ABSTRACT
The post-1945 struggles of Southeast Asian countries against the European colonial powers for independence and freedom were fought on land and for land. A consequence of this struggle on land and for land has been that we value the land we fought for more than the sea that surrounds the land. The sea does not also appear to have featured in the post-colonial construction of national unity and identity.1 But as these reflections argue, in the long cycles of history it is the sea that has shaped and defined who we are more than the land. The sea is not an empty void, in contrast to the land with its sites of memories that defines who we are as a nation. Just as land as space has been defined by a dynamic and conflicting spatiality, so too has the sea as space been defined by a conflicting set of spatial functions. These reflections are a preliminary attempt to look at Southeast Asia from the sea, rather than the land, and the implications of such a perspective for our understanding of maritime security.
