Association of Southeast Asian Nations

Southeast Asia: How the West shaped an identity (Essay by Marta Soliño) The influence from the West and its relations with Southeast Asia have been and still are really close. This connection can be seen just by taking a brief look at the term “Southeast Asia”, as it is not a term that has been going on since centuries ago. Not at all. This term was given and started to be used when these countries were colonized by Western superpowers, the Allied Forces. Actually, the term was first used in the Quebec Conference in August 1943, where Burma, Malaysia, Sumatra and Thailand were grouped under the Southeast Asia Command (SEAC-I). In the Potsdam Conference (1945), Netherlands East Indies (Indonesia) and several countries of Indochina were added to the SAEC-I . The fact that the name Southeast Asia was given by westerners proves how this concept is a projection of the images they had of the East. However, we should retrocede in time a little bit to the end of the 19th century, to t...

The Rohingya people are one of the globe’s largest ethnic minorities, a Muslim stateless nation considered one of the most persecuted minorities in the world (OHCHR, 2017). Their origins rely on the Arakan region in northern Myanmar and they are currently between 1.5 million and 2 million people. The nation lost its identity in 1983 with the Citizenship Act of Burma, which was declared by the military government of General Ne Win. Previously, the Rohingya had been recognised in 1950s by the U-Nu government during the parliamentary era.  The lack of a citizenship status has implicated an oppression conflict which has brought many social issues for this nation. These include a very restricted access to economic opportunities, health care and a decent education (Kiaw, 2008). This phenomenon has lead the Rohingya to seek for asylum in other countries, some of them belonging to South-East Asia such as Malaysia, Thailand and Indonesia. Despite of the farness, these places have proba...

The 25th of April the UPF held a conference about democracy and Southeast Asia. The name of the conference was “ Democracy in the European Union and its Impact in Asian Countries ” and it was given by professor Rajendra Jain, of Jawaharlal Nehru University. It was a very interesting conference and taking into account which is the subject of our project, it was a perfect fit. The conference explored different subjects such as the existence or not of a European identity, what is democracy, sovereignty of states, the idea of democracy that the EU tries to extend… Professor Jain argued that there’s no such thing as a common European identity because Europe is formed by different countries that still maintain their own identity, so there’s no sense of community. The citizens of the Eutopean Union don’t feel represented by its institutions. The lack of identity makes it difficult for Europe to be an influential actor when it comes to politics. The European Union is an important...

Members : Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore,Thailand, Vietnam Observers : Papua New Guinea, Timor Leste Headquarters : Jakarta, Indonesia. Secretary General : Lim Jock Hoi. Population : more than 600 million Area : 1.7 million square miles (4.5 million square km) The ASEAN was established the 8th of August of 1967 when the Bangkok declaration was signed. The Bangkok Declaration, also known as the ASEAN Declaration is the founding document of this association. It was signed in Bangkok by the five founding members: Indonesia, Malaysia, Phillippines, Singapore and Thailand. ASEAN is a regional intergovernmental organisation formed by ten southeast Asian countries that aimes to accelerate the economic growth, social progress and sociocultural evolution of this members. ASEAN also seeks to create economic and cultural relations between the countries that integrate it as well as to create relationships between ASEAN...

GENERAL HISTORY The 8th of August of 1967 the Foreign Ministers of of Indonesia (Adam Malik), Malaysia (Abdul Razak), the Philippines (Narciso R. Ramos), Singapore (S. Rajaratnam) and Thailand (Thanat Khoman); signed the document that would be known as the Association of SouthEast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Declaration, also known as the Bangkok Declaration for being in this city where it was signed. This Declaration consisted on just five articles declaring the establishment and spelling out the aims and purposes of the Association: accelerating economic growth, social progress, and cultural development and to promote peace and security in Southeast Asia through abiding respect for justice and the rule of law and adherence to the principles of the United Nations Charter. Apart from this it included cooperation in technical, educational and other fields. Although the declaration stipulated that it would be open for participation by all States in the Southeast Asian region subsc...

Influence The influence of ASEAN is growing in the Southeast of Asia, as a single entity, they would be the sixth largest economy in the world. That makes that countries like India and Australia are trying to stablish strong commercial and political relationships. For instance, the last ASEAN Summit was held in Australia, which is not a member of the Association. In this summit the Prime Minister of Australia, Malcolm Turnbull, made clear that they are working to improve the relationship with ASEAN and become “a family”. In fact, ASEAN has a free trade agreement with Australia and New Zealand, as well as with India and China, and they are planning to stablish more free trade deals with other countries of the region. ASEAN is the heart of Souteast Asia, and being in a good relationship with them means having impact on a region that right now is a hot spot. ASEAN in the Media Although the media reports in ASEAN, especially when they celebrate summits, they focus more in ...