] This neutrality creates a substitute diplomatic channel, what some call “ersatz diplomacy”, that keeps dialogue alive when official political channels stall. [45, 46] Scientists routinely collaborate across ideological divides because advancing knowledge outweighs political loyalty, a core principle of scientific globalism. [46] With existential global threats like climate change, pandemics, and environmental degradation forcing collective action, scientific cooperation becomes a diplomatic necessity rather than a luxury. [46, 47] When political systems are gridlocked, Track II scientific networks maintain trust, transparency, and communication, roles that become essential when formal diplomacy falters. [47] In short, science diplomacy offers a rare pressure resistant bridge it builds trust, de-escalates conflict, and sustains dialogue when every other channel breaks down. [41, 43, 47]

For APAC specifically, South-South cooperation among regional nations offers distinct strategic advantages rooted in shared developmental contexts and reduced transactional barriers. Collaboration among developing countries proves mutually beneficial through exchanges of knowledge, skills, and technical know-how that strengthen collective self-reliance via pooled resources and complementary capabilities. The expertise emerging from developing nations evolves within environments of similar factor endowments and relatively poorer infrastructure, making these capabilities more attuned to comparable geo-climatic conditions and inherently more cost-effective when transferred across similar contexts. Such cooperation carries little macroeconomic or governance conditionalities, remaining voluntary, driven by participating countries’ priorities, and fundamentally free from external conditions. This stands in sharp contrast to collaborations with large entities like the European Union, where non-member countries face complex frameworks of numerous requirements and challenges when navigating established programme structures. For APAC nations still building institutional capacity, horizontal cooperation circumvents these burdensome conditionalities while accelerating development through solidarity-based partnerships that respect sovereignty and align with regional priorities.[45,48,49.pp,12-17,21,24]