ASEAN should learn how to grow up

ASEAN should learn how to grow up

Meidyatama Suryodiningrat, Managing Editor,
'Van Zorge Report on Indonesia', Jakarta

"Ideologies separate us, dreams and anguish bring us
together."

These profound words probably encapsulate the fundamental
challenge faced by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations
(ASEAN): A deficiency of a clear sense of purpose, or vision, on
where the grouping is heading in this age of U.S. hegemony.

Without the construction of a vivid road map -- a tangible,
foreseeable dream -- ASEAN can only hope to teeter along to jeers
of growing irreverence.

Every year in the run-up to major ASEAN meetings, various op-
eds -- not unlike this one -- emerge, mocking the relevance of
the regional grouping. As ministers of the 10 member states
gather in Phnom Penh this week, once again the customary barrage
of media sarcasm abounds. After 35 years, the naysayers seem to
multiply faster than the converts.

The classic list of complaints have only extended as new
regional challenges further expose the incapacity of ASEAN. Bold
initiatives, particularly in the socio-political sphere, have
only evolved into lethargic processes that have produced mounds
of self-absorbed policy papers shelved in the four walls of the
academia, or worst yet, the bottom drawer of a middle-aged
foreign office bureaucrat.

In a nutshell, ASEAN has failed in three critical veins over
the past decade, which has led to the almost unanimous, albeit
sometimes harsh, perception of letdown. The first is the widely
held view that ASEAN could do little when the region was hit with
a crisis that directly impacted the peoples of the member states:
the economic meltdown of 1997-1998. No perceptible prescription
was forwarded through the ASEAN network during this crisis.

One can sympathize with the peoples of Southeast Asia who
question the value of such a pronounced association, if it could
not help itself when it most needed to. Economic initiatives like
AFTA have certainly helped invigorate regional trade, but they
have done little to directly touch the lives of the everyday
layman.

The second is the failure of ASEAN to propagate and defend
humanitarian and democratic values, which at the end of the 20th
century had become the over-arching political paradigm. Instead
of proliferating the democratic ideology, ASEAN became entrenched
in its political straitjacket. As the organization celebrated its
30th anniversary in 1997, there were just as many authoritarian
regimes within its ranks as there were in 1967. Because of the
increasing international focus toward human rights issues, the
inclusion of a country like Myanmar became a liability. Here,
once again, ASEAN could not reflect the growing political
aspirations permeating the region.

The third letdown is its inability to keep up with the
changing paradigms of international relations. Regional security
had initially been perceived in the context of an armed threat,
but by the early 1990s, there were new, non-traditional forms of
threats -- namely environmental degradation, migrant workers,
maritime piracy and drug smuggling.

ASEAN's response to these new challenges was mostly
reactionary. Not until the mid-1990s was there a serious move to
treat them as real threats. Even then, the decisions taken were
usually piecemeal without addressing longer-term solutions or
even looking at the root cause of these problems. The low point
probably came as forest fires in Sumatra and Kalimantan created
one of the region's biggest environmental catastrophes. Haze
blanketed most of Singapore, Malaysia and even parts of Thailand.

These three failures had a profound effect on how the citizens
of ASEAN perceived their grouping. Little confidence was retained
by an association which was seen as lacking in economic,
political and social astuteness.

To be fair to ASEAN, people were probably expecting too much
from an association which was, frankly speaking, formed to check
expansionist tendencies, avert interstate conflict and check the
spread of communism. If the assessment is limited to these goals
alone, than ASEAN has certainly fulfilled its objectives. But a
30-year-old should not aspire to the goals and standards of a 15-
year-old. Likewise, ASEAN should learn to grow up and expound
higher objectives.

The key words for the future is to "reinvigorate" and provide
a "sense of purpose" for ASEAN by quantifying a set of
conceptual, yet tangible, goals that the organization must aspire
to within the next two decades.

Qualified officials and academics are more equipped to detail
the precepts needed in the blueprint to achieving these goals,
but the most important which should be urged is for ASEAN to move
away from its conservatism, without wholly discarding proven ways
and means that have served it well in the past. That is to say
that debates in the future should not be encumbered by rather
"ideological" debates on issues such as non-intervention. This
blueprint must provide the architectural style and floor plans
for the edifice that needs to be constructed. The wallpaper motif
can be debated upon later.

Already, plans are afoot on drafting a proposal which would
help drive the ASEAN region to become some form of economic
common market or community. Such a goal is highly conceivable
given that under the umbrella of AFTA and APEC, much of the
necessary policy-oriented commitments have already been made.

What has only been discussed in limited circles are
suggestions that a political-security community, to complement
the economic one, also be introduced. The political commitment
for such an endeavor would thrust a greater purpose into the life
of ASEAN, and allow the some 500 million people in the region to
have a clear marker to judge the grouping's progress. The
drafting of such a political community would also allow ASEAN to
introspect its future paradigms amid a world that is rapidly
changing.

Indonesia has a significant role to play, given its diplomatic
tact, political clout and the fact that it will host the ASEAN
Summit later in the year. For most of the past six years, Jakarta
has remained aloof in playing a leadership role in the region.

With relative stability returning at home, it may be time for
Indonesia to start showing the natural leadership qualities it
has flaunted in the past. Indonesia would also be best placed and
most acceptable in taking the first sensitive steps in
recommending this proposal.