ASEAN, Institutional Strategy, and the South China Sea
Abstract:
This Open Access book explains ASEAN’s strategic role in managing great power politics in East Asia. Constructing a theory of institutional strategy, this book argues that the regional security institutions in Southeast Asia, ASEAN and ASEAN-led institutions have devised their own institutional strategies vis-à-vis the South China Sea and navigated the great-power politics since the 1990s. ASEAN proliferated new security institutions in the 1990s and 2000s that assumed a different functionality, a different geopolitical scope, and thus a different institutional strategy. In so doing, ASEAN formed a “strategic institutional web” that nurtured a quasi-division of labor among the institutions to maintain relative stability in the South China Sea. Unlike the conventional analysis on ASEAN, this study disaggregates “ASEAN” as a collective regional actor into specific individual institutions―ASEAN Foreign Ministers’ Meeting, ASEAN Summit, ASEAN-China dialogues, ASEAN Regional Forum, East Asia Summit, and ASEAN Defense Ministers Meeting and ASEAN Defense Ministers Meeting-Plus―and explains how each of these institutions has devised and/or shifted its institutional strategy to curb great powers’ ambition in dominating the South China Sea while navigating great power competition. The book sheds light on the strategic potential and limitations of ASEAN and ASEAN-led security institutions, offers implications for the future role of ASEAN in the Indo-Pacific region, and provides an alternative understanding of the strategic utilities of regional security institutions. --This text refers to the hardcover edition.
Review:
“Kei Koga is one of Asia's most thoughtful observers of regional security architecture. At a time when commentators question ASEAN's effectiveness and the viability of multilateralism more generally, he demonstrates its ability to shape great power behaviour in one of this region's most intractable flashpoints - the South China Sea. Theoretically rigorous and empirically rich, this book is required reading for Asian security scholars and practitioners alike." -Prof Brendan Taylor, Professor of Strategic Studies, Australian National University, Australia
“An empirically rich and distinctive study of small-state agency at the group level. Focusing on the “quasi-division of labor” among the ASEAN-led mechanisms, the book unpacks the ASEAN states’ institutional strategy of maintaining stability in the South China Sea. A timely contribution to understanding weaker-state hedging and the debate on the roles and limits of regional multilateralism amidst the growing big power rivalry in the Indo-Pacific era.”-Prof Cheng-Chwee Kuik, Associate Professor, National University of Malaysia (UKM), Malaysia
“The South China Sea literature is increasingly dominated by the role of the great powers with too little attention given to other actors. This book fills this gap by bridging security studies and the role of regional institutions. It offers conceptual innovation and convincingly studies the strategic utility of the ASEAN-led institutions in managing great power politics and curbing their ambitions in the disputed waters.”
– Prof Ralf Emmers, Dean of S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
Reviewed in:
Pacific Affairs (2023), Contemporary Southeast Asia (2023), ASEAN Wonk (2023), Strategic Analysis (2023)
Power shifts, ideas, and institutional change
Abstract:
Regional security institutions play a significant role in shaping the behavior of existing and rising regional powers by nurturing security norms and rules, monitoring state activities, and sometimes imposing sanctions, thereby formulating the configuration of regional security dynamics. Yet, their security roles and influence do not remain constant. Their raison d’etre, objectives, and functions experience sporadic changes, and some institutions upgrade military functions for peacekeeping operations, while others limit their functions to political and security dialogues. The question is: why and how do these variances in institutional change emerge?
This book explores the mechanisms of institutional change, focusing on regional security institutions led by non-great powers. It constructs a theoretical model for institutional change that provides a new understanding of their changing roles in regional security, which has yet to be fully explored in the International Relations field. In so doing, the book illuminates why, when, and how each organization restructures its role, function, and influence. Using case studies of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), and the Organization of African Unity (OAU)/ African Union (AU), it also sheds light on similarities and differences in institutional change between regional security institutions.
Review:
“'In recent years, there has been a growing body of literature on regional institutions and their ostensible contributions to regional security. But why and how those institutions do what they do within the context of their dynamic and complex regional milieus remains little appreciated let alone theorised. In Reinventing Regional Security Institutions in Asia and Africa, Kei Koga critically examines the conditions under which regional security institutions (RSIs) undertake institutional change. These conditions include changes in regional distributions of power and the reassessments by RSIs of their own utility and their subsequent adjustments in the light of those power redistributions. In other words, institutional change is the outcome of a complex blend of structural transition and institutional agency. For Professor Koga, RSIs such as ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations), ECOWAS (Economic Community of West African States) and OAU/AU (Organisation of African Unity / African Union) are interesting case studies in institutional agency and change even though their members are primarily non-great powers. Original and persuasive, this book is requisite reading for all who have an interest in comparative regionalisms.' - Tan See Seng, Professor of International Relations, Deputy Director and Head of Research, Institute for Defence and Strategic Studies, S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
'The fact that the book compares two very different regions, and focuses on the inherently regional input in the development of regional institutions makes the book original and innovative. It is essential reading for students of regional security institutions. ' - Timo Kivimäki, Professor of International Relations and Director of Research, University of Bath, United Kingdom
Reviewed in:
Perspective in Politics (2020), 『国際政治』(Kokusai Seiji [Internaitonal Politics]) (2019), Pacific Affairs (2018), 『国際安全保障』(Kokusai Anzenhosho [International Security]) (2018), Journal of Peace Research (2017), International Relations of the Asia Pacific (2017)