Re-thinking the role of regionalism in a fragmented trade world through the example of ASEAN

Abstract

Ever since the initiation of European regional integration efforts in the 1950s, analysts of international trade have debated over the form, role, place and impact of economic regionalism. These discussions have long been framed around the controversial issue of the relationship between global and regional regulations dividing the scholarly community between those viewing regionalism as a threat (at least potential) to global trade liberalization and those viewing it as a facilitating dynamic. Today, the “problem-laden” dyad seems to have shifted to the relationship between global and bilateral agreements. In this new context, “traditional” regionalism has somehow fallen by the wayside, particularly outside Europe. This paper uses the case of regionalism in South East Asia, and the Asia Pacific more broadly, to nurture new ideas on the role of regionalism in a world marked by multiple sources of trade regulation. In terms of regional integration developments, whereas Europe has been the ground for consolidation and expansion, Asia Pacific has been the ground for change and new developments with APEC in the 1990s and potentially with ASEAN in the 2000s. As most analysts have highlighted, change has been more visible in words than in practice but this paper is an effort to think outside the box and to link formal and normative considerations through the notions of justice and legitimacy drawn from the work of the French philosopher Paul Ricoeur. It posits that “traditional” regional organizations should not be viewed as restrictive clubs delivering private benefits to their members but as platforms for the supply of regional public goods, in particular legitimacy for integration and cooperation efforts, providing benefits to both members and non-members. With additional uncertainty linked to security concerns, such platforms bring comfort to states and offer solutions without legally binding and enforceable commitments. The proliferation of bilateral PTAs implies that such weak instruments of cooperation are becoming inadequate, prompting the move towards more ambitious integration plans, yet without any discernable adjustment in institutional machinery. Regional platforms appear doomed to remain parallel arrangements that will have only an indirect effect on the liberalization process in the region.

Biography of the Speaker

Cédric Dupont is Professor of International Relations at the Graduate Institute of International Studies, Geneva. He is a Senior Research Fellow of the Berkeley Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation Study Center (BASC) at the University of California at Berkeley and an Associate Editor for Europe of the journal Business and Politics. He has written extensively on regional integration developments in Western Europe, on domestic–international linkages in international negotiations and on game-theoretic modelling in political science. His current research focuses on the political economy of trade and finance, on the governance of world and regional integration processes and on regional integration in Asia and the Pacific.