Examining the Engagement Between Civil Society and ASEAN in the ASEAN Charter Process

Book excerpt: Essay from the year 2008 in the subject South Asian Studies, South-Eastern Asian Studies, grade: A, LUISS Guido Carli (Faculty of Political Science), course: Humanitarian Strategies and Non- Governmental Organisations, 40 entries in the bibliography, language: English, abstract: ...] The introduction is followed by the first section that provides readers with basic information about ASEAN, how ASEAN was born and how it has operated, expanded and developed over the years. My focus is on the ASEAN Way, ASEAN's agenda-setting and decision-making as well as ASEAN Community building. The second section describes the fragmented, complex picture of civil society in Southeast Asia, which has insufficiently and unevenly developed under unfavourable conditions. The third is about the engagement between civil society and ASEAN, which has often been criticised by the former for being elitist and state-centric, prior to the charter process. I divide this section into two periods: before and after the Asian financial crisis. And the fourth - the most important in this essay discusses and analyses the engagement of ASEAN and civil society in the ASEAN Charter process, in which I examine the interactions between the EPG and civil society, the latter's efforts to get access to the actual drafters (the High-level Task Force) and to the draft itself in spite of the uncooperative attitudes of the ASEAN senior officials, as well as civil society's reactions to the content of the charter. ...]