ASEAN Briefing Paper

In aiming to become a "concert of nations" in the new century, ASEAN does not mean to transform itself into a political union under any form of central supranational authority. Each ASEAN country will continue to preserve its national government and identity in accordance with the ideals and aspirations of its people. However, all ASEAN members are legally bound by the code of conduct embodied in the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in Southeast Asia, among other agreements. Neither the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation nor any other agreement, however, requires ASEAN members to change their political systems into any specific homogenised system.

Each member learned to see its stake in the viability of the Association

ASEAN has never assigned itself the mission of converting its members to a uniform political set-up. Unlike the European Union, ASEAN did not set any political criterion for its prospective members to fulfil before admission.
Differences in political systems do not hinder the strengthening of ASEAN unity and solidarity. On the contrary, ASEAN sees the diversity in its membership as a source of strength and inspiration for fostering a strong sense of community and regional solidarity. All ASEAN members willingly agree to share the responsibility of strengthening peace and stability in Southeast Asia.
At the 1992 Singapore Summit -- the first meeting of ASEAN leaders after the end of the Cold War --ASEAN decided to promote external dialogue on enhancing security in the region. This policy direction paved the way for the establishment of the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF) in 1994. ASEAN envisaged a multilateral consultative forum aimed at building confidence among the countries with security interests in East Asia.
Besides the ten ASEAN countries, ARF's membership includes the ten dialogue partners of ASEAN (Australia, Canada, China, the European Union, India, Japan, Republic of Korea, New Zealand, Russia and the United States), Papua New Guinea, Mongolia and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, which participated in ARF for the first time on 27 July 2000.

Economic Cooperation
ASEAN's programme for economic cooperation has evolved since its founding in 1967. Initially, economic cooperation dealt with programmes for joint ventures and complementation schemes among ASEAN governments or companies, such as the 1976

Map of ASEAN and neighoring countries

ASEAN Industrial Projects plan, the 1981 ASEAN Industrial Complementation scheme, and the 1983 ASEAN Industrial Joint-Ventures scheme. By the eighties and nineties, however, as countries all over the world began to dismantle economic barriers, ASEAN countries realised that the best way for them to cooperate for their development in the era of globalisation would be to open up their economies to one another, and eventually to integrate them.
The most important move towards this new model was made at the Fourth ASEAN Summit in 1992, at which member countries agreed to create the ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA). A free-trade area -- a market of close to half a billion people -- would allow corporations in ASEAN to take advantage of economies of scale. These companies would also have access to the best prices for the raw materials they require, even as competition among them stimulates their productivity and efficiency. An integrated ASEAN economy would thus be a potent attraction for investors from outside the region who prefer large, integrated and efficient markets to small, fragmented

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