Australia and ASEAN: A Marriage of Convenience?

Abstract

There is no doubt that Australia and ASEAN have developed a productive working relationship over their 40 years of Dialogue Partnership. Their many intersections of engagement—through formal ASEAN processes, free trade agreements (FTAs), memoranda of understanding, and across a range of sectors including education, tourism, cultural heritage, and the arts—have been documented over the last decade.¹ After the Asian Financial Crisis (1997–98), and the formalization of processes such as the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF, 1994), the East Asia Summit (EAS, 2004), and the ASEAN Defence Ministers Meetings-Plus (ADMM+, 2011), Australia has been keen to maximize future economic opportunities—through bilateral and multilateral FTAs, for example—and to play its part in securing peace and stability in the region—through leadership of initiatives such as the United Nations Transitional Authority in Cambodia (UNTAC) in 1992 and (though controversially) INTERFET (International Force East Timor) in 1999, plus a multitude of arrangements such as those in place with the Australian Federal Police. This expanding network of formal engagement is valuable on both a functional basis and in terms of guaranteeing Australia’s ongoing goodwill and cooperation with its region. Over 40 years these reliable and steady ties have become, a Malaysian economist observed, like “a long dependable marriage.”² It is an image that can conjure a picture of either close mutual understanding or of a fairly dull union bound by routine and duty.