What Explains ASEAN’s Centrality, and Will Disunity Derail ASEAN’s Success?
Thursday, October 29, 201512:00 PM - 1:30 PM (Pacific)
For more than two decades the Association of Southeast Asian Nations has been at the center of multilateral arrangements for security in the Asia-Pacific. That keystone role has gained global support. In 2010 Secretary of State Clinton called ASEAN “the fulcrum of regional architecture”; in 2014 her successor said, “We must continue to support ASEAN’s centrality.” The governments of China, Japan, India, and Australia, among many others, have joined the chorus of support for ASEAN’s linchpin role. What explains ASEAN’s success?
Prof. Vuving’s answer is threefold: In the first place, ASEAN’s hard power weakness is a diplomatic strength, captured in the legitimacy of cooperative norms such as “open regionalism” and the “ASEAN Way.” Second, ASEAN’s location and character as an autonomous but inoffensive actor between Northeast and South Asia, between China and the United States, and between the Pacific and Indian Oceans allows it to play a “bridging” role between different geopolitical zones and potentially rival players. Third, this bridging position has proven useful in managing changes in the relative power and status of major Asian-Pacific states. Prof. Vuving will also suggest that the unity of ASEAN’s own member states is less critical to ASEAN centrality than commonly thought.