Examining the Engagement Between Civil Society in Southeast Asia and ASEAN in the ASEAN Community Building Process

Book excerpt: Essay from the year 2008 in the subject South Asian Studies, South-Eastern Asian Studies, grade: A-, LUISS University of Rome (LUISS University of Rome, Faculty of Social Science), 47 entries in the bibliography, language: English, abstract: The essay examines the engagement between civil society in Southeast Asia and ASEAN in the ASEAN community building process. It argues that in spite of initial efforts in mutual accommodation, both sides have been divided from within, which slows the engagement and gives it more form than substance. The efforts by ASEAN so far will only create a community of the governing elite, not a community of the people. Regional community building, just like nation-building, is very much a people-centered process. It is not a simple top-down chain of command and control. If ASEAN wants to establish a real community, it must change its modus operandi. It must be much more than an exclusive club for the governing elite by giving more space as well as power to civil society in its agendasetting and decision-making. A community is much more a cognitive than material construction; it is something that has to be believed in, sensed, and nurtured by the people. In Southeast Asia, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) is building an ASEAN Community, which is its most far-reaching project. Yet is it possible for a regional organisation that has been widely criticised by civil society for being remote to and detached from the people to establish a community of caring and sharing societies by 2015 as its statements indicate? And if yes, how? Meanwhile, civil society has an important role to play in community building. Yet civil society in Southeast Asia is weak and fragmented. It has been excluded from ASEAN's decision-making process. Can civil society contribute to ASEAN community building? And if yes, how? This essay tries to answer these questions by looking at the engagement between civil society in Southeast Asia and ASEAN in the AS