ASEAN Community in Vietnam's Perception and Views

Abstract

With a length of 13 pages, my paper consists of three parts.

In the first part, I shall introduce the plan to build the ASEAN community given by the Associaton of Southeast Asian Nations.

The second part is the main content of the paper. I shall analyze Vietnam's views of the AC and its pillars (ASC, AEC and ASCC) and compare them with those of some other ASEAN member countries. There are four main remarks:

First, Vietnam's perception and views on the AC is not different with the general views of other ASEAN member countries. This is because Vietnam has deeply conceived itself as an ASEAN member. ASEAN has already reached a consensus regarding the content of the AC and its pillars and this addressed in the ASEAN documents. Vietnam expresses the AC with the voice of ASEAN.

Second, different from those of the formers of ASEAN member countries, Vietnamese leaders do not criticize other ASEAN countries and the stagnancy of regional integration. This is a fair conduct of Vietnamese leaders, not because Vietnam is still one of the less development countries of ASEAN and it is not able to join regional integration with the same level as other ASEAN members. Vietnam wishes to contribute to the acceleration of the intra-ASEAN solidarity, which is very necessary, especially when ASEAN is facing with several challenges in its way of development.

Third, the initiatives launched by Vietnam to build the AC and its pillars are highly eligible. They are easy to be accepted by other ASEAN countries, which also share the same aspirations and feel comfortable with their preparation to implement those initiatives.

Finally, so far, Vietnam's initiatives are the oriented ones. However, to realize the idea of building the AC realying on three pillars, Vietnam, following Malaysia and the Philippines, should raise concrete suggestions, such as conducting activities to establish an ASEAN University and setting up teaching programs for the ASEAN and its members.