Expanding the study of the EU-centred actorness: ASEAN in the emerging Indo-Pacific construct

Abstract

This article examines ASEAN’s position and strategies regarding the emerging Indo-Pacific politics by employing three elements of actorness—opportunity in the external environments, capacities for internal preference convergence and external engagement, and policy entrepreneurship. It argues that Indonesia’s policy entrepreneurship enabled ASEAN to respond to a new regional opportunity of the emerging Indo-Pacific construct, and ASEAN exhibited limited capabilities in internal preference convergence and the development of institutional influence on external relations as it relied on institutional features of conference diplomacy and the strong chairmanship system. The exploration of actorness in ASEAN’s policy reactions contributes to expanding the comparative scope of actorness research and deepening the theoretical implications of ASEAN’s regional initiatives in the emerging Indo-Pacific regionalism.