The theme of the Lecture was : New Trends and the Future of Southeast Asia.

The Lecture meeting was presided over by Prof. Pushpesh Pant, Dean, SIS, JNU. Other eminent speakers included Dr. Lourdes Salvador, Executive Director, Asian Scholarship Foundation and Dr. E. Sridharan, Executive Director, UPIASI..

	Prof. Wang Gungwu addressing the students and faculty members of JNU.
	To his right are : Dr. Reena Marwah, Dr. E. Sridharan and students.
	Prof. Wang Gungwu responding to questions. Prof. Pushpesh Pant is on his left.
	From left to right : Prof. Wang Gungwu, Prof. Pushpesh Pant, Dr. Lourdes Salvador, Dr. Swaran Singh.
	A view of the students and faculty members.

Prof. Pushpesh Pant welcomed the participants and the eminent speakers.

Dr. Swaran Singh, President, AAS introduced the eminent speakers.

Prof. Wang traced the historical and political situation in the late 1940s, when the Congress party in China won. He also referred to the intentions of the United States in trying to keep out both China and Russia from the U.N Security Council. However, the U.S did not succeed. China's growth was nothing less than a miracle in his opinion and despite it being a country which has a large number of poor people, China has succeeded in becoming a major economic and political power. ASEAN recognizes that China is the largest country in the region. ASEAN's success has never depended on South East Asian Cooperation; it has always been cooperation for strategic reasons, never publicly acknowledged or admitted till the present times.

After the cold war ended, ASEAN was expanded to include Cambodia, Vietnam. In the words of Prof. Wang, "It is very convenient to have it publicly declared in one way and secretly understood in another. We in Asia are not as scientific as the West and we continue to have our ambiguities. This concept of regionalism which is emerging in Europe looks like possible in ASEAN. However, it reminds everybody that there is no regionalism possible in North East Asia and the South Asian efforts to come together have made little progress and are unlikely to do so in the next 20-30 years."

He continued, "The problems in North East Asia with the Koreas being divided and with the differences between China and Japan is unlikely to emerge. South East Asia is the only one where cooperation is a reality and that is why China and Japan are interested. There will always be some barriers and cooperation among North Asian countries and South Asian countries. Therefore ASEAN is like a hinge between the South Asia and North East Asia. Earlier there was not much interest between the South and North East Asia but now all countries are interested. When South East Asia suffered the financial crisis in 1998, when people wrote off ASEAN. It lost its meaning and broke the back of many of its economic promises. But in today's date many of the countries, which suffered in the past, are recovering.

Up to 1997-98, everybody attributed the success of ASEAN to Indonesia. For 30 years, Indonesia went through a phase of tremendous growth and development. The future of ASEAN was dependent on this huge nation and it was perceived that everyone else could move around it. But after the nation collapsed, ASEAN lost its credibility. It was then when China realized that it was time to rise. Up to 1990s China was very hostile to ASEAN as it thought ASEAN the latter was hostile to the former. Its suspicion was justified to some extent as ASEAN was built as a defence alliance network to prevent China from having any influence in the region during the days of the Cold War. After the joining of Vietnam suspicions increased. Cambodia gave a chance to ASEAN and China to work together against Vietnam. ASEAN also learned that they can count on China in certain issues and know the country better. It was then when Chinese officials and ASEAN built contacts and linkages and all the past suspicion and hostility was overcome.

When China looks around its neighborhood, all directions, east, north, west and south, South East Asia is the friendliest and least dangerous to China. China was the first one to accept the Treaty of Neutrality and introduce the idea of ASEAN+1. Although a large number of South East Asian countries left ASEAN when the financial crisis struck it was China that used the opportunity to strengthen its relations with ASEAN and helped ASEAN by showing sympathy with their financial and trade problems.. China sought for an opportunity to trade with South East Asian countries as it needed raw materials to export its goods to the developed countries like U.S.A and the West. So they had no reason to affect the markets of South East Asia to a large extent. But the trade surplus was always inclined towards their neighbors as they bought huge quantities from these markets. So, the net result was that China was the closest to ASEAN by the end of the financial crisis.

Japan in many ways had taken SEA for granted because it was growing so well. The Japanese also stagnated for almost 10 years. So, all this coincided with the Chinese economy booming. ASEAN+1 was an initiative taken by China despite the fact that Japan and Korea were closer to ASEAN. Japan has still not been able to recover from that. Japan and China are now both offering all assistance to ASEAN. The coming in of China has given ASEAN a second chance. ASEAN+1 became ASEAN +3 with Japan and Korea joining in. This made U.S.A and Indonesia. quite uncomfortable because it was taken as a surprise as it was busy elsewhere. Small countries are not listening to Indonesia. The small countries in ASEAN are leaning on China and Japan. That is why Indonesia wants India and Australia to join."

He concluded by saying that, "the potential for further development in Asian Integration is ahead of us- whether ASEAN continues to be a bridge or a hinge will depend on the China- Japan rivalry and on the other hand, Indonesia wanting bigger Asian countries like India and Australia joining in. The final question is if ASEAN will develop into a community by itself and what will be its ultimate course in the future".