Commentary on Chapter 5

Summary

For a start, I share Dr Pelkmans' general scepticism on what more we could constructively say on this matter. I have for long felt that ASEAN's preoccupation with institutional reform since the early 1980s stems largely from an overspill of frustration over what some member countries felt to be a lack of real progress in ASEAN economic co-operation. The basic reason for this lack of progress was not institutional inadequacy (or bad programmes) but a lack of “political will”. (And, by that, I hasten to add, we are not casting aspersions on the character or resolve of ASEAN leaders — merely saying in a short hand way that objective circumstances, political and economic, were not yet ripe.) As Dr Pelkmans concludes from the EC experience, “institutions can and should facilitate but they cannot replace political will … [while) even a crippled setup like the EPC (European Political Committee) can be effective if only there is political will”.

This, of course, is not saying that institutions are irrelevant. There must obviously be some compatibility between organizational objectives and institutional means. Good programmes may come to grief without proper implementational mechanisms. But the instrumental importance of institutions in international co-operation could be exaggerated.

However, I may hasten to add that, like Dr Pelkmans, I am an economist, not an institutional expert. Lacking specialist credentials I will keep my comments general.

Dr Pelkmans has emphasized that as regional groupings, ASEAN and the EC exhibit vast systemic differences. These stem from two major sources.

First, as is well known, while the EC's primary programme was economic (i.e. the European Economic Community or EEC), this was founded on the very strong and broad based political support of a war-weary Europe. The EC can therefore start big, with highly ambitious (but realistic) economic objectives embodied in a comprehensive supranational legal frame with supranational institutions to pursue its implementation.