It is with pleasure that we share with you Stratbase ADR Institute’s January 2020 occasional paper entitled, “The ASEAN’s Divided Resistance: Duterte, China, and  the  Quest  for Rule of Law in the South China Sea.”

Comprised of three parts, the first part describes the primary challenge that ASEAN confronts in currently evolving regional geopolitics. The paper then proceeds on to the discussion of ASEAN peripherality and the condition of middle institutionalization trap that capture the internal hindrances that ASEAN currently has to deal with. And in the third section, a minilateral pushback against the China challenge is presented by elaborating on various forms of resistance that Malaysia, Indonesia and Vietnam are exhibiting. The said developments insinuate that ASEAN reviews its current unanimity-based decision-making process and even consider associate membership arrangements with other capable and increasingly like-minded greater Southeast Asia neighbors.

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