The Functionalist Logic of ASEAN

1. The Functionalist Logic of ASEAN Joel Ng and Joseph Liow S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies Nanyang Technological University Singapore

2. Introduction ASEAN as anomaly (Ba: 2009) • Lack of common material interests (realism) • Lack of democracies (liberalism) • Few consequentialist rules (institutionalism) • Is constructivism the only option? • Contingent explanations • Little to offer to IR • And is ASEAN really so puzzling?

3. Functionalism • Historically developed to explain and drive European integration • Mitrany (1948): Functional cooperation in limited areas • Haas (1958): ‘Spillovers’ as efficiencies and practices in one issue area come to be needed for other issue areas, redirecting the loyalties and preferences of political actors • Schmitter (1970): ‘Crisis-induced decision-making cycles’ spur pooling of sovereignty • But neo-functionalists failed to find spillovers happening outside Europe (did not adequately understand the underlying conditions and constraints) • Neo-functionalism became increasingly specified to the European experience (e.g. neo-neo-functionalism), increasingly tied to the ‘spillover’ which was not relevant elsewhere

4. Functionalism Mostly explains European experience, which has limited applicability elsewhere. But functionalist approach can be extended if handled with care Common core: • A functional explanation is ‘one in which the consequences of some behavior or social arrangement are essential elements of the causes of that behavior.’ (Stinchcombe: 1987) • Understanding institutions in means-ends relationships • Functional cooperation to promote security (or mitigate against extra-sovereign impulses) is shared by ASEAN • ASEAN norms are always described in functionalist terms: What they do, given the context and concerns they share

5. Functionalism in the ‘ASEAN Way’ • Discreteness: Projecting a united front • Informality: Lack of legalistic culture, desire to keep open the possibility of flexible approaches • Pragmatism: Solution-based (rather than ideological or rules-based) approach to problem solving • Consensus: No state’s interests can be ignored in coming to common agreement • Functional cooperation, changing actors’ interests, and tensions arising from contradictions…

6. European vs Southeast Asian functionalism The European source of misunderstanding: ASEAN is not that puzzling!

7. Key conditions • Given a single actor, instruments will reflect that actor’s goals • Given a single domain, but with multiple actors with diverse interests, institutions will reflect a negotiated settlement between rival interests or preferences • Changing the distribution or weights of those interests are the basis for changing the institutional arrangements, given a fixed set of actors in a domain

8. Security and Economics: ASEAN’s two-pronged game • Security was the underlying motivation for the creation of ASEAN • But security was not something you can simply do. It is a side-effect of other activities, particularly economic cooperation • Explicit goals tended to be economic, cooperation, etc. There were no international fields of shared security activity in 1967 (today there are joint exercises, information sharing on counter-terrorism, HADR, etc.) • But security remained the higher order goal: The regional norms reflect this higher order goal • But as economic priorities increased in importance, or as stronger rules were needed at more mature stages of development, tensions could arise

9. Economic goals under political norms • Anti-commons problem: • When multiple rights to exclude exist, a resource tends to be under-utilized • Consensus-based decision-making is equivalent to every member having a veto • Harder to promote economic goals, deliver public goods • ‘ASEAN Minus X’: ASEAN proceeds minus the countries not yet ready • Solution to anti-commons problem • First raised in the 1980s, but not formalized until ASEAN Charter (2007) • Requires consensus (i.e. agreement of the ‘minus’ members) to use this formula • Fears of a two-speed ASEAN with low levels of development in Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar

10. Political goals with economic norms • Hypothetical: political goals have not been subordinated to economic norms to date • ‘Rule of law’: purpose and principle of ASEAN • But how does one enforce the rule of law? • If sovereign mechanisms (e.g. courts) are the problem, how is a dispute resolved? • Extra-sovereign body (e.g. International courts) • ASEAN Dispute Settlement Mechanism • Moving away from informality, requires higher authority – a hierarchical structure

11. goals, not norms • Different norms for different goals Hypothesis: Preference for changing these mechanisms reveals the order of preferences in goals: Economics or Security

12. Drafting the ASEAN Charter Case I: Eminent Persons Group • Commissioned after Vientiane Action Programme • New members with lower levels of development • Concern about China’s growth absorbing investment to the region • Tasked to explore ways to drive economic integration, ‘ASEAN Economic Community’ • Recommendations: • Secretariat to monitor compliance with agreements • Power to address breaches of compliance • ASEAN Union with an ASEAN Council (heads of state summit) • ‘Hierarchical’ ASEAN

13. Drafting the ASEAN Charter Case II: High-Level Task Force on the drafting of the ASEAN Charter • Dropped ‘ASEAN Union’ immediately • Debate over formalizing ‘ASEAN Minus X’: Only on economic matters, and only after seeking consensus to use the formula • No stronger powers for Secretariat, rejected ASEAN Council (but accepted council on sectoral ‘communities’) • Dispute Settlement Mechanism, but requiring consent of both parties • Tensions between economic and foreign ministers • ‘Flat’ ASEAN

14. Conclusion • Functionalism is a sufficient explanation for the various norms in ASEAN • Conflicts in goals underlie conflicts of norms, but the overall institutional landscape reflects the preferences of the system as a whole • Change will be determined by the ability of ASEAN to deliver its public goods in both domains; under status quo, security precedes economic goals • But if security norms are unable to deliver public goods – especially goals on unity and centrality, ASEAN may rethink, including thinking about economic integration as more intrinsic to the security formula than it currently believes • If that happens, the alternatives before ASEAN all involve some hierarchical structures • This may make ASEAN less amenable to major powers – more assertive, or less of an ideal platform for the powers to interact with