ABSTRACT
This chapter analyses how international institutions or non-governmental entities can support free trade agreements (FTAs). To fulfil this objective, it studies the role of the Economic Research Institute for ASEAN and East Asia (ERIA), an international organisation established in 2008, before, during, and after the negotiation process for the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP). In this chapter, we touch upon ERIA’s role in supporting the RCEP launch and negotiations. Although ERIA was not an official party to the negotiations, it was involved in the RCEP process by providing specialist capacity and knowledge. We describe ERIA’s activities related to the RCEP and their changing characteristics at each phase of the negotiating process: (i) before the launch of negotiations, (ii) during the early stage of negotiations, (iii) during the later stage of negotiations, and (iv) during the implementation phase after the conclusion of the agreement. We investigate ERIA’s contribution to the RCEP negotiations and, more generally, the role of international institutions in supporting the negotiation of economic partnership agreements. We conduct this research by using the official documents and website information of the ASEAN Secretariat, relevant ministries of the RCEP-participating countries, and ERIA. We also conduct interviews with officials related to the RCEP negotiations and ERIA activities to enrich the research results.
