Burma and ASEAN: A Marriage of Inconvenience

Abstract

Though Burma joined ASEAN with high hopes in 1997, the union has been a mutually disappointing one. Burma has not enjoyed the influx of FDI and general economic windfall it expected from joining, and ASEAN has been repeatedly embarrassed by SPDC human rights abuses. Yet there have also been benefits: the junta was inspired to release Aung San Suu Kyi (at least for a while) and to set forth the 7-step “roadmap” to constitutional government, while ASEAN became a more comprehensive regional organization and has augmented its diplomatic toolkit to deal with intransigently dissident members. How this uneasy relationship fares amid the 2010 elections remains to be seen.