Association Of Southeast Asian Nations States Research Articles

Civil Society Perspectives on Rights and Freedoms in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations

Abstract This pan-regional analysis of non-governmental organisations’ (NGO) perspectives on the contemporary factors which constrain or repress civil society in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) is based on United Nations’ Universal Periodic Review (UPR) data. It shows that, paradoxically, whilst the majority of ASEAN states have ratified the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) that upholds civil society’s political role in promoting rights and democracy, this is inimical to the region’s political elites who regard civil society’s primary function as non-political delivery of social welfare and development. This disjuncture results in repression, performativity, and legitimation. The UPR data reveal an ever-shrinking civil space. Civil society, including human rights defenders (HRD s), faces a raft of rights pathologies, including threats, violence and murder—as well as increasing state restrictions on freedom of association and expression. This is compounded by impunity for offenders, corruption, and government inaction following earlier UPR recommendations.

ASEAN as network governance: An alternative lens to evaluate policymaking and performance

Background: This article offers a new perspective of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) as network governance (NG) using the policy network theory (PNT) for the analysis. Methods: Two case studies were selected from the ASEAN Community to examine the applicability and effectiveness of NG in promoting ASEAN cooperation. These case studies were chosen due to their prominence and the prevalence of critical comments about their effectiveness in promoting cooperation. The content analysis utilised primary data from ASEAN reports, documents, research articles and processes, and studies on NG and policy networks. A literature review was conducted using online academic databases and ASEAN-related websites. The search covered the period from June 2019 to March 2021, with further searches conducted between January and July 2023. These data collection efforts provided a robust analysis of the case studies within the NG and ASEAN integration contexts. Results: The findings show ASEAN as a hybrid structure which has supported its survival and relevance. This approach provides legitimacy for ASEAN globally by purposefully adopting structures similar to the EU without the supranational elements. It also showcases ASEAN’s motivation for asserting its centrality. Adopting a hybrid structure has led to ASEAN's soft institutionalisation, driven by its norms and characterised by a less empowered secretariat, where the member states are the decision-makers and implementors of policies. It opens a pathway to recognising ASEAN states’ autonomy, where the actors’ will and interests affect decision-making and defines performance. Conclusions: This article demonstrates NG's viability in promoting ASEAN's centrality in regional cooperation and institutional arrangements and allows for a nuanced assessment of its performance considering the context of the issue and ASEAN's history and emphasising the member states' primacy in policymaking. The NG framework contributes to ASEAN’s legitimacy, regional cooperation and performance despite its inherent limitations.

How Canada's Indo-Pacific strategy conflicts with ASEAN's outlook on the Indo-Pacific

Despite giving lip service to the importance of respecting the “centrality” of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), Canada's Indo-Pacific strategy (CIPS) conflicts with the ASEAN Outlook on the Indo-Pacific (AOIP). Instead, Canada defines its position in the Indo-Pacific through the lens of American priorities and perspectives. For its part, the AOIP expresses an ASEAN consensus position but fails to capture the highly complex and varied views of different ASEAN states toward the US and China. The ASEAN states are status-quo powers navigating a region that is undergoing profound strategic and economic changes. By allying itself so firmly with the US, Canada participates in sowing tension in the Indo-Pacific and may face potential consequences in the longer term. CIPS allows little room for the complex regional relations that the ASEAN states are trying to balance.

Examining the roles of labour standards, economic complexity, and globalization in the biocapacity deficiency of the ASEAN countries

ABSTRACT With Singapore currently the world’s most natural capital (biocapacity) deficit alongside four other Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) countries having varying degree of ecological deficit, i.e. Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Thailand, it then offers a clear justification for a more scrutiny of the ASEAN states’ ecological footprint dynamics. To provide more insight on the drivers of ecological footprint in the overall panel and for each of the above-mentioned countries, the roles of economic complexity, average working hours, labour productivity, labour income share, and globalization were examined by employing the Dynamic Ordinary Least Squares Mean Group (DOLSMG) alongside the recently developed (non)time-variant Granger causality approaches. For the overall panel, the DOLSMG approach established that labour productivity, labour income share, and globalization reduce the biocapacity deficit by improving ecological quality while economic complexity worsen the region’s environmental quality. Additionally, in the overall panel, there is Granger causality evidence from the average working hour, labour income share, labour productivity, globalization, and economic complexity to ecological footprint. Moreover, the results of the two Granger causality approaches are unanimous in evidence. For instance, average working hours per year is a significant causal of ecological footprint in all the sampled countries at varying periods. Specifically, there are Granger causalities: from labour productivity to ecological footprint in Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand; from globalization to ecological footprint in Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand; from economic complexity to ecological footprint in Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand, all at varying times.

Beyond Effectiveness

Abstract Why do Southeast Asian states use regional mechanisms for disaster relief? From a conventional functionalist perspective, inadequate domestic-level responses to emergencies create a demand for scaled-up governance. This article offers an alternative interpretation of disaster cooperation in Southeast Asia. Drawing on theoretical insights from comparative regionalism and critical disaster studies, it argues that the raison d’être of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Coordinating Centre for Humanitarian Assistance on Disaster Management (AHA Centre) is to empower ASEAN states vis-à-vis extraregional humanitarian actors. The AHA Centre works to enable Member States to gatekeep intrusive extraregional aid and, ultimately, to transform authority relations in the international humanitarian system in favor of state actors that have traditionally found themselves in a peripheral and passive role.

China's outward foreign direct investment in Southeast Asia: Analyzing the Chinese state's strategies and potential influence

AbstractThrough a comparative study of China's global and regional outward foreign direct investment (OFDI), this article seeks to understand the Chinese state's motives behind such investment, and how it leverages its OFDI to influence the regional economy in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). The analysis reveals several findings. First, the status of ASEAN states in China's global OFDI project have changed in the last decade from destinations for infrastructure investment to essential manufacturing hubs. The launch of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) did, in part, allow for this shift, insofar as it diversified the financial channels that facilitate the region's infrastructure development, thereby enabling China to concentrate its OFDI on manufacturing and service linkages throughout the region. Second, whereas China originally directed the majority of its OFDI to low‐income ASEAN countries, after 2013, it began to direct greater levels of OFDI to middle and high‐income ASEAN countries. This shift did not necessarily grant China greater influence in those countries owing to the much more inward FDI from other developed economies, while China has continued to leverage its OFDI in low‐income ASEAN countries to great effect. Third, China might enjoy greater influence in the infrastructure and manufacturing sectors in the region given its greater investment in these two sectors, as compared to that of other developed countries. China's influence in the regional service industry, meanwhile, continues to be less noteworthy, comparatively.

The Mekong Subregional Cooperation Framework: A Geopolitical Dilemma and the Ways Forward

The Mekong Subregional Cooperation Framework:A Geopolitical Dilemma and the Ways Forward Charadine Pich (bio) In the current environment of regional security architecture dynamics, complex geopolitical dilemmas, and the congestion of subregional cooperation mechanisms, the Mekong is no longer just a river but also a core ground for competition in a broader context for power play among the major powers. Some observers have even highlighted that the issue of Mekong geopolitics could follow the trajectory of the South China Sea disputes in the near future if it is not taken seriously. For the riparian states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), successfully managing geopolitical contestation over the river and its resources is of critical importance. ASEAN and the Mekong: A Diverging Path? The Mekong River (known as the Lancang in China) begins in the Tibetan Plateau and passes through China, Myanmar, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia, and Vietnam before joining the South China Sea. The Mekong basin is one of the most biodiverse areas in the world, sustaining around sixty-six million people. This figure amounts to 10% of ASEAN's total population and includes "most of the population of Laos and Cambodia, one-third of Thailand's sixty-five million, and one-fifth of Vietnam's ninety million people."1 At stake in the river's management are issues such as water sharing, dams and hydroelectricity production, fisheries, irrigation, environmental conservation, and climate change mitigation. The ASEAN countries are mostly divided into two camps over issues pertaining to the river: mainland Southeast Asia and maritime Southeast Asia. States in the former put the Mekong River among their top priorities because of the river's importance to the livelihoods of their people as well as their vulnerability to changes in the water flow from upstream by virtue of residing in the Lower Mekong region. States in the latter group, on the other hand, do not have a share of the river and consider issues regarding [End Page 57] the Mekong not primarily as security concerns but more in terms of their technical and environmental aspects. The troubles over the Mekong River have been largely viewed through an environmental and socioeconomic lens and seen as affecting only the mainland countries of ASEAN rather than ASEAN as a whole. Hence, the river's linkages with the region's broader security and geopolitical considerations have been given less attention. In contrast, although not all ASEAN member states are claimants in the South China Sea disputes, this particular issue is largely considered a wider security dilemma in the broader region of Southeast Asia and beyond and a major threat to regional peace, security, and stability. Although it might not be entirely fair to compare Mekong geopolitics to those of the South China Sea, there is no better approach to understand the Mekong security dilemma than to look at it through that benchmark. The disputes have been widely regarded as an alarming security threat for all of Southeast Asia that could jeopardize regional peace and security if not cautiously monitored. This risk is due to the diverse military presence and, to a certain extent, the arms race surrounding the area. While the Mekong security dilemma has not yet warranted this same level of heightened concern, many regional analysts are cautious of unprecedented trends in the Mekong given the increasing involvement of external actors and development partners alike. The Mekong issue has not yet attained a regional status or posed "alarming" threats that encourage discussions at the regional level among all the ASEAN member states or priority placement on any existing ASEAN agenda. In fact, Vietnam tried to slot the Mekong agenda into the wider discourse within ASEAN platforms during its 2020 chairmanship but found "very limited success."2 In part, this omission was due to the Covid-19 outbreak, which disrupted traditional ASEAN practices and shifted regional attention to focus more on public health and economic recovery. Nonetheless, Vietnam's attempt to highlight the Mekong on the ASEAN agenda was met with reservations from both maritime and mainland members. The maritime ASEAN states see Mekong issues as only affecting the mainland states and thus believe they should be dealt with through existing frameworks at the...

The Roadmap to the ASEAN-EU FTA in the Post-Pandemic Era

Relations between the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the European Union (EU) have enriched the multifaceted concept of interregionalism from legal and international relations perspectives. The article argues that the transformative ASEAN-EU frameworks have shaped the Third Interregionalism. Brussels’ building-block approach envisions pathfinder agreements with individual ASEAN states as the basis for the ASEAN-EU FTA, which will help realize the EU’s Indo-Pacific strategy and the ASEAN-EU Strategic Partnership. The designs of the EU’s trade and investment agreements with Singapore and Vietnam are therefore critical. The article assesses core areas such as tariff liberalization and ASEAN cumulative rules of origin, as well as commitments of trade in services and non-tariff barriers in key industries. Contributors to the special issue further analyse cutting-edge issues involving electronic commerce and sustainable development. These on-the-ground insights contribute to a new understanding of ASEAN-EU legal frameworks and evolving interregionalism in the post-pandemic era. ASEAN-EU FTA – CPTPP – Indo-Pacific strategy – Investment Protection – Singapore – RCEP – Sustainable Development – Third Interregionalism – Vietnam

Does air pollution affect clean production of sustainable environmental agenda through low carbon energy financing? evidence from ASEAN countries

This study describes different options regarding financing in low carbon energy sectors and air pollution, which further affect clean production and sustainable environment agenda regarding the Association of southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) states. The purpose of this study is to reduce air pollution and improve environmental production through low carbon energy financing. This study further investigates, which particular country among selected ASEAN states has most affected by air pollution and decrease their energy sources as well as clean productivity level. The findings of this study indicate that transformation toward low carbon energy increased energy efficiency encouraged by all sectors of society in the target countries. It is observed that around 20,000 people have died in South East Asia (SEA) every year due to the polluted air environment among these countries.

The role of ASEAN and its members in promoting the norm of responsible governance of marine biodiversity of areas beyond national jurisdiction

AbstractThis article analyses the potential of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and its members to promote the norm of responsible governance of marine biodiversity of areas beyond national jurisdiction (ABNJ). Based on the literature on international norms, this article suggests that the norm of responsible governance of ABNJ biodiversity will soon reach the point of a norm cascade, after which it will gradually move towards the stage of norm internalization. As such, the norm can have the potential to standardize appropriate behaviour of States. This article examines ASEAN’s norm‐promotion activities within and outside the region that support an improved governance system for ABNJ. Notably, some ASEAN States play an important role both individually and collectively in the development of a new global legal instrument on marine biodiversity of ABNJ. The findings suggest that although the conservation of biodiversity of ABNJ has been the subject of debate for more than a decade, ASEAN’s initiatives to protect marine biodiversity of ABNJ are limited. This is not surprising considering the lack of jurisdiction in ABNJ. Nevertheless, ASEAN’s overall initiatives for conservation of the marine environment are highly relevant for its future role in ABNJ governance because some regional ocean governance norms are transferable in the ABNJ context.

Consigned to hedge: south-east Asia and America's ‘free and open Indo-Pacific’ strategy

Abstract This article assesses how south-east Asian countries and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) have responded to the ‘free and open Indo-Pacific’ (FOIP) strategies promoted by the United States and the other countries in the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (the ‘Quad’: US, Japan, Australia and India). Their nuanced ripostes imply a persistent commitment to hedging and shifting limited alignments in the face of growing great rivalry and the lack of a clear FOIP vision among Quad members. In the face of external pressure to take sides, the ASEAN states are likely to keep hedging through working selectively with China and the United States. Given the United States' apparent preference to balance China and Trump's disregard for multilateralism, ASEAN's ability to maintain its centrality in the evolving regional architecture is in doubt—despite the Quad countries' (belated) accommodation of ASEAN in their FOIP strategies. However, the success of the US strategy depends on Washington's ability to build and sustain the requisite coalition to balance Beijing. ASEAN has undertaken efforts to enhance bilateral security collaboration with China and the United States respectively. In doing so, ASEAN is arguably seeking to informally redefine its centrality in an era of Great Power discord and its ramifications for multilateralism.

The Historical Evolution of ASEAN and Regionalism in Southeast Asia: With a Special Reference to ASEAN’s Role in the Cambodian Conflict (1978-1989)

In 1967, when the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) was established, its members (then Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand; Brunei joined in 1984) found themselves plagued by a wide range of security problems. These included intra-regional conflicts, domestic instability, extra-regional intervention, and latent inter-ethnic tensions. It was not accidental that the ASEAN states as a group of newly independent (with the exception of Thailand, which had never been a colony) developing countries prioritized ‘respect for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of all states’ and ‘non-interference in the affairs of States’. Rather, the commitment of ASEAN members to the principle of the modern Westphalian state system should be understood in the context of the search for internal stability and regime security as newly independent countries engaged in nation-building and state-making. What made ASEAN politico-security regionalism (driven by nation-state centrism) really distinctive were the norms and values which came to be known as the ‘ASEAN Way’, Within the ASEAN Way context, in particular, this article explores ASEAN’s role in the Cambodian conflict (1978-1989) for the purpose of tracing the scope of which it contributed to the consolidation of ASEAN’s norms and principles regarding the way of conflict management in Southeast Asia. Indeed, ASEAN had considered the feasibility of accepting Vietnam (as well as Laos and Cambodia) within its group. However, Vietnam’s invasion of Cambodia in December 1978 undermined an initial idea on the part of ASEAN to include Vietnam within its regional grouping. Therefore, by 1978 the intensifying conflict between Vietnam (supported by the Soviet Union) and Cambodia (backed by China) was a great difficulty to ASEAN for achieving the goal of ‘One Southeast Asia’ concept through including the rest of Southeast Asia. Against this background, this article analyses the creation, evolution and process of ASEAN politico-security regionalism up to the end of Cold War in order to highlight ASEAN’s approach to conflict management in the Cambodian crisis. Key words: Historical Evolution, ASEAN, Regionalism, ASEAN Way, Cambodian Conflict, Southeast Asia DOI : 10.7176/JAAS/58-12 Publication date :November 30 th 2019

Divergence amid Consensus in Southeast Asian Foreign Policy: Roll Call Voting Analysis across International Issues in the United Nations General Assembly (1991–2018)

This paper examines the nature of cohesive patterns of roll call voting behavior across international issues among the 10 member countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA). Existing studies reveal a high level of foreign policy convergence among these countries. By incorporating several international issues, we set out to advance the scholarly understanding of the ASEAN states’ voting convergence in the UNGA. Our bill-level analysis of voting similarity in the post-Cold War period shows that the respective voting patterns vary across issues on arms control and disarmament, colonialism, economic development, human rights, nuclear weapons and nuclear material, as well as the Palestinian conflict. These findings highlight the ideas and interests of Southeast Asian countries across different foreign policy contexts.

A Critique of Legal Protection of China’s Outward Direct Investment in ASEAN – Implications of Guangdong Corporations

As a result of the development of the “One Belt One Road” and the strategy of “Going Out” for multinational enterprises, China’s outward direct investments have grown rapidly. During the transformation period from a capital-importing to a capital-exporting country, issues of legal barriers, investment risks and insufficient investment disputes mechanism on China’s outward investment to Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) have surfaced. Although ASEAN countries and China agreed on further liberalization in investment, the effects of investment agreements and Bilateral Investment Treaties on risk prevention and safeguarding investment interests have rarely been discussed and examined via empirical studies. In examine legal barriers, major investment risks, and investment dispute settlement mechanisms of China’s multinational enterprises in ASEAN States, this study selects 30 state-owned enterprises and private companies among 300 Guangdong businesses, which largely invested in ASEAN via data analyses, surveys, and interviews. Nevertheless, the obstacles in investment treatment and high political risks as a result of outward investment in ASEAN suggest that China’s multinational enterprise should start to seek multiple investment insurance either from Sinosure or the international financial institution, or advancing investment treaties and formulating a “Going-in ” strategy. The findings of this research provide a reference to Chinese multinational enterprises for the investment protection and for the launching of investment litigation of these Chinese multinational enterprises whenever it is required.

China and Southeast Asia: Strategic Interdependence in the Making?

If we had to choose one word to describe the relationship between China and the Southeast Asian states, it would be “asymmetric.” China’s population is 2.2 times the combined population of the ten countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).1 Its GDP is 4.3 times these countries’ combined GDP,2 while its 2017 military expenditure was almost 6 times the amount they spent collectively.3 Some scholars like to use the metaphor of Gulliver and the Lilliputians to compare China and the ASEAN states in world politics.4 The hope is that the Lilliputians can somehow tie up Gulliver if they work together. In the post–Cold War era, the ASEAN states successfully constrained China’s behavior through multilateral institutions, especially the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF). After the 2008 global financial crisis, China’s assertive diplomacy in the South China Sea indeed caused some worries and suspicions in the region. However, the overall relationship between China and the ASEAN states has not fundamentally changed. Since 2013, China has continued its “charm offensive” to woo the ASEAN states with the proposal of the Maritime Silk Road—a massive infrastructure investment project that is part of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). On the one hand, Chinese investments, especially in the infrastructure sector, are largely welcomed in Southeast Asia despite some ups and downs, such as Malaysia’s [End Page 17] cancelation of two BRI-funded projects. The ASEAN states have, on the other hand, kept a nuanced and balanced attitude toward U.S. competition with China. I argue that a relationship of strategic interdependence has taken shape between China and the ASEAN states. Each side views the other as an indispensable actor in pursuing its strategic interests. Although the power asymmetry between China and the ASEAN states makes the latter more vulnerable than the former, the U.S. factor increases the sensitivity of China’s strategic dependence on ASEAN. Multilateral institutions have played a vital role in shaping Chinese-ASEAN relations. The more institutionalized relationship will empower both parties to reduce vulnerability and sensitivity levels in their nascent strategic interdependence in the future.

China's dual strategy of coercion and inducement towards ASEAN

ABSTRACTThis article contributes to the discussion about China's divisive influence on the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). It argues that recent China–ASEAN relations are based on Beijing's successful implementation of a dual strategy of coercion and inducement. The effectiveness of this strategy is tested against the South China Sea disputes – the issue that lies in the core of regional security and a key platform of power display. The article outlines Beijing's recent interaction with individual ASEAN member-states and its implications for the regional multilateral diplomacy. While by no means identical, Beijing's dual strategy of coercion and inducement with individual ASEAN states have resulted in an effective abuse of the ASEAN consensus principle – a tactic often referred to as ‘divide and rule’. Consequently, the group's internal discord has further eroded and affected the institutional confidence of ASEAN. This article draws attention to the psychological effect of coercion as a perception of punishment, and inducement as a perception of reward.

Great Power Dynamics and the Waning of ASEAN Centrality in Regional Security

The regional security architecture in Southeast Asia, arguably even within the broader East Asian region, has largely revolved in the last 25 years around the viability of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) as the driving force behind Southeast Asian (and East Asian) regionalism. Multilateral institutional arrangements established since 1994 had the ASEAN states as their core component, and the “ASEAN way” of conducting foreign affairs as their normative guide. These arrangements were seen as being a critical aspect of maintaining peaceful relations in the region in the face of long standing disputes and historical suspicions. This state of affairs, underpinned by ASEAN's ability to provide the basis for managing regional relations, has now begun to unravel with the intensifying strategic competition between China and the United States. Is the ASEAN‐driven multilateral security architecture sustainable in the face of intensifying great power competition?

Thailand's role in updating ASEAN immigration policy

This research examined how the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) can improve upon the common economic community through the revision of policies related to labor and migration. The literature review suggested that economic prosperity and growth are significantly related to national openness to naturalization and foreign investment. Citizenship laws from all 10 ASEAN states and several other nations were analyzed alongside economic indicators. Within ASEAN, Thailand is considered central to widespread immigration law changes due to its leadership role in the region. Human rights aspects of citizenship and migration were assessed and potential solutions posed for the high incidence of statelessness in Myanmar and Thailand. In order to support consistent, long-term economic growth and protection of human rights, the research recommends various statutory revisions and the implementation of an executive strategic plan to protect alien laborers. For the purposes of developing globally-competitive economies in ASEAN, the research supports expansive access to citizenship by descent, birthright, and by naturalization, with full recognition of multiple citizenship.

Assessing regional cooperation: ASEAN states, migrant worker rights and norm socialization in Southeast Asia

ABSTRACTExisting studies of Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) states’ engagement with migrant worker rights focus on the experience of such workers from gender, labour and security perspectives. As such, these studies are yet to consider the broader impact of migrant worker rights on the process and nature of cooperation between ASEAN members. This article addresses this gap by framing migrant worker rights within the broader human rights socialization ongoing within Southeast Asia, driven by both members of ASEAN and external stakeholders. It argues that, contrary to many existing accounts of norms as creating shared commitments, migrant worker rights have led to considerable contestation, often driven by diverging national approaches to the issue. This article examines the impact of migrant worker rights norms on Thailand, the largest labour-recipient state in ASEAN. It asserts that Thailand’s diverging experience is caused by the lack of norm precision, resulting in the applicatory contestation of such norms.

Legal Implications of the South China Sea Award for Maritime Southeast Asia

Southeast Asia, consisting of the ten Member States of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), has always been a uniquely maritime region. Indeed, its maritime nature has been characterised as the 'first and primary unifying factor of Southeast Asia'. Nine out of the ten ASEAN States are coastal States, with the Philippines and Indonesia being the world's largest archipelagic States. From the 1960s, newly independent Southeast Asian States, free of their colonial heritage, wishing to have control over their ocean resources and bolstered by ongoing negotiations of the Third UN Conference on the Law of the Sea, began to make maritime claims in the waters adjacent to their coasts. However, the congested coastal geography characterised by the presence of 'gulfs that penetrate deeply into the mainland, a multitude of large and small islands and wide and narrow [continental] margins', meant that nearly all Southeast Asian waters were enclosed in overlapping claims of territorial seas, exclusive economic zones (EEZs) and/or continental shelves. These overlaps have generated 'disputes, and even conflicts, that would not have arisen in a diffuse region such as the Southwest and Central Pacific Ocean'. Further, such disputes have been exacerbated by territorial sovereignty disputes over small islands. Despite these challenges, Southeast Asia has been described as the 'scene of very active and innovative ocean boundary diplomacy', and a significant number of maritime boundary delimitation agreements have been concluded.