ASEAN Diversities: the problematic in decision making
Class: IS210 Created Time: August 7, 2020 5:36 PM Database: Evergreen Database Last Edited Time: September 7, 2021 9:16 PM Provided Materials: IS210-G4-FinalDraft.docx Type: Permanent Notes
Royal University of Phnom Penh
Institute of Foreign Languages
Department of International Studies
Assignment Final Draft
“ASEAN Diversities: the problematic in decision making”
Course: (IS210) ASEAN in Regional and Global Context
Class: A2.1
Lecturer: Iem Heng (IMH)
Handed by Group 4:
Chea Resan
Hoeung Sodarina
Huy Lysieng
Rith Chanphirun
Sem Sonita
Word Count: 1460 words
Academic Year
2019-2020
Contents
ASEAN’s Decision-Making Mechanism
The Problem of Diversity
Political Diversity
Economic Diversity
Societal Diversity
Conclusion
Bibliography
Introduction
The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) is a regional organization that had been established since 1967. It is one of the big competitive markets in the world like India, China, U.S. and others. Throughout history, nations in South East Asia has developed very differently from one another. Today, this has resulted in a region that has so much diversity and difference that it has become a problem for cooperation. This essay will first describe the current decision-making mechanism of ASEAN. Then it will show the political diversity in ASEAN that has given ASEAN members their different interest. After that, it will explain how economic diversity has obstructed ASEAN integration to happen. Finally, it will take a look at the difference in religious beliefs in South East Asia that has set ASEAN members’ values and world views different from one another.
ASEAN’s Decision-Making Mechanism
ASEAN is facing difficulty in decision-making such as integration in facing globalization, internal issues, and dissenting states do not have to be bound by collective decision even though they reached consensus. To reach consensus, all ASEAN members have to sign the agreement and it is not easy to reach consensus because if consensus is against the national interest of members states, there will be a low possibility of reaching consensus like the case of Cambodia and Thailand border, Rohingya crisis and South China Sea dispute. All those cases had been brought to international level such as the United Nations or International Court of Justice. Each of member states have different national interest due to the diversities in the political sector, economic sector, societal sector and others.
The Problem of Diversity
Political Diversity
ASEAN was created mainly to contain the rising power of communist ideology in the region during the cold war. After the cold war ASEAN struggle to find their political identity as an ASEAN. Moreover, the expansion of membership has made ASEAN more diverse especially in political regime in national level of each member. Despite the diverse ASEAN manage to create a collective norm of non-interference, mutual respect for sovereignty and consensus building (Rumelili, 2007), this norm allows each member of ASEAN to practice their own political view inside their country. The diverse of political system range from Brunei is absolute monarchy, Malaysia, Thailand, Cambodia are constitutional monarchies, Indonesia, Philippines, Singapore are representative republics, Laos and Vietnam are socialist state, and Myanmar is military dictatorship. The political diversity and the way ASEAN practice their norm has become a tool that ASEAN members use to prevent other members from interfere in their national matter and to prevent ASEAN form reaching the decision that does not benefit the. As an example, the way ASEAN handling Myanmar humanitarian crisis, “Rohingya Crisis”. As in ASEAN summit in 2017 held in Manila and had Philippines as chair, the term of “Rohingya” was completely bloc to brought up in the summit (Loh, 2018). This maneuver had called the international attention and also criticisms on the humanitarian situation inside the region.
Economic Diversity
The ten members of ASEAN is generally separated by outsiders into two groups, the ASEAN Six and the CLMV. The ASEAN Six includes Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand. These are countries which are prosperous in economic activity and are richer in general compared to the rest of the members. On the other hand, the CLMV consists of Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, and Vietnam, which are countries with lower income and less developed society and economy. The difference between Singapore GDP per capita of 1,299 is so large that collective trade agreements are less likely to be offered (Plecher, 2019). This unofficial divide in Member States of ASEAN means that bilateral free trade agreements between each ASEAN Six members are more incentivizing than multilateral signings with ASEAN as a whole (Weatherbee, 2008). This divides ASEAN’s integration in two ways. One is that ASEAN as an economic cooperation platform for collective actions and mutual growth fails to fulfil its role. ASEAN members pursue their national interests and trade agreements elsewhere, in turn, halting ASEAN integration efforts. Secondly, the CLMV’s ties and reliance on external powers such as China for economic growth means their decision making in ASEAN is influenced by their relations, especially as ASEAN is a consensus-based institution. For Instance, China’s influence on Cambodia’s trade had pushed the country to block ASEAN unified movement on the South China Sea issue in both 2012 and 2016 (Hutt, 2016). Finally, ASEAN’s focus on dialogue partners’ free trade agreements has strayed from its ASEAN Values or ASEAN Ways of self-engagement to the capitalistic globalized market values of the West (Bara, 2014). As ASEAN’s members will act as separate entities in trade and as it holds onto its inconsistent values, ASEAN will continue to be a weak institution in integrating the South East Asian Region.
Societal Diversity
We have known that there are a lot of religions in our region. The main religions of the ASEAN countries are Buddhism, Islam Christianity and Hinduism. Islam is known as the largest religion in ASEAN. It is the official religion of Brunei, Indonesia and Malaysia. So that, the majority of Muslims are of these three countries. Indonesia has the largest Muslim population, not only among the ASEAN member states but also worldwide. Muslims are the majority in Brunei. However, in Thailand, the Muslims are also the majority population. In the Philippines, most Muslims are from Mindanao and Sulu Islands. There are also some Muslims in Myanmar and in Singapore, the biggest majority is Muslim. The Buddhist block consists of a few countries in ASEAN including Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Singapore, and Vietnam. The Philippines is mainly Christian. About 42% of ASEAN population is Muslim following by Buddhist 18% and Christianity 17% (EENI Global Business School, n.d.).
Because of religious diversity, it created the problem of racism and problem of ASEAN decision making. For example, Rohingya crisis where discriminatory policies of Myanmar government that was implied since the late 1970s have compelled Muslim Rohingya to flee their homes. Most of them crossed by land into somewhere including Bangladesh and others crossed the risky sea to reach Thailand, Indonesia and Malaysia (Eleanor Albert, 2020). Moreover, there is also the problem regarding disagreement over responsibility for the boat people as well. There are only three of Southeast Asian countries agreeing to Convention or Protocol Related to Status of Refugees it which they regulate countries treatment of refugees under international law. Also, ASEAN has failed to create an effective legal framework on refugees as well (Webb, 215). Moreover, Indonesia and Malaysia called on the Myanmar authorities to stop their campaign and bring an end to the violence, but it failed due to consensus. As a result, there was a creation of a renewed violence including rape, murder and arson in which the United Nations considered as “genocidal intent” and put international pressure on Myanmar to end the repression.
Conclusion
In conclusion, based on the explanation above it is clearly explained that ASEAN is still weak in decision making and problem-solving. Like a few cases which have mentioned such as Cambodian-Thai border disputes and Rohingya Crisis in Myanmar which had been brought to the international level to solve. This shown that ASEAN is still weak to solve the problem in their own region. However, these difficulties were due to the problem of each diversities and including the different national interests of each ASEAN members states. Based on political diversity, some ASEAN member states or some countries have a different political system and some are the same, which would be effect to the national interest for the member states when it comes to decision making since all members want the benefit of their country themselves. For economic diversity, since the ASEAN Six are developed and with high income and while the CLMV are less developed and with low income, it had divided ASEAN’s integration in two ways. One is a failure as a cooperation platform. Since ASEAN member states are pursuing their national interests and trade agreement, it has effect integration efforts. And two is the external influence in decision making. These will make ASEAN member states act as separate entities in trade. Lastly, diversity in religion. As have explained above, the well-known ongoing crisis in ASEAN which is the Rohingya crisis has not reached the consensus even though the Muslim countries in ASEAN like Indonesia, Malaysia, and Brunei asked ASEAN as a whole to condemn Myanmar, but was rejected by the non-Muslim countries like the Buddhist countries because of the religion matter. Similar to the US invasion of Iraq which would not able to find the consensus because the non-Muslim countries did not support it. Overall, ASEAN diversities have created the problem for decision making of ASEAN.
Bibliography
Bara, B. M. (2014, May 10). Weaknesses in the ASEAN way. Retrieved from The Jarkata Post: https://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2014/05/10/weaknesses-asean-way.html.EENI Global Business School. (n.d.). Religious Diversity in the ASEAN Region. Retrieved from Reingex.Eleanor Albert, L. M. (2020, January 23). The Rohingya Crisis. Retrieved from Council on Foreign Relations: https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/rohingya-crisis.Hutt, D. (2016, September 1). How China Came to Dominate Cambodia. Retrieved from The Diplomat: https://thediplomat.com/2016/09/how-china-came-to-dominate-cambodia/.Loh, B. D. (2018, November 11). The Disturbance and Endurance of Norms in ASEAN. Retrieved from Australian Institute of International Affairs: https://www.internationalaffairs.org.au/australianoutlook/the-disturbance-and-endurance-of-norms-in-asean/.Plecher, H. (2019, December 6). ASEAN countries: Gross domestic product (GDP) per capita in current prices from 2008 to 2018. Retrieved from Statista: https://www.statista.com/statistics/804307/gross-domestic-product-gdp-per-capita-in-the-asean-countries/.Rumelili. (2007). Identity/Difference and the ASEAN. In Constructing Regional Community and Order in Europe and Southeast Asia (pp. 126-152). London: Palgrave Macmillan.Weatherbee, D. E. (2008). International Relations in Southeast Asia: The Struggle for Autonomy (Asia in World Politics) Second Edition. New York: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.Webb, J. (215, May 27). Solving the Rohingya Crisis. Retrieved from The Diplomat: https://thediplomat.com/2015/05/solving-the-rohingya-crisis/.