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The leaders of the Association of the Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) announced to negotiate a Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RECP) in November 2012, which is comprised of 10 ASEAN Member States (Thailand, Indonesia, Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, and Myanmar) and its six FTA partner countries (China, Japan, South Korea, Australia, New Zealand, and India). Embedded in the ASEAN Charter and implemented in all existing ASEAN + 1 FTAs, the ASEAN Centrality has been a corner stone principle in ASEAN-centric economic initiatives. Emerging discord in the region, complicated security climate and the rise of China, among others, have put the ASEAN Centrality under challenge. The development of the RCEP provides a timely case to assess ASEAN’s leadership role in creating the world’s most populous Free Trade Area. The RCEP may enhance ASEAN’s central role, but ASEAN needs to address challenges facing the regional integration now and beyond 2015. On the country/economy level, the chapter reviews some ASEAN Member States and their FTA Partners how they practice their ASEAN policy and seek leadership role in ASEAN. The three major players in ASEAN-Indonesia, Thailand, and Malaysia have reiterated the importance of the ASEAN Centrality in their foreign policy in the past, but debates emerge whether, such as in Indonesia, ASEAN Centrality best suits the national interests. The chapter also explores how the major powers, including China and the United States, respond to and collaborate with the group of smaller developing country players.

The purpose of this paper is to study key economic strategies in Asia laid out by the Chinese Government since Xi Jinping became the General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China.

The paper is composed of six parts. The first part analyzes China’s Asian trade strategy with a focus on the free-trade agreement. The second part elaborates the Asian finance and currency strategy with the core being the regionalization of RMB. The third part introduces China’s newly proposed Belt and Road Initiative (B&R). The fourth part deals with the China–USA economic relationship with a view to China’s economic strategy in Asia. The fifth part explains China’s domestic economic policy which forms the basis of the Asian Economic Strategy.

A marked change has taken place in China’s economic strategy in Asia, namely, giving more consideration to how to offer more public goods to the region. This is natural as China’s economic power is developed to a certain level and it is highly related to China’s attempt to growing its economic influence in this region. China believes that the B&R Initiative and Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank are both public goods China has provided to Asia. China’s economic strategy in Asia demonstrates that China, as a rising power, though faced with domination of established power and the original regional economic rule system, still promotes the cooperation, integration, participation and development of this region. In general, China’s economic strategy in Asia offers an alternative for countries in this region so that Asian countries can better safeguard their rights amid China–America competition, and a new Asian economic order can be better built.

The paper contributes to the researched area of China’s economic strategy in Asia by comprehensively elaborating its trade, money, B&R Initiative and so on. This paper also shows the major challenges of China’s economic strategy in Asia and therefore is helpful to fully understand China’s economic statecraft.

The paper was written to highlight the advantages of initiating economic integration among Muslim countries across the globe, drawing special lessons from Europe's experience; its successful economic integration and challenges which trailed the process.

The methodology is basically descriptive and analytical. Theoretical construct and model on economic integration was developed for adoption by the Muslim countries. The model seeks to enhance their economic strength through intra and inter trade relations and reduces their weaknesses through specialization. Secondary data from Organization of the Islamic Conference and Islamic Development Bank member countries were exhaustively used in the study.

The paper found out that integration is plausible and beneficial, however, a concerted effort must be made in promoting technological development, raise human capital, and improve the product diversification among Muslim countries while developing stable institutions and infrastructures. Two, the potential benefits of integrating exceed the costs. The emphasis needs to be, not in cutting costs/inputs (reductionist approach), but on generating more wealth/revenue/income (incrementalist approach) that results in reducing the huge external debt, poverty, diseases, frustration, and corruption in most Muslim countries. Three, key to Muslims' socio‐economic happiness is through mutual cooperation for growth and development (Qur'an 42:38, Q3:159).

The major contributions of this paper are three, firstly, the paper explores a faith‐based integration effort, and secondly, it identifies reasons for low success in the integration efforts among Muslim countries and finally suggests an econometric model based on faith that neglects the artificial geographical barrier.

The practical implication of the paper is the recommendation to establish a Muslim Economic Bloc because Muslim countries are economically heterogenous group, with uneven development and growth pattern.

The paper is major contribution in the field of Islamic economics and applied economics. Contrary to what we know in the conventional economics, this paper advocates a faith‐based economic model and bloc in a globalised world economy. It is a contribution to existing literature.

The major economies of East Asia, namely Japan and the Four Asian Tigers, have always prioritized the WTO-led multilateral trade liberalization over other trade arrangements primarily due to their unique economic structure with a high dependency on the world’s major markets such as the US. Along the same line, even the huge blow from the Asian Financial Crisis in 1997 only managed to trigger a few initiatives to aide East Asian regional integration while being led by different centering bodies, APEC and ASEAN. These dispersed efforts naturally resulted in no realistically significant achievements in the light of ‘integration’ until the present day. Under these circumstances, East Asia now faces a second opportunity to achieve its economic independence from the extra-regional influences via regionalization: the 2009 Global Credit Crunch. This paper hereupon critically reviews the actual progress and the likely impacts of the current global recession on the East Asian region.

Various forms of regional cooperation in East Asia have greatly increased in the past two decades. Scientific collaboration is beneficial for both scientifically lagging countries (SLCs) and scientifically advanced countries (SACs) with respect to their S&T capacity and thus economic prosperity. This paper aims to provide a comprehensive description of intra‐regional scientific collaboration in East Asia from 1985 to 2008 with the 10+3 (ASEAN ten plus China, Japan and South Korea) framework.

The paper uses co‐authored articles embodied by Science Citation Index Expanded (SCI‐Expanded) to indicate cross‐border scientific collaboration.

Data show that heterogeneity in the publication output across East Asian countries is decreasing. Intra‐ASEAN, intra‐ Northeast Asia, as well as ASEAN and Northeast Asia scientific collaboration greatly improved since 1997.

This paper discusses factors influencing international scientific collaboration and focuses on explaining the impact of regional integration. Finally, it offers further suggestions on East Asian integration from the perspective of scientific collaboration.

This chapter focuses on South Korea’s newly found regional leadership, as the emergent middle power of East Asia, in order to advance regional integration and institution-building. Policy leadership is observed and analyzed from an international lens, linked to the literature of middle powers. The chapter first conceptualizes middle powers in connection with the issue of international leadership, since such states often play important roles in promoting cooperation. The chapter looks especially into South Korea’s foreign policy behavior toward East Asian regional processes and how it has manifested innovative and capable leadership. More specifically, the last three presidencies of Kim Dae-jung (1998–2002), Roh Moo-hyun (2003–2008), and Lee Myung-bak (2008–2013) are scrutinized in the hope of underscoring how their particular administrations, political leadership, and strategic approaches to foreign policy toward the region influenced South Korea’s regional leadership attempts and middle power status.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the trade and investment potential under the ambit of sub‐regional cooperation comprising the four contiguous countries of Bangladesh, China, India and Myanmar (BCIM).

The study addressed both intra‐regional and intra‐industrial trade, applying a dynamic gravity model of bilateral trade flows by product group of BEC's 1‐digit product classification, to set a panel data for the period of 1992‐2009.

The analysis reveals that higher trade transaction costs and tariff between each pair of countries reduce the trade flow. One of the major findings of the paper is that a large part of BCIM's trade has remained unrealized and the trade transaction cost is one of the major trading barriers prohibiting the growth of BCIM intra‐regional trade. The paper concludes that liberalization of non‐policy barriers will spur BCIM's trade, particularly in a time of ongoing global economic and financial crisis.

The study reinforces that improvement in infrastructure that leads to less trade transportation costs should be a necessary step in order to realize BCIM's trade potential. The paper concludes that liberalization of non‐policy barriers will spur BCIM's trade and economic cooperation, particularly in time of ongoing global economic and financial crisis.

This paper is the first‐ever attempt to estimate the trade potential of BCIM countries using dynamic gravity model.

The 1997-98 financial crisis has had a profound effect on how East Asian economies the role of the IMF and its strategic interests relative to those of the United States in the international financial regime. It has prompted them to create a regional mechanism for financial and monetary cooperation, ranging from deeper policy dialogue and surveillance, to a system of financial cooperation, and common exchange rate arrangements. This paper analyses the economic and strategic motivations behind this and outlines recent developments in financial cooperation in East Asia to provide possible directions for the future.

A network of bilateral swap arrangements under the Chiang Mai Initiative(CMI) needs stronger policy dialogue and surveillance to develop into a regional financing facility, a sort of East Asian IMF. The facility plays a role as an regional lender of last resort, providing short-term funds to a member country facing a temporary liquidity shortage and for market intervention to stabilize foreign exchange rate. East Asian countries need to achieve regional exchange rate stability. In the long run, the region may develop a common currency arrangement, but it cannot be expected in the very near future because there is no convergence of macroeconomic conditions, economic structure and systems. A realistic approach would be for East Asian developing countries to adopt a currency basket system to minimize the impact of dollar/yen exchange rate volatility on their economies. Strong political will and a vision for regional integration will be required to introduce it.

This paper is a historical account of the process by which Michael Porter and INCAE Business School put together a regional competitiveness strategy for Central America that was officially adopted by the governments of five participating countries, and implemented through a series of Presidential Summits that occurred between 1995 and 1999. The paper provides a unique case study on the adoption of the concepts put forth by Porter in his book “The Competitive Advantage of Nations” (1990) at the highest level of government. The study arrives at a series of practical implications for policy makers that are particularly relevant for the implementation of supra-national regional strategies.

The authors conduct an extensive literature review of 190 policy papers produced by INCAE Business School, that are used to recreate the historical evolution of the regional competitiveness strategy. The effect of Porter’s intervention is also assessed by comparing the main economic indicators of each participating country with those of 2005-2010. One of the authors was the main protagonist in the successful implementation of the strategy, and the paper relies partially on his accounts of events.

This study describes how economic policy in Central America was profoundly influenced by Michael Porter’s thinking in the second half of the 1990s. These policy changes promoted international competition of Central American clusters and firms, and opened the region for international investment and tourism. The region experienced important increases in its economic integration, its international trade, foreign direct investment and tourist arrivals. Gross domestic product growth was accelerated in Honduras and Nicaragua.

Like all case studies, this study has limits related to the generalizability of its conclusions. Additionally, it is not possible to determine the precise nature of the relation between the implementation of the regional economic strategy, and the impact on economic growth, integration, FDI attraction and exports.

The paper has several practical implications that relate to the design of regional economic strategies. First, it identifies policy areas that are more effective as part of regional strategies, and distinguishes them from those that should be resolved at the national level. Second, it suggests a process that can facilitate execution. Finally, it provides an example of the coordinating role that can be assumed by an academic institution such as INCAE.

The Central American Competitiveness Initiative provides a unique setting to study the implementation of competitiveness policy for several reasons. First, in all countries in Central America, Michael Porter’s diamond framework (1990) and cluster theory were officially adopted at the highest level of government. Second, in addition to their individual competitiveness strategies, all countries adopted a regional strategy for cooperation and economic integration. Finally, the Central American Competitiveness Initiative was founded on one of the first competitiveness think tanks of the world.

For both the Czech Republic and Poland, globalization is intricately linked to European integration and Europeanization. Globalization and European integration have strongly influenced the policies of these countries over the last 17 years. The Czech policy of accommodation and the Polish policy of initiation toward the European Union (EU) show two different ways how the individual Central and Eastern European (CEE) countries can react to the process of Europeanization. The Czech and Polish policies within CEE area are illustrative examples of reactions to the supraterritorializing effects of globalization. These two CEE countries have answered some of the challenges of globalization through sub-regional cooperation in the Central European Initiative (CEI), Visegrad Group (VG), and the Central European Free Trade Agreement (CEFTA), followed by accession to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and later joining the EU. The Czech Republic and Poland are gradually entering the area of supra-territoriality. But concurrently both, as EU member states, participate in building and strengthening external territorial borders of the EU through the Schengen Agreement. Despite sharing the experience of disappearing of the EU internal borders, the Czech Republic and Poland have not completely relinquished their existing territorial identity. In the context of the break-up of the Czechoslovak federation it is also useful to examine the issues of deterritorialization and reterritorialization.