Regional Commonalities and Regional Identities: Forging a Normative Understanding of Southeast Asian Identity

Abstract

In the last two decades, most of the IR academia's attention on Southeast Asian regionalism utilised constructivism and/or realism and has focused on ASEAN and its derivatives. This article aims to skew this angle by elaborating a possible relationship between Asian values and a normative understanding of Southeast Asian identity. The major reason for this article's focus on a normative interpretation is that a practical application of Southeast Asian identity is not very achievable due to various ethnic, cultural, political, territorial, and historical diversities. While the region is diverse, there are also a number of commonalities among its states. Asian values, from a Confucian perspective, account for some of these commonalities. By using constructivists’ claims on both the links between norms and identity and the dynamic interaction between values and norms, this article argues that Asian values could contribute to the development of Amitav Acharya's widely cited normative/ideational format of Southeast Asian identity. The article takes ASEAN identity as a case study and aims to show why a normative identity is more achievable than a practical identity among Southeast Asians, and how Asian values might contribute to the creation of this shared identity.

Keywords

Southeast Asian identity constructivism Asian values ASEAN identity

Introduction

This article shares the apprehension of Acharya (2001), Narine (2002), Peou (2002), and Eaton and Stubbs (2003) that we should view the formation of Southeast Asian identity optimistically. In particular, it assesses the additional and complementary role that Asian values could play in the formation of that identity. They could play this role more clearly and effectively within a normative/ideational scheme of Southeast Asian identity. This argument focuses on “discursive and social practices that define the identity of actors and the normative order within which they make their moves” and it “insist[s] on the importance of social processes that generate changes in normative beliefs” (Katzenstein, Keohane, and Krasner 1999: 42).

A significant amount of literature on Southeast/East Asian identity focuses on regionalism, constructivism, and/or realism, in addition to ASEAN and its derivatives – the ASEAN Regional Forum, ASEAN Capital Markets Forum, ASEAN+3, and ASEAN summits (Jones and Smith 2007; Antolik 1990; Jorgensen-Dahl 1982; Leifer 1986; Acharya 2001; Caballero-Anthony 2008; Emmers 2003; Narine 2002; Nesadurai 2003; Poon 2001; Rüland 2000). By focusing on the potential contribution of Asian values to ASEAN identity, the article aims to tweak this perspective a bit. Although Southeast Asia and ASEAN are not synonymous, the article aims to utilise ASEAN as a case study to test how meaningful it is to propose a normative understanding of identity among ASEAN member states that evince extreme heterogeneities within and amongst themselves.

Asian values, with a Confucian perspective, were assumed to encompass a small subset of Southeast Asian regional commonalities, which can be categorised under two dimensions: cultural/intellectual and economic/commercial. Due to the active interplay between norms and values, Asian values have the potential to constitute norms particular to Southeast Asia. Meaning, Asian values could contribute to Southeast Asian identity in the way that Amitav Acharya argues, whereby norms are linked with regional identity. Acharya's norms can be broken down into two major sets: The first is legal-rational or constitutive norms (i.e. the principle of non-interference, peaceful settlement of disputes, respect for each other's independence and territorial integrity), which are enshrined in ASEAN's constitutional documents including the Bangkok Declaration of 1967, the Kuala Lumpur Declaration of 1971, the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation, and the Declaration of ASEAN Concord from ASEAN's inaugural summit in 1976. The second set is sociocultural norms, which are the basis of informal social controls and habits (Acharya 2001: 24). This second set “may reflect ethnicity, religion, group social belief systems, historical memory, and domestic political rhythms and peculiarities of societies” (Acharya 2009: 22). Asian values could constitute norms falling into this second set.

Constructivism provides a useful theoretical framework by which to understand the interaction between values, norms, and identity due to its special emphasis on these terms (Acharya and Stubbs 2006: 132). Asian values, as values, are not completely detached from norms; in fact, they affect norms. Values may not influence identities directly but they do so via norms. In other words, norms could be a bridging element between values and identity. Through constituting norms shared and accepted by regional actors, Asian values could provide solutions to some predicaments of Southeast Asian identity, which have mostly been posed by scholars as problems about norms.

This article first gives a brief constructivist overview of the interaction between values, norms, and identity; second, it examines Asian values via the two above-mentioned subsets together with their caveats. The last section takes ASEAN identity as a case to show the possible complementary role that Asian values play in Southeast Asian identity. Examining ASEAN identity raises two, related questions: 1) Why is a normative Southeast identity more attainable than a practical one? 2) How can Asian values contribute to the forging of a normative Southeast Asian identity?

Values, Norms, and Identity: A Constructivist Overview of Southeast Asian Identity

Most of the constructivist discussions on East/Southeast Asia (Acharya 2001; Busse 1999; Haacke 2003; Katsumata 2003, 2004; Narine 2002; Tan 2006) “pay greater attention to […] the notion of ‘imagined communities’ in the regional context” (Tan 2006: 241). These imagined communities, as Acharya (2012) argues, link regional identity to a sense of belonging, which is still an ongoing process in the region.

This process has not constituted a homogeneous cultural or geographic entity yet. Southeast Asian identity has been developing but not in a coherent or consolidated way. As Park (2008: 81) claims, this identity is more like a “discursive process, a problem-raising consciousness, and a historical reality to be maintained inside” the region. Although social communication, official statements, and speeches of some Southeast Asian political leaders

[affirm] such an identity, a new commonality of interests have to be read in the particular context in which they were made and not be assumed to translate automatically into new collaborative outcomes. (Ravenhill 2002: 175)

Thus, a practical Southeast Asian identity has still quite a ways to go.

Although the “transformation of identity” in Southeast Asia is “incremental and slow” (Wendt 1992: 418), it is still following a positive trajectory. Acharya underlined this by examining its similarities with European identity development. Chew (2003) underlined Acharya's argument that

Asia is moving along the same trajectory of greater interdependence, institutionalisation, and political transformation as Europe did in the past centuries, and there can be reasonable hope that their pathways will converge more fully in the long-term future.

Oakeshott (1996) similarly emphasised “the politics of faith” for Southeast Asian identity's future, which asserts that norms alongside “regional interactions and interdependencies” will cultivate (Nabers 2003: 132–133) regional identities. These arguments highlight that a normative scheme of Southeast Asian identity seems more attainable.

Norms, Values, and Identity: Interaction and Constitution

In a normative understanding of Southeast Asian identity, values could play a role due to their relationship with norms.

A value is a conception, explicit or implicit, distinctive of an individual or characteristic of a group, of the desirable which influences the selection from available modes, means, and ends of action. (Kluckhohn 1951: 395)

Values are “cultural products,” which are also individually or commonly shared conceptions of the desirable (Kluckhohn 1951: 395–398). Norms, on the other hand, are “generally accepted, sanctioned prescriptions for, or prohibitions against, others’ behaviour, belief, or feeling, i.e. what others ought to do, believe, feel – or else” (Morris 1956: 610; emphasis in original). Values can be held by a single individual, norms must be commonly shared. Norms include sanctions, values do not (Morris 1956: 610). “Values are general and explicit, norms are specific and tacit” (Vickers 1973: 106).

Values and norms are different but they interact and have an active interplay. Values affect the establishment and development of norms. Although it is not a must, commonly held values mostly constitute norms (Morris 1956: 610). “That values affect norms is the faith behind all attempts at mutual persuasion and the experience which sustains them.” Norms also “equally affect and even generate the values to which they appeal” (Vickers 1973: 106).

Identity is an interdisciplinary concept used in psychology, sociology and, increasingly, human, cultural, and regional geography (Burke and Stets 2009; Paasi 1986; Conolly 1997; Graham 2000; Moore and Whelan 2007). Regional identity falls into the category of collective identity (Keating 1998), which differentiates groups from each other (Cohen 1986; Massey and Jess 1995; Hobsbawn 1996; Carvalho 2006). Regional identity is conceptualised in various ways (Paasi 2009). One view claims that it is “an emotional phenomenon related to regional consciousness, thus entailing a sense of belonging as well as distinctions between social groups” (Zimmerbauer and Paasi 2013: 32). This consciousness is “a dynamic continuing process of constant reproduction” of a region's “features, with collective meaning” (Paasi 2004; Escobar 2001; Raagmaa 2002). Such continuity hinders regional identity from having a “well-formulated basis” regarding its establishment and development. This ambiguity about the direction of regional-identity development makes us “try to build different kinds of identities hoping” that this effort “will direct the further development in a good direction” (Mutanen 2010: 35). As for regional identity,

[it] is based on the constitution of a regional image either from within or from outside or, in other words, how the region is presented and perceived by its own inhabitants and institutions as well as by others outside the region. (Semian and Chromy 2014; Hospers 2011)

Therefore, regional identity has two components: consciousness of the inhabitants and the image of the region (Paasi 1989). Norms play a role, particularly for the first component as they are shared collectively by most members of the region, which could contribute to development of consciousness.

Southeast Asian norms are shared by several types of actors (states, NGOs, and citizens), and affect their modus operandi. As Acharya argues, “norms are not epiphenomenal [.] [t]hey have an independent effect on state behaviour, redefining state interests and creating collective interests and identities” (Acharya 2001: 24). Norms throughout intraregional interactions constitute a sense of “we-ness” (Khong 2004: 189). For example, ASEAN demonstrated this “we-ness” after the 1997/1998 Asian financial crisis through “social communication, reciprocal speech acts, and changing attitudes and interests of the states cooperating with each other” (Nabers 2003: 132–133).

The “we-ness” also creates a notion of “otherness,” which both acts as a centripetal force intensifying the “consciousness of regional identity” (Poon 2001: 256) and has an instrumental value, which consolidates identity among the “in-group” (Wendt 1994: 386–389). It constrains “the primacy of major powers, particularly the strategic dominance of the [United States],” rejects Western “legalistic configurations of international relations,” favours the “Asian way of managing conflicts through consensus and consultation,” and “emphasizes the communitarian aspects of Asian culture where the welfare of the group is esteemed over that of the individual, and where loyalty and duties reign over morality” (Poon 2001: 256; see, Hood 1998). Hellman explained the functionality of this commonality-oriented “otherness” by claiming that

shared experiences of turbulence and change, brought on primarily by the political, cultural, and economic impact first of Western colonialism and then of the Cold War, encouraged the nations of [Southeast] Asia to view themselves as a distinct group. (Hellman 1972: 29)

The constructivist understanding of norms provides regional actors with an impetus to feel a sense of belonging within the region. Constructivists conceptualise norms as intersubjective social structures that enable the evolution of regional identities (Wendt 1994: 385). Although there are disagreements among various Southeast Asian leaders about the “Asianness” of Asian values, there are sufficient common elements that could still result in the formation of norms. The next section examines Asian values in view of these elements and their caveats.

Asian Values: A Discourse and a Subcategory

One focus of the post-Cold War IR literature on Asia's rise (see, Krugman 1994; DNI 2004; Kennedy 2010; Kapisthalam 2006; Berger and Borer 1997; Zhang 2003; Jorgenson and Vu 2011) was the cultural, commercial, intellectual, and even psychological elements particular to East/Southeast Asia, which were labelled “Asian values.” Although researchers have been discussing them from various perspectives, they have yet to agree on a precise list. As Koro Bessho (1999: 53) underscored, there is “no single set of clearly defined values applicable to Asia as a whole, or even to East Asia.” This makes Asian values more of a flexible set of cultural and psychological commonalities than a rigid, regional-defining package. The commonality of these values is that, as Acharya claimed, they are not epiphenomenal; they affect state behaviour and create collective interests and identities. The discourse on Asian values changed focus in time, but its psycho-cultural motto stayed the same: Southeast Asia is proudly and exclusively different from the “West.” Asian values create a sense of “we-ness,” which constructivists claim rejects the strategic dominance of the United States.

Asian Values: Discourse and Caveats

Asian values were first used in the 1970s in order to find a cultural reference to the East Asian miracle by focusing on Asian qualities (Khoo 1999; Hill 2000; Xu 2005). The discourse was rejuvenated as a reaction to the United States’ universalist claims about human rights and democracy in the 1990s, which was seen as the creeping reach of US ideological domination, and was re-ignited by the 1993 Vienna Conference on Human Rights (Moody 1996: 166; Hoon 2004). Both in 1970s and 1990s Asian values discourse had an anti-Western feeling stressing Asian supremacy.

The discourse has four major strands (Kim 2010: 318–319; Jenco 2013). The first strand asserts that Asia has a distinct value system based on collective destiny, individual sacrifice, and communitarianism, in which Western democratic values/institutions do not completely fit. This assertion has been criticised on the basis that it can be used to justify and protect East Asian semi-democratic regimes (Kim 1994; Ibrahim 2006). Malaysia's former deputy prime minister also stated that “it is altogether shameful to cite Asian values as an excuse for autocratic practices” (Kraar 1999).

The second strand focuses on the philosophical and historical roots of Asian values in Confucian and other traditional texts. The proponents (Fox 1997; Sen 1997b; De Bary 1998; Lee 2002; Ackerly 2005) claim that although these values are not compatible with the notions of Western democracy, they are still democratic by their very nature. These ideas have been criticised on the grounds that “proving” the democratic underpinnings of Asian values by referring to Asia's ancient texts is disingenuous: nearly anything can be “proven about pro-democratic ideas using this method” (Kausikan 1998: 17; Hood 1998).

The third strand, which has attracted less criticism, searches for links between Asia's economic development and Asian values (Ahn and Kang 2002; Apodaca 2002; Hampden-Turner and Trompenaars 2001; Han 1999; Kim 1997).

The fourth strand rejects the cultural authenticity of Asian values (Thompson 2001: 159; Zakaria 2002) by arguing that they “are not especially Asian by any significant sense” (Sen 1997a: 30; Ramos-Horta 1998). Therefore, economic reforms in East Asian countries are more about “sociocultural engineering” than Confucian cultural heritage (Kwon 2007; Milner 2000).

Some caveats to the Asian values discourse should be highlighted, relating to the heterogeneous, intricate, and evolving nature of Asian culture, which creates deep diversities within the region. The diversities in the region regarding political structures (from totalitarian regimes to parliamentary democracy), social structures (from advanced industrial societies to developing economies), and religious traditions (Buddhism, Taoism, Hinduism, Shintoism, Catholicism, and Islam) are very much alive (Yung 2012: 268; Foot 1997; Mauzy 1997; Schwentker 1998; Sen 1999; Thompson 2004). There is also great ethnic diversity within and between Asian countries. Additionally, there are value differences between Asian countries compared to West. As Welzel (2011) states, relying on the World Values Survey, “Asian countries do not cluster in a homogeneous group in opposition to the West.’” Therefore, it is not easy to capture the essence of Asian values in a single document since those values “are breathing cultural forces, too subtle, too slippery” (Sheridan 1999: 295). Moreover, they are continuously remodelled, re-imagined, and re-appropriated.

Ignoring such caveats and using Asian values and Confucian values interchangeably brings up another problem: Asian values, even from a Confucian perspective, could not even cover East Asia, let alone Asia as a whole. Even the big-name advocates of this discourse – former Singaporean prime minister Lee Kuan Yew and former Malaysian prime minister Mahathir Mohamad – have addressed this. Although Lee advocated Confucian values rather than Asian values, he added that “there are Hindu values, Muslim values, Buddhist values” in addition to Confucian values and “even among Confucians there are differences” (Barr 2002: 3). Similarly, Mohamad's Asian values proposal did not really aim to cover the whole region; rather he “put in a lot of effort in convincing the Malays to adopt these virtues as their own, in order to be differentiated from the West” (Hoon 2004: 158). Adopting or claiming Confucian values, from this perspective, would also be problematic in Muslim societies such as Malaysia and Indonesia. Claiming that Confucian values are “Asian values” would be an overgeneralisation and oversimplification of the diversities and complexities of Asian culture, which would also be a misrepresentation of realities (Yung 2012: 269).

Confucianism in Asian values discourse is more of a shared cultural heritage attributed to the economic miracles of Japan, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, and Hong Kong aiming to forge, at least, a comparable Asian alternative to Western modernisation (Xu 2005; Blondel and Inoguchi 2006; Chen 2008; Henders 2010). Such heritage includes “the importance of family, concern for virtues and ethics, the primacy of the group over the individual, emphasis on unity or harmony, hard work, thrift, and the importance of education” in addition to consensus-oriented political decision making, commitment to economic growth, and the importance of strong government (Park and Shin 2006: 343; Robison 1996: 310-311). Nevertheless, this article will accept Asian values as they are commonly understood: with reference to the “shared” Confucian heritage in Southeast Asia.

A Subcategorisation of Asian Values: Paving the Way for Regional Communities

By merging the first and third approaches above, this article aims to reveal two dominant dimensions of Asian values: psychological (cultural/intellectual) and pragmatic (economic/commercial). These two dimensions operate both independently and complementarily. The crux of the psychological dimension goes back to the German thinkers’ unique German Kultur arguments developed against the democratisation trend in Britain, France, and the United States (Duara 2001: 114). These arguments of the nineteenth century asserted Imperial Germany's separate path (Sonderweg from the other industrial nations. They were also presented as a source of national pride. German Kultur proponents claimed that industrialisation does not necessarily lead to democratisation, the latter of which was alien to German culture. The Kultur discourse also put forward a “stereotyped contrast between ‘us’ and ‘them’” (Thompson 2001: 159; Glaab, Weidenfeld, and Weigl 2010). Departing from these arguments, the psychological dimension emphasises East Asia's “distinct cultural value system” almost as a reaction to Western values (Du 1916). Therefore, it is an intellectual effort to emphasise East Asia's cultural peculiarities in order to create “cultural particularisation” (Thompson 200: 662). As Poon and Hood argue, Asian values favour particular Asian ways of managing conflicts and the communitarian aspects of Asian culture. These traditional Asian virtues, as in German Kultur, are contrasted with the decadence of the West.

Similar to Kultur arguments, Asian values provided “a presentation of ‘Asia’ built to serve certain Asian leaders’ interests in domestic politics.” One of them is to strengthen national identity. Similar to how Kultur discourse stressed “Germanness” “against regional identities in Germany, common ‘Asianness’ is emphasised over cultural difference in multi-ethnic Malaysia and Singapore” (Thompson 2001: 159).

Malaysian and Singaporean statements of the 1970s, perhaps as a result of the increasing influence of Southeast Asia, which coincided with weakening Chinese and Indian political leadership in the region in the 1960s, underlined the psychological dimension (Acharya 2010: 1008–1009). These statements put forward a theoretical value set, stressing Asian unity, as a means of cementing multi-ethnic nations (Berger 1997: 269–270). The statements stressed that Asian values were not only unique but “better” than their Western equivalents. Lee defined Western values as infectious in his speech on National Day in 1978 and said that the “antidote” should be the “strong assertion of the Asian values common to all Singapore's ethnic groups” and that “the virtues of individual subordination to the community […] counteracted] the disruptive individualism of Western liberalism” (Zakaria 1994: 113–118; Brown 1994: 64).

With the end of the Cold War, the psychological narrative of Asian values transformed once again, this time into an expression of confidence, pride, and empowerment as regards being “Asian” and being different from, or even opposing, the West. Lee and Mohamad often argued that these values had invigorated Asia and had paved the way for the East Asian miracle (Hoon 2004: 154). Mohamad (2000) stated that “the threat of Asian domination of the world in the twenty-first century was becoming more and more real.”

These statements found audience in the West. Some economists, in particular, supported Lee's and Mohamad's arguments that the economic development in Japan, Korea, Hong Kong, and Taiwan was due to their distinct sociocultural characteristics that challenged Euro-American culture (Berger 1987: 5; MacFarquhar 1980: 67–71). In this sense, Asian values fit into constructivist claims à la Hellman – namely, that Asians see themselves as a distinct group.

With the 1990s, the psychological aspect gained more attention. Relying on Confucian traditional values, proponents of Asian values discourse re-emphasised Asian cultural “supremacy” over the West (Chan 1998: 35, 37–38). Here, Confucianism was used as a politico-cultural linchpin to hold East Asian countries together despite their diversity (Chan 1998: 35, 37–38). The psychological dimension signified “Asianisation”

and a de-Westernisation of Asia at least on “social, moral, and political matters” (Fitzgerald 1997: 45–46). The “Asianisation” underscored shared norms and meanings, which, as Yoshimatsu (2009) has argued, could contribute to the essence of Southeast Asian identity.

The psychological dimension also reveals a deep-seated anxiety among the proponents of Asian values discourse. They proposed Asian values as an ideological bulwark against the dangers posed by Western-style capitalism, which is conceptualised as the “other.” Yet the same “other” was very much within the Asian “self,” as one of the results of rapid East Asian modernisation in the 1970s and 1980s (Huat 1998). Therefore, this dimension also reflects some Asian leaders’ concerns over the prospect of impending rootlessness. As Lee stated in an interview, “we have left the past behind, and there is an underlying unease that there will be nothing left of us which is part of the old” (Zakaria 1994: 126).

The pragmatic dimension is linked to Southeast Asia's economic and commercial relations, especially in terms of the region's openness to transregional economic and trade schemes. This dimension encourages “regional allegiances across a broad swath of East and Southeast Asia” via “a network of transnational capital flows” (Callahan 2012: 50). In other words, the psychological and the pragmatic dimensions operate, or seem to operate, as independent spheres.

The pragmatic dimension gives special insight into Southeast Asia's recovery from the 1997 Asian Crisis. To some commentators, the crisis was Asian values’ “death knell” (The CQ Researcher 1998: 629). Francis Fukuyama claimed that the crisis punctured “the idea of Asian exceptionalism” (Fukuyama 1998: 27). The pragmatic dimension, at this point, unearthed the significance of interdependence for Southeast Asian societies, which relied on the collectivist-individualist dualism of cross-cultural psychology (Schwartz and Ros 1995). Culturally, Asians supposedly have interdependent personalities, in contrast to the Westerners’ independent personalities (Markus and Kitayama 1998), which helped open up transregional interaction channels by encouraging Asian and non-Asian actors to cooperate in terms of goods, services, and information towards regional economic development. In a pragmatic sense, this interdependence increased the number of ties between Asian and non-Asian actors and strengthened the quality of commercial relationships.

Southeast Asian multilateral schemes give a good depiction of how the psychological and pragmatic elements cooperate. Asian multilateralism, as exemplified by the “ASEAN Way,” operates through a “flexible engagement” and the pursuit of “enhanced interaction” to promote regional peace and stability by establishing politico-security dialogue and cooperation (Narine 2002: 31–33; Haacke 1999; Loke 2005). To maintain the Confucian harmony, Asian multilateral schemes – for instance, the International Organization of Securities Commissions, the International Associations of Insurance Supervisors, and the International Accounting Standards Board – keep their focus narrow and usually limit the number of their members, as demonstrated by the membership of the ASEAN Free Trade Area and the 2002 ASEAN–China Free Trade Area framework agreement.

The psychological dimension supports Confucian harmony through “regional multipolarity” (Zhao 1997: 183), which considers Asia to be a big family where a “long” and “coherent cultural tradition” unifies “cultural cleavages and social schisms” (Tai 1989: 6–7). This engenders the multitude of multilateral schemes with overlapping memberships. The pragmatic dimension complements this by influencing Southeast Asian actors’ nationalist tendencies (Zhao 1997: 189). Although Southeast Asian nationalism resists “assimilation through foreign cultures” and emphasises “independence and autonomy,” the pragmatic dimension makes regional actors interpret intra-/extraregional multilateral schemes as “a ‘vehicle of modernisation’” (Hefele, Merkle, and Sturm 2013). Such pragmatic influence understates Southeast Asian actors’ conflicting national interests in their relations within or outside of the region. In this way, they can operate more in harmony and alignment, less in conflict and antagonism.

The review of these two dimensions so far shows that although Asian values were utilised by some Asian leaders to cover their “undemocratic” governing principles, they also have an intellectual depth. Asian values discourse is more of a postcolonial politico-cultural project to identify East and Southeast Asia through “authentic” common values. As Mahbubani (1995: 104) reformulated it, the task of Asian values is an attempt by Asians to “work out social, political, and philosophical norms that best capture their peoples’ aspirations.” The values may evince antiWestern aspects but

they are much more to do with an internal Asian debate about the nature of the good life, about regional community, about the dynamics of modernisation, about whether modernisation means Westernisation, about the civic dimensions of life, about the reconciliation of indigenous traditions with new cosmopolitan dynamics, and about the challenges of globalisation. (Sheridan 1999: 2–3)

These two dimensions operate in Southeast Asia's regional affairs both independently and complementarily. The psychological aspect claims the exclusiveness and distinctiveness of Southeast Asia by focusing on Confucian commonalities through an intellectual/theoretical process. Although it is not easy to say that Confucianism is a main common value in the region, it has specific features particular to Asia that underscore the exclusiveness of the region. The pragmatic aspect discards this exclusiveness and opens channels for non-Asians to align with Southeast Asians in the commercial sphere. These two dimensions also complement each other regarding the quality and the efficiency of these transregional multilateral alignments. The psychological element maintains that these alignments operate via Southeast Asia's distinctive cultural features and the pragmatic element complements this by keeping the channels of commercial interdependence open for non-Asians via an inclusive, flexible, and less nationalistic understanding.

The exclusiveness brought about by the psychological element helps cement a regional identity for Southeast Asian actors. In this sense, Asian values could create norms that constitute a sense of we-ness.” The exclusionism of the psychological element also creates a notion of otherness. As Poon claims, this otherness acts as a centripetal force intensifying the consciousness of regional identity, and as Wendt claims, it consolidates identity within group.

The complementarity between psychological and pragmatic dimensions influences Southeast Asian identity via institutions/regional communities. The psychological element underscores shared norms and meanings, important for founding and sustaining regional institutions. The pragmatic dimension facilitates the formation of intra-/interregional organisations/institutions by transnational capital flows, and regional allegiances. With these institutions, Asian values formulate “strikingly similar alternatives to accepted forms of social and political development as a means of crafting a positive identity” (Jenco 2013: 256–257) for Southeast Asia.

Although the discourse has lost its original heat, Asian values have not completely vanished from the literature. Over the last decade, they have been discussed in terms of political, economic, and security relationships between nation-states in the Asia-Pacific as constituting a form of community (Levine 2007). Additionally, their contribution to East Asia's rapid economic growth on micro- and macro-levels has been covered (Adams and Vernon 2007), and their place in Confucian narratives has been addressed from a constructivist critique (Tamaki 2007). Furthermore, their influence on human rights in Asia (Avonius and Kingsbury

2008) and on history, civics, and social studies curricula in Singapore in particular (Chia 2011; Han 2007) has also been taken up, along with their potential to be a model for development (Elgin 2010), their compatibility with good governance and modernisation (Yung 2012), their effect on neoliberal state discourses in Malaysia and Singapore (Ambikaipaker 2015), and their relevance for democratic citizenship (Knowles 2015).

ASEAN Identity: A Case for Linking Asian Values to Southeast Asian Identity?

Debates on regional community building in Asia over the last few decades have focused on “collective identity formation and informal/soft regionalism” (Beeson and Stubbs 2012: 19; Acharya 2011; Katzenstein 2005). These debates proclaim a “non-legalistic style of decision making,” in which “there is no transfer of national authority to a supranational” body, which is known as the “ASEAN Way” or “soft institutionalism.” Asian community building in this sense relies on “discreetness, informality, pragmatism, consensus building, and non-confrontational bargaining styles” (Beeson and Stubbs 2012: 19; Acharya 1997: 329). It also “reflects, to some extent, the illiberal underpinnings of the ‘Asian values’ construct” (Acharya 2002: 27–28). Asian values act as an informal process to homologise perceptions and interests of members of the community and help to consolidate the regional identity. This informality enables smoother cooperation for regional communities (Acharya and Johnston 2007: 268–270).

Asian values’ influence on Southeast Asian identity is more of a contribution via constituting social norms. As Wendt (1992: 417) claims, learning how to cooperate

is at the same time a process of reconstructing [the] interests in terms of shared commitments to social norms, which will tend to transform a positive interdependence of outcomes.

Asian values “can free” Southeast Asian actors “from the debilitating burden of self-interested, competitive state relations.” This

interdependence and a common destiny can eventually transcend egotistical state identities and forge a group identity that will, in turn, fashion new norms that establish an alternative pattern of interests, displacing older, more restrictive identities. (Jones and Smith 2007: 173)

This makes the region “so closely connected in political, economic, social, and ecological terms that it is impossible to consider one state's fate independently from another” (Beeson and Stubbs 2012: 132). This type of socialisation is one of the keystones of Southeast Asian community building.

Regional identity “has been widely perceived as a prerequisite for the creation of regional communities” (Kim and Jhee 2008: 158). In that process of creation, regional identity operates as “a set of social and political values and principles” that a region's members recognise as theirs either individually or as something in common with nearby states (Cerutti 2003: 27; Bruter 2005: 102). The importance of Southeast Asian identity for community building fits into the constructivist tradition, which emphasises “how ideational factors – norms and identity – [not only have] led to regional peace, stability, and order, but also [.] possess transformative potential” to create a “normative community” governed by shared understandings of appropriate behaviour (Nesadurai 2009; Acharya 2001; Busse 1999; Kivimaki 2001).

Southeast Asian identity puts forward a pan-Asian unity, which refuses the domination of Asian giants – Japan and China – or “American-led globalisation and a developing unilateral world system” (Saaler and Szpilman 2011). Asian values proponents put forward a socio-economic, psychological, and intellectual basis for the construction of this identity. Southeast Asian identity represents a regional consciousness, which enhances regional community building, and the regional communities enhance Southeast Asian identity. Asian values, in this interaction, could construct the norms on which regional identity could be based.

Difficulties of an ASEAN Identity in Practice

Perhaps one of the clearest examples of creating a Southeast Asian identity within a regional community format is ASEAN. ASEAN identity is also a meaningful example to show how regional communities and regional identities interact. It is openly declared in the Vision 2020 document presented in December 1997 in Kuala Lumpur that ASEAN envisions all of Southeast Asia “to be, by 2020, an ASEAN community conscious of its ties of history, aware of its cultural heritage, and bound by a common regional identity.”

Yet the document did not propose a clear path to achieving this ambitious demand. The Vision document was followed at the Fourth ASEAN Informal Summit, from 22 to 25 November 2000 in Singapore, by the Initiative for ASEAN Integration. The initiative intended to focus “collective efforts to narrow the development gap within [.] and between ASEAN and other parts of the world.” At the Phnom Penh Summit¹, the initiative was approved with series of projects addressing four priority areas: infrastructure development, information and communication technology, human resource development, and the promotion of regional economic integration. Although it looks like the initiative mostly focuses on economic development for regional integration, it also emphasises social solidarity (Jones 2004: 142) among ASEAN members.

ASEAN Summit Meeting, 4 November, 2002, Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

The Vision document and the initiative show that ASEAN's regional identity focuses on both states and citizens. ASEAN member states’ efforts towards creating such an identity are not enough. ASEAN citizens also need to feel that they are a part of a regional community that transcends their national identity. This requires a cultural, not a national, understanding of citizenship (see, Rosaldo 1994), by which citizens of ASEAN states would classify themselves as belonging to a distinct social environment and sharing common ground with citizens of other ASEAN states. Asian values could provide this sociocultural common ground.

Yet the sociocultural contribution of Asian values may still not be sufficient to fully achieve ASEAN's regional identity goal, especially in practice. A clear reason is the cultural diversification within the ASEAN community. Surin Pitsuvan, Thai foreign minister and later secretary-general of ASEAN, stated that this diversity has become a problem, or a weakness, for ASEAN, saying,

We have no freedom and flexibility to express our views concerning some members. We have to be silent because we are members of the family. This is not fair, not just. (Pitsuvan 1998)

This is aggravated by translocalised identities emerging from ethnic groups that are spread across national borders (Toyota 2003: 302; Evans, Hutton, and Eng 2000). This creates a “confusing and conflicting nature of boundaries” (Jones 2004: 148). To address this very issue, in 2008 the ASEAN Secretariat released One Vision, One Identity, and One Caring and Sharing Community (ASEAN Secretariat 2008). However, “problematic” diversity cannot be easily overcome by new ASEAN documents, initiatives, or even by Asian values and cultural citizenship. The member states and citizens need to understand and appreciate this diversity and accept that the unity must occur within this diversity. There is still quite a ways to go on this front. Due to the multicultural and multi-ethnic aspects of the ASEAN region, ASEAN citizens still do not share a sense of “ASEAN-ness” (Thomson and Thainthai 2008; Wadsorn 2012). Therefore, ASEAN identity is still “evolving” and “developing” on the state and citizen level.

This evolution and development is not completely hassle-free, either. The ASEAN identity is contested in regards to at least four aspects: its definition (what are its defining characteristics?), its measurement (with what type of quantitative methodology could we measure identity?), its causation and correlation (is identity independent or dependent, and on what grounds?), and its identification and delineation (how to identify and delineate identity in order to better understand its nature, nuances, and complexities?) (see, Acharya and Layug 2013).

In addition to the problems of identity, there are even more significant restrictions on ASEAN identity in practice. One major hindrance is the conflicts and tensions within ASEAN. There are anti-regime ethnic, political, and ideological struggles within some ASEAN member states (Thailand, Myanmar, and Cambodia); there are territorial conflicts between some ASEAN members (between Malaysia and the Philippines over Sabah, along with border disputes between Thailand and Malaysia and Thailand and Myanmar), and there are other continuing antagonisms between some states (e.g. Singapore–Malaysian relations after the 1997 Financial Crisis, and Thai–Cambodian relations in light of each claiming the Preah Vihar Temple). There are also tensions caused by the increasing arms race among Southeast Asian countries. These all impair the mutual political trust among ASEAN members, which is essential for identity building (Rüland 2000: 431). The rise of China and India also hinders ASEAN identity's practicability. ASEAN members are divided on interpreting China's rise: some see it as an opportunity, some as a threat (Ba 2009; Ravenhill 2006; Tsunekawa 2009; Beeson 2010). The rise of China and India has increased economic vulnerabilities in ASEAN due to asymmetrical interdependence (Acharya and Layug 2013). Last but not least, there is not much community-mindedness among ASEAN members when it comes to pandemics, natural disasters, and terrorism (Caballero-Anthony 2008: 201; Glover and Jessup 1999).

Another significant hindrance to the creation of a common ASEAN identity is the requirement to wrap up the various national identities of ASEAN citizens within a regionally imagined community. This is necessary to integrate the masses into the ASEAN identity, which has thus far been more of a discussion among ASEAN elites. Since such a melding is difficult to achieve even at the national level, it is not clear how to achieve it at the heavily multicultural ASEAN level (see, Acharya and Layug 2013; Anderson 1991; Brown 2006). There is also a similar problem arising from the political heterogeneity in the ASEAN region. ASEAN identity sees converting Southeast Asian regimes into democracies as a central and legitimate goal. The issue here is how to transform ASEAN into a “democratic entity” and how much the non-democratic member would support it (Sukma 2008: 137–140). Even on paper it is problematic, since the final ASEAN Charter written by the High-Level Task Force made reference to democracy (and human rights) only in “general” terms. Democracy is “generally” necessary to “enhance good governance and the rule of law, and to promote and protect human rights and fundamental freedoms.” Yet, the charter did not “explain how these goals might be pursued, or what, if anything, will happen to the members that do not pursue them” (Sukma 2008: 141). Thus, one of the major goals of ASEAN identity is still not too solid.

ASEAN Identity: Forging a Normative Understanding with the Help of Asian Values?

These difficulties in the practicability of ASEAN identity lead us to ask about a normative, or even theoretical understanding of ASEAN identity. Could a normative understanding be more useful than a practical one, at least at this stage? From the normative/theoretical angle, ASEAN identity could rest on three elements:

the ASEAN Way (informal, non-legalistic, consensus-based, process-driven diplomacy), ideas (e.g. “One Southeast Asia,” ASEAN Community, [peace, and prosperity]), and norms (both substantive and procedural, as well as legal political and sociocultural). (Ba 2009: 225; Acharya and Layug 2013)

Asian values could be useful particularly in terms of constituting these norms. ASEAN does not completely disavow normative identity building. The ASEAN Socio-Cultural Community Blueprint (2009–2015) stated that the ASEAN community would reflect a collective personality, norms, values and beliefs, and aspirations. The “Master Plan” for the ASEAN Socio-Cultural Community (2009–2015) reiterated that ASEAN would mainstream and promote greater awareness and common values in the spirit of unity-in-diversity at all levels of society.

Norms are unquestionably the foremost element of a normative identity formulation. ASEAN subjects (states/NGOs/citizens) should feel they have “common” norms rather than be arbitrarily wrapped up within a regional imagined community. Asian values could provide a basis for the constitution of these norms, particularly in the sociocultural sphere in terms of emphasising the significance of the Confucian family – the notions of trust and filial piety and the importance of the common good (Tu 1991; Mohamad 1989; Ikels 2004) – for creating a community of harmony and peace; for respecting the authority of the developmental state, which is responsible for maintaining not only economic growth but also social harmony in multi-ethnic and multi-religious societies (Chu et al. 2008; Xu 2005; Zakaria 1994; Hsu 1975) through a father figure (Mohamad and Ishihara 1995); for the significance of education and hard work, which relies on the “Confucian faith in the betterment of the human condition through individual effort” (Tu 1996: 33); and for regional multi-polarity (Zhao 1997: 183), which enables Southeast Asian actors to be in several overlapping alliances/alignments at the same time.

The ASEAN Way, as the other element, signifies an informal/forum-style multilateral diplomacy. This enables ASEAN to keep its members together not via a rigid organisational structure but through soft regionalism. It does not ask members to transfer their national authority to a supranational body. Therefore, it is more about a “normative” sense of an organisational scheme facilitating cooperation and collaboration among ASEAN members without strictly controlling them with a rigid acquis communautaire.

Ideas, another major element, are not as essential as norms, but they can be complementary. Peace and prosperity have been the two main ideas of the ASEAN community since 1967. “One Southeast Asia” and regional resilience (Ba 2009) are the other two important ideational mottos. These are reiterated in Vision 2020, in the Bali ConcordII in 2003, and also in the Bali Concord III in 2011. To what extent these ambitious ideational mottos have been absorbed by ASEAN members is still unknown (Nischalke 2002: 109–110). Norms, on the other hand, are not this ambitious and demanding. Moreover, they are more specific to Southeast Asia, which makes them easier for ASEAN members to support.

These norms helped ASEAN to overcome initial contestations and reach compromises over the meaning and scope of the legalrational principles [i.e.] respect for national sovereignty, noninterference in another state's domestic affairs and renouncing the threat or use of force in settling disputes. (Acharya and Layug 2013, see, Leifer 1986)

The norms also contribute to the values of ASEAN identity: respect for justice, rule of law, democracy, human rights, regional cooperation, regional resilience, regional autonomy, regional peace, harmony, stability, and prosperity (Acharya and Layug 2013). All of these norms (and some ideas and diplomatic practices) could lay out a normative understanding of ASEAN identity. They do not necessarily intend to radically alter the foreign and domestic policy interests of ASEAN member states/NGOs or their citizens’ sense of national belonging. Therefore, norms have the potential to lead ASEAN members to congregate around a regional identity.

Conclusion

This article is somewhat optimistic about regional-identity formation in Southeast Asia. Although Southeast Asian identity has several complications in its practical apprehension, a normative posture seems attainable. One significant strand in the literature on Southeast Asian identity, led by Amitav Acharya, focuses on the importance of norms. Relying on this, this article aimed to reconceptualise Asian values under two headings (cultural and commercial) and discussed their prospective influence on Southeast Asian identity via their potential to constitute norms specific to Southeast Asia.

The influence of norms on identities is a frequent theme of constructivists. They claim that imagined communities are significant because they create a sense of belonging essential for regional identities. Norms foster this via regional interactions and interdependencies, as the politics of faith underscores. In these interactions and interdependencies, norms have an independent effect on states’ collective interests and behaviour. With these collective interests and modus operandi, norms create a notion of we-ness, which also forges a sense of otherness. They both act as a centripetal force, intensifying regional identity.

Due to the active interplay between values and norms, Asian values could be significant for Southeast Asian identity. They emphasise a communitarian ethic and act as an informal process to homogenise Southeast Asian actors’ perceptions and interests, which indirectly consolidates regional identity. Asian values play down self-interested and competitive state relations, and forge a group identity in order to make the region closely connected in various aspects.

A case study of ASEAN identity shows how Asian values contribute to a normative sense of Southeast Asian identity. Due to the complications and diversity within the ASEAN community, it has not been easy to achieve an ASEAN identity that functions in practice. Yet a normative formulation requires ASEAN members to share norms rather than be arbitrarily “wrapped up” within an imagined regional community. An Asian values-oriented normative Southeast Asian identity is not a challenge to the policies, perceptions, and/or national belongings of ASEAN's actors. Therefore, these values have the potential to assemble these actors around a Southeast Asian identity.

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