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The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) is an alliance promoting economic and political cooperation by fostering dialogue among its ten members: Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam. ASEAN is becoming a major economic powerhouse in the region, having enacted free trade agreements (FTA) with China, Australia, New Zealand, India, Japan, and Korea. However, ASEAN still faces distinct challenges: Member nations continue to vie over maritime sovereignty, and ASEAN's policy of non-intervention in the domestic affairs of member states attracted considerable international attention in the wake of Myanmar's human rights crisis. With Myanmar's recent shift toward democracy, though, ASEAN's policies of open diplomacy and non-intervention have gained more credibility. ASEAN members have also been divided over control of the South China Sea, and institutional weakness has prevented the organization from making meaningful progress in negotiating the issue with China.
ASEAN has proved a vital and welcoming partner in Asia for the United States as it moves to secure economic interests in a shifting global framework. Anxiety over Chinese economic and military expansion has also motivated the United States to deepen engagement with ASEAN and other multilateral institutions to secure U.S. influence in the region. In recent years, Washington has strengthened economic and security ties with ASEAN by joining the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation, participating in ASEAN summits, and formally establishing a U.S.-ASEAN annual summit.
Addressing Regional Security Issues
ASEAN was formed in the midst of the Vietnam War in 1967, uniting Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand against the potential threat of communist-led insurgency. It was intended as a security community, promoting social and political stability during a turbulent time, says CFR Senior Fellow Sheila A. Smith.
In addition to preventing intraregional flare-ups, ASEAN provided a way for the countries to create "a voice for themselves in the broader Cold War arena so the Southeast Asian area would speak as one on particular issues," she says. To that end, in 1971 ASEAN signed a declaration that Southeast Asia was a Zone of Peace, Freedom, and Neutrality. The resolution was intended as a statement that ASEAN countries refused to be included in Cold War dividing lines, says Sheldon Simon, a professor of political science at Arizona State University.
The end of the Cold War left ASEAN "searching for a new organizing principle for security," Simon says, and ASEAN has since established various forums to address more contemporary challenges:
- ASEAN Regional Forum: Launched in 1993, it aims to promote security in the broader Asia-Pacific region, but the body's contribution has involved more discussion than action, says Zachary Abuza, a professor of political science at Simmons College in Boston. Still, white papers, military exchanges, and the creation of a register of experts who can be called upon during conflicts have increased transparency and defense cooperation.
- ASEAN Plus Three (APT): Initiated in 1997, it aims to cultivate multidimensional collaboration between ASEAN, Japan, China, and South Korea, and was characterized as "the most coherent and substantive pan-Asian grouping" in a recent CFR Council Special Report.
- East Asia Summit: First held in 2005, it is an annual gathering of heads of state from ASEAN member countries, plus Australia, China, India, Japan, South Korea, and New Zealand, to promote security and prosperity in the region.
Since 2009, China has adopted a more aggressive tack in regional disputes (Newsweek) over borderlands with India, maritime sovereignty, and the Mekong River, say analysts. CFR's Fellow for Southeast Asia Joshua Kurlantzick warns that countries like Vietnam and Malaysia are "arming up" to protect strategic interests and energy resources in areas like the South China Sea. Investment in arms purchases in Southeast Asia nearly doubled (WPR) between 2005 and 2009 alone, writes Richard Weitz, senior fellow at the Hudson Institute.
Various ASEAN members have ongoing disputes with China over claims to the resource-rich South China Sea. The Philippines and China have been in a standoff over a reef area known as the Scarborough Shoal since April 2012. China also has overlapping territorial claims with Vietnam, Malaysia, and Brunei. ASEAN foreign ministers meeting in the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh in July 2012 failed to finalize a code of conduct for the region that was to be presented to China. Deliberation among ASEAN members on further steps is impeded by member states such as Cambodia that receive Chinese aid and investment and therefore are hesitant to take action.
China's military buildup and an anticipated change in top-level leadership have motivated the United States and ASEAN nations to work together. Faced with China's assertiveness, some ASEAN nations have also indicated a desire for a continued and active U.S. presence (Bloomberg) in the region to counterbalance China. At a CFR meeting in September 2010, Indonesian Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa expressed that in the interest of building a "dynamic equilibrium" in Asia, Indonesia wants to ensure participation of the United States and Russia in the "evolving regional architecture." Philippines' President Benigno S. Aquino III echoed the necessity of an ongoing U.S. presence in the region.
Despite the rising level of engagement, experts have pointed out that considerable hurdles to multilateral cooperation remain. Members' security priorities vary, and therefore military and counterterrorism issues tend to be handled bilaterally between countries with shared concerns and trusting relationships, like Singapore and Malaysia or Singapore and Thailand. Still, as Andrew Chau of the University of Queensland's School of Political Science and International Studies writes in Asian Survey, ASEAN's consensus-based decision-making and policy of non-interference in members' affairs have created a "state-centric approach to foreign policy behavior" that undermines regional integration initiatives.
Human Rights Concerns
The alliance's non-interference principle came under scrutiny when the group drafted a charter in 2007, which all ten members ratified by October 2008. Early drafts of the charter included provisions for sanctions for charter violations and a system of compliance monitoring for ASEAN agreements, but these elements were cut after deliberations revealed conflicting visions on ASEAN's continued role in the region.
Experts say the concept of non-interference has become a tool for protecting human rights transgressors. Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, and Vietnam--countries with poor human rights records--balked at the proposition (Economist) to give the human rights commission established in the charter the power to monitor or investigate abuses (Brunei and Singapore also expressed reservations, fearful of opening the door to intervention in members' affairs). The commission was rendered virtually powerless, dismaying Indonesia and the Philippines, the last members to ratify the charter.
ASEAN is currently drafting its own Human Rights Declaration, to be adopted at the twenty-first ASEAN Summit in Cambodia in November 2012. However, Human Rights Watch has condemned the draft process for being secret and closed to outside consultation. The group wants ASEAN foreign ministers to publicly commit to a declaration that complies with international human rights standards and wants the current draft to be immediately released to civil society organizations.
The Myanmar Question
While the charter did not change ASEAN's conflict resolution tactics, the group's response to events in 2008 revealed willingness to use tougher diplomatic pressure on members. Such was the case after Cyclone Nargis hit Myanmar in May 2008, when the country's ruling junta allowed only limited international aid and insisted that aid be distributed through its military. In response, ASEAN called an emergency meeting of members' foreign ministers and issued a statement that "Myanmar should allow more international relief workers into the stricken areas, as the need is most urgent, given the unprecedented scale of the humanitarian disaster." After Secretary-General Surin Pitsuwan continued to press for cooperation on a trip to Yangon, Myanmar's ruling junta finally allowed the entry of international aid workers.
In November 2010, Myanmar held its first elections since 1990. Though critics complained the elections were marred by rampant corruption and fraud, reform-minded Thein Sein was elected president and took office in 2011. Sein began implementing reforms, and the country has started moving toward full-fledged democracy. ASEAN's treatment of Myanmar was a significant factor in that democratic shift, wrote Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak in an April 2012 op-ed in the Wall Street Journal. While most countries treated Myanmar with sanctions and isolation, Razak wrote, ASEAN members believed "constructive engagement and encouragements were just as effective."
Growing Trade
ASEAN's diverse membership has presented difficulties as leaders plow through the "very tedious" process of dismantling barriers to trade, Surin told a CFR meeting. He said the process of creating a single economic community was complex in an organization whose members' average per capita incomes ranged from $209 to $50,000 per year, requiring catering to a wide range of economic needs in setting trade standards. Still, annual trade between ASEAN members grew from $79 billion in 1993 to $404 billion in 2007, though it slipped to $376 billion (PDF) in 2009. According to ASEAN's 2011 report, however, trade increased to over two trillion dollars in 2010.
The United States and ASEAN have a trade and investment framework (TIFA), though talks are relatively ineffective, writes Ernest Bower of the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Japan was ASEAN's principal trading partner in 2009, but China overtook Japan in 2010 to comprise 11% of ASEAN's external trade. Japan and the European Union follow close behind at 10 percent, with the U.S. at 9 percent.
Catharin Dalpino, a visiting associate professor of Southeast Asian studies at Georgetown University, cautioned that the recent free trade agreements may not solve institutional hurdles to free trade. For example, ASEAN doesn't yet have the legal framework to support a fully implemented free-trade agreement. "They don't have a dispute resolution mechanism nor do they have a central authority to take disputes to," Dalpino says. Government corruption and unreliable judicial systems in the region also create roadblocks to trade because they make contracts hard to enforce.
Relations with the United States
In 2010, ASEAN became the United States' fourth-largest trading partner, with goods trade totaling more than $178 billion. A stronger China, the importance of Southeast Asian sea lanes for the flow of goods and oil, and U.S.-China currency disputes, have all given the United States an impetus to secure tighter diplomatic and trade ties with ASEAN, said former CSIS fellow Derek J. Mitchell, now the U.S. Ambassador to the Union of Burma.
The Obama administration has increased U.S. participation in ASEAN activities, naming an ambassador to ASEAN and establishing the U.S.-ASEAN annual summit, providing a forum for the U.S. president to meet with ASEAN leaders. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has attended all ASEAN regional forums during her time in office, a marked departure from former secretaries of states' sporadic attendance, say analysts.
In July 2012, Clinton began a series of high-profile visits to Southeast Asian states, culminating in a meeting in Cambodia with ASEAN foreign ministers. Increased engagement between the United States and ASEAN is part of the Obama administration's policy of intensifying U.S. engagement in Asia, and the U.S.-ASEAN relationship will prove increasingly strategic as the United States works to strengthen its position in the region, this Council Special Report points out. According to CFR fellow Joshua Kurlantzick, Clinton's visits reinforce the Obama administration's desire for intensified diplomacy with ASEAN and its increasing focus on trade with Southeast Asia.
