ABSTRACT
This book aimed to reassess ASEM’s first decade of interregional dialogue by taking a European perspective. It examined ASEM’s “output performance” in the three domains of interaction, looked at the democratic dimension of the process and the role of identity-formation, and surveyed the ramifications of the institutional choices and working methods. ASEM was conceived as an important tool for the EU to deepen engagement in the Asian region. It was the outcome of the vision expressed in the Asia Strategy of 1994, aiming to serve as an instrument to fully utilize the opportunities offered by “the rise of Asia” and tackle its challenges. The creation of ASEM in 1996 signified the start of a new era in Asian-European contacts, but was at the same time marked by widely diverging expectations. For many Asian countries but also for leading EU member states the forum symbolized the political will to strengthen relations between the two regions as the third leg of the global power triangle. For others in the EU, ASEM could contribute to transforming EU-Asia relations into the “third pillar of the EU’s foreign policy”, or could at least establish a dialogue on political and security issues. Certainly for many Asian countries, ASEM was primarily a forum to promote economy and trade, aiming at the creation of a “partnership for greater growth” as expressed by the Bangkok ASEM1 Chairman’s Statement. However, ASEM’s basic principle and point of departure was a much less ambitious intention to serve as a forum for informal dialogue among equal partners. Consequently, from the outset too much emphasis may have been placed on concrete results and grand projects.
