The Emerging Regional Economic Integration Architecture in East Asia

2013 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-37 ◽  
Author(s):  
Siow Yue Chia
Keyword(s):  
East Asia ◽  
Free Trade ◽  
Economic Integration ◽  
Market Integration ◽  
Free Trade Area ◽  
Asia Pacific ◽  
Production Networks ◽  
Integration Architecture ◽  
Economic Integration Agreements ◽  
Economic Partnership

This paper examines regional market integration through production networks and free trade agreements in East Asia and their attendant challenges and issues. It examines progress in the ASEAN Economic Community and in various ASEAN+1 free trade and economic integration agreements. It argues that there is a strong case for a region-wide agreement to maximize economic synergy and resolve emerging problems, including market fragmentation and the “noodle bowl” effect. It explores three possible paths to region-wide integration, namely, the East Asia Free Trade Area (encompassing ASEAN+3 [the People's Republic of China, Japan, and Korea]), the Comprehensive Economic Partnership for East Asia (encompassing ASEAN+3 countries and Australia—New Zealand and India) and the Trans-Pacific Partnership, currently involving nine negotiating countries in the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation. The paper explores the economic and political benefits and challenges of forming these three regionwide agreements.

scholarly journals Trans - Pacific Economic Integration Processes

2016 ◽  
Vol 54 (1) ◽  
pp. 83-102
Author(s):  
Dejana Gajinov
Keyword(s):  
Free Trade ◽  
Economic Integration ◽  
Regional Integration ◽  
Free Trade Area ◽  
The United States ◽  
Asia Pacific ◽  
Economic Relations ◽  
Important Region ◽  
Economic Partnership ◽  
Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership

AbstractAsia-Pacific (AP) region is the world’s most important region today from the viewpoint of long-term economic growth. It is also the extremely important cite of rivalries or partnerships - or both - between China and the United States. The strong expansion of trade, investment and other economic ties within the AP region has stimulated the process of economic integration. The network of bilateral and regional free trade agreements has increased dramatically in recent years, linking virtually all major trading countries in the region, with one exception: either the US or China have not become members of the free trade arrangements involving the other country. The paper examines the scope, principles and characteristics of economic relations and cooperation in the AP region. The issue of whether Asian efforts for regional integration have been compatible with an open multilateral trading system at the global level is also addressed. The paper also assesses changes in the dynamics of regional integration and its future prospects. In this sense, in the Asia Pacific there are now two tracks which lead to the formation of a Free Trade Area of the Asia-Pacific (FTAAP): Asian, based on the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) and trans-pacific, based on Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP).

Integration Potential of Free Trade Area of the Asia-Pacific

2016 ◽  
Vol 60 (1) ◽  
pp. 68-81
Author(s):  
E. Arapova
Keyword(s):  
Economic Growth ◽  
Economic Development ◽  
Free Trade ◽  
Economic Integration ◽  
Hybrid Approach ◽  
Free Trade Area ◽  
Hierarchical Cluster ◽  
Asia Pacific ◽  
Trade Area ◽  
Asian Regionalism

During the 2014 APEC summit the participating countries agreed to move towards a region-wide economic integration and approved China-backed roadmap to promote the Free Trade Area of the Asia-Pacific (FTAAP). The paper examines prospects for economic integration in the Asia-Pacific in the framework of 21 APEC participating members. It aims to measure the “integration potential” of the FTAAP on the basis of quantitative and qualitative analysis of the actual statistic data, to explore key obstacles hampering economic integration in the region. The research comes from the theory of convergence and concept of proximity. They suppose that the higher is the degree of homogeneity in economic development and regulatory regimes of the integrating countries the higher is their “integration potential”. The objective of the author’s analysis is to measure the “integration potential” of APEC countries in four directions: trade liberalization, free movement of investments, monetary and banking integration, free division of labor. Initial estimates of the FTAAP prospects base on the merchandize trade complementarity indices and coefficients of variation analysis. Besides, the research uses hierarchical cluster analysis that helps to classify countries in different groups according to similarity of their economic typologies. This methodology allows to reveal the favorable algorithm of regional economic integration in the framework of the “hybrid approach” (or “open regionalism” adopted for APEC countries in 1989) which encourages the countries to enter into free trade agreements on a bilateral basis or to make offers to the APEC membership as a whole. Final conclusions are based on the results of authors’ calculations with consideration for contemporary trends of the member countries’ economic development and long-term strategies of economic growth. Acknowledgements. The research was supported by the Russian Fund for Humanities, project no. 15-07-00026 “East Asian regionalism in the context of diversifi cation of economic growth model”.

WILL ASEAN ECONOMIC INTEGRATION PROGRESS BEYOND A FREE TRADE AREA?

2004 ◽  
Vol 53 (4) ◽  
pp. 935-967 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lay Hong Tan
Keyword(s):  
East Asia ◽  
Free Trade ◽  
Economic Integration ◽  
Free Trade Area ◽  
The Philippines ◽  
South East Asia ◽  
Trade Area

The raison d'être of ASEAN was a political one,1 to secure the region's peace, stability, and development. Against all odds, the founding members, namely, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand signed the ASEAN Declaration on 8 August 1967. Brunei was admitted in January 1984, Vietnam in 1995, which was followed closely by Laos and Myanmar in 1997. Thirty-two years later, on 30 April 1999, ASEAN formally encompassed all ten countries of South-East Asia by admitting Cambodia.2

ASEAN’s TRADE AND FOREIGN DIRECT INVESTMENT: LONG-TERM CHALLENGES FOR ECONOMIC INTEGRATION

2016 ◽  
Vol 62 (03) ◽  
pp. 643-680 ◽  
Author(s):  
MASAHIRO KAWAI ◽  
KANDA NAKNOI
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Direct Investment ◽  
Multinational Corporations ◽  
Free Trade ◽  
Economic Integration ◽  
Direct Investment ◽  
Free Trade Area ◽  
Trade Flows ◽  
Asia Pacific ◽  
Asean Member

This paper explores the long-term challenges for economic integration of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) through trade and foreign direct investment (FDI). The region has emerged as an important production base for global multinational corporations by joining East Asia’s supply chains. While proceeding to establish the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) by the end of 2015, ASEAN has also forged five major free trade agreements (FTAs) with its dialogue partners (China, India, Japan, Republic of Korea, and Australia–New Zealand) and is currently negotiating the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership. In addition, four ASEAN member states have completed Trans-Pacific Partnership negotiations. Econometric evidence suggests that (i) trade flows and inward FDI mutually reinforce each other, i.e., an increase in trade flows stimulates inward FDI and vice versa; (ii) a larger market tends to attract more inward FDI; (iii) FTAs tend to help stimulate inward FDI; and (iv) strong institutions, good physical infrastructure, and low costs of doing business are critical in boosting inward FDI. The paper suggests that in the long run it is ASEAN’s interest to further integrate itself with the rest of Asia and the world (through a Free Trade Area of the Asia-Pacific and an Asia–Europe FTA), while substantially deepening its internal integration (by moving from the AEC to a customs and economic union) and thereby maintaining ASEAN centrality.

Explaining the resurgence of regionalism in world politics

1995 ◽  
Vol 21 (4) ◽  
pp. 331-358 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew Hurrell
Keyword(s):  
Free Trade ◽  
Economic Integration ◽  
Free Trade Area ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Common Market ◽  
Asia Pacific ◽  
Regional Security ◽  
Post Cold War ◽  
Trade Area ◽  
The North

The past decade has witnessed a resurgence of regionalism in world politics. Old regionalist organizations have been revived, new organizations formed, and regionalism and the call for strengthened regionalist arrangements have been central to many of the debates about the nature of the post-Cold War international order. The number, scope and diversity of regionalist schemes have grown significantly since the last major ‘regionalist wave’ in the 1960s. Writing towards the end of this earlier regionalist wave, Joseph Nye could point to two major classes of regionalist activity: on the one hand, micro-economic organizations involving formal economic integration and characterized by formal institutional structures; and on the other, macro-regional political organizations concerned with controlling conflict. Today, in the political field, regional dinosaurs such as the Organization of African Unity (OAU) and the Organization of American States (OAS) have re-emerged. They have been joined both by a large number of aspiring micro-regional bodies (such as the Visegrad Pact and the Pentagonale in central Europe; the Arab Maghreb Union (AMU) and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) in the Middle East; ECOWAS and possibly a revived Southern African Development Community (SADC, formerly SADCC) led by post-apartheid South Africa in Africa), and by loosely institutionalized meso-regional security groupings such as the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE, now OSCE) and more recently the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF). In the economic field, micro-regional schemes for economic cooperation or integration (such as the Southern Cone Common Market, Mercosur, the Andean Pact, the Central American Common Market (CACM) and CARICOM in the Americas; the attempts to expand economic integration within ASEAN; and the proliferation of free trade areas throughout the developing world) stand together with arguments for macro-economic or ‘bloc regionalism’ built around the triad of an expanded European Union (EU), the North American Free Trade Area (NAFTA) and some further development of Asia-Pacific regionalism. The relationship between these regional schemes and between regional and broader global initiatives is central to the politics of contemporary regionalism.

scholarly journals Trans-Pacific Strategic Partnership: the Balance of Power and Role in the Formation of Regional Free Trade Area in Asia- Pacific

2012 ◽  
pp. 94-100
Author(s):  
G. M. Kostyunina
Keyword(s):  
Free Trade ◽  
Free Trade Area ◽  
Balance Of Power ◽  
Free Trade Zone ◽  
Strategic Partnership ◽  
Asia Pacific ◽  
Trade Area ◽  
The Future ◽  
Economic Partnership ◽  
The U.S

The article describes the main provisions of existing agreement on the transpacific strategic economic partnership, the need for expansion and its importance to the future Asia-Pacific free trade area (FTAAP). It analyzes of the positions of the leading countries in the region on a Pacific free trade zone - the U.S., Japan and ASEAN.

scholarly journals Perubahan Ekonomi Global dan Tantangan bagi Indonesia [Global Economic Change and Challenges for Indonesia]

2016 ◽  
Vol 8 (16) ◽  
pp. 55
Author(s):  
Ignatius Ismanto ◽  
Roy Vincentius Pratikno
Keyword(s):  
Free Trade ◽  
Global Economy ◽  
Regional Economy ◽  
Free Trade Area ◽  
The Other ◽  
Asia Pacific ◽  
South East Asia ◽  
Dynamic Changes ◽  
Trade Area ◽  
Economic Partnership

The shifting of global political-economy since early 1990s has been followed by the expansion of regional economy cooperation forum establishment, such as: NAFTA (North America Free Trade Area), EFTA (European Free Trade Area) and APEC (Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation). Indonesia, together with the other South East Asia countries who join ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asia), is also actively involved in engaging regional economy cooperation forums, such as: ASEAN-China FTA, ASEAN-India FTA, ASEAN-Jepang Economic Partnership, ASEAN Regional Economi Partnership (ARCEP). The establishment of those economic regionalism is apparently a strategy in responding economical globalization. Indonesia’s involvement in those regional economy cooperations has increased its national commitment, both in going through economical liberization as well as in building its national economy competitiveness. This research describes Indonesian political challanges in responding the dynamic changes of that global economy.

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