it had managed the avoidance of military conflict among member states
it had continued to be a successful diplomatic community in that collective international
had been variously the convenor,
Given the strategic distrust between them they have been content to assign ASEAN a leadership role in regional associations, notably the
With regard to economic integration, intra-ASEAN trade has continued to grow rapidly since the 1990s, for the inauguration of an ASEAN community in 2015.
the opening of free-trade and economic-partnership agreements with most of its key trading partners in the first decade of the twenty-first century contributes to the development of the ASEAN economic community.
But set against that are the many bilateral FTA and so on, that have been established bilaterally between membership states and external economies, which have resulted in a variety of often contradictory economic arrangements that militate against reaching genuine economic integration in the near future.
Given the diversity of the membership, the disparity in levels of economic development and the differences of their political system, it is not surprising that the ASEAN countries have found integration difficult.
None of the ten members can take the sustainability of their political for granted and all ten are highly protective of their sovereignty, which may explain why in practice most states still adhere to the norm of non-interference and have yet to accede to following a rules-based organization, despite their declared obligation to do so.
Thus despite tariff reductions, and collective FTAs with China, India and others, the rhetoric about economic integration has tended to outshine real achievement.