ASEAN, Sovereignty and Intervention in
Southeast Asia
Palgrave Macmillan, 2012
The member-states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations
(ASEAN) are famed for clinging to the principle of non-interference in the
internal affairs of other countries and resisting the shift to 'post-
Westphalian' sovereignty, much to the derision of many critics. Yet the
historical record shows that Southeast Asian states have also been
involved in subversion, invasion, annexation, proxy warfare,
peacekeeping, state-building and humanitarian interventions. How do we
make sense of this apparent contradiction, and what is the real state of
sovereignty in Southeast Asia today?
Critiquing mainstream constructivist and realist accounts, this book offers
a fresh, revisionist history of ASEAN. Drawing on political economy,
political geography and state theory, it offers a new approach to theorizing
sovereignty and intervention as technologies of power. Focusing on
ASEAN states' interventions in Burma, Cambodia and East Timor, it
argues that the selective application of sovereignty norms reflects power
struggles within Southeast Asian societies.
Contents
Introduction
1. Theorising Sovereignty and Intervention
PART I: THE COLD WAR
2. The Social Foundations of ASEAN and 'Non-Interference'
3. East Timor: ASEAN and Third-World Colonialism
4. Cambodia: Representation, Refugees and Rebels
PART II: THE POST-COLD WAR PERIOD
5. ASEAN after the Cold War: Capital, Crisis, Conflict
6. Cambodia: From Cold War to Conditionality
7. East Timor: Interdependence and Intervention
8. Burma: ASEAN's Image and the 'Regional Interest'
Conclusions
Reviews
Anyone who thinks that ASEAN’s ‘non-interference’ principle has not been problematic in practice should read this
original, thoughtful, and debatable book.
Professor Donald K. Emmerson, Director, Southeast Asia Forum, Stanford University
This innovative study introduces new ways of understanding the relations between ASEAN states... Lee Jones
challenges assumptions that these are defined simply by principles of non-intervention and argues that interference
and intervention have also been critical drivers of regional relationships. Most important, he challenges both realist and
constructivist assumptions that state interests and norms can be understood in abstractions of ‘national interest’,
arguing that specific forms of state interest and ideology are the products of deeper conflicts within nations themselves
and across the region. By embedding critical cases in this political economy framework, the author provides a powerful
new analysis of how relations have been forged between the regimes of this increasingly complex and potentially
volatile region.
Professor Richard Robison, Asia Research Centre, Murdoch University, Perth
This engaging, timely and intellectually compelling book manages both to ground political science theorising in the
richness of an area studies investigation, and to speak truth to power. It reminds us, at a time when ASEAN is
increasingly gaining international credibility beyond Southeast Asia, of the Association's sordid, reactionary,
undemocratic and interventionist origins. It exposes the ASEAN principle of 'non-intervention' as patently false, ruling
elites having repeatedly intervened to suppress or contain populist, democratic and socialist protest. The myth has
been shattered; the ‘honourable’ ASEAN diplomat looks more like a local thug.
Professor Patricio Abinales, University of Hawaii
To read a sample chapter, click here.
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