Pacific Alliance and ASEAN: A bridge toward a long-term inter-regional cooperation between Latin America and Southeast Asia

• In Event: Regional Integration & the Rise of China in Latin America

Abstract

The inter-regional relationship between Latin America and Southeast Asia is not a priority of the foreign policies of both regions since they mostly focus on developing their diplomatic relations with neighboring countries from the same region. Consequently, both regions have never implemented any long-term inter-regional policies that encompass actors of their societies beyond the economic and political spheres. The member countries of Latin America and Southeast Asia usually coincide in some international forums and solely meet in ad hoc meetings. Their relationship emerges from economic points of view where high-ranked officers and private entrepreneurs exclusively participate. Therefore, this kind of relationship falls short of including the both regions’ population who are important human capitals and are enable to facilitate inter-regional cooperation in the long run.
This paper recognizes the gaps in the inter-regional relationship between Latin America and Southeast Asia and wants to make a proposal toward their long-term cooperation. Both regions should demonstrate how to link their inter-regional cooperation to the level of regional and national development. That is, for the benefits of population, Latin American and Southeast Asian countries should take advantage of their existing regional integrations to promote networking and people-to-people cooperation like academic exchanges, institutional building, good practices and lesson learned. In this sense, this paper is projected to study about building a strategic inter-regional partnership between Pacific Alliance and ASEAN as a bridge toward a long-term inter-regional cooperation among the two regions.

Author

• Tipaporn Attasivanon, Georgetown University