Regional Security in Southeast Asia: Beyond the ASEAN Way

1. REGIONALISM AND REGIONAL SECURITY: Locating ASEAN

14 REGIONAL SECURITY IN SOUTHEAST ASIA: BEYOND THE ASEAN WAY 1 REGIONALISM AND REGIONAL SECURITY Locating ASEAN INTRODUCTION This chapter sets out the framework in examining ASEAN’s mechanisms in managing conflicts and relates its experience in the broader study of regionalism and regional security. The first part begins with a brief discussion of regional organizations and their role in managing regional security. This section highlights the experiences of regional organizations, particularly in the developing world in responding to regional crises. It then proceeds to argue that in spite of its chequered history, regional organizations play a significant role in managing and resolving regional conflicts, particularly if one looks at their specific experiences. The second part of this chapter identifies the kinds of mechanisms that regional organizations develop and deploy in responding to conflicts. In exploring what these mechanisms are, regional security approaches are also examined to establish their linkages with the kind of mechanisms that regional organizations generate. In drawing the linkages between these two elements, the study demonstrates that one informs the other — that is, security approaches influence the nature of mechanisms regional organizations develop. The third part then proceeds to locate these mechanisms of conflict management within the constructivist school of international relations theory in order to analyse why distinct mechanisms are constructed. Through the prism of social constructivism, this section examines how mechanisms of conflict management have evolved and identifies the kinds of influences that would have informed the choice of certain types of mechanisms that would be applied under given circumstances. A key question that is being asked here is whether norms and identity matter. ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ ○ 01 Reg Security Ch 1 24/1/05, 12:59 PM 14 1. Regionalism and Regional Security: Locating ASEAN 15 The purpose of adopting a three-step approach in this first chapter is to present ASEAN as a regional organization that has actively been engaged in managing the security of Southeast Asia. As the other chapters of this book will show, ASEAN has dealt with regional conflicts in a rather distinctive manner, characterized by the observance of informal mechanisms in managing inter-state disputes. This three-step approach is, therefore, characteristically deductive as a prelude to the overall thrust of this book that seeks to explore how ASEAN may have changed its modalities in dealing with conflicts and, more importantly, to argue the point that there is more beyond the ASEAN way in its approach in working towards regional security. I. REGIONAL ORGANIZATIONS AND REGIONAL SECURITY By their very nature, regional organizations have been ascribed the role of managing regional conflicts. This is not really an entirely new phenomenon. Regional organizations were established with the primary aim of maintaining peace and resolving conflicts or containing conflicts to avoid further escalation. In fact in the late 1960s and early 1970s, regional organizations were already regarded as possible building blocks of peace and for regions to become “islands of peace”.1 Prior to this period, the potential role of regional organizations for settlement of disputes was also recognized by the United Nations at the end of the Second World War. At the 1945 San Francisco Conference for the drafting of the United Nation’s Charter, a vigorous debate over the merits of universalism versus regionalism took place. While the debate ensured the superiority and seniority of global organization over any regional organizations, Chapter VIII nevertheless envisaged “regional arrangements or agencies” which would deal with such matters relating to the maintenance of international peace and security as are appropriate for regional action.2 Although the basic idea was to enable and empower regional organizations to settle local disputes before referring them to the United Nations, the record of this role was unimpressive. As one scholar noted, forty-five years hence, the UN found “only limited use for regional organizations”.3 The failure of such relationship was attributed to superpower conflict. The Cold War politik prevented the development of what could have been a potentially close relationship when the major antagonists — the United States and the former Soviet Union — excluded the Security Council from being involved in the regional conflicts in 01 Reg Security Ch 1 24/1/05, 12:59 PM 15 16 REGIONAL SECURITY IN SOUTHEAST ASIA: BEYOND THE ASEAN WAY which they were respectively involved. For example: when the cases of Guatemala of 1954, the Cuban complaint against the United States in 1962, and that of Panama in 1965...