Informal Diplomacy of the ASEAN-ISIS Network

Abstract

For several decades a number of Asian think tanks have had research programmes concerning economic affairs of the Asia Pacific and, later, security cooperation. Their role has been at the earlier stages of regional cooperative efforts, that is, agenda-setting. Rather than focusing on political and economic interests involved in the tangible features of building political institutions of regional cooperation, the focus of this chapter is on these earlier efforts of agenda-setting undertaken through research, advocacy and networking of the ASEAN-Institutes of Strategic and International Studies (ASEAN-ISIS) with political elites in the region. ASEAN-ISIS has played a proactive and sometimes influential role in regional debates on Asian economic integration and, more prominently, security cooperation.