The Next 50 Years of ASEAN

ASEAN prides itself on being one of the most forward-looking regional organizations in the world. Part of its success has stemmed from its bold initiatives --  Vision 2020 and the Bali Concord, for example. A strategic perspective helped ASEAN adopt an external outlook while at the same time not losing sight of its commitment to its over 600 million constituents. Its formal declaration of an ASEAN Community in 2015 served less as an accomplishment of its vision and more of a further reinforcement of its commitments.

The dynamism of ASEAN’s regional environment presents a set of challenges that puts stress on its institutional infrastructure as well as norms of decision-making. As enduring structures that regulate behavior and stabilize expectations, institutions are vital for the pursuit of mutual interests and shared goals. Born in a regional milieu characterized by conflict, distrust, and uncertainty, ASEAN’s institutions helped in reshaping this environment to create a modicum of stability, peace, and prosperity. By acting in concert in the midst of cross-cutting diversity and political tensions, ASEAN made itself an attractive institutional mechanism for powers both big and small.

In the past 50 years, this regional organization’s convening and agenda-setting powers grew at a pace comfortable to its members and at the same time unthreatening to its neighbors.

ASEAN’s evolving institutional configuration is a byproduct of both its evolution as well as flexibility to respond to the most pressing political, economic, and sociocultural challenges that affect its members. Underpinning its institutions and multilateral processes such as the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF), ASEAN+3, and the East Asia Summit (EAS) is ASEAN centrality, a collective principle of action of and a shared vision for the Asian regional security architecture.

It is said that one can become a victim of one’s own achievements. Critics have spared no punches against ASEAN, reducing it to an ineffective, compromised, and paralyzed community. While in the past criticisms emanated from its decision-making practices, palpable inaction on pressing issues, and lack of liberal and democratic credentials, current discontent over ASEAN focuses on the possible erosion of its cohesion and credibility as a community.

Coming full circle on its 50th anniversary, ASEAN is now caught in a regional strategic environment similar to one that existed at its founding, defined by volatility, hostility, and superpower rivalry that pose a serious existential threat to the organization. Can ASEAN maintain its autonomy and reputation as a credible and cohesive unit capable of regional resilience in the 21st century? Will it remain relevant in the eyes of its members and its dialogue partners as a feasible platform to pursue mutual interests and realize shared visions? Or will it fall victim to its own inability to adapt to the extent that it will be replaced by an alternative regional order?

The answers to these questions will partly depend on the consequences of regional power shifts and ongoing superpower rivalry. While ASEAN does not have sufficient leverage nor the resources to fully shape these outcomes, it can make a significant dent by reshaping its current institutions and ensuring that centrality remains a critical pillar of the regional security architecture.

Bolstering ASEAN’s relevance today requires a smart combination of institutional upgrading, calibration, and retooling guided by a strategic appreciation of the Asia-Pacific’s volatile environment. Domestic developments within member states, collective learning from past failures and mistakes, and leadership fueled by political will are all crucial to jointly undertaking institutional reform.

In the end, the long-overdue changes to ASEAN’s institutions and regional architecture should contribute to the overlapping goals of credibility and cohesion, as key elements in reinforcing centrality. This is critical to overcoming the fear of decreasing relevance and worsening polarization the regional organization currently suffers from.

A more cohesive ASEAN will make it more credible to manage regional security, and a viable platform for pursuing mutual interests. Similarly, a more credible ASEAN in the eyes of its citizens and dialogue partners will contribute to a more credible community that is truly people-centred and contributes to a region of peace, freedom, neutrality, and prosperity.

ASEAN Institutions: A Community and a Driving Force

As a regional organization of small powers and developing economies, ASEAN’s institutional evolution was guided by a sensitivity to its internal contexts as well as recognition of the prevalent Cold War realities. It was founded after three failed attempts because of external meddling, intense distrust, and domestic distractions.

Lacking similarities in political regimes and societal composition, ASEAN’s founding members (Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand) realized that common aspirations are the ties that bind them. But learning from abortive regional experiments, they carefully embedded in ASEAN a flexible legal and institutional structure.

ASEAN’s founding legal document, the Bangkok Declaration, was less a binding treaty than an expression of shared aspirations to simultaneously build national resilience while fostering solidarity. Defying the path trod by other regional groupings, it did not anchor itself at first on economic integration, nor development of similar political systems. ASEAN’s essential “region-ness” lay in the common perception of vulnerabilities that could only be addressed by an organization that enhances sovereignty and promotes security in the most comprehensive sense.

Over time, it was ASEAN’s flexibility that dictated the gradual pace of its institutional growth. It took ASEAN four decades to formally establish a rules-based regime through a charter. But rather than impose limitations on the scope of action of its members, this formal document gave legal standing and legitimacy to existing informal practices collectively known as the “ASEAN Way.”

The ASEAN Way is anchored on norms such as non-intervention, consensus, and face-saving that are likewise shared by other regional bodies and arguably even more so (culturally) across Asia. However, it is the strict interpretation of these norms that has caused discontent. For example, consensus decision-making does not imply unanimity or veto powers for every member-state. Its history furthermore demonstrated that the ASEAN Way has not been consistently used, lending credence to the observation of the group’s “organized hypocrisy.”

It is this emphasis on informality that enabled ASEAN to incrementally become comfortable in creating other noncommittal institutions, such as a human rights mechanism, that helped realize and further strengthen its community. A common currency, passport, parliament, court, or security policy remain elusive, as the organization painted its shared goals in broad and bold strokes. In the end, they are as much roadmaps as they are by-products of meaningful community-building.

ASEAN’s aspirations have grown beyond the geographic space it occupies. This stemmed from a strategic appreciation of its complex interdependence with big and middle powers in Asia, and beyond. Related to this is the acknowledgment that ASEAN member states’ security and development are interlocked with these powerful states. The organization’s ambition was less to be a regional hegemon than a safe venue where erstwhile adversaries can sit together, discuss common issues, and possibly pursue cooperation.

Major and middle powers took notice of ASEAN’s potential to be a defining element in the regional security architecture. ASEAN+3, ARF, and EAS were the tangible outcomes of an imaginative ASEAN that envisioned the possibilities of multilateralism despite inherent tensions and antagonisms. As a driving force of regional cooperation, ASEAN as a non-threatening convener was made possible precisely because of its perceived credibility to act in concert as one community, and its equidistance from superpowers.

Outpaced by Social Transformation

In a region characterized by dynamic and fast-paced change, ASEAN’s future will be determined by the extent to which it can meet the expectations of its growing population. In particular, its member-states must elevate a level of cooperation that engages the diverse sectors that now comprise a burgeoning society. Previously, without much prodding from its people, ASEAN committed to abide by norms such as human rights, democracy, the rule of law, good governance, social inclusion, and equitable development. Today’s Southeast Asians are imbued with a sense of regional awareness and capable of making demands and asserting their rights as provided in ASEAN’s own legal instruments.

The United Nations estimated that ASEAN will be 717 million strong by 2030 and will possess the third largest labor force after China and India. ASEAN’s population will mostly comprise young, educated, technology savvy, and globally aware people, who will have a different set of expectations on what roles ASEAN should play in their lives. They will likely be less patient and forgiving of ASEAN’s current limitations and weaknesses. It is therefore critical that ASEAN recognizes the views of its new generation and make the corresponding institutional changes in the future.

ASEAN’s next generation is the region’s engine of growth and innovation and has been leading the charge in fostering social and political change in their respective countries. Chheang Vannarith, cofounder and chairman of the Cambodia Institute of Security Studies, remarked in a 2016 article that social and demographic transformation has outpaced the political and institutional evolution of ASEAN as well as the governance frameworks of its member-states. ASEAN citizens put a high premium on principles found in more developed societies such as equality, freedom, democracy, inclusivity, and social justice. While all found in ASEAN’s legal documents, it remains to be seen whether there is sufficient resolve and will to help these norms manifest in actual policy.

The fact that no ASEAN member-state has been judged as a “free” country by Freedom House is a telling reminder of the gap between what ASEAN promises and what it puts into political practice. Nevertheless, the seeds of democracy, human rights, and citizen empowerment have been planted in Southeast Asia with the help of ASEAN’s current generation. Given their exposure to post-materialist values aided by globalization, the community’s future citizens will demand further cultivation of these norms from their domestic governments as well as ASEAN. If the regional organization continues to shirk from its commitments and responsibilities, then it risks its own future.

Criticisms, Fears, and Traps: ASEAN’s Institutional Limitations 

The propensity for informal practices and “soft” institution-building may have worked in ASEAN’s first 50 years, but many have predicted that they will be untenable in the future. Continued lip service to commitments and failing to act decisively and swiftly have become staple criticisms against the organization.

Several of ASEAN’s institutions continue to exist only on paper, and when they are put to work suffer from implementation deficits and poor quality. ASEAN’s silence on a number of pressing transnational issues and domestic problems that have regional repercussions have desensitized many within the international community, who thus describe ASEAN as a mere “talk shop.”

Lacking the necessary substance and quality, can ASEAN remain a driving force in regional affairs as well as a people-centered community in the future? The answer lies in successfully navigating through two traps: irrelevance and polarization.

First, ASEAN needs to overcome its increasing inability to be the centripetal community in Southeast Asia. An often unappreciated facet of ASEAN integration is in the regional interconnections it has formed within and across the political, economic, and sociocultural spheres of collective life. ASEAN has reached a point at which it is larger than the sum of its 10 member-states.

However, a burgeoning regional civil society, assertive of its role in representing the peoples of ASEAN and advocating for their issues, has yet to be fully taken seriously. Businesses and other economic actors are another set of players that have significant influence and resources. Other government entities such as parliamentarians, judges, bureaucrats, military officials, and civil servants are all being interlinked through the ASEAN project. Heads of states and the ASEAN Secretariat might be the organization’s visible manifestation, but they now share the regional stage with a panoply of actors all with their own interests, advocacies, and linkages with external entities.

Some claim that ASEAN’s present institutional infrastructure is inadequate to meet the demands of sustained internal centrality. The greatest fear in this regard lies in ASEAN’s obsolescence as a community. Unless its institutions are transformed to effectively channel demands, ASEAN’s irrelevance trap may lead other actors to prefer to conduct their activities beyond the framework the organization currently provides.

The other equally gloomy scenario is that ASEAN will remain mired in a polarization trap, stuck between a diverse group of states that continue to hold onto historical baggage between them, generating continued distrust. This has a multiplier effect on the several divides within ASEAN: between old and new members, between democracies and non-democracies, and between less developed and thriving economies. Attempts to bridge or transcend these divides by focusing on mutual pursuits have not been entirely successful.

In its next 50 years, ASEAN should not continue to sweep these divides under the rug, and delay a candid conversation about them. The 2012 incident, when ASEAN was not able to produce a joint statement, is a clear sign of entrenching polarization. External powers have taken notice of these differences, with some more willing and able to take advantage of them to the detriment of ASEAN’s collective interests.

Unless ASEAN overcomes these polarizing divides, they will rip the organization at its seams, letting pure national interests and bilateral strategies define the relations of its member states with one another, as well as with other countries in the region. In this sense, national resilience and regional resilience cease to overlap, and Southeast Asia becomes an arena where big powers define the rules of engagement. Polarization can make ASEAN’s external centrality evaporate, as it ceases to become a regional convener to promote security in the Asia-Pacific.

Ways Forward: Back to Basics and Bold Action

How can ASEAN surpass these traps and overcome these existential threats? Part of the solution lies within the current institutional infrastructure and toolkit. It doesn’t require more innovation, necessarily, but more political will and decisive action. The way forward is for ASEAN to tap into its already extant flexibility and take creative and bold action. At stake is the organization’s credibility and cohesion. Unless maintained or restored, the exit costs for ASEAN member-states will be dangerously low.

First, ASEAN needs to activate dormant institutions and mechanisms. In Hegelian dialectics, “the hand that inflicts the wound is also the hand that heals it.” A deeper gaze into ASEAN’s institutional set-up reveals the presence of mechanisms capable of making it more responsive and dynamic to face future challenges. The problem lies in their present dormant state.

For example, the creation of the ASEAN troika was celebrated as one historical moment in which the regional grouping exhibited the necessary resolve and flexibility required to take decisive action during a crisis. As M.C. Abad, Jr., the chairman of the Board of Directors of the Institute for Strategic and Development Studies (ISDS) in the Philippines, stated, “It is time that we give life to the agreed mechanisms and processes to take cognizance of crisis situations such as the High Council under the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation and other mechanisms provided for under the ASEAN Charter.” The more ASEAN institutions remain simply on paper, the more the irrelevance and polarization traps become more paralyzing.

Second, ASEAN needs to pursue sincere dialogue and engagement with peoples and sectors from across the grouping. ASEAN has significantly shaped the transformation of the states and societies of its members. The proliferation of new actors and their increasing leverage in the regional scene is a reality that governments within ASEAN must embrace.

Old thinking, false impressions, and strict formality cannot continue to dictate ASEAN’s relationships with the region’s various sectors. For example, its continued stubbornness and lack of sincerity in engaging civil society needs to be replaced with a tolerant and open attitude that extends to other actors such as businesses. A people-centered ASEAN does not only interface with its larger public at predetermined points with strict rules of engagement. A way forward is to give life and substance to the institutional mechanisms within ASEAN’s community pillars to constantly engage the mélange of actors and players that it now shares the regional stage with. Failure could result in possible disengagement of these sectors and ASEAN’s own growing future irrelevance.

ASEAN cannot afford to continue adopting a purely paternalistic attitude toward its people. To say that it alone knows what is best for its population is to belittle the intelligence of its constituents and their ability to contribute ideas and insights critical in a democratic society. ASEAN can no longer monopolize representation of its people’s interests. Its civil societies could resort to more creative avenues and build other venues for representation and participation resulting in a further diminution of ASEAN’s relevance.

Third, ASEAN must deal with common issues based on reality rather than rhetoric. If ASEAN refuses to reform and upgrade its institutions based on demands from above and below, its collective stand on issues will be defined less by geostrategic realities and more by self-perpetuating rhetoric. ASEAN’s first 50 years has been defined by sweeping divisive issues under the rug, a stop-gap strategy that will no longer work in the future. ASEAN also needs to decrease the uncertainty induced by leadership changes within its member-states.

In a memo sent to ASEAN leaders, a network of think tanks engaged in track-two diplomacy in the region recommended that ASEAN set up mechanisms for definitive and swift action. The highest decision-making body, the ASEAN Summit of Leaders, should not monopolize most of the regional body’s decision-making process. Other ministers, for example, can be empowered to have emergency meetings to rapidly respond to a host of issues that may include an “escalation of tensions among the major powers, a financial crisis, the emergence of an epidemic, or a large-scale movement of refugees and migrants,” among others. Therefore, meetings between officials of ASEAN member-states at varying levels should be regular but also in-depth and decisive.

ASEAN’s institutions need to evolve into entities that structure incentives, prolong time horizons, and reshape expectations, particularly on the imperatives of acting in concert. The secret of ASEAN’s success in fostering peace and prosperity was its ability to mutually pursue national resilience and regional resilience. Under polarizing conditions, ASEAN must have the necessary mechanisms to facilitate a common stance that is mutually beneficial. A cohesive community that is unable to do so loses its credibility to be a collective entity, with a single voice.

Finally, ASEAN needs to set realistic targets that induce a regional outlook. When the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) was formally launched in 2015, there were still questions on whether it was a real or prospective declaration. The skepticism has merit, but what is seldom emphasized is the ability to think regionally that ASEAN infused to its members. This mutually beneficial perspective needs to be sustained by setting realistic targets.

It is said that among ASEAN’s pillars, the AEC is the most advanced and dynamic. For the next 50 years, ASEAN may need to go back to basics and focus on economic and functional cooperation to bridge current distrust and uncertainty. This entails generating material benefits (trade, investment, interconnectivity, security, cultural exchange) easily accessible to its people. Institutions must not only facilitate cooperation, but truly bind states to attain promised targets. Developing a habit of compliance could substantially contribute to building the credibility and cohesion necessary to be considered a reputable institution for regional security and peace.

ASEAN’s institutions will be critical in its path in the next 50 years. It can continue to cling to old habits and become trapped in a downward spiral leading to its irrelevance and marginalization in the regional order, or it can defy current cynicism and take bold but pragmatic steps to activate, substantiate, and transform its institutional infrastructure in order to revitalize its centrality among its members.

By filling the gaps in its integration process, ASEAN can regain some of its credibility, and present itself as a cohesive actor that can continue to shape the regional security architecture in the Asia-Pacific. By being truthful to each other and adopting a perspective grounded on realities, ASEAN’s member-states can once again direct an organization that was once able to to attract and work with powers both big and small. To be taken seriously by its people and external actors, ASEAN must take institution-building seriously. It must be a catalyst for change and an engineer of transformation for its future generation.

An abridged version of this essay will be part of a compendium to be published by the Institute for Strategic and International Studies (ISIS Malaysia) to commemorate ASEAN’s 50th Anniversary.