Regional politics: soft-law cooperation

Chapter 5 explores the interactions between producer and consumer governments by evaluating regional architectures for resource interdependence. There has been no shortage of efforts to promote resource cooperation in the Asia-Pacific, with many regional organisations (including ASEAN, APEC and their associated bodies) launching new resource security initiatives during the 2000s. However, the outcomes have been decidedly poor. None have moved from talk-shop activities to more impactful forms of cooperation, and many initiatives have either foundered due to poor compliance or been vetoed by governments outright. This is symptomatic of a ‘soft-law’ approach to resource security, where sovereignty-protective vetoes limit cooperation to dialogue and principle-setting activities. These patterns are then traced to the effects of securitisation and economic nationalism, which have meant governments are unwilling to commit to anything but low-cost (but arguably ineffective) dialogue-based responses to resource insecurity. The absence of effective cooperation means the potential benefits of regional interdependence have not been fully exploited and have left the Asia-Pacific without institutions to manage resource tensions between governments.