ASEAN

What is ASEAN?
The Association of Southeast Asian
Nations (ASEAN) was founded in 1967
and now includes Brunei Darussalam,
Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia,
Myanmar, the Philippines,Singapore,
Thailand, and Vietnam. This economic
block is different from most others
in that the primary emphasis is not on
reducing trade barriers among the
members, although this has been done
with the agreement on the ASEAN Free
Trade Area(AFTA), but rather on
promoting exports to other countries.
Members have been particularly
successful in promoting exports to the
Japanese market and to the EU. Until the
late 1990s members of ASEAN
experienced rapid economic growth,
thanks in no small part to the efficiency
and productivity of their members as
well as to their impressive marketing
skills.
What ASEAN can do?
ASEAN will undoubtedly miss a number
of targets defined in the AEC Blueprint,
but the ASEAN spirit is still going strong.
Moreover, the AEC should not be
considered in separation from the other
two components of the ASEAN
Community: ASEAN’s supreme
achievements have been in the political
and security areas. By building
confidence and dispelling mutual
suspicion between members through
frequent meetings and other
cooperative activities, ASEAN has made
Southeast Asia’s impressive economic
growth possible. This has, in turn,
enticed major global powers to seek, for
strategic and economic reasons,
relationships with the Association as a
group. Some observers may be
disappointed by ASEAN’s failure to
‘resolve’ legal sovereignty and
jurisdictional disputes involving member
states, but they forget that ASEAN is not
an adjudicating body and was never
meant to function as such.
What ASEAN cannot do?
It should, however, still be recalled that
ASEAN member countries have
committed themselves to carry out
certain measures that are intended to
lead to regional economic integration
within a given timeframe. While ASEAN
should not be condemned for its
members’ failure to make good on their
commitments, any failure to deliver will
likely lead to a loss of credibility and
could mean that member countries fall
further behind in the global competition
for export markets and foreign direct
investment (FDI). ASEAN is still far from
being economically integrated as a
region. And there is little prospect that it
will be fully integrated, as envisioned, in
the near future, much less by 2015. But
whether or not the AEC is achieved by
2015 should not be held against the
literal rendering of the specific measures
to realise ASEAN economic integration,
as provided for in the Strategic Schedule
appended to the AEC Blueprint.