On The Evolution And Motivation Of The Operation Mechanism Of The Association Of Southeast Asian Nations

After nearly a half century of development since 1967,ASEAN nowadays becomes an important organization in the international community, which was once regarded as unsuccessful attempt at the beginning because of its members` poverty, complex religious, territorial disputes etc. But, with its unique "ASEAN way", ASEAN not only facilitated the cooperation between its members, but also upgraded the organizational structure and function three times. ASEAN is good at using every international event to develop and improve, for instance, ASEAN formed after World War II and constructed ASEAN+3 finance ministers and ARF with the end of the Cold War and the Asian financial crisis. What`s more, ASEAN even plan to build ASEAN community, which include ASEAN Political- Security Community, ASEAN Economic Community and ASEAN Socio – Cultural Community. Why ASEAN developed steadily when facing with international interference or the internal contradictions? The writer try to find some reasons in this article by analyzing ASEAN operation mechanism and comparing ASEAN with EU.As ASEAN development is closely related to the change of international and internal relationship, this paper holds that the theory of realism may be very helpful on analyzing the development of ASEAN. Realism formed in the 19 th century, but had become one of the core theories in the field of international relations until 20 century. The basic point of Realism is that due to the anarchy of international community, every nation can only maintain their own national interests and survival by enhancing it`s power. Realism has three main section which is classical realism, new realism and neoclassical realism, and the paper found that this three section have high consistency with ASEAN`s three development stages. Thus, the realistic development of ASEAN and theoretical development can promote each other.All in all, though ASEAN is becoming more and more important and mature, its organization and operation principles still limited by the member states of the sovereign, independent consciousness and other conditions. There is still a large reform space for ASEAN. Whether “ASEAN Way” can be a widely used principle, it determines by ASEAN`s own development.