Cover of Building ASEAN Community: Political-Security and Socio-cultural Reflections." Photo grabbed from ERIA website.

The Economic Research Institute for ASEAN and East Asia (ERIA) recently published “ASEAN @ 50 Volume 4: Building ASEAN Community: Political-Security and Socio-cultural Reflections”, co-edited by Professor Aileen Baviera of the UP Asian Center and Larry Maramis, Senior Consultant for ASEAN Affairs of the United Nations ESCAP. It is the fourth installment of a five-volume publication reflecting on the past fifty years of ASEAN, from achievements to challenges.

In her integrative chapter summarizing the book, Professor Baviera writes that “this mixed record of ASEAN has led to sharply contrasting observations, captured in the oft-cited metaphor of ASEAN being simultaneously perceived as a glass half-full (in the eyes of supporters and optimists) and a glass half-empty (in the view of critics and sceptics). To help make sense of the significance of ASEAN now, and to draw insights into what needs to be done to fill a half-empty glass closer to the brim, several eminent analysts of ASEAN and Southeast Asia come together in this volume to share their analyses, assessments, and their recommendations for ASEAN’s way forward, focusing on the project of building an ASEAN Political–Security Community (APSC).

Building ASEAN Community: Political-Security and Socio-cultural Reflections is one of five volumes commemorating the 50th anniversary of ASEAN.

• Volume 1: The ASEAN Journey: Reflections of ASEAN Leaders and Officials

• Volume 2: Voices of ASEAN: What Does ASEAN Mean to ASEAN Peoples?

• Volume 3: ASEAN and Member States: Transformation and Integration

• Volume 4: Building ASEAN Community: Political-Security and Socio-cultural Reflections

• Volume 5: The ASEAN Economic Community into 2025 and Beyond

ABOUT ERIA

The Economic Research Institute for ASEAN and East Asia (ERIA) is an international organization established at the 3rd East Asia Summit in Singapore on 21 November 2007. ERIA works closely with the ASEAN Secretariat, researchers and research institutes from East Asia to provide intellectual and analytical research and policy recommendations. VIEW THEIR WEBSITE  [Quoted from their website]

ABOUT THE EDITOR

Dr. Aileen SP. Baviera is Professor at the Asian Center, University of the Philippines Diliman. She specializes on and writes about contemporary China studies, China-Southeast Asia relations, Asia-Pacific security, territorial and maritime disputes, and regional integration. The editor in chief of the journal, "Asian Politics & Policy," she is the author of many academic publications, including the "The Domestic Mediations of China's Influence in the Philippines," which appears in Rising China's Influence in Developing Asia, edited by Evelyn Goh and published by Oxford University Press. She completed her Ph.D. in Political Science at the University of the Philippines Diliman. VIEW FULL PROFILE. 

The UP Asian Center offers M.A. degrees in Asian Studies with four fields of specialization: Northeast Asia, Southeast Asia, South Asia, and West Asia. The Center also has an M.A. program in Philippine Studies that allows students to major in Philippine society and culture, Philippine foreign relations, or Philippine development studies. The Center offers a Ph.D. program in Philippine Studies in conjunction with the College of Arts and Letters and the College of Social Sciences and Philosophy. Get an overview of these programs. The Asian Center also houses a peer-reviewed, open-access journal, Asian Studies: Journal of Critical Perspectives on Asia. It has published several books and monographs, and hosts or organizes various lectures and conferences.