Imelda Deinla

Imelda Deinla
University of New South Wales, Australia

Patterns of sovereignty and the rule of law in Southeast Asia: Implications for Closer Integration in ASEAN

Abstract:

The ambivalent attitude of state leaders toward ‘legalization’ in ASEAN and aversion to supranational body has been traced from the members’ fear of diminishing their state sovereignty. By contrast, EU members consider the establishment of supranational institutions as a way to preserve their autonomy by placing certain restraints on their sovereignty and pooling some of its aspects with other members. In ASEAN, sovereignty is a fundamental part of regional political practices. The principle of non-intervention, among other norms that comprise the ASEAN Way, represents the most concrete manifestation of the members’ passionate adherence to sovereignty. ASEAN’s institutional form, which is a combination of informal and formal intergovernmental machinery such as the Ministerial Meetings, Secretariat and ad-hoc intergovernmental committees, was not designed in such a way as to challenge the member’s state sovereignty but to protect and strengthen it. Enhancement of sovereign capacity of member states was the primary motivation for establishing ASEAN. ASEAN became the regional instrument by which state sovereignty can be strengthened through observance of the principle of non-interference thus supporting domestic consolidation and capacity building of the members. The paper seeks to explain this ambivalence by reconstructing the function of law and attitudes of member states to the rule of law in Southeast Asian regionalism. It is here argued that the issue has to be located from the historical process of nation-state formation of member states in Southeast Asia which requires an explication of the relationship among the rule of law, sovereignty and the nature of the state in Southeast Asia. The focus of the discussion is on the five original members – Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore and Thailand, and during the formative years of ASEAN. The EU’s experience on legal integration will be used for comparison.

Biographical note:

Imelda Deinla – is a PhD Candidate at the Faculty of Law, University of New South Wales. Her dissertation is a comparative study on the process and development of legal integration in the European Union and ASEAN. She finished her Bachelor of Arts in Political Science and Bachelor of Laws from the University of the Philippines as well as her Master of Laws (LLM-International Law) from the UNSW. She is also a practising attorney in the Philippines and assists in cases involving violence against women.

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