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Asean, S-E Asia are growing apart

Nearly five decades after the formation of its regional organisation known as the Association of South-east Asian Nations (Asean), South-east Asia faces issues and challenges that hark back to its geographic and conceptual coalescence in the post-colonial period after World War II.

Nearly five decades after the formation of its regional organisation known as the Association of South-east Asian Nations (Asean), South-east Asia faces issues and challenges that hark back to its geographic and conceptual coalescence in the post-colonial period after World War II.

So rich in diversity and thus facing great difficulty in cultivating and harnessing a common identity and organisational coherence and thrust, South-east Asia is an unnatural region.

It was initially conceived by external powers but later rationalised into its own entity by resident governments, characterised by divergent regimes and a motley multitude of religions, ethnicities, languages and histories.

On the map, South-east Asia is divided by the South China Sea into two halves that straddle mainland and maritime states. Compared with other regions, South-east Asia is congenitally unwieldy and untidy.

Yet after a series of trial-and-error experimentations with region-building, this mixed neighbourhood established Asean in August 1967, against the prevailing odds. In fact, Asean came along at an opportune time amid extenuating conditions, namely the regional conflict between Indonesia and Malaysia, and the ideological standoff during the Cold War. It brought together the Malay-speaking and Muslim states of Malaysia and Indonesia on the one hand and the predominantly Buddhist Thailand and largely Catholic Philippines on the other, while incorporating the newly-independent small island of Singapore.

This ethno-religious balance enabled Asean to achieve regional autonomy vis-a-vis major external powers, focus on national development, douse intramural territorial tensions, and maintain peace and stability in the neighbourhood. No major conflict among Asean members has transpired since. The ensuing decades displayed what became known as the “Asean Way” of regionalism.

New members came on board, first Brunei in 1984 and later Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar (formerly Burma) and Vietnam in the 1990s. The inclusion of the CLMV countries aligned Asean and South-east Asia into a full eclipse of “One South-east Asia”, no longer divided by ideological conflict from the Cold War that pitted communist and anti-communist states against one another, backed respectively by the Soviet Union and the United States.

To be sure, Asean’s evolution and development have progressed incrementally in fits and starts, beset by regular setbacks and obstacles, and marked by milestones at the same time. Yet the 10-member grouping’s principal objectives of maintaining regional autonomy, managing major-power relations, promoting economic development and keeping South-east Asia’s peace have stayed on track.

Asean has grown into Asia’s premier and most durable regional organisation, the fulcrum and foundation of region-building efforts in the early 21st century. “Asean centrality”, or Asean’s central and “driver’s seat” role in shaping regional contours and outcomes, has been a primary norm in driving and shaping Asian regionalism. But just as Asean appears to have achieved so much over recent decades, its challenges in recent years have become more daunting and existential.

As the region heads from the mid-2010s towards the 2020s, Asean and South-east Asia have become more problematic. It is internally divided by diverging interests and geographical realities, increasingly dictated by major-power manoeuvres and rivalry.

While South-east Asia’s collective growth trajectory appears on course to expand by about 5 per cent over the medium term, the peace and stability that have been secured through Asean as a regional vehicle can no longer be taken for granted. Asean’s cohesion, centrality and community aspirations have been directly challenged by China’s rise and growing assertiveness in the South China Sea and the Mekong subregion, in view of the US’ pre-eminent staying power.

‘CHINA FACTOR’ A PRIME CONCERN

Indeed, the “China factor”, which emanates from Beijing’s strategic intentions and regional designs, has become South-east Asia’s paramount security concern. But China is not alone, and the China-US axis is not the only consequential hinge in determining the fate of South-east Asia. Other major powers, large and medium, have also waded into the fray, particularly Japan but also Russia, India, Australia and South Korea. Just as in the decades before Asean’s establishment, the contemporary and former imperialist powers are hovering and prowling all over South-east Asia again.

Asean is South-east Asia’s order-promoting regional institution in Asia. There is no single consensus in South-east Asian capitals on what roles the major powers should play in the region. Different capitals hold different views. However, a broad pattern is clear.

Asean wants to maintain its original role and objectives in setting the regional agenda, whereas South-east Asian states want to see a moving balance among the major powers in the region, particularly the US and China. No country in the region wants to see a dominant China and an absent US (or vice versa). Nor does any Asean member want to see a superpower conflict between Beijing and Washington. And all South-east Asian countries do not want to see their region carved up between the two Asia-Pacific superpowers in a so-called “G-2” arrangement, as was effectively the case during the Cold War between the US and Soviet Union.

It is within these parameters that South-east Asia’s aims and views of how to engage and draw on the major powers should be ascertained and analysed. Although used interchangeably, Asean and South-east Asia as organisation and region have become increasingly distinctive. They are growing apart in reality.

What matters for Asean to maintain its role and do what it has done well as a platform for regionalism is now being impeded by the different nationalist interests of South-east Asian states.

Put another way, after decades of staying together, South-east Asian states are being divided by the major powers, particularly China. This is why we are seeing more discord and hearing more dissonant voices from major Asean undertakings, notwithstanding the superficial soundings of Asean-related officials and bureaucrats about unity and progress. It is not a separation but a sense of drift, for example, between maritime and mainland states, and between supporters and opponents of China’s territorial claims and strategic intentions.

Unless the leaders of South-east Asian states, who do not have the warm camaraderie and esprit de corps of their predecessors in Asean’s formative years, realise the imperative of staying together and making Asean larger than their narrower country aims, South-east Asia will end up with more tensions that could lead to conflict.

The major powers, too, should realise that it behoves them to have a reliable and strong Asean as a regional platform for peace and stability. A divided Asean is not just bad for South-east Asia. It is also detrimental to the major powers. BANGKOK POST

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Thitinan Pongsudhirak is associate professor and director of the Institute of Security and International Studies, Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University.

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