7. Decipher the following abbreviations denoting some of the most important international institutions:

ABBREVIATION	EXPANSION
AFTA
ARF
CBOs
UNCI
UNCLOS
UNCTAD
UNDOF
UNGOMAP
UNIIMOG
UNIDO
UNIKOM
UNSCOB
UNTAG
IGAD
ILO

8. Give the English equivalents:

Соціo-культурна та економічна інтеграція, Економічна спільнота АСЕАН, Зона вільної торгівлі, вільний потік товарів, країни – учасниці АСЕАН, Декларація про зону миру, свободи та нейтралітету у Південно- Східній Азії, Декларація про сумісні дії проти тероризму, сприяння регіональній інтеграції торгівлі, закладення засад добросусідських взаємовідносин між країнами – учасницями.

IX. Translate into English:

1. Асоціація держав Південно –Східної Азії була створена 8 серпня 1967 року за ініціативою Філіпін, Малайзії, Індонезії, Сінгапура і Тайланду, які прийняли Бангкокську декларацію.

2. Пізніше до них приєднались Бруней, Камбоджа, Лаос, М’янма та В’єтнам.

3. Проте сам союз було закріплено у вигляді Договору про дружбу та співробітництво АСЕАН у Південно – Східній Азії лише 1976 року на Балі.

4. Найвищим органом АСЕАН є саміт лідерів країн- учасниць, який проводиться щорічно, починаючи з 2000 року.

5. Саміт триває три дні і супроводжується зустрічами з партнерами по регіону.

6. Повсякденне керування роботою організації виконує постійний комітет у складі міністра закордонних справ поточної країни – голови та послів інших країн – учасниць.

7. Міністри країн Південно – Східної Азії погодилися на ухвалення хартії, яка закріплюватиме відданість країн регіону ідеї демократії та повазі до прав людини.

8. Активісти кажуть, що це матиме незначний вплив на такі країни, як Бірма – загальновідому своїми порушеннями прав людини, і пояснюють це тим, що основна увага більше буде зосереджена на підтримці, ніж на захисті людських прав.

9. На порядку денному триденного саміту також розглядаються питання кліматичних змін, харчової безпеки і біоенергетики.

10. АСЕАН планує розширити регіональну зону вільної торгівлі та включити нові країни до свого складу.

X. Discuss the following:

1. New Steps Forward in ASEAN’s Defence Cooperation.

2. A Diplomatic Spat: ASEAN Members Meet on the Sidelines of Summits.

Unit 10

Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation

Read the text and decide whether the sentences are true or false:

Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) was established in 1989 to facilitate intergovernmental dialogue on economic policy issues with the goal of sustaining growth and development. An important unstated purpose, especially for the Asian members, is to support a process of confidence building among countries of the region that have no tradition of multilateral cooperation and were reluctant to create a regional organization that might compete with ASEAN or lead to domination by the United States and Japan. Members are referred to as “economies”, not countries. The diversity of size, economies, political systems, and policies is greater than in any other regional grouping- a source of both strength and weakness.

The basic ideas for an Asia-Pacific regional organization were laid out by Japanese and Australian economists in 1960s.They initiated informal gatherings, but it took two decades before governments were ready to act. Neither the U.S. nor Japanese governments were willing to take lead. Some ASEAN governments were also wary of another organization in the region, of trade liberalization that might advantage the region's industrial countries, of excluding the centrally planned economies of the Soviet Union, Vietnam, and China, and of compromising their non-aligned status. Thus, the idea of Asia-Pacific collaboration was promoted for twenty years by a group of economists through several organizations. The most prominent of these was the Pacific Trade and Development (PAF-TAD) conferences of government, academic, and IGO economists initiated in 1968.This group became an epistemic community and an important agency of socialization, especially for economists from less developed and nonmarket economies. The Pacific Economic Cooperation Council (PECC), with representatives from business, and governments, first put forward a blueprint of an intergovernmental organization for managing regional interdependence in the early 1980s.

What moved Asia-Pacific regionalism from idea to APEC were a series of developments in the 1980s that changed the international context, the nature of several countries' economies, and countries' perceptions of their interests. Increased intraregional foreign direct investment by Japanese, South Korean, Singaporean, and Hong Kong companies created transnational production networks. Also, most ASEAN countries had shifted from primary product exports to manufactured goods as the largest share of exports, increasing confidence in their ability to compete. This confluence of factors helped change many countries' perceptions of their economic interests and persuade them in 1989 to support the Japanese and Australian initiative to create APEC. It was conceived as a defense against a “Fortress Europe” when both Asians and Americans were concerned about the consequences of the EU's single market; as insurance against protectionism in North America; and as a hedge against a fracturing of the global trade system into rival blocs when successful completion of GATT negotiations was in doubt. APEC's key principle of “open regionalism” reflected the commitment to advance regional economic integration without enacting discriminatory trade measures against outsiders.

APEC was intended to operate informally with consensus decisionmaking. The core structure initially consisted of the informal meetings of trade and foreign ministers. This changed when President Clinton convened the first summit meeting of heads of government in 1993. Now, in addition to the annual summits, there are dozens of specialized meetings, committees, and working groups convened each year. The annual summits have raised APEC's profile and reinforced the idea of Asia-Pacific as a region. As the only institutionalized forum for heads of government from all Pacific Rim countries, they have some value just as a means of facilitating intergovernmental communications at the highest level. It has also been valuable to leaders of smaller countries who get the opportunity to talk with counterparts from all countries.

Even after more than a decade, APEC is shrouded in ambiguity over its goals and how those should be realized and does not fulfil a key criterion for the existence of the international regime: agreement on core principles. There is no agreement among the member economies over priorities among the three pillars of the organization: liberalization of trade and investment, facilitation of trade, and economic and technical cooperation. The 1994 Bogor Declaration envisioned free trade and investment in the region by 2010 for the industrialized economies and 2020 for developing economies. This plan required individual and collective actions by members. Subsequent summits established a framework for liberalization, a program for coordination and harmonization of economic policies, and joint activities for economic and technical cooperation. Many East Asian members preferred loose coordination of unilateral trade policies and economic and technical cooperation rather than an agenda of trade negotiations. By the 1998 summit, the trade liberalization priority disappeared.

Economic and technical cooperation is of primary interest to Asian members, but Western governments initially viewed it as development assistance and only slowly realized the value of activities such as developing human capital, strengthening economic infrastructure, harnessing future technologies, and promoting small enterprises. Although a large number of projects were underway in 2000, there was little coordination among them, few specific objectives, limited financing, and little attention to measurable performance criteria. APEC illustrates the tension between Asian and Western views on regional cooperation. Asian members want a process of dialogue and socialization that at most produces a general framework for regional economic cooperation and other activities through consensus decisionmaking. They wish to preserve maximum flexibility for unilateral determination of economic and trade policies, to avoid a precise timetable for actions, and to limit any monitoring of compliance. They fear that Western members prefer a formal organizational structure and contractual framework of rules achieved through negotiations on specific trade and investment questions. Although initially it appeared that APEC was successfully promoting an Asia-Pacific regional identity, by the end of its first decade the tensions between Western and Asian members were weakening that perception. Western members of APEC especially the United States no longer identify as closely with Asia and have lost interest in APEC. This leaves the question of APEC's future and its identity uncertain.

Because APEC has been a unique experiment in regionalism, it is valuable to look at what can be learned from it. Its flexibility and ambiguity were consistent with Asian members’ preferences, but contributed to lack of agreement on objectives and substantive governance activities. Despite its hegemonic position, the United States failed to change their commitment to “open regionalism” and flexible agreements and, increasingly, found that it still had more in common with Europe than with Asia. In contrast, Japan has identified increasingly with Asia. The diversity of APEC's twenty-one members has made effective cooperation on trade and investment issues difficult. Finally, many of the contextual factors that made APEC's creation fortuitous in 1989 had changed a decade later. Still, APEC's existence is an achievement, even if its contributions to regional governance are modest at best. It links countries of great diversity and longstanding rivalry and hostility. It helped make some countries more comfortable dealing with each other, building confidence where the past offered little experience of constructive interaction. As a long-time Indonesian participant noted,”APEC is first and foremost about community building”.

1. Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation was established to facilitate intergovernmental dialogue on political issues.______

2. An important purpose for the Asian members is to support a process of confidence building among countries of the region.______

3. The basic ideas for an Asia - Pacific regional organization were laid out by Asian and European economists ._____

4. The idea of Asia - Pacific collaboration was promoted by a group of economists through many organizations.______

5. APEC was intended to operate with consensus decisionmaking._____

6. The monthly summits have raised APEC's profile and reinforced the idea of Asia - Pacific as a region._____

7. APEC is shrouded in ambiguity over its goals._____

8. There is no agreement among the member economies over priorities among the four pillars of the organization._____

9. The Bogor Declaration envisaged free trade and investment in the region by 2020 for the industrialized economies.____

10. Economic and political cooperation is of primary interest to Asian members ._____

Choose the most suitable word/word combination and fill in the gaps:

1. Asia - Pacific Economic Cooperation was established to help intergovernmental dialogue on ________ issues .

1. economic

2. political

3. agricultural

4. cultural

2. The diversity of size, economies and policies is greater than in any other grouping - a source of ________.

1. strength

2. weakness

3. prosperity

4. both strength and weakness

3. What moved Asia- Pacific ________ from idea to APEC were a series of developments in the 1980s that changed the international context.

1. structuralism

2. pluralism

3. regionalism

4. fundamentalism

4. The confluence of factors helped change many countries' perceptions of their economic interests and persuaded them to support the __________ initiative to create APEC.

1. Australian and Japanese

2. Vietnamese and Japanese

3. Australian and the U.S.

4. Thai and Cambodian

5. Many East Asian members preferred loose coordination of __________ trade policies rather than an agenda of trade negotiations.

1. multilateral

2. bilateral

3. unilateral

4. free

Exercises and Tasks

1. Complete the text with the following words: cooperation, wary, core, underway, tension, framework, diversity, blueprint, trade, primary, foreign, convened, coordination, look, effective.

1. The Pacific Economic ________ Council first put forward a _________ of an intergovernmental organization for managing regional interdependence.

2. Some ASEAN governments were ________ of another organization in the region of _________ liberalization that might advantage the region's industrial countries.

3. Most ASEAN countries had shifted from _________ product exports to manufactured goods.

4. The _________ structure consisted of the informal meetings of trade and ________ ministers.

5. President Clinton _______ the first summit meeting of heads of governments.

6. Although a large number of projects were _________, there was little ________ among them.

7. APEC illustrates the _________ between Asian and Western views on regional cooperation.

8. Western members prefer a formal organizational structure and contractual ________ of rules.

9. It is valuable to ________ at what can be learned from a unique experiment in regionalism.

10. The _________ of APEC's twenty - one members has made _________ cooperation on trade and investment issues difficult.