Commentary on Chapter 5

Summary

I think Dr Pelkmans was being too modest when he states in his paper that he has “some knowledge about international organizations including ASEAN”. Rather, his paper and presentation indicates a thorough familiarity with the ASEAN institutional organization and provides an excellent review of the proposals put forward by the Group of Five (of which he was a member) on the strengthening of the structure and mechanism of ASEAN, and of the subsequent institutional decisions of the Singapore summit.

Dr Pelkmans then proceeds in his paper to deepen the institutional debate by raising some counter-arguments to the criticism of the G-5 report by Dr Chng Meng Kng (1991) particularly in light of the decisions of the recent ASEAN summit and the European experience.

Being a lawyer and not an economist, I was particularly interested by Dr Pelkmans' comments on the need to take implementation seriously and the need for institutional, legal, or administrative requirements to ensure implementation. As has been said, in international economic law, the economist tells us what should be done while the lawyer is left to figure out how to do it. Dr Pelkmans touches on these issues briefly in the final section of his paper. I agree with his comments and I would like to expand briefly on them.

Constructing a free trade area is largely a problem of “managing” interdependence. In considering the problem of “managing” interdependence, governments may be limited in their policy choices by sets of rules, procedures and principles that may constrain their options. Although it is arguable that, in theory, each state is free to regulate economic transactions which take place with it or within its boundaries as it pleases, in practice, international economic relations are governed by an international legal framework which comprises multilateral, plurilateral and bilateral agreements, international economic law forms the international legal framework which establishes the parameters within which international trade in goods and services and foreign investment is conducted. Such a framework is necessary in order to promote increased order and predictability in international transactions.