Effective Multilateralism ─ Through the Looking Glass of East Asia

Western liberal order is in a protracted process of transition. There is no new hegemon willing or able to replace the United States and to push for a redesign of the global governance architecture from scratch. Emerging powers engage in global cooperation in their own way and on their own terms. While there seems to be a growing demand for effective global cooperation, there are no longer universally applicable concepts to analyze it nor a common language with which to describe it. Effective Multilateralism makes the case for a new approach in order to understand and explain global cooperation and collective action juxtaposing the European concept of effective multilateralism with the empirical reality of regional cooperation in East Asia. The careful examination of East Asian cases leads to a better understanding of the scope conditions of analytical frameworks of multilateralism.

Jochen Prantl is Associate Professor in International Relations, Asia-Pacific College of Diplomacy, Australian National University. Previously he held positions in the Department of Politics and International Relations, and Nuffield College, University of Oxford, and the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, National University of Singapore. In 2007, Dr Prantl was the inaugural recipient of the Zvi Meitar/Vice-Chancellor Oxford University Research Prize in the Social Sciences.