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strong>April 25, Online/ANN

After almost 47 years of ASEAN'€™s existence, many believe the region'€™s present peace and prosperity are the natural order of things.

Delivering the 34th Singapore Lecture this week, Brunei Sultan Haji Hassanal Bolkiah noted that the region'€™s strategic landscape would be influenced by changes in the relationship between emergent major and middle powers. ASEAN'€™s challenge would be to find its place in the new configuration.

Your comments:

The ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) is the most momentous of ASEAN'€™s plans. Yet, we still have to see whether it will ever be fully implemented and indeed it is unlikely to see fruition at its planned start in 2015. ASEAN differs significantly to the European Union (EU) as its nations do not have a shared culture and history.  

The EU came about through the initial unifying theme of a greater Germany during World War II, where people from all European countries fought in German divisions against the red menace.  These were the initial steps in pan-Europeanism.

None of this unity exists in ASEAN. Myanmar, for example, can cause a flood of undocumented migrants without any consideration of its impact on other ASEAN nations. In the end, ASEAN nations need to come to terms with how they interact as a unified entity rather than as individual nations.

Jagera

ASEAN is largely an economic union. So far, national interests seem paramount where potential seabed resources are an issue. As China develops its blue sea capabilities, ASEAN can be split into pro-Bejling and pro-White House, all for the sake of prosperity.

The possibilities are obvious as different nations of the loose grouping are at different stages of economic growth.

Tant KT