Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) is an intergovernmental organization that promotes political and economic cooperation among its member states. It was founded in 1967 by the governments of Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand to foster peace, security, justice, rule of law, and economic prosperity in Southeast Asia. Several other nations later joined ASEAN, including Brunei (1984), Vietnam (1995), Laos (1997), Myanmar (Burma) (1997), and Cambodia (1999). Timor-Leste (East Timor) became an official observer of ASEAN in 2022.

ASEAN nurtured economic and intergovernmental partnerships among member nations and other, similar regional associations in the twenty-first century. The ten ASEAN nations, which boasted a combined population of 622 million and a collective economy of $2.6 trillion, still abide by the principles of the ASEAN Declaration, the organization's founding document. The agreement allowed the countries to integrate their economies, encourage the progression of their individual societies and cultures, and sign free-trade agreements with countries such as China and Japan.

Background

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations was born out of political tensions among several nations of Southeast Asia in the mid-1960s. By 1962, President Sukarno of Indonesia had come to believe that the upcoming creation of the Federation of Malaysia was only a ploy by the United Kingdom to control its former colonial possession. In response, Sukarno ordered Indonesian military forces to raid territory in neighboring Malaysia to spread anti-federation propaganda and sabotage the new government. The Federation of Malaysia was officially created in late 1963. Sukarno continued attempting to subvert its leadership over the next few years.

By the mid-1960s, the Foreign Minister of Thailand Thanat Khoman had reached out to the governments of Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines—which had also become involved in the conflict—to attempt to broker peace among them. This effort eventually succeeded, and government representatives from all four nations held a banquet to celebrate the normalization of their countries' diplomatic relations. At the banquet, Khoman asked Adam Malik, foreign minister of Indonesia, for his thoughts on the four nations forming a regional organization for intergovernmental cooperation. Malik agreed, and Thailand's foreign ministry started drafting a charter that it would propose for the association.

In 1967, Khoman officially invited the foreign ministers of Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines to meet with him at the beach resort of Bang Saen in Thailand to discuss the four-member organization. Singapore then requested that it also be allowed to send its own foreign minister to the proceedings so the country could join the new association. Thailand had originally intended only for itself, Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines to join the organization, but it ultimately included Singapore in the discussions.

For four days in August of 1967, the five foreign ministers informally negotiated the design and objectives of the cooperative association, working out their countries' political differences over games of golf. The ministers agreed on several points. They wanted their nations' partnership to encourage political stability and peace during a troubled time for Southeast Asia. By 1967, the violence of the United States' war in Vietnam had reached a high point, and the five Southeast Asian countries now forming a collective organization wanted to prevent similar types of Communist insurgencies in their territories.

The ministers also hoped the association would foster economic, educational, scientific, and cultural development throughout member countries while respecting each nation's sovereignty and rule of law in accordance with the principles of the Charter of the United Nations. The ministers included all of these stipulations in the ASEAN Declaration, or the Bangkok Declaration, the founding document of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, which was signed on August 8, 1967.

Impact

ASEAN was led by an annually changing presidency and a supporting secretariat, both based in Jakarta, Indonesia. Membership in ASEAN did not stop the organization's five original member states from quarreling over political issues, but it provided them with a platform to resolve their differences peacefully, without fearing the outbreak of violence. For instance, ASEAN allowed Malaysia and the Philippines to discuss diplomatically their dispute over which of them possessed sovereignty of the Sabah region on the island of Borneo.

The organization solidified its guiding principles even further in the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation, which was signed at the first ASEAN summit in 1976. The document declared that ASEAN member states would respect the sovereignty and territory of one another, refrain from interfering in other members' internal matters, and entirely reject the use of force against one another.

Another chief purpose of ASEAN was to facilitate economic growth among member countries. The members of the organization planned to create a single economic market throughout their respective countries that would allow goods and services to move freely across national borders. ASEAN would also encourage fair competition among members' industries and endeavor to include Southeast Asia more fully in the activities of the global economy.

Many of these goals became easier to achieve with changing political and economic climates in the late twentieth century and early twenty-first century. The year 1975 brought about the end of the American war in Vietnam and the beginnings of that country's political normalization. Two years later, the United States became a partner country of ASEAN, thereby opening an American dialogue with the organization. In 1993, ASEAN established a free-trade area within its dominions, meaning member states could trade most of their goods to one another without tariffs or taxes. Meanwhile, Brunei joined ASEAN in 1984, Vietnam in 1995, Laos and Myanmar in 1997, and Cambodia in 1999, bringing the total number of member nations to ten.

Over the next few decades, ASEAN carefully promoted the electronics, automobiles, textiles, and tourism industries. This economic cooperation led to trade among ASEAN member countries growing from 19.2 percent in 1993 to 24 percent in 2015. From the mid-2010s to the mid-2020s, this percentage remained around 21 percent. One of ASEAN's primary tasks in the early twenty-first century was to respond adequately to China's growing power, which had claimed some of the same territories in the South China Sea as various ASEAN countries. Policy experts worldwide named China as one of ASEAN’s principal concerns as the twenty-first century progressed. This was because China was ASEAN's largest trading partner but could also become one of its most formidable military opponents if territorial disputes in Southeast Asian waters continued. ASEAN's response to Myanmar’s 2021 coup d'état was also of great concern for the organization. Concerning trade issues, in 2008, the ASEAN-Japan Comprehensive Economic Partnership (AJCEP) went into effect, and the ASEAN-China Free Trade Agreement (ACFTA) in 2010. Ten years later, in the largest free trade agreement in history, ASEAN signed the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) along with China, Japan, South Korea, New Zealand, and Australia.

Bibliography

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"Association of Southeast Asian Nations." United States Department of State, www.state.gov/subjects/association-of-southeast-asian-nations. Accessed 10 Dec. 2024.

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"Indonesian Confrontation, 1963–66." Australian War Memorial, www.awm.gov.au/articles/atwar/indonesian-confrontation. Accessed 10 Dec. 2024.

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"What Is ASEAN." Council on Foreign Relations, 18 Sept. 2023, www.cfr.org/backgrounder/what-asean. Accessed 10 Dec. 2024.