ABSTRACT
The rule of law and governance have become the new catechisms of multilateral organisations such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Analysis of the rule of law and governance in East Asia is built on the proposition that economic and social institutions can accommodate a wide range of market and political structures. Governance and rule of law programs - economic constitutionalism of the ordo liberal variety - have been reinforced by those who argue that stable and prosperous market economies require the construction of effective forms of governance, which the 'rule of law' is a primary element. The emergent authoritarian legalism in East Asian is characterised first, by the use of law as an instrument of state building or a set of techniques to rationalise the state and second, by the disjunction between private rights and public autonomy that constitutes an economic arena sealed off and depoliticised, thereby helping to produce the termed a 'dual state'.
