The full implementation of the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) this year is a step toward further consolidating the ASEAN Community through political-security, economic, and socio-cultural co-operation.
A post-2015 vision of "ASEAN 2025: Forging Ahead Together" endorsed by ASEAN leaders at the 27th ASEAN Summit in Nov. 2015 articulates ASEAN's goals in promoting an inclusive and people-centred community for the next ten years.
The forward-looking roadmap promises that, in line with the free movement of people across Southeast Asian countries' borders, ASEAN citizens will have their human rights protected, equitable access to job opportunities and a people-centred community for the next ten years.
However, experts say that ASEAN's vision for further integration will be hard to realise, as until now, member states hold different views regarding human rights protection and lack shared democratic values, which could hamper diplomacy at the regional level.
In addition, the consensus-based and non-interference principles - dubbed the "ASEAN Way" - may become problematic, as most member states still regard rights and governance issues as sensitive and thus insist on maintaining them under domestic jurisdiction, instead of being addressed at the regional level.
With the nearing deadline of AEC full implementation and the ASEAN Community that follows, member states need to address differences and make compromises while Indonesia, according to experts, should take on the main role of leading community integration to prevent from getting dragged into regional matters that pose a threat to Indonesia's democracy.
ASEAN speaks in language of history, but progresses forward
ASEAN's first key document, the 1976 Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in Southeast Asia (TAC), introduced the term "ASEAN Way", asserting that member states effectively co-operate as long as they did not interfere in each other's domestic affairs and maintained the principles of consensus among members.
Their sensitivity toward sovereignty was due to the fact that all ASEAN member states - except for Thailand - had been under colonial rule before gaining independence, leading them to reject any subversion or coercion from other states or supranational bodies that interfered with their national interests.
Former chairperson of the National Commission on Human Rights (Komnas HAM) Marzuki Darusman said that historical matters, including colonisation, were important to ASEAN members.
"ASEAN speaks in the language of history. Member states tend to look at the past to find similarities between each other. ASEAN has become a peaceful region where they interact with benefits," Marzuki told thejakartapost.com recently.
As ethnic, religious, political, and economy diversity puts ASEAN member states at risk of irreconcilable disputes, ASEAN adopted a decision-making process that accommodated discussion to proceed at a pace that each member was comfortable with, even though it often hampered the progress of certain issues to be addressed at the regional level.
Taking the example of the formation of the ASEAN Intergovernmental Commission on Human Rights (AICHR), Marzuki said it took 17 years of negotiations for member states to reach consensus after deciding to set a regional mechanism for human rights protection in 1993.
"We cannot expect ASEAN regional forum to function like other regional forums because ASEAN strives to seek communalities through consensus, and this cannot be changed," said Marzuki.
In progressing toward inclusive and people-centred community in 2025, experts have said that ASEAN should make attempts to change its non-interference principle, particularly in addressing grave violations of human rights.
The former dean of the School of Social and Political Science at Parahyangan Catholic University, Yulius Purwadi, said that it would be impossible to expect non-democratic states such as Myanmar, Vietnam and Laos to reach Indonesia's position by 2025.
"Normatively, [the change] will be hard, but in practice, there is space for ASEAN countries to loosen their consensus decision making and non-interference principles," Yulius said.
Yulius said Indonesia should be more proactive during ASEAN intergovernmental meetings while at the same time, carry out a more bilateral approach rather than collective approach when discussing sensitive issues such as rights protection and politics with member states.
"Indonesia has a strong position to propose that ASEAN development orientation should be based on social policies that determine economic policies. It should not happen in reverse, as we will only get what we have today," Marzuki added.
Bread before freedom, trade-off between development and rights
ASEAN establishment dates back to 1967, with the Bangkok Declaration signed by the five founding member states - Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore and Thailand - which had mutual interests in promoting regional co-operation, but were persistent in maintaining their absolute sovereignty.
The founding document made no mention of human rights and democracy, making it obvious that both sensitive issues were not considered vital for the region. ASEAN's guiding principles allowed member states to deal with the issues individually.
"Non-interference, sovereignty and consensus principles are the characteristics of development in Southeast Asia. However, those principles keep human rights protection in the region at its minimum level," Puri Kencana Putri, Commission for Missing Persons and Victims of Violence (Kontras) deputy coordinator for strategy and mobilization, said recently.
According to Putri, there was a trade-off to placing greater importance on regional development over human rights protection in Southeast Asia, with some governments in the region still using the logic of "bread before freedom".
Even though ASEAN has made significant progress in human rights protection with the establishment of the AICHR in 2009, Putri said that the rights protection body still failed to address violations in Southeast Asia.
With only Indonesia and the Philippines having established their own national commission on human rights, issues emerged between human rights protection and elite interests, Putri added.
Similarly, Migrant Care executive director Anis Hidayah said that despite the 2007 ASEAN Declaration on Promotion and Protection of the Rights of Migrant Workers, many migrant workers were still susceptible to having their rights violated, particularly in the business sector.
"ASEAN political elites' commitment to create a platform for domestic workers' rights protection is still rather low," said Anis.
Anis said that ASEAN should further strengthen its dialogue to focus on human rights, women rights, and migrant workers' rights protection.
Meanwhile, International NGO Forum on Indonesian Development (INFID) noted that Indonesia should push ASEAN member countries to ratify all human rights-related international conventions as an initial step to empower AICHR in strengthening its function to promote and protect human rights in Southeast Asia.
Raising public participation, toward a people-centred ASEAN
Since ASEAN member states attained their independence at different times after World War II, distinctions between democracies should be considered for improved co-operation.
ASEAN Peoples' Forum steering committee manager Atnike Nova Sigiro said that the dynamics of democracy in each ASEAN member state heavily affected the democratic values shared in the organisation, as creating good synergy among member states was not east due to diverse political systems.
"There is a relevancy between level of democracy and room for public participation. A higher level of democracy will increase the chance for civil society to interact with the government," said Atnike.
Among ASEAN countries, Atnike said, countries that provided the widest room for civil society participation were Indonesia, the Philippines and Thailand, while other member states had their own systems of governance, ranging from an absolute monarchy (Brunei) to democratic yet still repressive (Singapore) countries.
To pursue a people-centred and people-oriented ASEAN that protected human rights and civil liberties, experts believe that while Indonesia and other freedom-promoter countries should carry out efforts at the intergovernmental level, civil society organisations (CSOs) role to create a grassroots movement from below was important to push ASEAN member states to further address peoples' needs.
"For example, labour unions in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia that share mutual interests can create pressure at the grassroots level to raise government awareness," Purwadi said.
According to Purwadi, CSO networks that comprised experts, academicians and students from all Southeast Asian countries could contribute more to influence the decision-making process not only in their respective states but also at the regional level.
INFID researcher Daniel Hutagalung said that ASEAN should further develop a mechanism, such as improving the accreditation process for CSOs in each ASEAN intergovernmental body, to further accommodate ASEAN's CSO participation.
"This will lead to more transparent, accountable, legitimate, qualified and effective decision-making in ASEAN," Daniel said.
Sumber - AsiaOne
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