Nearly five decades after the formation of its regional organisation known as the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean), Southeast Asia as a region faces issues and challenges that hark back to its geographic and conceptual coalescence in the post-colonial period after World War II. So rich in diversity and thus so difficult to cultivate and harness a common identity and organisational coherence and thrust, Southeast Asia is an unnatural region.
It was initially conceived by external powers but later rationalised into its own entity by resident governments, characterised by divergent regime types and a motley multitude of religions, ethnicities, languages and historical pathways. On the map, Southeast Asia is divided by the South China Sea into two halves straddling mainland and maritime states. As a region compared to others, Southeast Asia is congenitally unwieldy and untidy.
Yet after a series of trial-and-error experimentations with region-building, this mixed neighbourhood established Asean in August 1967 against the prevailing odds. In fact, Asean came along at an opportune time under extenuating conditions of regional conflict between Indonesia and Malaysia and ideological standoff during the Cold War. It brought together the Malay-speaking and Muslim states of Malaysia and Indonesia on the one hand and predominantly Buddhist Thailand and largely Catholic Philippines on the other, incorporating the small island and newly independent Singapore.
This ethno-religious balance enabled Asean to achieve regional autonomy vis-à-vis major external powers, focus on national development, douse intramural territorial tensions, and maintain peace and stability in the neighbourhood. No major conflict among Asean members has transpired since. The ensuing decades displayed what became known as the "Asean Way" of regionalism.
Thitinan Pongsudhirak is associate professor and director of the Institute of Security and International Studies, Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University.
New members came on board, first Brunei in 1984 and later Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar (formerly Burma), and Vietnam in the 1990s. The inclusion of the CLMV countries aligned Asean and Southeast Asia into a full eclipse of "One Southeast Asia", no longer divided by ideological conflict from the Cold War that pitted communist and anti-communist states against each other, backed respectively by the Soviet Union and the United States.
To be sure, Asean's evolution and development have progressed incrementally in fits and starts, beset by regular setbacks and obstacles and marked by milestones at the same time. Yet the 10-member grouping's principal objectives of maintaining regional autonomy, managing major-power relations, promoting economic development, and keeping Southeast Asia's peace have stayed on track.
Asean has grown into Asia's premier and most durable regional organisation, the fulcrum and foundation of region-building efforts in the early 21st century. "Asean centrality", or Asean's central and "driver's seat" role in shaping regional contours and outcomes, has been a primary norm in driving and shaping Asian regionalism. But just as Asean appears to have achieved so much over recent decades, its challenges in recent years have become more daunting and existential.
As the region heads from the mid-2010s toward the 2020s, Asean and Southeast Asia have become more problematic. It is internally divided by diverging interests and geographical realities, increasingly dictated by major-power manoeuvres and rivalry.
While its collective growth trajectory appears on course to expand in the 5% range over the medium term, Southeast Asia's regional peace and stability that has been secured through Asean as a regional vehicle can no longer be taken for granted. China's rise and growing assertiveness in the South China Sea and the Mekong sub-region in view of the US's preeminent staying power has directly challenged Asean cohesion, centrality and community aspirations.
Indeed, the "China factor" that emanates from Beijing's strategic intentions and regional designs has become Southeast Asia's paramount security concern. But China is not alone, and the China-US axis is not the only consequential hinge in determining the fate of Southeast Asia. Other major powers, large and medium, have also waded into the fray, particularly Japan but also Russia, India, Australia and South Korea. Just as in the decades prior to Asean's establishment, the contemporary and former imperialist powers are hovering and prowling all over Southeast Asia again.
Composed of Southeast Asian states and societies, Asean is Southeast Asia's order-promoting regional institution in Asia. There is no single consensus in Southeast Asian capitals on what roles the major powers should play in the region. Different capitals hold different views. However, a broad pattern is clear.
Asean wants to maintain its original role and objectives in setting the regional agenda, whereas Southeast Asian states want to see a moving balance among the major powers in the region, particularly America and China. No regional country wants to see a dominant China and an absent America (or vice versa). Nor does any Asean member want to see a superpower conflict between Beijing and Washington. And all Southeast Asian countries do not want to see their region carved up between the two Asia-Pacific superpowers in a so-called "G-2" arrangement, as was effectively the case during the Cold War between the US and Soviet Union.
It is within these parameters that Southeast Asia's aims and views of how to engage and draw on the major powers should be ascertained and analysed. Although they have been used interchangeably, Asean and Southeast Asia as organisation and region have become increasingly distinctive. They are growing apart in reality. What matters for Asean to maintain its role and do what it has done well as a platform for regionalism is now being impeded by the different nationalist interests of Southeast Asian states.
Put another way, Southeast Asian states are being divided by the major powers, particularly China, after decades of staying together. This is why we are seeing more discord and hearing more dissonant voices from major Asean undertakings, notwithstanding the superficial soundings of Asean-related officials and bureaucrats about unity and progress. It is not a separation but a sense of drift, for example, between maritime and mainland states, between supporters and opponents of China's territorial claims and strategic intentions.
Unless the leaders of Southeast Asian states -- and they do not have the warm camaraderie and esprit de corps of their predecessors in Asean's formative years -- realise the imperative of staying together and making Asean larger than their narrower country aims, Southeast Asia will end up with more tensions that could lead to conflict. The major powers, too, should realise that it behoves them to have a reliable and strong Asean as a regional platform for peace and stability. A divided Asean is not just bad for Southeast Asia. It is also detrimental to the major powers.