Vinod K. Aggarwal and Charles Morrison
Asia-Pacific Crossroads: Regime Creation and the Future of APEC, 1998
Regionalism has become a prominent feature of international relations in the second half of the 20th century, but one whose significance for the international order is not yet fully understood. The volume has examined one crucial area of the world, the Asia-Pacific, where a distinctive, but late form of regionalism is developing in the shape of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum. Evolving in an environment of rapid economic growth, growing interdependence, possible underlying political-military tension, and very limited historical experience with institutionalization, APEC seeks to establish free trade and investment and economic cooperation through a new mechanism of “open regionalism” based on concerted, but voluntary actions. How successfully with this organization evolve? What impact will it have on the relations among states and firms in its region? How will APEC regionalism influence and be influenced by globalism and by subregional arrangements? Will APEC and its form of open regionalism be influential in the establishment of international values, norms, or rules at either the global or regional level?