Practicing Peace: Conflict Management in Southeast Asia and South America 0197633226, 9780197633229

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Practicing Peace

Practicing Peace Conflict Management in Southeast Asia and South America AARIE GLAS

Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and certain other countries. Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press 198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America. © Oxford University Press 2022 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, by license, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reproduction rights organization. Inquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above. You must not circulate this work in any other form and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer. Library of Congress Control Number: 2022018781 ISBN 978–​0–​19–​763322–​9 DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780197633229.001.0001 1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2 Printed by Integrated Books International, United States of America

Contents List of Figures and Table  Acknowledgments  List of Abbreviations 

1. Introduction 

vii ix xi

1

2. Habitual Dispositions and Conflict Management 

30

3. Uncovering Meaning and Practice in Regional Diplomacy 

60

4. Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia 

90

5. Practicing Peace in South America 

140

6. Comparisons, Contributions, and Conclusions 

197

References  Index 

213 235

List of Figures and Table Figures 1.1. War in South America and Southeast Asia, 1850–​2010

5

1.2. Militarized Interstate Disputes in South America and Southeast Asia, 1946–​2010 6 4.1. Militarized Interstate Disputes of Southeast Asian States, 1946–​2010

96

4.2. Intra-​ASEAN Militarized Disputes by Intensity Level, 1967–​2010

97

5.1. Militarized Interstate Disputes of South American States, 1946–​2010

155

Table 6.1. Regional Diplomatic Habitual Dispositions

198

Acknowledgments The book is the product of an often-​meandering scholarly journey over many, many years. It was made possible only with the encouragement and support of far too many people to name in these brief acknowledgments. My thanks are first and most appreciatively extended to the practitioners who shared their voices and experiences with me during the course of my research. I am hugely indebted to many officials at ASEAN and the OAS and the missions and embassies that support them. As scholars, we ask and take much from those we interview and work with, and I am immensely grateful for the warm welcome and earnest engagement I was offered by those quoted within these pages and many other officials who informed this project in myriad ways. This book would not have been possible without the guidance of my doctoral committee and many others who supported me during my studies at the University of Toronto. My sincere thanks to Matthew Hoffmann, Steven Bernstein, and Vincent Pouliot for their insightful and engaged supervision as well as their much-​needed encouragement during my studies. In particular, I thank Matt Hoffmann for all he has done to support and guide me during my studies and beyond. This book and my academic life more generally would not have been possible without the late and much missed Lee Ann Fujii. She was a kind, keen mentor throughout my studies and a pillar of support and insight during my time conducting interviews. Her work and legacy continue to serve as an inspiration to me, and so many others. I also extend my sincere appreciation to Jarrod Hayes, who has long been an enthusiastic supporter of my work and whose feedback at various stages of this research has been immensely important. This book also benefited greatly from the constructive comments and critique from its anonymous readers and the editorial support offered by Angela Chnapko. I owe yet more debts of gratitude to a long list of scholars and friends who have meaningfully contributed to this work in many ways, over many years. At the top of this list are my friends Stéphanie Martel, my co-​ASEAN-​enthusiast, and Jessica Soedirgo, my frequent collaborator on questions of interpretive methods. I also thank Emanuel Adler, Alice Ba, Emmanuel Balogun,

x Acknowledgments Seva Gunitsky, Ted Hopf, Marion Laurence, Dylan Loh, Jennifer Mustapha, Deepak Nair, Alesha Porisky, Peri Schwartz-​Shea, and Dvora Yanow. All offered support in varied and meaningful ways, from constructive feedback on components of this book to conversations and collaborations exploring related issues and ideas. David Zarnett has my sincere thanks as well, for his feedback and commiserations during the ups and downs of our doctoral studies. Omissions, errors, and limitations in this book, of course, remain entirely my own. I would also like to thank all my colleagues and friends at Northern Illinois University, where I have found a welcome and supportive academic home. In particular, I thank Colin Kuehl and Ches Thurber, my IR colleagues, for their friendship and support, and Kikue Hamayotsu, Eric Jones, Judy Ledgerwood, Mitch Pickerill, and Scot Schraufnagel, who have all been most supportive departmental chairs and colleagues, as well as good friends. Finally, my thanks and gratitude to my family: my loving and supportive parents, grandparents, and brothers, and my wonderful wife and our new wee son. I dedicate this book to them.

List of Abbreviations AEM AIMO ALBA APEC ARF ASA ASEAN ASEC AU CAN CELAC CIFTA

ASEAN Economic Ministers Meeting ASEAN Integration Monitoring Office Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America Asia-​Pacific Economic Cooperation ASEAN Regional Forum Association of Southeast Asia Association of Southeast Asian Nations ASEAN Secretariat African Union Andean Community Community of Latin American and Caribbean States Convention Against the Illicit Manufacturing of and Trafficking in Firearms, Ammunition, Explosives, and Other Related Materials COW Correlates of War CPR Committee of Permanent Representatives ECOWAS Economic Community of West African States EDSM Enhanced Dispute Settlement Mechanism EU European Union IACHR Inter-​American Commission on Human Rights IADB Inter-​American Defense Board IMF International Monetary Fund LAIA Latin American Integration Association LAFTA Latin American Free Trade Association MCC Brazilian-​Argentine Consultation and Coordination Mechanism for International Security and Defense Issues Mercosur Southern Common Market MID Militarized Interstate Dispute MOMEP Military Observer Mission, Ecuador Peru NATO North Atlantic Treaty Organization OAS Organization of American States PR Permanent Representative SADC South American Defense Council SEATO Southeast Asia Treaty Organization

xii  List of Abbreviations SOM TAC UN UNSC UNASUR WTO ZOPFAN

Senior Officials Meeting Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in Southeast Asia United Nations United Nations Security Council Union of South American Nations World Trade Organization Zone of Peace, Freedom, and Neutrality

1 Introduction Introduction On December 15, 2008, the Charter of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) came into effect. The 10 member states—​Cambodia, Brunei, Indonesia, Laos, the Philippines, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam—​bound themselves to shared principles and norms of pacific regional relations. Six months later, they devised a blueprint for an ambitious ASEAN Community to further deepen regional integration. However, surrounding the progress of this regional project, militarized interstate conflict flared. Periodically in 2008 and again 2011, violent clashes along the Thai–​Cambodian border displaced as many as 100,000 people and saw the use of tanks, heavy artillery, and cluster munitions between these ASEAN member states.1 These episodes are not isolated events among the organization’s members. Tensions between Indonesia and Malaysia flared in 2005 and prompted a confrontation of nine warships off the Sipadan and Ligitan islands, with Indonesian military officials claiming their intent to “crush Malaysia.”2 These are 2 of 26 militarized interstate disputes between formal ASEAN members since its foundation in 1967. Across the Pacific, South America’s 12 states exhibit a similar pattern of conflict and cooperation. The region is often recognized as particularly institutionalized, with myriad and overlapping regional organizations from the hemisphere-​wide Organization of American States (OAS) established in 1948, to the faltering Union of South American Nations (UNASUR) founded in 2008. Given a dense and consequential network of organizations and the growing interdependence it makes possible, many observers see the region as uniquely peaceful. Kalevi Holsti, for example, suggests it may well be “the most peaceful region in the world.”3 However, alongside 1 International Crisis Group, “Waging Peace: ASEAN and the Thai-​Cambodian Border Conflict,” Asia Report, no. 205 (December 2011). 2 Bill Guerin, “Sulawesi Sea Row Dredges up Defenses,” Asia Times, March 9, 2005. 3 Kalevi J. Holsti, The State, War, and the State of War (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 155. Practicing Peace. Aarie Glas, Oxford University Press. © Oxford University Press 2022. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780197633229.003.0001

2  Practicing Peace cooperation and peace, there has been a pervasive level of interstate violence. From 1945 to 2010 these heavily institutionalized regional states engaged in some 70 militarized interstate disputes, including 39 that involved the use of force.4 In both Southeast Asia and South America, then, there exists a long record of pervasive interstate conflicts alongside regional organization and integration. In each case, disputes have been actively managed, and in each region war remains rare. In South America, despite persistent territorial disputes and regime instability, war has been the exception rather than the rule since at least the 1940s. Similarly, in Southeast Asia since the 1960s war has largely eluded the region, despite territorial disputes and interstate rivalries that remain all but endemic. In both cases, scholars of many theoretical stripes have recognized a puzzling pattern of peace where we would not expect to see it: largely illiberal states exhibiting long peace. In many accounts of interstate relations, the absence of war is assumed to be an ephemeral and fragile condition of interstate relations, and often the product of a tenuous balancing of material capability to disincentivize the costly escalation of conflict. However, in neither region does this appear to be the case. Similarly, democratic development and economic interdependence have long been seen as generative of sustained peaceful relations among states. Yet both regions demonstrate an absence of war largely absent democratic regimes and with relatively limited economic interdependence. Given this, both regions exhibit puzzling patterns of peace where we might not expect to see it. However, and all the more puzzling, both regions demonstrate pervasive and violent interstate conflict short of war. In both regions, then, there appears a long history of conflictual peace; real and sustained cooperation and community-​building alongside pervasive interstate violence short of war. This reality is often overlooked by scholars attentive to the long peace of each region. This book aims to explore and account for the conflictual peace of Southeast Asia and South America. To do so, I highlight the voices, experiences, and practices of diplomatic officials in each of these regions of the Global South. I build on Vincent Pouliot’s suggestion that “peace exists in and through practice when security officials’ practical sense makes 4 See also David R. Mares, Latin America and the Illusion of Peace (New York City: Routledge, 2008); David R. Mares, “The Zone of Violent Peace,” in Power Dynamics and Regional Security in Latin America, eds. Marcial A. G. Suarez, Rafael Duarte Villa, and Brigitte Weiffen (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017), 225–​246.

Introduction  3 diplomacy the self-​evident way to solving interstate disputes.”5 I argue that this is the case in both Southeast Asia and South America. In both regional cases, interstate relations are circumscribed by particular and largely given habits and practices of cooperation that generate both cooperative relations and a tolerance of limited violence between states. As I unpack in detail in the following chapters, the habitual and practical qualities of interstate relations—​from how consensus is sought to what effective mediation looks like and why—​vary across regional communities of diplomats. I argue that attention to these qualities—​varied regional diplomatic habitual dispositions—​allows us to understand the puzzling dynamics apparent in these regions; community-​building alongside sustained levels of interstate violence and long-​term patterns of conflict and cooperation more broadly. Habitual dispositions are discrete sets of processual and substantive qualities of relations that are understood and enacted largely as a matter of a course by communities of practice. Said another way, they are the cognitive foundations and relatively automatic behaviors that are known to be normal, natural, and effective for particular groups of officials. This book, then, is an inquiry into the foundations of the long and conflictual peace of each region from the vantage point of those who practice peace. In this chapter I introduce this study in five steps. First, I survey peace and conflict in both Southeast Asia and South America to illustrate the puzzle at the heart of this book: the long, but conflictual peace of each region. In the second section, I briefly explore existing accounts of this reality. These accounts underscore the role of state power, regional organizations, and norms of appropriate conduct in shaping regional relations. In the third section I advance my argument in brief: that regional peace is the product of communities of diplomatic practice that actively manage conflict in particular ways as a result of particular habitual dispositions. In the fourth and fifth sections, I outline central terms and concepts and explore the structure of the chapters that follow.

Peace and Conflict in Southeast Asia and South America There is a two-​part puzzle at heart of this book. On the one hand, both Southeast Asia and South America exhibit decades-​long peace where many 5 Vincent Pouliot, “The Logic of Practicality: A Theory of Practice of Security Communities,” International Organization 62, no. 2 (2008): 259.

4  Practicing Peace international relations (IR) scholars may not expect to find it: historically illiberal states with limited economic independence and no regional hegemony to deter risky or violent behavior. These states have abhorred large-​scale violence between them and showcase a long and varied history of attempts at integration and the institutionalization regional relations. These claims are well-​trodden ground in IR. A long line of social constructivist scholars, in particular, have documented the role of ideas and norms in making possible peaceful regional relations in Southeast Asia.6 Others have examined the domestic and international sources of interstate peace in South America.7 On the other hand, and as is less well established, this long peace exists alongside pervasive levels of interstate violence short of war. In this section I explore these two realities in order to outline the conflictual peace of each region. Existing scholarship affords us a few clues as to how to account for this reality. However, as I show, it largely neglects a crucial element: the communities of practice who actively manage regional relations—​those who practice peace. Both Southeast Asia and South America are regions recognized as exhibiting a long peace. Here, peace is measured by an absence of large-​scale interstate violence, itself defined by 1,000 or more battle deaths in a given year. For many scholars this is an empirical reality, and a puzzling one. By this measure, the 12 states of South America—​Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Columbia, Ecuador, Guyana, Paraguay, Peru, Suriname, Uruguay, and Venezuela—​have not fought a war since 1935. Similarly, the 10 states of Southeast Asia—​Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam—​have not fought a war while these states were members of ASEAN, and the five original members—​ Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand—​since the organization’s founding in 1967. Figure 1.1 offers the scant details of these claims. Figure 1.1 provides a limited and rudimentary depiction of regional relations. It illustrates intraregional, interstate wars from 1850 to 2010 when 6 See Amitav Archarya, Constructing a Security Community in Southeast Asia: ASEAN and the Problem of Regional Order (London: Routledge, 2014); Alice D. Ba, [Re]Negotiating East and Southeast Asia: Region, Regionalism, and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2009); Alice D. Ba, “ASEAN’s Constructed Dichotomies: The Ongoing Need for Complexity-​Sensitive Research Agendas,” Pacific Review 33, no. 3–​4 (2019): 593–​603. 7 See Arie M. Kacowicz, Zones of Peace in the Third World: South America and West Africa in Comparative Perspective (New York City: State University of New York Press, 1998); David R. Mares, Violent Peace: Militarized Interstate Bargaining in Latin America (New York City: Columbia University Press, 2001); Felix Martin, Militarist Peace in South America (New York City: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006).

Introduction  5 1850

1870

1890

1910 Southeast Asia

1930

1950

1970

1990

South America

Figure 1.1.  War in South America and Southeast Asia, 1850–​2010

regional states were on opposing sides. It notes the five wars in South America during this period that involve South American states in opposition, and the four wars that involve opposing Southeast Asian states, defined as the 10 current members of ASEAN. War in South America is concentrated in three decades prior to the 1880s, a time when the emergent states of the Iberian colonies came into being. These include the limited 1851–​1852 Platine War and 1863 Ecuadorian-​ Colombian War, as well as the disastrous 1865 War of the Triple Alliance and the 1879–​1883 War of the Pacific. After 1883 there are five decades of peace, by this measure, until it is broken by the Chaco War of 1932–​1935, the “only major South American war of the twentieth century.”8 In Southeast Asia, the four noted wars belie the reality that no ASEAN member states have engaged in a war among themselves after ascending to the organization. The three episodes clustered around 1970 are conflicts within the umbrella of the Vietnam War, and the 1977 point represents the Vietnamese-​Cambodian War, which saw the Vietnamese occupation of Cambodia. However, there is an immediate complication to this story and one that serves only to deepen the puzzle that animates this book. While interstate war in each region has been an aberration, interstate violence has not. Throughout their respective periods of long peace, states in both regions have experienced sustained levels of interstate violence. Figure 1.2 provides illustration. Figure 1.2 narrows the temporal focus to the post–​World War II period (1946–​2010) and widens the focus from war to cases of militarized interstate disputes (MIDs).9 It offers a more nuanced look at intraregional interstate conflict in each case. Rather than an absence of war, the sheer 8 Martin, Militarist Peace, 86. 9 Glenn Palmer, Vito D’Orazio, Michael Kenwick, and Matthew Lane, “The MID4 Data Set, 2002–​2010,” Conflict Management and Peace Science, 32, no. 2 (2015): 222–​242. The description in Figure 1.2 presents only conflicts within each region (excluding regional states engaged in conflict external to the region), and only those that saw regional states in opposition. It ignores conflicts that regional states were involved in that occurred outside of the region, and conflicts internal to the region involving external actors when regional states were not in opposition.

6  Practicing Peace 5 4 3 2 1 0 1946

1956

1966

1976

South America

1986

1996

2006

Southeast Asia

Figure 1.2.  Militarized Interstate Disputes in South America and Southeast Asia, 1946–​2010

frequency of conflict is most apparent in this figure. During the period from 1946 to 2010 Southeast Asian states engaged in 105 MIDs among themselves.10 These include 78 disputes characterized by the use of force (level 4), including acts of seizure, attacks, and military clashes. These are conflictual relations between states that, while short of war, denote the existence of pervasive interstate conflict. Moreover, many of the conflicts that pepper the post-​1967 period are the same that colored the earlier “warlike” period of the early 1960s.11 Central here are territorial disputes, the “stuff ” over which states tend to engage in disputes that escalate to war.12 For example, throughout the Southeast Asian long peace disputes remained between Malaysia and Singapore over Pedra Branca, Indonesia and Malaysia over the Sipadan and Ligitan Islands, Indonesia and the Philippines over the Miatan Islands, Malaysia and both Indonesia and the Philippines

10 Again, here the region is defined as the current ten member states of ASEAN: Cambodia, Brunei, Indonesia, Laos, the Philippines, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam. This descriptive exploration of regional conflict is advanced in more detail in c­ hapter 4. 11 Acharya, Constructing a Security Community, 46; Timo Kivimäki, “The Long Peace of ASEAN,” Journal of Peace Research, 38, no. 1 (2001): 19. 12 Kalevi J. Holsti, War and Peace: Armed Conflict and International Order 1648–​ 1989 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001). See also John A. Vasquez and Marie T. Henehan, Territory, War, and Peace (New York: Routledge, 2010); Paul K. Huth, Standing Your Ground: Territorial Disputes and International Conflict (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1996); Dominic D. P. Johnson and Monica Duffy Toft, “Grounds for War: The Evolution of Territorial Conflict,” International Security 38, no. 3 (2013/​14): 7–​38.

Introduction  7 over Sabah, and Malaysia, Vietnam, and the Philippines over the Spratly Islands.13 Further, in terms of use of force, there is little discernable difference between the pre-​and post-​founding of ASEAN in 1967. There are 28 intraregional MIDs (23 of which were level 4 or higher) in the 10 years prior to ASEAN’s founding and 20 (14 of which were level 4 or higher) in the 10 years after. Moreover, 18 of the 78 disputes involving the use of force occurred between ASEAN members. From 1946 to at least 2010, then, war may be an aberration but pervasive disputes remain. By this limited measure, a “major shift,” as Amitav Acharya describes it, from low-​level war to something more peaceful is not easily apparent.14 South America tells a similar story. As with Southeast Asia, a lack of war does not mean a lack of interstate violence.15 During the post–​World War II period, South American states engaged in 70 militarized interstate disputes among themselves, including 39 uses of force. As Holsti observes, the “record of near wars until the 1980s would place the region only at the ‘introductory’ levels of no-​war zone” (1996, 158). In the broader context of Latin America, David Mares finds that “the use of violence across national boundaries has been a consistent trait”16 of regional history and the region today is best seen as “an environment with little transparency, limited common understanding of threats and competing strategic views, and in which the use of low levels of military force in interstate bargaining is considered acceptable.”17 Moreover, the recurrent perceived threats and territorial conflict that, prior to 1883, had been cause of decades of war did not vanish with the onset of the apparent long peace.18 The 1978 dispute between Argentina and Chile over the Beagle Channel Islands, the 1941 border conflict between Ecuador and Peru, and the enduring Argentine-​Brazilian rivalry, to name just a few examples, illustrate this reality.19 As in the Southeast Asian case, once a focus shifts from an 13 See Kivimäki, “Long Peace,” 10–​11; Barry Wain, “Latent Danger: Boundary Disputes and Border Issues,” Southeast Asian Affairs (2012): 54–​55. 14 Acharya, Constructing a Security Community, 4. 15 As with the Southeast Asian case, a more detailed exploration of regional conflict is advanced in ­chapter 5. 16 Mares, Violent Peace, 28. 17 Mares, Latin America, 169. Mares suggests that the wider Latin American region exhibits patterns of war similar to the rest of the world, save for the Middle East. See Mares, Violent Peace, 28–​29. His focus, however, is not only on a wider region (including Central America states) but also on conflicts with actors external to the region (e.g., the Malvinas or Falkland Islands war). 18 On regional trends in this regard, see Mares, Violent Peace, and Martin, Militarist Peace. 19 See Kacowicz, Zones of Peace, 20; Mares, Violent Peace, 32–​46; Marcos Valle Machado Da Silva, “Interstate Conflict Management in South America: The Relevance of Overlapping Institutions,” in Power Dynamics and Regional Security in Latin America, eds. Marcial A. G. Suarez, Rafael Duarte Villa, and Brigitte Weiffen (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017), 207–​215.

8  Practicing Peace analysis of “war,” the region appears marked by distrust, rivalry, and conflict. While war may indeed be the exception to the regional rule in both Southeast Asia and South America, the relative dearth of war belies the plethora of conflict between regional states. This is all the more puzzling in each region because alongside this sustained level of conflict are successful attempts at regional cooperation and integration. In Southeast Asia this is clear through the establishment and growth of ASEAN. ASEAN was founded in 1967 as means for five regional states to pursue nation-​building and entrench state sovereignty. Since then, as c­ hapter 4 explores in more detail, the organization has expanded its membership and scope, formalizing regional norms and principles of peaceful coexistence and conflict management and pursuing a regional community of political, economic, and sociocultural cooperation. In South America, as ­chapter 5 details, attempts at regionalism have been even more pronounced. Particularly since the 1960s, a patchwork of organizations and agreements has united the 12 states of South America in dense political and economic interactions. Each region, then, exhibits dual realities of a long but conflictual peace.

Peace as a Puzzle International relations scholarship provides a host of arguments and conceptual focal points to understand and explain peace between states. Broadly construed, these tend to center on the role of power, institutions, and or norms and to track traditional paradigmatic divides in the discipline. These approaches include rationalist accounts of power and deterrence, institutionalist accounts of organizational dynamics, and social theoretical accounts centered on the role of prescriptive norms and community-​ formation. All provide useful insights into the puzzle of peace in Southeast Asia and South America, as I explore below. However, none alone is sufficient to account for these cases. Rather, each approach offers a starting point to develop a more productive account of regional relations and one that centers on the thinking and behavior of communities of diplomats and officials tasked with responding to conflict and pursuing regional cooperation. Before advancing my own account, I turn now to survey the paradigmatic propositions on which it is built.

Introduction  9

Peace and Power A first set of propositions to explain peace and conflict among states draws attention to the “geometry of power” between them.20 In bluntest terms, peace in this account is the product of variations in state power. An absence of power (there being little to fight over or with), a balance of power (there being rational restraints on risky or violent behavior), or an asymmetry of power (there being a powerful state within or external to the region to dissuade violence) are core claims in this brand of argument.21 However, the role of power does not seem, alone, to offer much insight into either regional case. In neither case is a “peace by irrelevance” compelling.22 That each region was once characterized by war, and then by the onset of a long peace renders this potential rather unconvincing from the start.23 It was the weakness of both South American and Southeast Asian states that led to regional instability, violent confrontations, and interstate war in their formative decades.24 Moreover, in South America, it was the strength of Brazilian and Argentinian power that risked large-​scale war during their rivalry in the 1970s.25 In terms of regional hegemony, the image is similarly unclear. Southeast Asia is a region exclusively comprised of “lesser powers and lesser economies” and absent a regional hegemon to enforce peace or deter conflict actively.26 While Indonesia is and has been a leading state among these lesser powers, according to many scholars, it has not demonstrated an interest or 20 Bruce M. Russett, Thomas Risse-​Kappen, and John J. Mearsheimer, “Back to the Future, Part III: Realism and the Realities of European Security,” International Security 15, no. 3 (1990): 220. 21 See Jack S. Levy, “The Causes of War and the Conditions of Peace,” Annual Review of Political Science 1 (1998): 145–​146; Barry Buzan, People, State, and Fear: An Agenda for International Security Studies in the Post–​Cold War Era (Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 1991), 219–​221. 22 David McIntyre, “ ‘La Paz Larga’: Why are There so Few Interstate Wars in South America?” (PhD diss., University of Chicago, 1993), quoted in Kacowicz, Zones of Peace, 96; See also William H. Bolin, “The Transformation of South America’s Borderlands,” in Changing Boundaries in the Americas: New Perspectives on the U.S.-​Mexican, Central American, and South American Borders, ed. Lawrence A. Herzog (San Diego: Center for U.S.-​Mexican Studies, University of California, 1992). 23 See also Melvin Small and David J. Singer, Resort to Arms: International and Civil War, 1816–​ 1980 (Los Angeles: SAGE Publications, 1982); Alexander Wendt, “Anarchy Is What States Make of It: The Social Construction of Power Politics,” International Organization 46, no. 2 (1992): 415. 24 On Southeast Asia, see Kivimäki, “Long Peace.” On South America, see Holsti, The State, 152–​153, and Miguel Angel Centeno, Blood and Debt: War and the Nation-​State in Latin America (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2002). 25 Kacowicz, Zones of Peace, 109; Martin, Militarist Peace, 62–​64; Scott D. Sagan, “Why Do States Build Nuclear Weapons? Three Models in Search of a Bomb,” International Security 21, no. 3 (1996): 61. 26 Ba, [Re]Negotiating, 25 and 253.

10  Practicing Peace the means to actively and singularly manage regional affairs.27 Similarly, in South America, Brazil is a major power with “more territory and greater population and economic strength than all the remaining countries of the continent combined.”28 For some observers, Brazil represents a leading state that has affected the quality of regional peace and cooperation in meaningful ways. In this view, Brazil is a “quintessential status quo power” and has adopted an avowedly “diplomatic way” to maintain the regional status quo since 1822.29 However, Brazil has rarely attempted to exert hegemonic influence (or expansionist policies) and has generally been satisfied with the regional status quo. Thus, while Brazil may play a particular role in shaping the contours of regional cooperation and peace, many scholars agree it has sought influence through normative and institutional challenges more than it has engaged in displays or use of its relative capability coercively. The role of extraregional hegemony in each case is even less clear. In Southeast Asia, the potential extraregional hegemon, the United States, has not translated its immense relative capability into a commanding or hegemonic role within the region according to most observers.30 Indeed, rather than offering an active stabilizing role in the region, it was fears over possible American intervention that drove the emergence of ASEAN in 1967 and fears of American disengagement that spurred the development of the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF) in 1994.31 As Timo Kivimäki finds, “there is no correlation between the variation in power structures and US position and the number of conflicts or battle deaths in ASEAN.”32 The story is similar in South America, where the United States again is the major extraregional power in the period of long peace. Prior to 1948 there seemed little American interest in actively managing conflict in the region. 27 Alan Collins, “Bringing Communities Back: Security Communities and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations’ Plural Turn,” Cooperation and Conflict 49, no. 2 (2014): 276–​291; Pattharapong Rattanasevee, “Leadership in ASEAN: The Role of Indonesia Reconsidered,” Asian Journal of Political Science 22, no. 3 (2014): 469–​488; Anthony Smith, “Indonesia’s Role in ASEAN: The End of Leadership?” Contemporary Southeast Asia 21, no. 2 (1999): 238–​260; Sue Thompson, “Leadership and Dependency: Indonesia’s Regional and Global Role, 1945–​1975,” in Indonesia’s Ascent: Power, Leadership, and the Regional Order, eds. Christopher B. Roberts, Ahmad D. Habir, and Leonard C. Sebastian (New York City: Palgrave Macmillan), 22–​39. 28 Holsti, The State, 157. 29 Kacowicz, Zones of Peace, 89–​91; Holsti, The State, 162–​163; Sean W. Burges, “Brazil as Regional Leader: Meeting the Chavez Challenge,” Current History 109, no. 74 (2010): 53–​59. 30 Kai He, “Institutional Balancing and International Relations Theory: Economic Interdependence and Balance of Power Strategies in Southeast Asia,” European Journal of International Relations 14, no. 2 (2008): 512 fn2. 31 Ba, [Re]Negotiating. 32 Kivimäki, “The Long Peace.”

Introduction  11 Miguel Centeno offers the 1941 border dispute between Ecuador and Peru to illustrate a similar point. Not only did the United States not involve itself in the conflict, preferring to be regarded as a “disinterested friend and consoler,” but it also dissuaded French and British involvement to limit the crisis.33 As Mares observes, the “myth of hegemonic management” does not bear out here.34 This is all the more the case for the potential of European engagement. As ­chapter 5 details, various European states have played a minor mediating role in conflict management in the region during the period of long peace. However, none played an active or hegemonic role in the conflict management of the region in the postwar period, and European engagement in regional affairs ebbed as US intermediary activity increased across the wider Latin American region in this period.35 Finally, in each region the role of a balance of power also seems less than clear as a driver of peace and growing cooperation. There have been no formal intraregional balancing behaviors in Southeast Asia. Rather, the region has been characterized by attempts to band together to allow for domestic political stability and economic development through ASEAN. In South America, two periods of balancing are apparent, and both driven by the Brazilian-​Argentine rivalry: from 1883 to 1919 and again during the 1970s. However, these are ephemeral and variable dynamics within the long peace, suggesting little relevance to its establishment and limited role in its continuance.36 From this quick survey of power dynamics, it is clear that in both regional cases there are powerful states—​Indonesia in Southeast Asia and Brazil in South America loom large—​that may affect the quality and contours of regional peace and cooperation. However, in both cases there is no clear regional hegemony or balancing behaviors throughout the periods of long peace, and US power waxes and wanes and varies in its effects as the long peace persists in each region. For many scholars, this suggests less the role of powerful states than powerful institutions to help us account for the long peace in each region. 33 Centeno, Blood and Debt, 72. See also Arie M. Kacowicz, The Impact of Norms in International Society, the Latin American Experience: 1991–​2001 (South Bend: University of Notre Dame Press, 2000), 53. 34 Mares, Violent Peace. 35 Jorge Domínguez, David Mares, Manuel Orozco, David Scott Palmer, Francisco Rojas Aravena, and Andres Serbin, “Boundary Disputes in Latin America,” Peaceworks, 50, Washington DC, United States Institute of Peace, 2003. 36 Kacowicz, Zones of Peace, 74; Mares, Violent Peace, 109–​131; Domínguez et al., “Boundary Disputes.”

12  Practicing Peace

Peace and Institutions To account for peace between states, a long tradition of liberal and institutionalist scholarship highlights the effects of institutions, including those of democracy at the domestic level and those that facilitate interdependence at the regional level.37 In particular, the democratic peace literature posits the mechanisms by which democratic states refrain from risky behavior or signal resolve, and thereby make possible sustained peaceful relations.38 Related arguments center on the role of economic interdependence and joint organizational membership, something assumed to restrain the agency of leaders to engage in behavior that may escalate conflict and that offer institutionalized means of mitigation should conflict arise.39 Of particular importance are regional organizations, often established for explicit means of entrenching peaceful conflict resolution and interdependence.40 However, these explanations alone, once again, seem ill-​suited to the cases at hand. On the first and second claims, both Southeast Asia and South America are regions with varied domestic political regimes, and both exhibit limited democratization and economic interdependence during their periods of long peace. In Southeast Asia, at the onset of its long peace in the 1960s, none of the five founding ASEAN members were democratic. Further, as Kivimäki finds, “the overall level of institutionalized authoritarianism was higher in ASEAN [states] during the peaceful period than during the warlike period [of 1960–​1967],” with Thailand the lone exception.41 Regional economic integration also has been and remains relatively limited, with consistent levels of intraregional exports at roughly 25%42 paling in comparison to the more 37 Michael Doyle, “Kant, Liberal Legacies and Foreign Affairs,” Philosophy and Public Affairs (1983): 205–​235 and 323–​353; Michael Doyle, Ways of War and Peace (New York City: W.W. Norton, 1997); Michael Doyle, “The Three Pillars of the Democratic Peace,” American Political Science Review 99, no. 3 (2005): 463–​466; John M. Owen IV, “How Liberalism Produces Democratic Peace,” International Security 19, no. 2 (1994): 87–​125; John M. Owen IV, Liberal Peace, Liberal War: American Politics and International Security (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1997). 38 Bruce Bueno De Mesquita, James D. Morrow, Randolph Siverson, and Alastair Smith, “Institutional Explanations of the Democratic Peace,” American Political Science Review 93, no. 4 (1999): 791–​807; William J. Dixon, “Democracy and the Peaceful Settlement of International Conflict,” American Political Science Review 88 (1994): 14–​32. 39 Alan Collins, “Forming a Security Community: Lessons from ASEAN,” International Relations of the Asia-​Pacific 7 (2007): 203–​225; John R. O’Neil and Bruce Russett, “The Kantian Peace: The Pacific Benefits of Democracy, Interdependence, and International Organizations, 1885–​1992,” World Politics 52, no. 1 (1999): 1–​37. 40 E.g., Aarie Glas and David Zarnett, “Regional Organizations,” in The Routledge Handbook of Peace, Security, and Development, eds. Fen Osler Hampson, Alp Ozerdem, and Jonathan Kent (New York City: Routledge, 2020), 348–​363; O’Neal and Russett, “The Kantian Peace,” 15. 41 Kivimäki, “Long Peace,” 19. 42 Calculated using IMF Direction of Trade Statistics (DOTS) Data (IMF 2017).

Introduction  13 than 50% in well-​integrated security communities in North America or Europe.43 Moreover, this development is largely spurious to the development and deepening of the regional peace in Southeast Asia. As Kivimäki notes, using this measure ASEAN states were more interdependent in 1967 than they were in the two decades that followed.44 In South America, similarly, it was not until the 1970s that regional states saw marked democratization—​ a spurious development in connection with the establishment of its long peace decades prior. While the establishment of democracies across the region may have affected the quality of the peace,45 these changes did not play a role in the establishment of peace between regional states and may not have informed its continuance in a substantial way.46 As Holsti finds, “Domestic politics are no doubt important in explaining individual events, but variations between types of regimes do not correlate either with the overall incidence of crises and wars, or with a propensity to resolve conflicts peacefully.”47 As one example of the complicated relationship between South American regime type and peaceful regional relations, the rapprochement between Brazil and Argentina began in 1979, when both states were under military rule.48 Mares casts further doubt on this line of inquiry, noting that the transition to democracy may have actually increased the likelihood of escalation in the enduring territorial dispute between Ecuador and Peru over access to the Amazon River—​a case explored in c­ hapter 5.49

43 John M. Owen IV, “Economic Interdependence and Regional Peace,” in International Relations Theory and Regional Transformation, ed. T. V. Paul (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), 123. 44 Timo Kivimäki, “Southeast Asia and Conflict Prevention: Is ASEAN Running Out of Steam?” Pacific Review 25, no. 4 (2012): 409–​411; see also Miles Kahler, “Legalization as Strategy: The Asia-​ Pacific Case,” International Organization 54, no. 3 (2000): 553; Kivimäki, “Long Peace,” 11–​14. 45 Jorge Mario Battalingo, “The Coexistence of Peace and Conflict in South America: Toward a New Conceptualization of Types of Peace,” Revista Brasileira de Politica Internacional 55, no. 2 (2012): 131–​151, 141–​142; Kacowicz, Zones of Peace, 98–​99; Andrew Oelsner, “Friendship, Mutual Trust and the Evolution of Regional Peace in the International System,” Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy 10, no. 2 (2007): 257–​279. 46 See Mares, Violent Peace, 84–​108; Michael A. Morris and Victor Millan, “Introduction,” in Controlling Latin American Conflicts: Ten Approaches, eds. Michael A. Morris and Victor Millan (Boulder: Westview Press, 1983), 1–​10. 47 Holsti, The State, 169. 48 Kacowicz, Zones of Peace, 98–​99; see also Gian Luca Gardini, The Origins of Mercosur: Democracy and Regionalization in South America (New York City: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010). 49 Mares, Violent Peace, 161–​189. See also Domínguez et al., “Boundary Disputes in Latin America”; Augusto Varas, Controlling Conflict in South America: National Approaches,” in Controlling Latin American Conflicts: Ten Approaches, eds. Michael A. Morris and Victor Millan (Boulder: Westview Press, 1983), 71–​85, 76.

14  Practicing Peace Relatedly and similarly, economic interdependence between the states of South America does not seem to drive patterns of regional relations either. Prior to the 1960s as the long peace was established and developed, the economic interconnections of the region were “almost null.”50 This is the case for much of this period, wherein, from a foundation of roughly 10% in 1948, the share of regional exports reaches only as high as 20% prior to the 1990s.51 There is little to suggest interdependence is a driver of pacific relations and economic interdependence, again, may be more the consequence than the cause of pacific regional relations and potential integration.52 However, in each case the role of institutions to facilitate peaceful relations and economic interdependence appears potentially more consequential. Southeast Asia is a region defined by membership to ASEAN, and the long peace of the region begins with its establishment in 1967.53 The basic institutionalist argument rests on the logic that through a host of means, particularly decreasing the risks and costs of negotiation through formal mechanisms, organizations limit the escalation of conflict.54 However, ASEAN is widely recognized as a relatively weak and informal organization, limited in its institutionalization and legalization.55 From an institutionalist perspective, ASEAN is a mere “talk shop,” reflecting little of the formalities necessary to impact regional stability.56 Miles Kahler, for example, finds ASEAN “a model of institutional development without legalization.”57 This contrasts markedly with the levels of institutionalization and legalization seen elsewhere, particularly in the European experience. As Robert E. Kelly observes of institutionalized interstate relation across the wider region, “Asian regionalism . . . violates European-​derived notions of institutions’ roles, focused as it is on sovereignty-​reinforcement and prestige-​taking rather than integration and binding rules.”58 Further, ASEAN’s elitist organizational practices abhor 50 Kacowicz, Zones of Peace, 97 and 101. 51 Calculated using IMF Direction of Trade Statistics (DOTS) Data (IMF 2017). 52 Kacowicz, Zones of Peace, 102. 53 Kivimäki, “The Long Peace.” 54 O’Neal and Russett, “The Kantian Peace,” 9. 55 Ba, [Re]Negotiating, 19; Kahler, “Legalization as Strategy.” 56 Ba, [Re]Negotiating; Hiro Katsumata, “Establishment of the ASEAN Regional Forum: Constructing a ‘Talking Shop’ or a ‘Norm Brewery’?” Pacific Review 19, no. 2 (2006): 181–​ 198; Richard Stubbs, “The ASEAN Alternative? Ideas, Institutions, and the Challenge to ‘Global Governance,’” Pacific Review 21, no. 4 (2008): 451–​468. 57 Kahler, “Legalization as Strategy,” 554. 58 Robert E. Kelly, “A ‘Confucian Long Peace’ in pre-​Western East Asia?” European Journal of International Relations 18, no. 3 (2012): 409. See also Stephanie Hofmann and Frédéric Mérand (2012), “Regional Integration à la Carte: The Effects of Institutional Elasticity,” in Regional Integration and International Relations Theory, ed. T. V. Paul (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), 152 and 155.

Introduction  15 public participation and are closed to the plurality of voices often assumed to be necessary to bind state interests and restrict conflict.59 As Alice D. Ba summarizes nicely, “institutionalists find in ASEAN few of the consequentialist rules and arrangements that, to them, are key to facilitating cooperation between competitive and divergent states.”60 ASEAN, as an organization, then, seems to offer little support for traditional institutionalist claims prima facie. However, ASEAN is a site of repeated social interaction. Its famously proliferate meetings, working groups, and summitry are potentially important sites or “social environments” that may render this institution of consequence, as explored below.61 In South America there appears a similar relationship between long peace and a long, varied history of regional organizing.62 The Bolivarian tradition in the region, for example, is founded on an aspiration of integration through common organization.63 This long-​held aspiration has only partially, and variably, been realized throughout South America’s history of regionalization.64 The hemispheric project’s development through the OAS in 1948 may suggest a divergent form of regional organization, and the development of the Andean Pact of 1969 and the Southern Common Market (Mercosur) in 1991 exemplify attempts at economic and political integration in the region. Further, for some observers UNASUR, the constitutive treaty of which only came into force in 2011, may have been the closest realization of this impulse, even as its prospects for relevance grow increasingly limited.65 However, the emergence of regional organizations in South America seems less correlated with the emergence of peace and more with the continuance and perhaps deepening of pacific relations over time.66 As Holsti summarizes in his account of the long peace of the region, “liberal-​institutional theories do not 59 Collins, “Forming a Security Community.” 60 Ba, [Re]Negotiating, 2 61 Alastair Iain Johnston, “Treating International Institutions as Social Environment,” International Studies Quarterly 45 (2001): 487–​515 62 See Holsti, The State, 171. 63 Gordon Mace and Jean-​Philippe Thérien, “Introduction: Foreign Policy and Regionalism in the Americas,” in Foreign Policy and Regionalism in the Americas, ed. Gordon Mace and Jean-​Philippe Thérien (Boulder: Lynne Reiner Publishers, 1996), 5. 64 See Jose Antonio Sanahuja and Francisco Javier Verdes-​Montenegro Escánez, “The Copenhagen School in South America: The (De)Securitization of UNASUR (2008–​2017),” Revista Brasileira de Política Internacional 64, no. 2 (2021): 1–​20. 65 Brigitte Weiffen, Leslie Wehner, and Detlef Nolte, “Overlapping Regional Security Institutions in South America: The Case of OAS and UNASUR,” International Area Studies Review 16, no. 4 (2013): 370–​389; Pia Riggirozzi and Jean Grugel, “Regional Governance and Legitimacy in South America: The Meaning of UNASUR,” International Affairs 91, no. 4 (2015): 781–​797. 66 See Kacowicz, Zones of Peace, 195.

16  Practicing Peace take us very far because until recently there have been only low levels of integration and successful multilateral institution-​building in the region.”67 In both of these regional cases, then, there is little to suggest that institutionalist accounts offer much insight into the establishment or the development of regional peace. However, the existence and persistence of organizations beckons further investigation of their potential to affect the contours of peace once established. This impulse has led a number of social constructivist scholars interested in the pacific relations of both cases to examine the role of regional ideas, culture, and norms, social qualities of regional relations that are often expressed, entrenched, and codified within organizations.

Peace and Norms Social constructivist scholarship offers an array of potential accounts for patterns of peace and conflict, centering attention on the intersubjective qualities of social relations and shared knowledge and meanings that inform them.68 Often, these qualities are traced to common cultural and historical experiences or iterated interactions within social and institutionalized settings. This appears potentially important to the cases here. In each regional case, a rich literature points to the existence of regional norms, and many scholars trace them to supposedly cultural foundations born of shared languages and traditions and collective experiences with colonialism and decolonialization. In the most common formulation, norms are defined as collective expectations of appropriate conduct that affect state behavior by proscribing or prohibiting behaviors.69 In Southeast Asia the so-​ called “ASEAN way” is frequently cited in this regard. At the most general, the ASEAN way is understood as an important set of prescriptive norms often traced to a distinctive Southeast Asian culture.70 Central among the 67 Holsti, The State, 161. 68 Emanuel Adler, Communitarian International Relations: The Epistemic Foundations of International Relations (London: Routledge, 2005); Alexander Wendt, Social Theory of International Politics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999). 69 Ronald L. Jepperson, Alexander Wendt, and Peter Katzenstein, “Norms Identity, and Culture in National Security,” in The National Security: Norms and Identity in World Politics, ed. Peter Katzenstein (New York City: Columbia University Press, 1996), 54. See also Michelle Jurkovich, “What Isn’t a Norm? Redefining the Conceptual Boundaries of ‘Norms’ in Human Rights Literature,” International Studies Review 22, no. 3 (2019): 693–​711. 70 Stuart Harris, “Asian Multilateral Institutions and Their Response to the Asian Economic Crisis: The Regional and Global Implications,” Pacific Review 13, no. 3 (2000): 495–​516; Alice D.

Introduction  17 norms of the ASEAN way are a preference for peaceful and informal dispute settlement, the sanctity of state sovereignty, and regional noninterference.71 In many social theoretical accounts of regional relations here, these qualities are seen as part of a distinctive Southeast Asian “diplomatic culture” or broader “diplomatic and security culture.”72 Similarly, South America is often seen as home to its own distinctive “diplomatic culture,” also born from common regional experiences and traditions.73 In the South American case, this diplomatic culture is recognized as a commitment to particular set of norms that center on legal obligation and a recourse to formal arbitration.74 However, the claim that distinctive cultural or ideational qualities of regions and officials therein and codified or institutionalized norms translate into peaceful relations is not a straightforward proposition.75 First, culturally essentialist claims are problematic on both conceptual and empirical grounds. Kahler, for example, has most forcefully rejected this line of inquiry in Southeast Asia.76 There, supposedly distinctive regional cultural practices that abhor legalization and formal judicial instruments have not been uniformly upheld across domestic contexts. Rather, at the domestic level, the region is characterized not by a particular ASEAN way, but by “legal pluralism” within and across states. Moreover, there has been variation over time regarding the level of informality and institutionalization across domestic cases.77 Rather than “deeper cultural preferences,” Kahler contends

Ba, “Who Is Socializing Whom?” The Pacific Review 19. no. 2 (2006): 157–​179. He, “Institutional Balancing”; Collins, “Bringing Communities Back”; Stéphanie Martel and Aarie Glas, “The Contested Meaning-​Making of Diplomatic Norms: Competence in Practice in Southeast Asian Multilateralism.” Working paper (n.d.). 71 E.g., Jose T. Almonte, “Ensuring Security the ‘ASEAN Way,’” Survival 39, no. 4 (1997): 33–​56; Kivimäki, “Long Peace,” 16–​17. 72 Ba, [Re]Negotiating, 27; Jürgen Haacke, ASEAN’s Diplomatic and Security Culture (New York City: Routledge, 2003). See also Kivimäki, “Long Peace”; Hadi Soesastro, “ASEAN and APEC: Do Concentric Circles Work?” Pacific Review 8, no. 3 (1995): 475–​493. 73 Holsti, The State, 170; Andrew Hurrell, “Working with Diplomatic Culture: Some Latin American and Brazilian Questions,” Paper Prepared for ISA Annual Conference (2004), 2; Kacowicz, The Impact of Norms, 47; See also Da Silva, “Interstate Conflict Management”; Jorge Heine, “Between a Rock and a Hard Place: Latin America and Multilateralism after 9/​11,” in Multilateralism under Challenge? Power, International Order, and Structural Change, eds. Edward Newman, Ramesh Thakur, and John Tirman (Tokyo: United Nations Press), 481–​503; Diana Tussie, “Latin America: Contrasting Motivations for Regional Projects,” Review of International Studies 35 (2009): 169–​188. 74 Holsti, The State, 169–​171; Kacowicz, Zone of Peace, 102, 196. 75 E.g., Arie M. Kacowicz, Yaacov Bar-​Siman-​Tov, Ole Elgstrom, and Magnus Jerneck, Stable Peace among Nations (New York City: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, 2000); Kivimäki, “Long Peace.” 76 Kahler, “Legalization as Strategy.” 77 Kahler, “Legalization as Strategy,” 560. See also Tom Ginsburg, “Constitutional Courts in East Asia: Understanding Variation,” Journal of Comparative Law 3, no. 2 (2008): 80–​99.

18  Practicing Peace that Asian regionalism—​broadly speaking—​displays the instrumental and strategic use of legalization when officials deem it appropriate and effective.78 This suggests the importance of investigating what is done and why, rather than assuming codified or rhetorically articulated regional norms affect behaviors in practice uniformly, or at all. Second, and relatedly, the regional norms of each case tend to be rather abstract. As a rich literature on norm contestation and localization documents, norms around both noninterference or legalism, for example, are open to interpretation, contestation, and, therefore, variation in understanding and performance over time and across contexts and communities.79 Identifying the existence or codification of regional norms may highlight collectively held “notions of what appropriate behavior ought to be,” but this itself tells us little about the behavior of actors themselves.80 As I have examined elsewhere, for example, while a particular governance norm may be commonly adopted by different organizations, what this means in practice may vary widely between them.81 Observing some notion of regional culture or set of codified or otherwise asserted regional norms does not tell us much about the effect of these social qualities on the dynamics of conflict management or regionalism more generally. That said, scholarship that attests to the pacific effects of regional norms and organizations offers an important first step in accounting for peaceful relations by uncovering potentially important normative qualities of regional relations. However, it requires further clarification to explore how (or if) normative qualities of relations shape the behavior of states or their officials. In Southeast Asia, for example, Acharya recognizes that “there is considerable room for doubt whether it [the set of norms of the ASEAN way] has been upheld in practice.”82 This is precisely the point of interest of this book: To investigate what is upheld and what is done in practice by the communities of officials who attempt to manage regional crises and conflict. This, I contend, can help us account for the conflictual peace of each region. 78 Kahler “Legalization as Strategy,” 562. 79 Amitav Acharya, “How Ideas Spread: Whose Norms Matter? Localization and Institutional Change in Asian Regionalism,” International Organization 58, no. 2 (2004): 239–​275; Antje Wiener, “Enacting Meaning-​in-​Use: Qualitative Research on Norms and International Relations,” Review of International Studies 35 (2009): 175–​193. 80 Steven Bernstein, The Compromise of Liberal Environmentalism (New York City: Columbia University Press 2001), 29. 81 Aarie Glas and Emmanuel Balogun, “Norms in Practice: People-​Centric Governance in ASEAN and ECOWAS,” International Affairs 96, no. 4 (2020): 1015–​1032. 82 Acharya, Constructing a Security Community, 63.

Introduction  19 To bring these discussions together, there are a number of potential analytical avenues to understand conflictual peace in Southeast Asia and South America. It is clear that attention should be directed at powerful states, the sites of their interaction within organizations, and how or if norms of appropriate conduct are understood and enacted. In short, attention ought to be directed at what is upheld in practice in each regional case, within what context, and by which actors. In large part, this is a call to look down and within each region to the communities of officials who represent states, work within organizations, and know and respond to regional crises. In the next section, I outline in more detail why this analytical move is important and how we might go about developing a framework to investigate regional practitioners and practices.

Argument in Brief: Communities and Conflict Management Practices As the preceding section suggested, to explore and account for the conflictual peace of each region—​cooperation and community-​building alongside pervasive interstate violence short of war—​analytical attention should be directed downward. We should move from a focus on state power, interdependence, and the existence of codified regional norms to examine the thinking and behavior of groups and individuals; to explore how conflict is managed and community-​building pursued in practice within each region. At its heart, a core interest of this book is to uncover and showcase the practice and particularities of conflict management and regionalism in both Southeast Asia and South America. In doing so, I aim to show how peace works in each region, and how the often-​banal assumptions and practices of interstate interactions inform the long and conflictual peace of each region. An examination at the level of a regional communities of practice is a useful focus for this kind of investigation. A community of practice is a relatively bounded group of individuals defined and observable through four qualities: a shared joint enterprise, dense interactions, common repertoires or tools of action, and a sense of like-​ mindedness.83 As I explore in detail in c­ hapters 4 and 5, each of the regional 83 Etienne Wenger, Communities of Practice: Learning, Meaning, and Identity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998); Emanuel Adler, “The Spread of Security Communities: Communities of Practice, Self-​Restraint, and NATO’s Post-​Cold War Transformation,” European

20  Practicing Peace cases at hand demonstrates a community of diplomatic practice. Officials from states and organizations in each region share common and institutionalized means of cooperation centered within respective regional organizations and related institutions and summitry. Through face-​to-​face and routinized interactions, organizations make possible the development of a sense of belonging and like-​mindedness.84 The officials working within regional diplomatic contexts are united by their respective enterprise of regionalization and they pursue their particular interests through institutionalized forums. Diplomatic officials within South America engage in the multiple and overlapping institutional settings in which diplomacy plays out and collectively are united in the pursuit of peace and economic development, and in regionalization as means to achieve both. Officials in Southeast Asia know the hub of their community is ASEAN, and they recognize their common interest in institutionalizing and deepening regional relations through the organization. Officials in each region are also engaged in routine, iterated interactions within these settings and beyond. Communities of practice, like those of diplomatic practitioners in Southeast Asia and South America, are important sites of social interaction because they are where power, organizations, and norms intersect. Through collective understandings of who has power, what organizations can and should do, and what norms mean communities of practice shape interstate regional relations in important ways. These foundational claims build on a growing literature in IR attentive to cognitive and behavioral habits, routines, and practices of interstate interaction. Ted Hopf, for example, argues that automatic habits of relations between states shape much of the stability and patterns we see in the international system.85 Jennifer Mitzen similarly argues that routines of interaction among states produce patterns of enmity and amity between them.86 Most forcefully, Journal of International Relations 14, no. 2 (2008): 195–​230; Christian Beuger, “Communities of Security Practice at Work? The Emerging African Maritime Security Regime,” African Security 6, nos. 3–​4: 297–​316; Aarie Glas, “African Union Security Culture in Practice: African Problems and African Solutions,” International Affairs 94, no. 5 (2018): 1124. 84 Johnston, “Treating International Institutions.” See also Emanuel Adler, “Seizing the Middle Ground: Constructivism in World Politics,” European Journal of International Relations 3, no. 3 (1997): 319–​363; Dylan Ming Hui Loh, “Institutional Habitus, State Identity, and China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs,” International Studies Review 22, no. 4 (2020): 879–​902; James N. Rosenau, “Before Cooperation: Hegemons, Regimes, and Habit-​ Driven Actors in World Politics,” International Organization 40, no. 4 (1986): 849–​894. 85 Ted Hopf, “The Logic of Habit in International Relations,” European Journal of International Relations 16 (2010): 539–​561. 86 Jennifer Mitzen, “Ontological Security in World Politics,” European Journal of International Relations 12, no. 3 (2006): 341–​370.

Introduction  21 the “practice turn” in IR illustrates how background knowledge and the relatively automatic behaviors of state officials pattern interstate relations in important ways.87 Collectively, a growing body of scholarship finds that cognitive and behavioral dispositions make possible certain understandings of the world for particular communities, defining what is assumed normal, natural, and effective, and shaping the contours of their interaction in important ways. These kinds of habitual dispositions, as I outline in ­chapter 2, are found within particular communities of practice, such as those of regional diplomacy in Southeast Asia and South America, and they influence thinking and behavior in important ways. Within these diplomatic communities, as I document in ­chapters 4 and 5, practitioners know and practice particular means of conflict management and regionalism. They think from, rather than about certain ways of confronting and responding to regional challenges.88 Southeast Asian officials relatively automatically turn to informal processes of dialogue to manage crises and pursue regionalization, and relations within and beyond the confines of ASEAN are shaped by a deeply held habitual disposition toward particular practices of consensus-​seeking and noninterference. South American officials, on the other hand, default toward particularized practices of legalism and formality in dialogue, often turning to extraregional mediation of regional disputes as a matter of course. This is what normal, natural, and effective regional diplomacy looks like in each case. These are particular understandings and practices of competent interaction, or the way things work within each regional community.89 This is not to suggest that these sorts of practices are culturally essentialist for states and officials of either region. Rather, distinctive habitual dispositions are the product of organizational and community relations over time. Moreover, it does not suggest that particular habitual and dispositional approaches to managing conflict and pursuing regionalism are not themselves functional, instrumental, or effective—​at least in the minds of officials who practice them.90 Indeed, the particular habitual dispositions of reach 87 Emanuel Adler and Vincent Pouliot, International Practices (New York City: Cambridge University Press, 2011); Philippe Bourbeau, “The Practice Approach in Global Politics,” Journal of Global Security Studies 2, no. 2 (2017): 170–​182; Iver B. Neumann, “Returning Practice to the Linguistic Turn,” Millennium 30, no. 3 (2002): 627–​651. 88 See also Hopf, “The Logic of Habit,” 541; Pouliot, “The Logic of Practicality,” 260. 89 Neumann, “Returning Practice,” 637. 90 See also Aarie Glas, Clifton van der Linden, Matthew Hoffmann, and Robert Denemark, “Understanding Multilateral Treaty-​Making as Constitutive Practice,” Journal of Global Security Studies 3, no. 3 (2018): 340.

22  Practicing Peace regional community are “what works” in practice for officials in each.91 In this way, my approach bridges social and instrumental arguments, showing that habitual dispositions are important largely because practitioners know they serve their interests well. In each regional community of practice, officials understand and respond to crises and pursue regionalism from and through a particular habitual disposition. In each case, as I show in the empirical studies that follow, these discrete habitual dispositions lead to a toleration of limited levels of violence between regional member states and predispose them to particular means to manage recurrent regional crises as a matter of course. The central argument of this book, then, is that regional conflictual peace is the product of communities of diplomatic practice that actively manage conflict and pursue regionalism in particular ways as a result of particular habitual dispositions. Before turning to outline the structure of the book that allows me to make this argument, I pause to clarify a number of foundational concepts for my argument.

Clearing Conceptual Ground However intuitive they may seem, the two foundational concepts of this book—​regions and peace—​are due some conceptual unpacking. A region is an appealing concept when thinking about world politics.92 Generally speaking, a region refers to a relatively discrete geographic area. This may be a useful level of analysis in making inquiries about interstate relations, given the presumably consequential interactions between proximate states.93 Long-​established literatures have explored the emergence of cooperative and conflictual interstate relations by reference to regions of states sharing iterated and consequential interactions.94 Many observers recognize regions as 91 Adler and Pouliot, International Practices, 22. 92 See Rodrigo Taveres, “Understanding Regional Peace and Security: A Framework for Analysis,” Contemporary Politics 14, no. 20 (2008): 107–​127; T. V. Paul, “Regional Transformation in International Relations,” in International Relations Theory and Regional Transformation, ed. T. V. Paul (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), 3–​21. 93 See Hedley Bull, The Anarchical Society: A Study of Order in World Politics (New York City: Columbia University Press, 1977), 10; Benjamin Miller, States, Nations, and the Great Power: The Sources of Regional War and Peace (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 41. 94 E.g., Barry Buzan and Ole Wæver, Regions and Powers: The Structure of International Security (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003); Ernest B. Haas, Beyond the Nation-​ State: Functionalism and International Organization (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1964); Robert Keohane, After Hegemony: Cooperation and Discord in the World Political Economy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984).

Introduction  23 the sites of “community” formation between states,95 use this level of analysis to define and understand “zones” of war or peace among them,96 and recognize proximity as essential in shaping state interests and behavior more generally. Barry Buzan’s concept of a “security complex,” for example, rests on the intuitive assertion that proximate states cannot reasonably conceive of their own security absent concerns over neighboring states.97 Other scholars apply a similar logic of interaction to explain growing and variable attempts at regionalization more generally.98 Within the growing literature on regions and regionalisms, a common assertion is that these groupings are an important—​or perhaps the most important—​level of analysis for inquiries into peaceful and conflictual interstate relations.99 As Benjamin Miller suggests, regions are “the most appropriate—​and relevant—​context for studying war and peace.”100 In short, it is clear that proximity matters and regions are commonly defined by reference to geographic proximity. However, just what constitutes the boundaries of a region is fuzzy in theory, and even more unclear in practice.101 While geographic proximity is a useful starting point for conceptualizing regions and regional relations, it raises more questions than it solves. Southeast Asia, for example,

95 Karl W. Deutsch, Sidney A. Burrell, Robert A. Kann, and Maurice Lee Jr., Political Community and the North Atlantic Area: International Organization in the Light of Historical Experience (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1957). 96 E.g., Kacowicz, Zones of Peace; Kacowicz, The Impact of Norms; Max Singer and Aaron Wildavsky, The Real-​World Order: Zones of Peace and Zones of Turmoil (Chatham: Chatham House, 1993). 97 Buzan, People, State, and Fear. 98 E.g., David Mitrany, “The Prospect of Integration: Federal or Functional,” Journal of Common Market Studies 4, no. 2 (1965): 119–​149; Joseph Nye, “Comparative Regional Integration: Concept and Measurement,” International Organization 22, no. 4 (1968): 855–​880; Louise Fawcett and Andrew Hurrell, eds., Regionalism in World Politics: Regional Organizations and International Order (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995); Edward Mansfield and Helen Milner, eds., Political Economy of Regionalism (New York: Columbia University Press, 1997); Louise Fawcett, “Exploring Regional Domains: A Comparative History of Regionalism,” International Affairs 80, no. 3 (2004): 429–​ 446; Amitav Acharya and Alistair Ian Johnston, eds., Crafting Cooperation: Regional International Institutions in Comparative Perspective (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007); Edward Mansfield and Etel Solingen, “Regionalism,” Annual Review of Political Science 13 (2010): 145–​163. 99 See Louise Fawcett, “The Evolving Architecture of Regionalization,” in The United Nations and Regional Security: Europe and Beyond, eds. Michael Pugh and W. P. S. Sidhu (Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 2003); Andrew Hurrell, “One World? Many Worlds? The Place of Regions in the Study of International Society,” International Affairs 83, no. 1 (2007): 331–​358; Peter J. Katzenstein, A World of Regions: Asia and Europe in the American Imperium (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2005). 100 Miller, States, Nations, and Great Powers, 42. See also Benjamin Miller, “Explaining Variation in Regional Peace: Three Strategies for Peacemaking,” Cooperation and Conflict 35, no. 2 (2000): 155–​192. 101 See Fawcett, “Exploring Regional Domains”; Derrick Frazier and Robert Stewart-​Ingersoll, “Regional Powers and Security: A Framework for Understanding Order within Regional Security Complexes,” European Journal of International Relations 16, no. 4 (2010): 731–​753; Douglas Lemke, Regions of War and Peace (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002).

24  Practicing Peace is considered by IR scholars and practitioners alike to exclude Papua New Guinea and Sri Lanka—​much to these states’ frustration at times—​while the inclusion of Australia in ASEAN seems almost inconceivable despite some recent debate.102 Geography alone does not tell us much about what a region is—​or why. This is because regions are themselves social constructs. Regions are best understood as ideas about belonging rooted in ideas about geography. For state and organizational officials within “regional” spaces, this ideational quality is intuitive. Regions are socially meaningful categories that they confront and (re)produce daily. Officials from ASEAN member states, for example, recognize that they are part of varied of regions, from Asia to the Indo-​Pacific to Southeast Asia. However, they see a particular importance in terms of their organizational reality—​they work within ASEAN, which seeks “centrality” in the affairs of its members.103 Moreover, this regional grouping is of particular significance; officials know ASEAN membership is exclusive of and defining of a region. These ideational constructs are also multidimensional. They are composed of assumptions of social and economic realities, of historical experience, and of political expediency. Regions, then, may overlap. For example, many South American officials working in the Pan-​American OAS recognize themselves as part of a multitude of overlapping regional categories and identities, from a part of the Western Hemisphere and a Pan-​American region to members of both a Latin and South American region, to a host of sub-​and cross-​regional organizations and communities including the Andean Community and the Pacific Alliance. As Louise Fawcett notes, “Ultimately, regions and regionalism are what states and non-​state actors make of them.”104 Thus, as she continues, “To make sense of the idea of regionalism, a certain amount of both definitional and theoretical flexibility is required; there is no ‘ideal’ region, nor any single agenda to which all regions aspire.”105 Regions, then, are both geographic and ideational constructs. In this book, I contend that regions, analytically, should be defined by reference to how members of communities 102 See Amitav Acharya, “Collective Identity and Conflict Management in Southeast Asia,” in Security Communities, eds. Emanuel Adler and Michael Barnett (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), 198–​227, 216; Malcolm Cook, “ASEAN-​Australia Relations: The Suitable Status Quo,” Lowy Institute, https://​www.lowyin​stit​ute.org/​publi​cati​ons/​asean-​austra​lia-​relati​ons-​suita​ble-​sta​ tus-​quo. 103 Amitav Acharya, “The Myth of ASEAN Centrality?” Contemporary Southeast Asia: A Journal of International and Strategic Affairs 39, no. 2 (2017): 273–​279. 104 Fawcett, “Exploring Regional Domains,” 434; See also Harris, “Asian Multilateral Institutions,” 498. 105 Fawcett, “Exploring Regional Domains,” 434.

Introduction  25 conceive them. As imagined and important spaces, the boundaries of regions should be discerned from the thinking and behavior of practitioners within and between them. More narrowly, I focus on how state and organizational officials assume particular regions—​Southeast Asia and South America—​are important sites for conflict management and peace. Accounts of peace in IR generally rest on two underlying assumptions. First, investigations often start from an understanding of peace and violence as dichotomous and, therein, tend to see peace as a negative quality of relations defined through the absence of large-​scale organized violence.106 In this way, peace is often assumed to be a fragile and fleeting quality of interstate relations under the “brooding shadow of violence.”107 For example, John Gaddis famously observed the “long peace” between the superpowers of the Cold War was explained in part by nuclear deterrence and parity in material capability.108 The same thinking grounds some treatments of democratic peace, where institutions are seen to limit the potential for conflict by disincentivizing violent or risky behavior.109 That Arthur Stein could open his investigation of interstate cooperation with the suggestion that, post–​ Cold War, “Peace, it seems, is breaking out all over the place” highlights this assumption.110 Beyond assuming a dichotomy of peace and war and peace a negative quality, many scholars have posited gradations of peace.111 In many of these accounts the main criterion for distinguishing between qualities of peace is ideational, reflecting the thinking of policymakers and practitioners 106 Paul F. Diehl, “Exploring Peace: Looking beyond War and Negative Peace,” International Studies Quarterly 60, no. 1 (2016): 1–​10. See also Kenneth Boulding, Stable Peace (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1978); John S. Duffield, “Explaining the Long Peace in Europe: The Contributions of Regional Security Regimes,” Review of International Studies 20, no. 4 (1994): 369–​388; Martin, Militarist Peace; Singer and Wildavsky, The Real World Order. 107 Kenneth Waltz, “Anarchic Order and Balance of Power,” in Neorealism and Its Critics, ed. Robert Keohane (New York: Columbia University Press 1986), 97–​130, 98. 108 John Lewis Gaddis, “Great Illusions, the Long Peace, and the Future of the International System,” in The Long Postwar Peace, ed. Charles W. Kegley (New York: Harper Collins: 1991), 25–​ 55. See also John J. Mearsheimer, “Back to the Future: Instability in Europe After the Cold War,” International Security 15, no. 4 (1990): 5–​56. 109 E.g., O’Neal and Russett, “The Kantian Peace”; see also Virginia Page Fortna, “Scraps of Paper? Agreements and the Durability of Peace,” International Organization 57, (2003), 337–​372; Kivimäki, “Power, Interest, or Culture.” 110 Arthur A. Stein, Why Nations Cooperate: Circumstance and Choice in International Relations (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1990). 111 E.g., Emanuel Adler and Michael Barnett, eds., Security Communities (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998); Buzan and Waever, Regions and Powers; Johan Galtung, “Violence, Peace, and Peace Research,” Journal of Peace Research 6, no. 3 (1969): 167–​191; Johan Galtung, Essays in Peace Research (Copenhagen: Christian Eilers, 1975); Holsti, The State; Kacowicz Zones of Peace; Miller, States, Nations, and Great Powers; Oelsner, “Friendship, Mutual Trust.”

26  Practicing Peace regarding the appropriateness or even possibility of the use of force. This is clearest in the security community literature, where “dependable expectations of peaceful change” is the core measure of the emergence of mature and peaceful interstate communities.112 This scholarship underscores a second underlying assumption: An assumed reflective and active appraisal by actors of their identity and the context in which they interact. In many accounts of the development of cooperative and pacific interstate relations, it is trust among states—​or various state elites including leaders, policymakers, and diplomatic officials—​that makes possible stability in relations. Many and varied accounts of peaceful relations investigate the subjective foundations of trust, highlighting the development of varied “trust-​building properties,” such as institutions and shared ideas.113 This is particularly clear in the vast literature on regimes, wherein iterated relations within institutionalized settings generate trust through active learning.114 However, as Pouliot observes, the assumption that actors continually reflect on context and identity does not bear out when considering the very foundations of cooperative relations—​diplomatic interactions.115 In this book, I do not develop (another) a typology of peace.116 Rather, I see peace as variable, active, and social processes of conflict management. I find that peace is practiced, and it is possible largely through particular habitual dispositions within regional communities. This understanding aligns with recent developments in practice and social constructivist scholarship. Pouliot, for example, argues that peace emerges when an “axiomatically peaceful logic of practicality sets in [and] it takes on a dimension of habit or routine. Without instrumental calculations, reflexive rule-​following or communicative action about the opportunity of settling disputes non-​violently,

112 Adler and Barnett, Security Communities, 30. 113 Adler and Barnett, Security Communities, 42. See also Acharya, Constructing a Security Community; Thomas Christensen, “Fostering Stability or Creating a Monster? The Rise of China and U.S. Policy Toward East Asia,” International Security 31, no. 1 (2006): 81–​126; Katsumata, “Establishment of the ASEAN Regional Forum”; Brian C. Rathbun, “Before Hegemony: Generalized Trust and the Creation and Design of International Security Organizations,” International Organization 65, (2011): 241–​273; Swaran Singh, “Paradigm Shift in India-​China Relations: From Bilateralism to Multilateralism,” Journal of International Affairs 64, no. 2 (2011): 1–​14. 114 E.g., Keohane, After Hegemony. 115 Pouliot, “The Logic of Practicality,” 278. 116 See Acharya, Constructing a Security Community; Collins, “Forming a Security Community”; Daniel Flemes, “Creating a Regional Security Community in Southern Latin America: The Institutionalisation of the Regional Defense and Security Policies,” Working Papers: Global and Area Studies 13 (Hamburg: German Overseas Institute, 2005); Hurrell, “An Emerging Security Community.”

Introduction  27 the security officials’ practical sense leads them to go on diplomatically.”117 Emanuel Adler, similarly, argues that “Self-​restraint . . . is a disposition.”118 Ba, too, observes that cooperation, more generally, is best understood as “a social process involving interactive and cumulative social negotiations.”119 This book examines the practices, dispositions, and processes of peace in Southeast Asia and South America, highlighting the consequential role of particular habitual dispositions in shaping the thinking and behavior of communities of diplomatic practice in each regional case.

Plan of the Book In the following chapters, I develop a framework and detail the methods required to explore habitual dispositions of regional communities of diplomatic practice. I then make use of this approach to understand conflictual peace in Southeast Asia and South America, before bringing these regions into comparison. In ­chapter 2, I take a first step toward these ends by outlining the theoretical framework of the book. I do this over three sections. First, I explore the logic by which habitual and dispositional qualities of diplomacy structure and pattern relations among states. Second, I outline what communities of practice and their habitual dispositions are in more detail. Here, I operationalize these concepts, illustrate their analytical utility, and underscore the similarities and differences between habitual dispositions and established concepts in IR including norms, habits, and practices. In brief, I argue that habitual dispositions are the cognitive foundations and relatively automatic behaviors that are known as normal, natural, and effective for particular communities of practice. Habitual dispositions are one way of making sense of what diplomatic actors think from, rather than about when confronting crises and pursuing regionalism. In the third section, I underscore the added value of my approach and I show that these 117 Pouliot “The Logic of Practicality,” 259; Vincent Pouliot, International Security Practice: The Politics of NATO-​Russia Diplomacy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), 43. 118 Emanuel Adler, “The Spread of Security Communities: Communities of Practice, Self-​Restraint, and NATO’s Post-​Cold War Transformation,” European Journal of International Relations 14, no. 2 (2008): 195–​30, 205. See also Corneliu Bjola and Markus Kornprobst, “Security Communities and the Habitus of Restraint: Germany and the United States on Iraq,” Review of International Studies 33 (2007): 285–​305. 119 Ba, [Re]Negotiating, 4.

28  Practicing Peace qualities matter for regional relations by shaping patterns of conflict and cooperation in important ways. In ­chapter 3, I take a second step toward understanding conflictual peace in Southeast Asia and South America. In this chapter, I outline how to observe habitual dispositions. I do this over two main sections. First, I discuss how to observe the existence of habitual and dispositional qualities of interstate relations. Here, I detail the interpretive and social constructivist methodology at the heart of this book, offering one means of doing practice-​ oriented research and justifying my approach. In particular, I articulate the utility and limitations of interview research with overlapping communities of diplomatic officials. As I demonstrate, contrasting what is unproblematically assumed as given and natural by one community of practitioners (e.g., ASEAN member state officials) with a group of practitioners who engage with this community as external others (e.g., extraregional state officials working alongside ASEAN) brings into relief both the bounds of communities of practice and their distinctive habitual dispositions. In the second section, I focus on the effects of habitual dispositions in two ways. I show that effects can be gleamed from the robustness of habits—​that practitioners know that they are “well served” by their habitual dispositions—​and by tracing their role in particular cases of regional crisis.120 This chapter offers an account of my practice-​oriented research design and interpretivist methodology and provides a straightforward survey of the analytical framework used in the two empirical investigations that follow. Chapter 4 documents the existence and effect of a distinct and discrete regional diplomatic habitual disposition in Southeast Asia over three sections. I begin with a brief contextualization of the long and conflictual peace of the region, paying particular attention to the role of powerful states, organizations, and regional norms. In the section, I outline the Southeast Asian habitual disposition. I draw attention to the informalities of regional relations and how the particular practice of regional and global norms indicates deeply internalized assumptions as to normal, natural, and effective diplomatic practice. After outlining the existence of this habitual disposition, in the third section I examine its effects through two investigations. First, I explore the robustness of these habitual qualities by reference to their assumed efficacy by regional practitioners. Second, I trace the effect of these practical and habitual qualities of relations in the regional response to the 2011

120

Rosenau, “Before Cooperation,” 862.

Introduction  29 Thai-​Cambodian Preah Vihear border dispute. I argue that the Southeast Asian habitual disposition makes possible the long conflictual peace of the region, as its practitioners share a set of self-​evident practices that have both pacifying and protracting effects on their relations. Chapter 5 mirrors the structure of the previous chapter to explore the existence and effect of the diplomatic habitual disposition in South America. I first explore the conflictual peace of the region before underscoring the discrete habitual qualities of regional relations. In particular, I highlight the formal and rules-​based disposition of regional practitioners. I then explore the effects of the South American habitual disposition in terms of its robustness and its role in the regional response to the 1995 Cenepa conflict between Ecuador and Peru. As with ­chapter 4, this investigation unearths the existence and effect of a particular habitual disposition and it demonstrates its effects, shaping regional conflict management and the contours of regionalism more generally in important ways and making possible the long and conflictual peace of South America. In ­chapter 6, I conclude by bringing the two preceding regional cases into comparison and underscoring the substantive, theoretical, and methodological contributions of this book. Taken together, this final chapter brings the particularities of the habitual dispositions of Southeast Asian and South American diplomatic relations into starker relief and underscores their consequence.

2 Habitual Dispositions and Conflict Management Introduction In this chapter I outline a theoretical framework to explore the dynamics of conflict management and regionalism within diplomatic communities. My aim in this chapter is not to advance the theory of conflict management and regionalism nor outline all possible means by which states, organizations, and their officials confront and manage challenges. Rather, I seek to unearth and operationalize one particularly consequential and often overlooked aspect of regional interstate relations: habitual dispositions. Attention to the habitual, practical, and dispositional qualities of regional diplomacy and governance sheds light on how challenges are understood by regional officials and what options they see as effective and indeed possible in responding to them. With this in mind, my goal is to offer a framework that allows us to uncover the foundations of the very “imaginability and thinkability of interests and choice,” in Hopf ’s words, in order to account for how regional officials understand and respond to conflict and pursue regionalism more generally.1 In drawing attention to these qualities of community thinking and behavior, my approach examines how power, norms, and organizational sites shape regional conflict management and regionalism. This chapter proceeds over three sections. In the first section, I explore the logic by which habitual and dispositional qualities of interaction structure and pattern relations among states. Here, I draw attention to the related concepts of norms, practices, and habits and articulate their commonalities and the utility of accounts of each. In the second section, I build on these accounts to outline a theoretical framework attentive to the habitual dispositions of communities of practice. I operationalize this concept and 1 Ted Hopf, Social Construction of International Politics: Identities and Foreign Policies, Moscow, 1955 and 1999 (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2002), 283. Practicing Peace. Aarie Glas, Oxford University Press. © Oxford University Press 2022. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780197633229.003.0002

Habitual Dispositions and Conflict Management  31 take a first step in showcasing its analytical value. In brief, I show that habitual dispositions are basic cognitive foundations and relatively automatic behaviors known to be normal, natural, and effective for particular communities of practice. They are what officials think from, rather than about as they pursue their collective and individual interests. In the third section, I argue that habitual dispositions matter for global and regional politics because they make possible stability in complex social interactions.

Norms, Practice, and Habit Much of social action occurs rather unthinkingly. As Emile Durkheim suggests, “by its very nature, human action, whether individual or collective oscillates between two poles, that of consciousness or reflection on the one side, and that of habit on the other side, with the latter pole being stronger.”2 Relatively thoughtless behavior and sets of understandings structure social relations for individuals, groups, and states alike. However, across much of the social sciences theoretical attention has been disproportionally devoted to examining the conscious side of this spectrum. Charles Camic nicely summarizes this oversight: whether action is depicted as the pursuit of economic ends via norms of efficiency, or whether more sublime needs and obligatory moral norms are also taken into consideration, the underlying assumption is that the human personality is essentially the aggregate of various end preferences and normative orientations. . . . Missing altogether here is an appreciation . . . that personality is a good deal more than the tidy sum of attributes like these; that the implications for actual conduct of any particular norms, beliefs, and ideas are highly contingent on the basic cast or form of the whole personality of which these components are parts—​on a generalized disposition.3

Much of our theorizing in international relations (IR) upholds this neglect, assuming and starting with an exploration of the conscious reflection of agents prior to action.4 Be it in reference to material structures and 2 Quoted in Charles Camic, “A Matter of Habit,” American Journal of Sociology 91, no. 5 (1986): 1052. 3 Camic, “A Matter of Habit,” 1076. 4 James G. March and Johan P. Olson, Rediscovering Institutions: The Organizational Basis of Politics (New York City: Free Press, 1989).

32  Practicing Peace incentives, intersubjectively held assumptions of “we-​ness” in a community, or the perceived appropriateness of norms, much of IR theory suffers from what Pouliot refers to as a “representational bias.”5 We tend to assume that actors, be they individuals, groups, or states themselves, reflect on their position and aspects of self—​assumptions as to expected gains, the appropriateness of conduct, or the persuasiveness of arguments—​prior to action. This is not to imply that active reflection is not important. However, exclusive attention on the conscious and deliberate aspects of social interaction risks missing much of what goes on in the social world. As Hopf makes clear, “We have been ignoring what most people do most of the time in their social lives.”6 A central focus of this book is to take this neglect on directly, uncovering and exploring what two diplomatic communities do most of the time when responding to regional conflict and pursuing regionalism more generally. In doing so, it offers insight into regional conflict management and wider patterns of cooperation and conflict from the perspectives of those within diplomatic communities engaged in these activities. The central aim of this chapter is to take a first step in this investigation by advancing one means to explore the thinking and behavior of diplomatic communities. To this end, I start with attention to the norms of diplomatic and interstate relations. Interactions between states and their officials within and beyond organizational settings are filled with normative qualities—​from norms around attire to procedural norms of social interaction to the codified principles of regional organizations advanced to promote regularity and unity in interactions. Norms, by the most common defection, are collective expectations of appropriate conduct. They are basic standards of right or wrong, given inclusion in some community.7 A recognition of the importance of norms is the mainstay of constructivist accounts of global and regional politics, although the definition and its analytical utility of the concept has been much debated in recent years.8 In most accounts, norms are important 5 Pouliot, “The Logic of Practicality,” 6 Hopf, “The Logic of Habit,” 539. 7 Martha Finnemore and Kathryn Sikkink, “International Norm Dynamics and Political Change,” International Organization 52, no. 4 (1998): 891; Jepperson, Wendt, and Katzenstein, “Norms, Identity,” 54; Nina Tannenwald, “The Nuclear Taboo: The United States and the Normative Basis of Nuclear Non-​Use,” International Organization 53, no. 3 (1999): 436. 8 E.g., Nicole Deitelhoff and Lisbeth Zimmermann, “Norms under Challenge: Unpacking the Dynamics of Norm Robustness,” Journal of Global Security Studies 4, no. 1 (2019): 2–​17; Jurkovich, “What Isn’t a Norm?”; Simon Frankel Pratt, “From Norms to Normative Configurations: A Pragmatist and Relational Approach to Theorizing Normativity in IR,” International Theory, 12, no. 1 (2020): 59–​82.

Habitual Dispositions and Conflict Management  33 because they are seen to prescribe or prohibit certain behaviors. For example, mainstream constructivist accounts have detailed how the norm of women’s suffrage9 and the prohibition of the use of nuclear weapons10 have shaped state behavior in fundamental ways. Across diplomatic contexts, norms are recognized to shape how state and organizational officials recognize and respond to challenges and pursue their interests more generally.11 More broadly, it has been argued that “norms represent the legitimating core of global governance” and thereby shape wider patterns of global and regional interaction in meaningful ways.12 Many international and regional norms are institutionalized within organizations—​codified as prescriptive principles of action by the member states of organizations, like the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), the Organization of American States (OAS), or the United Nations (UN).13 However, even when institutionalized and codified within organizations, norms are not themselves static or fixed “things.” Their meaning and effect are not given or consistent.14 Rather, norms are often ambiguous and open to interpretation, variation in performance, and contestation within and across communities and over time.15 What they mean, the behaviors they prescribe or prohibit, and how they ought to be enacted can vary within and across contexts and time. A growing literature centers on elucidating these dynamics, exploring forms of norm contestation and underscoring its ubiquity.16 In this vein, the inherent ambiguity of many norms, like the Protection of Civilians norm in UN peace operations, may allow certain actors to actively

9 Finnemore and Sikkink, “International Norm Dynamics.” 10 Tannenwald, “Nuclear Taboo.” 11 E.g., Glas and Balogun, “Norms in Practice.” 12 Antje Wiener, A Theory of Contestation (Heidelberg: Springer, 2014), 4. 13 Finnemore and Sikkink, “International Norm Dynamics,” 900. 14 Mona Lena Krook and Jacquie True, “Rethinking the Life Cycles of International Norms: The United Nations and the Global Promotion of Gender Equality,” European Journal of International Relations 18, no. 1 (2011): 103–​127. 15 Acharya, “How Ideas Spread”; Wiener, “Enacting Meaning-​in-​Use.” 16 E.g., Amitav Acharya, “Asian Regional Institutions and the Possibilities for Socializing the Behavior of States,” Asian Development Bank Working Paper Series on Regional Economic Integration (2011), 82; Steven Bernstein and Marion Laurence, “Practices and Norms: Relationships, Disjunctures, and Change,” in Conceptualizing International Practices: Directions for the Practice Turn in International Relations, eds. Christian A. Bueger, A. Drieschova, and Ted Hopf (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2022); Lisbeth Zimmermann, “Same or Different? Norm Diffusion between Resistance, Compliance, and Localization in Post-​Conflict States.” International Studies Perspectives 17, no. 1 (2016): 98–​115; Susanne Zwingel, “How Do Norms Travel? Theorizing International Women’s Rights in Transnational Perspective,” International Studies Quarterly 56, no. 1 (2012): 115–​129.

34  Practicing Peace contest or reject a norm or to enact it varied ways over time.17 A growing area of scholarship also recognizes that variation in the enactment of widely held norms may stem less from purposive rejection or contestation of a norm, but from variation in understandings of how to adopt and enact the norm. In this way, a group may attest that a norm has been adopted or enacted appropriately, even when their practices appear to be mismatched or in tension with the norm in the eyes of others.18 The study of regional relations in Southeast Asia offers a useful illustration. A central focus of the literature on Southeast Asian governance and diplomacy is the so-​called “ASEAN way.”19 In most accounts, this “way” of diplomatic interaction is understood as a set of prescriptive norms that shape the behavior of regional states—​for better20 or for worse.21 Of central importance are norms of noninterference, peaceful-​settlement of disputes, and consensus-​based decision-​making. These norms have been adopted by regional officials and institutionalized and codified within the organization since its founding in 1967. Noninterference, for example, has been codified within agreements including ASEAN’s founding Declaration in 1967, the 1976 Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in Southeast Asia (TAC), and the ASEAN Charter signed in 2007. This recognition offers important insights into the regional diplomatic community’s approach to managing crises and pursuing regionalism. As discussed in ­chapter 1, however, it remains less clear if or how noninterference and other norms and principles codified within the organization are “upheld in practice” by officials.22 This is the focus of this book. While the existence and codification of norms may 17 Marion Laurence, “An ‘Impartial’ Force? Normative Ambiguity and Practice Change in UN Peace Operations,” International Peacekeeping 26, no. 3 (2019): 256–​280; Emily Paddon Rhoads and Jennifer Welsh, “Close Cousins in Protection: The Evolution of Two Norms,” International Affairs 95, no. 3 (2019): 597–​617. 18 Steven Bernstein, Aarie Glas, and Marion Laurence, “Norms, Practice, and Social Change,” Working paper (n.d.). 19 Acharya, Constructing a Security Community; Ba, [Re]Negotiating; Alex J. Bellamy and Mark Beeson, “The Responsibility to Protect in Southeast Asia: Can ASEAN Reconcile Humanitarianism and Sovereignty?” Asian Security 6, no. 3 (2010): 262–​279; Alan Collins, “W(h)ither the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), W(h)ither Constructivism: Fixity of Norms and the ASEAN Way,” International Relations 33, no. 3 (2019): 413–​432; Haacke, ASEAN’s Diplomatic and Security Culture; Kivimäki, “Southeast Asia and Conflict Prevention”; Taku Yukawa, “The ASEAN Way as a Symbol: An Analysis of Discourses on the ASEAN Norms,” Pacific Review 31, no. 3 (2018): 298–​314. 20 E.g., Kivimäki, “The Long Peace.” 21 E.g., David Martin Jones and Michael L. R. Smith, “Making Process, Not Progress: ASEAN and the Evolving East Asian Regional Order,” International Security 32, no. 1 (2007): 148–​184. See also Richard Stubbs, “ASEAN Sceptics versus ASEAN Proponents: Evaluating Regional Institutions,” Pacific Review, (2019): 923–​950. 22 Acharya, Constructing a Security Community, 63.

Habitual Dispositions and Conflict Management  35 highlight collectively held “notions of what appropriate behavior ought to be,” this tells us less about the actual thinking or behavior of actors.23 To account for patterns of behavior within communities, like the diplomatic community of Southeast Asia, we may start with an analysis of norms, but we need to move beyond narrow accounts of norms alone. We must examine the practical and relational dynamics of interaction in order to investigate what regional officials do uphold in practice and why.24 This interest necessitates attention to the related concepts of habit and practice. Habits and practices are similar and similarly useful analytical concepts in IR literature. Both speak to the cognitive and behavioral qualities of individuals and groups. Habits, which have been afforded relatively less attention, are sets of deeply held knowledge that generate unthinking responses to situations.25 Practices, which have received much more exhaustive engagement, are understood in varied but similar ways.26 Practices are most commonly defined as competent and socially meaningful performances that generate patterns of interactions.27 Habits and practice, then, have both behavioral and cognitive aspects, and the concepts beckon us to investigate how individuals and groups think and act. In this view, cognition is understood as a social quality, rather than something in the minds of individuals. In Adler’s view of practice, for example, cognition is embodied and mediated through social interaction.28 Thinking about both habit and practice directs analytical attention to Durkheim’s “stronger pole” of action. Both emerge from deeply ingrained or taken-​for-​granted knowledge about the world. This “background knowledge” informs what communities of people understand as appropriate, what they know to be competent ways of doing, and, indeed, what they assume is possible.29 In accounts of habit and practice this kind of knowledge is unconsciously self-​evident to actors. As a result, these particular understandings are particularly important; they bound and delimit action, making possible 23 Bernstein, The Compromise, 29 24 See also David M. McCourt, “Practice Theory and Relationalism as the New Constructivism,” International Studies Quarterly 60, no. 3 (2016): 475–​485. 25 Hopf, “The Logic of Habit.” 26 See Christian Bueger and Frank Gadinger, “The Play of International Practice,” International Studies Quaterly 59, no. 3 (2015): 449–​460; Jonathan Joseph and Milja Kurki, “The Limits of Practice: Why Realism Can Complement IR’s Practice Turn,” International Theory 10, no. 1 (2018): 71–​97. 27 Adler and Pouliot, International Practices. 28 Emanuel Adler, World Ordering: A Social Theory of Cognitive Evolution, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2019), 115. 29 Pouliot, International Security in Practice.

36  Practicing Peace certain behavior while precluding others from a rather foundational level.30 According to practice theorists, this inarticulate “practical sense” or “socially constituted ‘sense of the game’ ” acts as a lens through which actors confront the world.31 These are, then, potentially, useful insights in examining how diplomatic officials confront and respond to challenges. Returning to Camic, both concepts promise insight into the generalized dispositions that may shape instrumental and normative behavior.32 However, another similarity in treatments of the concepts of practice and habit is that neither offer much attention to norms themselves.33 Rather, both propose alternative logics of action to that of appropriateness, which is at the heart of most accounts of norms. Practice theorists, in particular, tend to articulate and distance themselves from what Ole Jacob Sending terms the “motivationally externalist” reading of the logic of appropriateness that is most common to traditional constructivist accounts.34 This externalist understanding of norms and their consequence assumes individuals consciously reflect on what constitutes appropriate conduct. In this account, compliance with a norm is the product of reflection on identity and appraisals of what norms are relevant as a result. Actors actively recognize who they are and the context in which they exist, and then they decide what they ought to do by reference to their understanding of existent norms. In a mundane example, this logic assumes that when a car driver stops at a red light on a deserted night, she has weighed the appropriateness of her conduct as a law-​abiding citizen. Her reflection guides her reasoned behavior. At the international level, many accounts of state behavior assume a similar level of reflection on contemporary international norms, such as the “fundamental norms” of citizenship, sovereignty, and noninterference.35 Many such norms 30 See also Jarrod Hayes, Constructing National Security: U.S. Relations with India and China (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013), 25–​27, 31–​39; Ted Hopf, Reconstructing the Cold War: The Early Years, 1945–​1958 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), 14–​15. 31 Pouliot, “The Logic of Practicality”; Vincent Pouliot, International Pecking Orders: The Politics and Practice of Multilateral Diplomacy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016). See also Pierre Bourdieu and Loïc J. D. Wacquant, “The Purpose of Reflexive Sociology (The Chicago Workshop),” in An Invitation to Reflexive Sociology, eds. Pierre Bourdieu and Loïc J. D. Wacquant (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992), 61–​215. 32 CAMIC, “A Matter of Habit.” 33 See also Christian Bueger, “Practices, Norms, and the Theory of Contestation,” Polity 49, no. 1 (2017): 126–​131. 34 Ole Jacob Sending, “Constitution, Choice and Change: Problems with the ‘Logic of Appropriateness’ and Its Use in Constructivist Theory,” European Journal of International Relations 8, no. 4 (2002): 443–​470. See also Alan Collins, Building a People-​Oriented Security Community the ASEAN Way (New York City: Routledge, 2013), 16–​19; Pouliot, “The Logic of Practicality,” 262. 35 Wiener, “Enacting Meaning-​in-​Use,”183.

Habitual Dispositions and Conflict Management  37 leave “behavioral traces,” as they are recorded in treaties, agreements, and other formal or less than formal means when they are established and internalized by actors.36 This allows norms to be both verbal and intentional. Just as the driver stopped in the dead of night may account for her behavior by reference to her understanding of domestic rules and norms, a state official may reference the norm of sovereignty through the UN Charter or articulate the relevance of noninterference to their behavior via rhetorically invoking ASEAN’s TAC. In these cases, behavior is assumed to be shaped by reflection on what ought to be done. It is this representational quality that distances a focus on norms from both practice and habit. Habit and practice assume no such active reflection. As explored, both concepts highlight the “background” thinking and rather automatic behavior of actors. As Hopf summarizes, “Significant features distinguish habitual action from normative compliance. Generally, norms have the form ‘in circumstance X, you should do Y’, whereas habits have a general form more like ‘in circumstance X, action Y follows.’ ”37 The same is true of the logic of practice. As Pouliot summarizes, practice rests on “what popular parlance calls commonsense, experience, intuition, knack, skill or practical mastery.”38 These dispositional traits shape behavior innately, rather than through reflection on the consequence or appropriateness of action. Actors just do their habits and practice. This recognition is an important contribution from these literatures. The deeper, dispositional logic of action at work in both habit and practice is particularly consequential because it is so foundational, delimiting behavior before reflection on appropriateness, consequence, or arguing. It bounds the reflection of actors—​be that regarding who they are, what they should do, and indeed, what they can do. For example, consider the oft-​discussed example of a master chess player.39 She innately knows the rules of the game as she plays it. It matters little whether she actively learned the rules through the instruction of a teacher in an instrumental way, as Hopf suggests is common for habits, or if she learned in and through her years of playing of the game, as Pouliot suggests of the logic of practice.40 What matters most is that she has a deep knowledge of the game as she faces her appointment. 36 Bernstein, The Compromise, 30. 37 Hopf, Social Construction, 12. 38 Pouliot, International Security, 28. 39 Daniel Kahneman, “A Perspective on Judgment and Choice: Mapping Bounded Rationality,” American Psychologist 58, no. 9 (2003): 697–​720. 40 Hopf, “The Logic of Habit,” 541–​542; Pouliot, International Security, 30.

38  Practicing Peace This knowledge shapes her thinking and behavior. She is unlikely to reflect on the breadth of those rules as she plays her game; she simply knows them. She no longer thinks actively about the boundaries of what is possible, as may a novice. Rather, as a master, she thinks from this background knowledge. She recognizes what is competent and indeed possible as she plays her game. This does not mean her moves are given nor that she may not experiment or deviate from patterns she’s engaged in before. She may even be a “virtuoso” of improvisation in her play.41 However, her deep, background knowledge disposes her toward certain ways of thinking and doing as she plays her game. This knowledge is particularly consequential for how the game is played because it precedes and thus shapes deliberation on what is appropriate, effective, or risky behavior. In this way, habits and practices are often seen to be more robust, more resilient, and more consequential for social relations than consciously referenced norms of appropriate conduct. From this survey, it is clear that these concepts, or the commonalities between them, are useful starting points to investigate patterns of state behavior as well. Diplomats and organizational officials themselves may know—​ through teaching and learning and through doing—​how to play their own game. They may themselves be disposed to certain ways of thinking and doing. Moreover, these dispositions may shape how norms themselves are understood and enacted. The relationship between habit, practice, and norms is not well developed in IR literatures. Until rather recently these have been siloed camps in the discipline, particularly among practice theorists. However, this is a needlessly narrow focus and a problematic one when investigating the behavior of regional diplomatic communities. Rather, what norms mean and how they ought to be enacted for a community is often shaped by the practical sense of that community. And a community’s practical sense is often related to underlying normative commitments.42 This interrelationship is clear when we consider the role of competence within accounts of practice and habits. Competence is a necessarily subjective quality of communities. It refers to an assumed fit between behavior and expectation, or a recognition of appropriate and effective conduct—​that something is done correctly. This 41 Jérémie Cornut, “Diplomacy, Agency, and the Logic of Improvisation and Virtuosity in Practice,” European Journal of International Relations 24, no. 3 (2018): 712–​736. 42 See Bernstein and Laurence, “Practice and Norms”; Aarie Glas and Marion Laruence, “Changing Norms in Practice: Noninterference in the UN and ASEAN,” Journal of Global Security Studies 7, no. 2 (2022): https://​doi.org/​10.1093/​jogss/​ogac​003.

Habitual Dispositions and Conflict Management  39 recognition stems from claims of authority—​that “this is how things are done” within and for particular contexts and groups.43 This social quality is something Adler and Pouliot highlight to distance their understanding of practices, as competent performances, from habits, which they understand as necessarily individualistic and absent social meaning.44 This is a restrictive view of habit, as habits may also be socially held and socially meaningful, as explored above. Regardless of the semantic distinction, it is clear that actors tend to engage in iterated practices or habits that they and their community perceive as normal, natural, and effective—​as competent. In this way, the notion of competence helps address critiques from those who highlight the strategic or rational use of culture and norms through a recognition of the pragmatist foundations of practice.45 Much the same can be said of habit. As James Rosenau summarizes, “a person is usually well severed by her habits. They get her through a variety of situations and enable her to meet a variety of challenges. So, there are good reasons to be comfortable as a habit-​ driven actor, and as such, to eschew capricious behavior.”46 Both habits and practices have a functional, competent quality, serving community interests and thereby entrenching them as commonsensical or practical sense for their members. As Iver B. Neumann suggests, “practice speaks: ‘this is how we have always done things around here.’ ”47 However, as norm localization and contestation accounts remind us, what works “around here” is likely to vary across both contexts and settings. Different groups and different communities will likely have variable understandings of what works—​what are normal, natural, and effective or competent ways of doing for them. Moreover, institutionalized and codified norms themselves may be understood and enacted in variable habitual and practical ways by disparate communities. For example, and as ­chapter 4 demonstrates, from an extraregional vantage point there appear important differences between the norms codified in both the founding ASEAN Declaration of 1967 and the Charter signed 40 years later and the way that ASEAN officials understand and enact these norms. In the view of 43 Rebeca Adler-​Nissen and Vincent Pouliot, “Power in Practice: Negotiating the International Intervention in Libya,” European Journal of International Relations 20, no. 4 (2014): 893. See also Finnemore and Sikkink, “International Norm Dynamics,” 891–​892. 44 Emanuel Alder and Vincent Pouliot, “International Practices,” International Theory 3, no. 1 (2011): 6–​7. 45 See Kahler, “Legalization as Strategy.” 46 Rosenau, “Before Cooperation,” 862. 47 Neumann, “Returning Practice,” 637.

40  Practicing Peace ASEAN officials, there are normal, natural, and effective ways to enact or “do” norms of noninterference and the peaceful settlement of disputes, for example. However, these often appear puzzling or incompetent expressions of norms in the eyes of European officials working alongside the organization. Similarly, among South American officials, as ­chapter 5 shows, legalism means something very different—​and requires a distinctive set of behaviors to do competently—​than it does for North American officials within the OAS. The concepts of habit and practice help us make sense of variable understandings and enactment of norms. In sum, norms, habits, and practices all appear to be important and potentially useful concepts to adopt in order to understand how groups of actors manage conflict and pursue regionalism. A first step to this end is to examine how, or whether, norms are practiced in socially meaningfully and habitual ways. These dynamics can be investigated through three lines of inquiry: unearthing (1) collectively held background knowledge that may inform (2) relatively automatic and socially -​meaningful behaviors within (3) particular communities.48 As I explore below, these communities themselves are observable in their joint enterprise and like-​mindedness, their shared tools and resources, and their dense and repeated interactions. To pursue this line of inquiry, I next advance a concept of habitual dispositions. I intend this as a synthesis of the core commonalities in accounts of norms, practice, and habit, as explored.

Habitual Dispositions In this section I build on the concepts of norms, habits, and practices to articulate and operationalize the concept of habitual dispositions. I mean this as an analytical tool to grapple with the cognitive and behavioral dispositions of groups of actors. More narrowly, it allows us to explore the normative, habitual, and practical qualities of regional diplomatic relations that may, themselves, affect regional peace and cooperation in important ways. The concept of habitual dispositions rests on three core assertions. First, as with concepts of habit and practice, these are social qualities of groups that exist largely prior to reflection. They are usefully conceived of as foundational predispositions toward certain behaviors within a given context.

48 See also Glas and Balogun, “Norms in Practice.”

Habitual Dispositions and Conflict Management  41 While they are temporally and spatially contingent, once established, habitual dispositions shape perception and practice in important ways—​they are what groups of actors think from, rather than about. Second, and analytically, these dispositional qualities can be conceptualized in terms of knowledge and practice—​or as both elements of content and process of groups and their interactions. Third, rather than assuming a culturally essentialist account of social relations, habitual dispositions are qualities that originate in and are shared by members of relatively bounded communities of practice within particular institutionalized settings. I unpack each of these assertions in turn.

Prior to Reflection As the cognitive foundation of behavior, habitual dispositions can be understood as “ontologically prior” to other logics of action.49 They are qualities of thinking and behavior that influence actors before active reflection in a strict sense. They can be understood as an impulse in response to stimuli that is more or less unthinking.50 In this way these qualities shape how reflection itself unfolds, setting the bounds of what may be considered as risk or reward and as effective or appropriate action. Said differently, they are sets of proclivities to see and engage the world in particular ways as a matter of course. However, they are temporally and spatially contingent. They emerge in and through practice, by internalizing knowledge that was once reflected on within particular communities. Just as our master chess player knows how to play her game, once established, habitual dispositions shape perception and practice, be it in reference to the risks, rewards, or perceived appropriateness of action. Two caveats may be offered at this point. First, attention to habitual dispositions suggests nothing of the judged efficacy of behavior, only that it emerges from knowledge outside and before active reflection. Habitual dispositions should not be assumed good, bad, or otherwise to an external observer. As Adler notes in his articulation of internalization processes: “it may not be the best-​fitted ideas, nor the most efficient institutions, that become ‘naturalized’ or reified, but those that prove most successful at imposing

49 Pouliot, “The Logic of Practicality,” 277.

50 Hopf, “The Logic of Habit,” 542–​543; Kahneman, “A Perspective on Judgment and Choice.”

42  Practicing Peace collective meaning and function on physical reality.”51 Said differently, habitual dispositions may be learned and adopted not because they are the most effective means to serve the interests of communities, but because they appear to work to members over time. This suggestion, as advanced in more detail in c­ hapter 3, aligns with the established literature on norm localization dynamics as well.52 For “new” ideas or practices to be “naturalized” within a community, they must resonant with and be adjusted to fit with established predispositions. Once internalized, however, these practical and habitual qualities of relations tend to work in the minds of their communities. For those within a community, they know that they are “well served” by their habitual dispositions and that they simply “work.”53 This recognition of competence is one made within the bounded community, not in accordance with measures external to it. Thus, some habitual dispositions may be effective for members of the community but appear much less so to those outside of it. Indeed, as the empirical chapters showcase, what works for officials in one regional community may be “insane” to diplomatic officials from another.54 Second, recognizing habitual dispositions does not imply that actors respond to stimuli—​or challenges—​in simple or unskilled ways. They may generate rather complex and skilled actions, but actions that emerge largely as a matter of course and within the bounds of given understandings of what is known to be normal, natural, and effective. This logic is clear if we return to the chess master. As Daniel Kahneman recognizes: “The proverbial master chess player who walks past a game and declares, ‘White mates in three,’ without slowing is performing intuitively, as is the experienced nurse who detects subtle signs of impending heart failure.”55 Indeed, “skilled decision makers often do better when they trust their intuitions than when they engage in detailed analysis.”56 This intuitive or dispositional thinking is central to the concept of habitual dispositions, as explored below. 51 Alder, “Seizing the Middle Ground,” 340. See also Vincent Pouliot and Frédéric Mérand, “A Political Sociology of International Relations,” in Bourdieu in International Relations, ed. Rebecca Adler-​Nissen (New York: Routledge, 2012), 31. 52 Acharya, “How Ideas Spread”; Brook Coe, Sovereignty in the South: Intrusive Regionalism in Africa, Latin America, and Southeast Asia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2019); Giovanni Barbieri, “Regionalism, Globalism and Complexity: A Stimulus towards Global IR?,” Third World Thematics: A TWQ Journal 4, no. 6 (2019): 424–​441. 53 Rosenau, “Before Cooperation,” 862; Adler and Pouliot, International Practices, 22. 54 Interview with American official, Jakarta, July 3, 2014. Interviews throughout this book are generally anonymous, unless the interviewee explicitly agreed to attribution. Anonymous interviewees are referred to using female pronouns. On occasion dates, locations, and/​or nationality is withheld to ensure anonymity. 55 Kahneman, “A Perspective on Judgement,” 699. 56 Kahneman, “A Perspective on Judgement,” 699.

Habitual Dispositions and Conflict Management  43

Process and Content Relatedly and second, these deeply internalized qualities of relations can be analytically parsed out along two lines. Habitual dispositions can be conceptualized in terms of both processual attributes and particular substantive content—​as both background knowledge and inherent, rather automatic behaviors.57 Habitual dispositions rest on predispositions. In the practice literature, this is most often articulated as a commonsense, practical sense, or background knowledge that is shared among members of communities.58 From this assumed sense of what is normal or natural stems relatively automatic behaviors known to be competent for members of a community. Again, this does not suggest we would expect simple, fixed, or mechanical responses to stimuli “devoid of meaning from the actor’s point of view.”59 Rather, the behaviors that emerge from dispositional knowledge are better understood as variable forms or classes of action. Habitual dispositions may include behaviors that are both “simple and circumscribed” and “generalized and complex.”60 As John Dewey obverses, and in parallel to the assumptions inherent in Pierre Bourdieu’s habitus, “habits are arts. They involve skill of sensory and motor organs, cunning or craft, and objective materials. They assimilate objective energies, and eventuate in command of an environment. They require order, discipline and manifest technique.”61 Habitual dispositions imply a proclivity toward classes of action, but not a mechanistic or determined act. Again, they denote behaviors that stem from intuitive thought and predispositions known innately to an actor and pursued as a matter of course. Further, then, habitual dispositions do not presuppose a lack of agency. Rather, a recognition of habitual dispositions suggests that we should conceptualize agency as bounded by less than conscious background knowledge 57 A similar analytic distinction is made within psychology literature, e.g., Bas Verplanken, “Habit: From Overt Action to Mental Events,” in Then a Miracle Occurs: Focusing Behavior in Social Psychological Theory and Research, eds. Christopher R. Agnew, Donal E. Carlston, William G. Graziano, and Janice R. Kelly (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010), 74, 77. In IR, Mariano Bertucci makes the same distinction in his study of foreign policy stability. See Mariano E. Bertucci, “Habits and Policy: The Socio-​Cognitive Foundations of Foreign Policy Stability” (PhD diss.: University of Southern California, 2014). 58 E.g., Pouliot, “The Logic of Practicality.” 59 Camic, “A Matter of Habit,” 1046; and see Nick Crossley, “Habit and Habitus,” Body and Society 19, nos. 2–​3 (2013): 148. 60 Camic, “A Matter of Habit,” 1045. 61 Quoted in Crossley, “Habit and Habitus,” 150.

44  Practicing Peace or rather set ways of knowing. From this foundation, particular repertoires of action are known to be normal, natural, and effective and enacted as a matter of course. Here, agency is not obviated, but it is delimited by community-​ held forms of knowledge. Returning to the chess master, she has agency over her strategies as she plays, but in practice her strategies are delineated by her given understanding of the contours of the game. This distinction has been long recognized in psychology. For example, Keith Stanovich and Richard West articulate two systems of cognition that we rely on in varied ways and situations: intuition and reasoning. The behavior produced in and through habitual dispositions is a product of the first.62 Intuitive thinking is relatively effortless, fast, and associative, rather than slow, controlled and rule-​ governed. Intuition stems from given and generalized dispositions toward thinking and behavior.63 This understanding of how background knowledge shapes action contrasts with how “habit” has been described in IR, and better aligns with practice theory’s attention to habitus. Hopf, for example, offers a particularly narrow reading of habit. Rather than treating it as bounded agency, he assumes habit as mechanistic in its dictates. That Hopf concludes that the “fuller implications” of habit suggest the “elimination of rationality, agency and uncertainty” in social action seems to invite a similar lament to many who survey the concept’s evolving usage in sociology.64 Camic, for example, surveys the development of the terminology around habit and suggests that the transition in linguistic use from habit to habitus does not denote the development of a novel concept.65 Rather, the semantic recourse to habitus was a move largely in effort to distance some from the distorted appropriation of the concept by particular behaviorist sociologists keen to associate “habit” with mechanistic and deterministic responses to stimuli, something mirrored in IR with Hopf ’s usage. Robert E. Park notes this keenly when he suggests that what we do “when we behave most like human beings [is] pretty sure to escape the behaviorists [who focus on] habits.”66 Similarly, as Nick Crossley observes, “The reason that writers such as Marcel Mauss and Bourdieu argue for a conception of habitus over a conception of habit, I believe, is because the concept of habit has been distorted and, on this basis, 62 Keith E. Stanovich and Richard F. West, “Individual Differences in Reasoning: Implications for the Rationality Debate,” Behavioral Brain Sciences 23, (2001): 645–​665. 63 See also Kahneman, “A Perspective on Judgement,” 698–​699. 64 Hopf, “The Logic of Habit,” 544. 65 Camic, “A Matter of Habit.” 66 Quoted in Camic, “A Matter of Habit,” 1073.

Habitual Dispositions and Conflict Management  45 discredited in the course of intellectual history. It is probable that these particular writers recognize this distortion and adopt ‘habitus’ for purely strategic reasons.” As he continues, such thinkers “recognize that ‘habit’ need not imply mechanical repetition but recognize also that this is how it often is conceived.”67 Just as the limited behaviorist view of habit seemed at odds with human action for Park, Mauss, and Bourdieu, so too does Hopf ’s habit seem at odds with agency in IR and with earlier uses of habit in that field.68 Rather than assuming a lack of agency, then, adopting the lens of habitual dispositions means thinking about the dispositional rather than mechanistic nature of much of social action.

Diplomatic Communities Third, the context in which this social action occurs is consequential for how actors interact. Practice theorists confront this directly by stressing the importance of overlapping fields or relational spaces in which individuals interact.69 In this account, individual action is shaped by their context-​or field-​specific dispositions. These durable dispositions lead individuals to particular tendencies toward certain practices within certain contexts.70 Mitzen relies on a similar assumption to account for state behavior.71 Following from Anthony Giddens, she draws attention to the routinization of relations that offer states “ontological security”—​continuity in the self that makes possible social action. Driven by this need, states create certainty through the establishment of cognitive and behavioral routines of relations with significant others.72 The result is that states become disposed toward certain types of behavior within particular contexts.73 These claims are made on the shoulders of major social theorists who highlight the significance of such dispositional traits. Durkheim’s views on “primitive” societies, the modern division of labor, and even suicide are 67 Crossley, “Habit and Habitus,” 143. 68 E.g., Rosenau, “Before Cooperation,” 862. 69 Rebecca Alder-​Nissen, “Inter-​and Transnational Field(s) of Power: On a Field Trip with Bourdieu” International Political Sociology 5, no. 3 (2011): 327–​ 330; Pouliot, “The Logic of Practicality”; Pouliot, International Security; Pouliot and Mérand, “A Political Sociology.” 70 Pouliot, “The Logic of Practicality,” 272. 71 Mitzen, “The Prospect of Integration.” 72 See also Jennifer Mitzen and Randall L. Schweller, “Knowing the Unknown Unknowns: Misplaced Certainty and the Onset of War,” Security Studies 20, (2011): 2–​35. 73 See also Rosenau, “Before Cooperation,” 863.

46  Practicing Peace all informed by recognition that unreflexive knowledge structures behavior through collectively held habits.74 Max Weber offers a similar understanding of collectively held habits, or Eingestellthiet, that lead societies to replicate practices from the past.75 Dewey, too, argues that groups generate and socialize societal customs through purposive design and incidental action.76 While individuals may have their own and personalized habits, societal habits are of particular importance and structure relations in important ways across time. As with the aspiration of Durkheim, Dewey therefore saw a possibility of entrenching particular collectively held habits through education. In his account, habituating critical inquiry and compassion for others, for example, may lead to positive social change.77 These dispositional and habitual traits, then, may exist across various levels of aggregation, from the individual to states to entire societies. The focus of this book is much narrower than that of Dewey, Durkheim, and Weber. My focus is on the habitual dispositions of diplomatic communities of practice. A community of practice is a relatively bounded group of individuals defined and observable through four related qualities. Communities of practice are composed of actors who share joint enterprise and like-​mindedness, make use of shared tools of action, and are engaged in dense and repeated interactions.78 The concept was originally developed and adopted to shed light on social learning within organizational settings.79 In IR, it has been widely adopted to examine the sources and dynamics of continuity and change, largely by drawing attention to the everyday interactions or quotidian unfolding of social life within institutional contexts.80 The concept, as

74 Camic “A Matter of Habit,” 1051–​1053; Emile Durkheim, The Division of Labor in Society, translated by George Simpson (New York City: Free Press, 1893); Emile Durkheim, The Rules of Sociological Method, ed. Steven Lukes, translated by W. D. Halls (New York City: Free Press, 1895). 75 Max Weber, Economy and Society, eds. Guenther Roth and Claus Wittich (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978[1922]). See also Camic, “A Matter of Habit,” 1057. 76 John Dewey, “Human Nature and Conduct,” in Middle Works, ed. Jo Ann Boydston (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1922), 15–​21, 43–​47. 77 Dewey, “Human Nature,” 127–​128. 78 See Adler, Communitarian International Relations; Glas and Balogun, “Norms in Practice”; Wenger, Communities of Practice. 79 Jean Lave and Etienne Wenger, Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991). 80 E.g., Federica Bicchi, “The EU as a Community of Practice: Foreign Policy Communications in the COREU Network,” Journal of European Public Policy 18, no. 8 (2011): 1115–​1132.; Federica Bicchi and Niklas Bremberg, “European Diplomatic Practices: Contemporary Challenges and Innovative Approaches,” European Security 25, no. 4 (2016): 391–​406; Nina Græger, “European Security as Practice: EU–​NATO Communities of Practice in the Making?,” European Security 25, no. 4 (2016): 478–​501.

Habitual Dispositions and Conflict Management  47 an analytical device, has been used to offer insight into surprising continuity in social relations81 and dynamics of learning within institutional contexts.82 Communities of practice are analytically distinct from related concepts, including networks83 and fields.84 As Adler describes, unlike the emphasis on connectivity in networks, communities of practice emphasize identity.85 Unlike the hierarchical assumption of authority and power in a field, a community of practice emphasizes power and accountability as a function of relational dynamics. As Adler and Pouliot summarize, practices “develop, diffuse, and become institutionalized” through socialization and learning within such communities.86 These communities themselves are often “grounded” in physical places.87 For example, they are often centered around or within an institutional hub, such as an international organization or a government office. These environments act as a center of activity and site for socialization.88 For example, as Dylan Loh documents, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs has developed and internalized its own particular “institutional habitus” that shapes how officials therein confront and engage the world.89 Within institutional settings, particular repertoires of action are also developed, diffused, and made use of.90 This often includes both material resources, such as documents, databases, and other institutional resources, and ideational resources, such as common representations of self and other and shared concepts to make sense of the world. It is within these sorts of institutional settings that habits and practices themselves are learned, enacted, and reproduced.91 In this way, “communities of practice are intersubjective social structures that constitute the normative and epistemic ground for action, but they are also agents, made up of real people who—​working via network

81 E.g., Mathew Davies, “A Community of Practice: Explaining Change and Continuity in ASEAN’s Diplomatic Environment,” Pacific Review 29, no. 2 (2016): 211–​233. 82 E.g., Mäika Sondarjee, “Collective Learning as the Boundaries of Communities of Practice: Inclusive Policymaking at the World Bank,” Third World Quarterly 42, no. 2 (2021): 348–​365. 83 Patrick Thaddeus Jackson and Daniel H. Nexon, “Relations before States: Substance, Process, and the Study of World Politics,” European Journal of International Relations 5, no. 3 (1999): 291–​322 84 Alder-​Nissen, “Inter-​and Transnational Field(s) of Power.”. 85 Adler, World Ordering, 113. 86 Adler and Pouliot, International Practices, 17. See also Adler, Communitarian International Relations; Bueger and Gadinger, “The Play of International Practice,” 29–​31. 87 Adler, World Ordering, 113. 88 Johnston, “Treating International Relations.” 89 Loh, “Institutional Habitus.” 90 See also Cornelia Navari, “The Concept of Practice in the English School,” European Journal of International Relations 17, no. 4 (2011): 626. 91 Rosenau, “Before Cooperation,” 863; Adler, “Seizing the Middle Ground,” 354; Hopf, “The Logic of Habit,” 547.

48  Practicing Peace channels, across national borders, across organizational divides, and in the halls of government—​affect political, economic, and social events.”92 In this book I center attention on these sites: communities of real people tasked with responding to regional crises and pursuing regionalism more generally. The groups of state and organizational diplomats and officials in Southeast Asia and South America who interact within and beyond regional organizations can be usefully conceived of as such communities, as I document in c­ hapters 4 and 5. Within these communities, organizational and state officials share a joint enterprise, at the broadest level, in the pursuit of regionalism. They also share a like-​mindedness, through the recognition of their belonging to some regional community. They make use of commonly held diplomatic and organizational tools, including forums within regional organizations and ministerial and leader-​level summits, and the appropriateness of regional norms and principles to pursue their interests and justify behavior. And, they are engaged in dense, regularized, and face-​to-​face interactions through a host of multilateral channels, from regular working-​ group and plenary meetings to negotiations within summits and ad hoc responses to crises.93 This is not to suggest any community of practice exists without divisive interests or varied behaviors of its members. However, it does suggest relatively discrete and bounded communities in which norms are likely to be institutionalized and wherein group members are likely to share a particular “practical sense” that impacts how they understand and respond to conflict and pursue their interests. Before I turn to the question of how these habitual and dispositional qualities of group relations matter for interstate relations and conflict management more directly, I briefly posit where they come from.

Origins of Habitual Dispositions While sociologists have long debated variation in habitual behavior and explored habit and practice across a wide breath of social relations,94 relatively less attention has been paid to their origins. The dispositions, practices, 92 Adler and Pouliot, International Practices, 17; Adler, Communitarian International Relations, 199; Adler, World Ordering, 112. 93 See also Adler and Barnett, Security Communities, 31–​33; Vincent Pouliot and Jérémie Cornut, “Practice Theory and the Study of Diplomacy: A Research Agenda,” Cooperation and Conflict 50, no. 3 (2015): 297–​315. 94 E.g., Camic, “A Matter of Habit.”

Habitual Dispositions and Conflict Management  49 and habits of different groups are relatively stable, but they are not inherent and this book does not speak to any culturally essentialist traits of societies or groups. As already hinted at, the social and practical qualities of relations of interest here are acquired in and through interaction, particularly within organizational settings. As Margaret Archer details, two mutually reinforcing factors are consequential in generating the habituation or routinization of particular behaviors: a low level of structural differentiation among actors and a low level of ideational diversification.95 According to an array of scholarship, these are qualities present within formal organizational settings—​like foreign policy bureaucracies96 or intergovernmental forums97—​given their “relatively closed networks of mutual influence.”98 For example, Hopf argues that institutionalized settings are the most likely sites to see the logic of habit emerge and operate, from international regimes around the World Trade Organization (WTO) or International Monetary Fund (IMF) to security community dynamics around diplomatic elites.99 This is the result of particular routines, standard operating procedures, and a relative insulation from competing ideological structures. This mirrors conclusions from much of the constructivist literature on socialization processes, which highlights the role of closed institutional settings.100 Given the sustained interaction within an insulated context with relatively depoliticized in camera situations, such settings are often sites for learning and socialization through a host of social mechanisms, from explicit arguing and persuasion to implicit mirroring of behaviors.101 The development of habitual dispositions can come in various forms. In diplomatic communities there is always a mix of social mechanisms at work: new officials are socialized in and through practice to new ways of doing, but some are also actively taught what is acceptable, preferable, and 95 Margaret Archer, “Routine, Reflexivity, and Realism,” Sociological Theory 28, no. 3 (2010): 272–​ 303, 281–​282. 96 Loh, “Institutional Habitus.” 97 Vincent Pouliot, “Diplomats as Permanent Representatives: The Practical Logics of the Multilateral Pecking Order,” International Journal 66, no. 3 (2011): 543–​561. 98 Crossley, “Habit and Habitus,” 155. 99 Hopf, “Logic of Habit.” 100 E.g., Johnston, “Treating International Institutions.” See also Rosenau, “Before Cooperation,” 863; Adler, “Seizing the Middle Ground,” 345. 101 Jeffrey T. Checkel, “International Institutions and Socialization in Europe: Introduction and Framework,” International Organization 59, no. 4 (2005): 801–​826.; Jeffery Lewis, “The Janus Face of Brussels: Socialization and Everyday Decision Making in the European Union,” International Organization 59 (2005): 937–​971.

50  Practicing Peace possible, and what is not. Others mirror what they perceive as effective, competent discourse and conduct.102 Two qualities are important to the development of habitual dispositions within institutionalized settings: the power and authority to advance new ideas and shape practice, and the fit of these novel claims and ways of doing within the existing dispositional traits of a community. Within formal organizational contexts and wider diplomatic communities hierarchies of authority exist. These “pecking orders” are recognized by practitioners and scholars alike, with some states and individuals able to affect change and shape the rules and norms of interactions more than others.103 As Martha Finnemore observes, rules and norms “will serve the interests of powerful actors [and] they will not survive long if they do not.”104 Power in this sense refers to the varied social and material resources and relational positions or perceptions of status that allow some agents to influence outcomes and will vary across settings.105 The ability to set an agenda, to be perceived as competent, or to deter behavior through the threat of material costs are all means by which individuals and the states they represent exert power. In exercising this power, actors actively or passively present “authoritative definitions of truth and morality” through their rhetoric and behavior within a community.106 One means to doing so is by presenting certain assumptions or particular behaviors as natural or self-​evident for a community. As Adler and Pouliot note, borrowing from Roxanne Lynn Doty, “it is repetition and dissemination that give representations their power, not an inherent stability and closure.”107 For an example, Neumann finds that Norwegian officials were able to use commissioned studies to narrate into existence peaceful regional relations with Russia at the end of the Cold War by demonstrating that “relations between Norway and Russia had ‘always’ been friendly at the grassroots level—​except for the last 70 years of communism.”108 102 See also Hopf, “The Logic of Habit,” 541–​542; Pouliot, International Security, 31–​32; Verplaken, “Habit: From Overt Action,” 70; Michael C. Williams, Culture and Security: Symbolic Power and the Politics of National Security (New York: Routledge, 2007), 25–​26. 103 Pouliot, International Pecking Order. 104 Martha Finnemore, National Interest in International Society (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996), 30. 105 Adler-​Nissen and Pouliot, “Power in Practice.” 106 Adler and Pouliot, International Practice, 21. See also Adler, “Seizing the Middle Ground,” 340; Christian Reus-​Smit, “The Constitutional Structure of International Society and the Nature of Fundamental Institutions,” International Organizations 51, no. 4 (1997): 564. 107 Emanuel Adler and Vincent Pouliot, “International Practices,” International Theory 3, no. 1 (2011): 3. See also Ingvild Bode, Individual Agency and Policy Change at the United Nations: The People of the United Nations (New York: Routledge, 2015), 18. 108 Neumann, “Returning Practice,” 640–​641.

Habitual Dispositions and Conflict Management  51 Pouliot finds a similar dynamic at work in relations between Russia and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). As he summarizes, “By systematically practicing diplomacy as if such a move were self-​evident, dominant security elites from the transatlantic community make their counterparts see that things have changed—​that peaceful change has become the ‘normal’ way of behaving, as part of the (unthought) order of things.”109 In both examples, authoritative, powerful actors establish rather novel ideas and behaviors as normal or natural for a community. However, authority and power are not always sufficient to establish new ways of thinking and doing within a community. As Kathryn Sikkink observes, “powerful individuals are important for the adoption of ideas, but if these ideas do not find institutional homes, they will not be able to sustain themselves over the long term.”110 Novel or particularized ways of thinking and doing must resonate or fit within existing institutional and cognitive dispositions.111 The habitual and dispositional qualities of interaction of interest here, then, do not emerge in a vacuum. They are likely to be shaped by powerful actors within organizational settings, and nested within existing and overlapping practices, norms and, in this case, regional narratives that unite a diplomatic community of practice.112 As with all norms and ideas, they are localized within and interact with existing institutional and ideational contexts. For example, Acharya documents how external ideas about collective security were contested and internalized in unique ways within Southeast Asia during the Cold War in order to fit with existing cultural and institutional predispositions against Western-​style formal alliances.113 These kinds of new ways of thinking and doing must be assumed to work in practice, given the predispositions of a community.114 In this articulation, the qualities of habitual dispositions experience an “appropriative moment” when a once reflected upon thinking and behavior shifts to the unconscious

109 Pouliot, “The Logic of Practicality,” 283. 110 Kathryn Sikkink, Ideas and Institutions: Developmentalism in Brazil and Argentina (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1991), 248. 111 Christian Reus-​Smit, “The Constitutional Structure of International Society and the Nature of Fundamental Institutions,” International Organization 51, no. 4 (1997): 564. See also Acharya, “How Ideas Spread”; Coe, Sovereignty in the South. 112 See Neumann, “Returning Practice,” 635–​636; Vincent Pouliot, “Regional Security Practices and Russian-​Atlantic Relations,” in International Relations Theory and Regional Transformation, ed. T. V. Paul (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), 214–​215. 113 Acharya, “How Ideas Spread,” 254–​260. 114 Adler and Pouliot, “International Practices,” 22; Robert Axelrod, “An Evolutionary Approach to Norms,” American Political Science Review 80, no. 4 (1986): 1097; Crossley, “Habit and Habitus,” 152.

52  Practicing Peace background for a community.115 This observation is consistent with social constructivist literature on norm emergence and internalization, and hints at the underexplored interrelationship between norms and practice.116 Much of this literature highlights the role of purposeful behavior by entrepreneurial actors that generates self-​evident norms and knowledge that, in turn, shape wider patterns of relations in important ways.117 That habitual dispositions may be taught and learned differentiates the concept from practice, as has widely understood in IR. Practices originate in and through doing. New ways of doing emerge through the “wiggle room” of practice.118 Rather minor and unintentional changes in practice can lead to more meaningful changes in practice and wide social change over time. As Pouliot describes, this is akin to the construction of an ant hill, where small and uncoordinated behaviors produce something much more.119 In this view practices are not explicitly taught or learned, nor do practices shift over time to the background of thought at some appropriative moment. Rather, practical knowledge, from that of a master sailor at sea to an infant learning a mother tongue, is developed experientially and tacitly through doing.120 As noted, this claim founds the critique of the constructivist position that sees internalization and habituation as a process of reflexive learning. Pouliot and other practice theorists center on this distinction to reject a focus on habit, which they equate to reflexive behavior. Adler suggests the same, divorcing a similar concept to practical knowledge, “dispositions,” from habits for similar reasons.121 However, neither Pouliot or Adler is entirely consistent with this claim—​or at least not in language—​and their accounts leave room for the possibility of more active mechanisms of learning. In earlier work, Adler recognizes that individuals may “learn . . . new habits slowly, as background conditions change.”122 Similarly, Pouliot notes that it takes a year for 115 Mitzen, “Ontological Security,” 36. 116 E.g., Acharya, “How Ideas Spread”; Checkel, International Institutions”; Matthew J. Hoffmann, “What’s Global about Global Governance? A Constructivist Account,” in Contending Perspectives on Global Governance: Coherence, Contestation and World Order, eds. Alice D. Ba and Matthew J. Hoffmann (New York City: Routledge, 2005), 110–​128. 117 E.g., Finnemore and Sikkink, “International Norm Dynamics”; Martha Finnemore, The Purpose of Intervention: Changing Beliefs about the Use of Force (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2003); Martha Finnemore, “Fights over Rules: The Role of Efficacy and Power in Changing Multilateralism,” Review of International Studies 31 (2005): 187–​206. 118 Adler and Pouliot, International Practices, 7. 119 Vincent Pouliot, “The Gray Area of Institutional Change: How the Security Council Transforms Its Practices on the Fly,” Journal of Global Security Studies 6, no. 3 (2021): 1–​18. 120 Pouliot, International Security, 28; Pouliot, “The Logic of Practicality,” 272. 121 Adler, “Seizing the Middle Ground.” 122 Adler, Communitarian International Relations, 215.

Habitual Dispositions and Conflict Management  53 diplomats at NATO and the UN to learn the “feel for the game” or the practical sense from which practice emerges at each organization.123 Hopf ’s articulation of the logic of habit and Mitzen’s account of routine both assume a similar appropriative moment, when once reflected upon knowledge and behavior is no longer.124 Empirically, this is a widely observed phenomenon in diplomatic and organizational settings, and an underlying reason why accounts of practice, as defined, are not entirely sufficient to account for the ways of thinking and doing within these contexts. Interviews with regional officials bear this out. A “sense of the game,” as Pouliot uncovered at NATO and the UN, is also apparent in the diplomatic communities of practice in Southeast Asia and South America. My interviews with ASEAN officials, for example, suggest that practitioners think and act in ways informed by established background knowledge—​ ways of confronting and interacting in the world. They attest to this practical or tactic knowledge—​that there are particular ways things are done as a matter of course or, “the only game in town” in the words of one Southeast Asian official.125 However, for many interviewees, once forced to reflect on these givens, they reveal that they “at one time” they felt them odd, only to naturalize them as unproblematic realties over time. When thinking about habitual dispositions then, as opposed to practice, we can see that there is a likely transition from fore-​to background, and from querying behaviors to enacting them relatively automatically within particular communities. Largely for this reason, I adopt the conceptual approach of habitual dispositions rather than practice and practical knowledge to account for the taken-​for-​granted ways of thinking and doing common within communities of officials. In sum, habitual dispositions emerge from precedent and iteration but are influenced by power, authoritative actors, and community-​held perceptions of appropriateness and efficacy. In this way, habitual dispositions are a related but distinct analytical concept from practice and habit. Moreover, as has been made clear, habitual dispositions are qualities of social and organizational settings, and are not to be assumed some culturally essentialist traits of states or societies. What is done in practice may—​and as I show, indeed does—​vary widely across regional diplomatic communities. But these 123 Pouliot, International Pecking Order. 124 Hopf, “The Logic of Habit”; Mitzen, “Ontological Security”; Jennifer Mitzen, “Anchoring Europe’s Civilizing Identity,” Journal of European Public Policy 13, no. 2 (2006): 270–​285. 125 Interview with Thai official, Jakarta, July 1, 2014.

54  Practicing Peace observations reflect dynamics of communities of officials themselves, rather broader cultural assemblances to which I make no claims. As competent performances, the processual and substantive aspects of regional diplomatic habitual dispositions are necessarily shaped by existent and collectively shared expectations. In this way, they often relate to particular normative understandings, representing dispositional understandings and distinctive practices of largely abstract and codified norms within institutional settings. Habitual dispositions fill norms with meaning and orientate them toward action. Finally, once pushed into the background of community thinking over time, these habitual and dispositional qualities shape what is known to be normal, natural, and effective and what is done as a matter of course.126

Taking Stock Borrowing from common assertions across accounts of norms, practice, and habit, communities of actors hold particular practical and dispositional qualities. These qualities shape thinking and behavior in meaningful ways. One way of unearthing the existence and effect of such qualities is through the concept of habitual dispositions, an analytical move that compels a focus on the practical and habitual elements of relations alongside the normative. Three definitional qualities of habitual dispositions have been outlined. Habitual dispositions exist largely prior to reflection. They are composed of both unreflected upon background knowledge and relatively automatically enacted behaviors that stem from it—​an element of both cognitive substance and practice or process. Informed by precedent and iteration, habitual dispositions are the properties of particular communities—​diplomatic communities of practice, in the cases at hand. This understanding of habitual dispositions borrows heavily from practice literature and is intended as a complement. It serves to narrow analytical focus directly on the habitual and dispositional thinking and behavior of communities of actors. It beckons us to focus on the background of cognition within institutionalized settings and to examine the practices that derive from this rather automatically as part of 126 There is a small literature on how habits, routines, and practices end, an issue that is not explored in this book. See Archer, “Routine, Reflexivity, and Realism,” 284; Hopf, “The Logic of Habit,” 543; Janice Gross Stein, “Background Knowledge in the Foreground: Conversations about Competent Practice in ‘Sacred Space,’” in International Practices, eds. Emanuel Adler and Vincent Pouliot (New York City: Cambridge University Press, 2011), 87–​107.

Habitual Dispositions and Conflict Management  55 the “normal” way of interaction for a community. In doing so, it also alludes to the potential interrelationship between practice and norms, wherein habitual dispositions represent inarticulate understandings and competent enactments of norms in action; what is the normal, natural, and effective practice of an often-​abstract codified norm.127 In the following section, I turn to explicate how and why these qualities of community interaction matter for global politics and for regional conflict management more narrowly.

Habitual Dispositions Matter Habitual, dispositional, and practical knowledge and relatively unthinking behavior matter for social relations in important ways. Deeply taken-​for-​ granted background knowledge and relatively automatic behaviors produce stability and continuity in the interactions of individuals, groups, and states. Across levels of analysis, scholars have recognized that social action is shaped128—​if not determined129—​by knowledge and practices that are more or less unconsciously held and enacted. At the individual level, in Crossley’s words, “our very agency depends upon” our “habitual tendencies.”130 Consider, as another oft-​cited example, a blind man who is reliant on a walking stick. His stick, and his innate and learned knowledge of how to make use of it, shapes how he confronts and interacts with the world. It delineates what is known to be possible, precluding some experiences and behaviors and making possible others. It also leads to patterned interactions and continuity in his experience of the world. At a global level, Andrew F. Cooper and Pouliot find that ingrained diplomatic practices “inhibit global transformation and reproduce the existing order.”131 Corneliu Bjola and

127 See also Aarie Glas, “Habits of Peace: Long-​Term Regional Cooperation in Southeast Asia,” European Journal of International Relations 23, no. 4 (2017): 833–​856; Glas and Balogun, “Norms in Practice.” 128 Neumann, “Returning Practice”; Mitzen, “Ontological Security”; Mitzen, “Anchoring Europe’s Civilizing Identity”; Bjola and Kornprobst, “Security Communities”; Adler, “The Spread of Security Communities”; Pouliot, “The Logic of Practicality”; Adler and Pouliot, International Practices; Ole Jacob Sending and Iver B. Neumann, “Banking on Power: How Some Practices in International Organizations Anchor Others,” in International Practices, eds. Emanuel Alder and Vincent Pouliot (New York City: Cambridge University Press, 2011), 231–​254. 129 Hopf, “The Logic of Habit.” 130 Crossley, “Habit and Habitus,” 150–​151; Camic, “A Matter of Habit,” 1046. 131 Andrew F. Cooper and Vincent Pouliot, “How Much Is Global Governance Changing? The G20 as International Practice,” Cooperation and Conflict 50, no. 3 (2015): 334. See also Glas et al., “Understanding Multilateral Treaty-​Making.”

56  Practicing Peace Marcus Kornprobst offer a similar argument in their account of the emergence of security communities, where deeply internalized knowledge and rather automatic behaviors—​a habitus of restraint—​patterns interstate relations in meaningful and peaceful ways.132 Rosenau and Hopf both go further, finding that individuals and states alike are predominately “habit-​driven” in their relations.133 Cooperative relations between the United States and the United Kingdom, for example, may be best accounted for by unreflected upon assumptions of amity and habits of peaceful interaction between the two. As Hopf suggests, “The United States cooperates with Britain in the WTO automatically, without any reflection at all about costs and benefits or norms . . . because the people making the decisions have stereotyped Britain as a friend or partner, and so respond to Britain’s actions, even if objectively ambiguous or possibly non-​cooperative, as if they are naturally benign.”134 The lesson from these accounts is that background knowledge and automatic behaviors pattern relations between states in important ways. These deeply interrelated claims—​that habitual forms of thinking and doing delimit social relations—​emerge in all accounts of habit and practice surveyed and offers us a starting point to explore the potential consequence of habitual dispositions for conflict management and regionalism more generally. Returning to the example of the blind man, in that example what is most important is that “The man does not perceive the stick, rather he perceives with it. The stick becomes a perceptional organ and a part of the man’s self and agency.”135 Habitual dispositions can be understood similarly. They are given means through which communities confront and engage the world, making possible certain behaviors and precluding others. In this way, they both permit and produce possible action.136 The basic understanding that underpins this claim is that actors’ beliefs and actions constantly recreate the structures that bound their interactions, serving to both “evoke and suppress action.”137 The habitual and practical qualities of thinking and behavior shape what is possible. Thus, stability in social relations may be the

132 Bjola and Kornprobst, “Security Communities.” See also Pouliot, International Security, 280; Adler, “The Spread of Security Communities,” 205. 133 Rosenau, “Before Cooperation,” 861–​870; Hopf, “Logic of Habit,” 544–​545. 134 Hopf, “The Logic of Habit,” 550. 135 Crossley, “Habit and Habitus,” 147. 136 See also Archer, “Routine, Reflexivity, and Realism,” 283. 137 Hopf, “The Logic of Habit,” 548. See also Richard Ned Lebow, “Constitutive Causality—​ Imagined Spaces and Political Practices,” Millennium: Journal of International Studies 38, no. 2 (2009): 215.

Habitual Dispositions and Conflict Management  57 product of the habitual, practical, and dispositional qualities of interactions. As Adler and Pouliot observe, “Stability . . . is an illusion created by the recursive nature of practice.”138 Similarly, and more explicitly, in Crossley’s succinct view, “Whatever consistency can be identified in our conduct and experience derives from interlocking and mutually reinforcing habits.”139 Social interaction is never in stasis and “over time, actors reify or transform the foundational understandings through their actions and interactions.”140 Any presumed stability in social relations is, then, the product of the iteration and reproduction. As Archer concisely contends, “Nothing social is self-​sustaining.”141 Stability in social relations across levels of analysis, then, is affected through the establishment of proclivities to engage in previously adopted practices as natural and to accept previously adopted knowledge as unproblematic—​ a mechanism of habituation. From this account, interstate peace itself, far from a negative definition as the absence of war, can be understood as an active and recursive process made possible by unreflexive knowledge and particular habits, practices, and dispositions among officials.142 Without making it explicit, Jarrod Hayes offers a similar account in his examination of the democratic peace and the central mechanism that makes it possible, democratic public identity.143 He shows that implicit assumptions of self and other are foundational to the threat perception of states and thereby delimit how states interact with each other, making possible the democratic peace itself.144 Similarly, and again without making such a reliance explicit, Pouliot suggests a similar logic with his observation that when an “axiomatically peaceful logic of practicality sets in, it takes on a dimension of habit or routine. Without instrumental calculations, reflexive rule-​following or communicative action about the opportunity of settling disputes non-​violently, the security officials’ practical sense leads them to go on diplomatically.”145 Acharya, too, comes near an appreciation of this reality within ASEAN

138 Adler and Pouliot, “International Practices,” 16. 139 Crossley, “Habit and Habitus,” 150. 140 Hoffmann, “What’s Global,” 115. 141 Archer, “Routine, Reflexivity, and Realism,” 276. 142 Adler, “The Spread of Security Communities,” 205; Pouliot International Security, 42–​43. 143 Jarrod Hayes, “Securitization, Social Identity, and Democratic Security: Nixon, India, and the Ties That Bind,” International Organization 66, no. 1 (2012): 63–​93; Hayes, Constructing National Security. I thank Jarrod Hayes for this observation. 144 Hayes, Constructing National Security, 25–​27, 31–​39. 145 Pouliot, International Security, 43.

58  Practicing Peace through his application of the security community framework. Without exploring it in detail, he observes a “long term habit” of peaceful state interaction in the region. Further, and again without making it explicit, he suggests the importance of the particular community that makes possible this habit. He notes that it is intriguing that the “ASEAN way” exists, despite “differing kinds of national identity prevailing among its members.”146 His suggestion, inherently, is that within the particular community of ASEAN diplomatic practitioners, a set of given and routine practices may be at work and generative of peaceful interstate relations. Habitual dispositions, as defined, may undergird long and conflictual peace by shaping how officials understand and manage regional conflict.

Conclusion In this chapter I advanced the core theoretical claims and framework of this book. Through a survey of varied accounts of norms, practices, and habits, it is clear that much of the social and political world is shaped prior to reflection. However, much of our analytic toolkit in IR is ill-​suited to investigate these dynamics. My focus on the habitual dispositions of communities of practice is one means to this end. To understand conflictual peace and how and why different regions manage conflict in the ways they do, this chapter suggests that we should be attentive to how regional communities of practice understand and respond to crises. This analytical impulse directs us toward an investigation of how, or whether, norms are practiced in socially meaningfully, competent, and habitual ways and, therefore, to examine what communities of regional officials think from, rather than about when managing regional conflict and pursuing regionalism. More narrowly, this chapter offered a framework attentive to habitual dispositions. Taking stock of the above survey, habitual dispositions exist largely prior to reflection. They are analytically composed of process and content—​the deeply internalized background knowledge and reactively automatic behaviors that stem from them. They are the properties of discrete communities—​in our case regional diplomatic communities—​and they have their origins within these social and institutionalized settings.



146 Acharya, Constructing a Security Community, 25.

Habitual Dispositions and Conflict Management  59 Two lines of inquiry and sets of questions follow immediately from the framework developed in this chapter. How can we observe habitual dispositions and the communities in which they exist? And, how can we observe and explore the effects of habitual dispositions on regional conflict management and interstate relations more generally? The next chapter offers answers.

3 Uncovering Meaning and Practice in Regional Diplomacy Introduction In ­chapter 2 I showed that groups of actors think and act from established predispositions and understand and enact norms in particular, practical, and habitual ways. In that chapter, I took a first step toward understanding regional conflict management and the regional conflictual peace of Southeast Asia and South America by outlining a framework that centers analytical attention on the habitual dispositions of regional communities of diplomatic officials. In this chapter I take a second step. I explore one means of uncovering and exploring the habitual dispositions of diplomatic communities. This requires two related investigations. The first investigation is to query the existence of habitual dispositions within particular communities of practice. To this end, I offer a two-​part approach: elucidating qualities of community relations that officials think from, or the deeply taken-​for-​ granted knowledge and automatic practices that exist within a community of officials, and contrasting this thinking and behavior with a community that overlaps with and engages that community. The second investigation is into the effects of habitual dispositions on the ways that communities understand and respond to crises. Again, I offer two means to this end. The first is to discern whether officials themselves understand their habitual dispositions to work and work well. I term the recognition of the suitability and efficaciousness of these taken-​for-​granted qualities of relations as the robustness of habitual dispositions. Finding evidence of this robustness is a preliminary step in understanding the consequence of habitual dispositions for regional relations. The second, and more direct, means to investigate the effect of habitual dispositions is to examine particular instances of regional conflict and crisis for evidence that regional officials thought from and enacted as a matter of course practices that flow from their distinctive habitual dispositions. Practicing Peace. Aarie Glas, Oxford University Press. © Oxford University Press 2022. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780197633229.003.0003

Uncovering Meaning and Practice in Regional Diplomacy  61 The logic of this approach borrows from studies that uncover and trace the effects of ideas and practice across social relations.1 In particular, I start from Alan Jacobs’s suggestion that any inquiry into the role of ideas must accomplish three things.2 The analysis must provide evidence that decision-​makers held particular cognitions; that those cognitions impacted their choices; and that those cognitions were not solely the product of the material features of the circumstances of choice.3 Building from these insights, to illustrate how or whether habitual dispositions shape conflict management and conflictual peace in each case, I seek to provide evidence of two things. First, that communities of regional practitioners hold particular cognitions—​i.e., collectively held innate knowledge and distinct and unproblematic understandings of normal or natural regional relations and diplomacy. Second, I see whether those qualities influence behavior and impact regional relations—​i.e., that these inform relatively automatic practices that, in turn, shape regional conflict management in meaningful ways. This chapter proceeds over two main sections. In the first section, I discuss how to uncover the existence of habitual dispositions. Here, I outline the varied methods used to interpret the dispositional foundations of diplomacy and conflict management in each regional case. In the second section, I examine how to observe the effects of habitual dispositions by discerning the robustness of the habitual qualities of regional relations for members of a regional community of practice and by tracing the impact of practices on and for crucial cases of regional conflict management.

The Existence of Habitual Dispositions Recognizing practice, habits, and dispositions within groups is a methodological challenge. These qualities of thinking and doing are not only repetitive but also characterized by a degree of naturalness and undertaken as a matter of course.4 As ­chapter 2 explored, this given or unthinking quality 1 E.g., Andrew Bennett and Jeffrey T. Checkel, eds., Process Tracing: From Metaphor to Analytic Tool (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014), 30; Jacobs, “Process Tracing the Effects,” 45, 48–​49; Pouliot, International Security in Practice, ­chapter 3. 2 Jacobs, “Process Tracing the Effects,” 45. 3 See also Jeffrey T. Checkel, “Mechanisms, Process, and the Study of International Institutions,” in Process Tracing: From Metaphor to Analytic Tool, eds. Andrew Bennett and Jeffrey T. Checkel (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014), 89–​91. 4 See Verplaken, “Habit,” 71–​72.

62  Practicing Peace action stems from background knowledge—​what actors think from rather than about.5 Habitual dispositions are both cognitive (founded on given or background ways of knowing) and behavioral (expressed in repetitive and relatively automatic ways of doing). What counts as repetitious may be debated, but the observation of what is assumed a “normal” or “natural” way of doing serves to highlight the core of habituated action and knowledge. Both of these elements of analysis are challenging to uncover. Knowing what is “inside” the heads of individuals or understood as commonsense by some group is an analytical challenge.6 Moreover, repeated actions produced through reflection do not look any different from those done unthinkingly. Observing this distinction requires an interpretive sensibility.7 Uncovering the background knowledge that undergirds habit or practice, as scholars of each suggest, requires a methodological focus on phenomenology and induction, and one that begins with an aspiration to understand the meaning and thinking of actors themselves.8 Analyses in this vein often start with a focus on actors as part of larger collectives and seek to recover shared meaning therein.9 This impulse directs inquiry toward the pragmatist assumption that “what practitioners generally do, as they go on with their lives, is basically ‘what works’ in and through practice.”10 However, the recovery of meaning and practice is also itself necessarily an “imaginative act,”11 and one that requires a marrying of both inductive observation with local and historical contextualization and a reflexive recognition of the role of the researcher in the generation of this knowledge. Reflexivity is a variable practice of reflection on the ways a researcher and her positionality influence the course of research and knowledge generation.12 Positionality refers to the array of one’s physical and social 5 Hopf, “The Logic of Habit,” 541; Pouliot, “The Logic of Practicality,” 260. 6 See also Pouliot, International Security, 28. 7 Vincent Pouliot, “Practice Tracing,” in Process Tracing: From Metaphor to Analytic Tool, eds. Andrew Bennett and Jeffrey T. Checkel (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014). See also Dvora Yanow, “Thinking Interpretively: Philosophical Presuppositions and the Human Sciences,” in Interpretation and Method: Empirical Research Methods and the Interpretive Turn, eds. Dvora Yanow and Peregrine Schwartz-​Shea (New York City: ME Sharpe, 2006), 5–​25; Dvora Yanow and Peregrine Swartz-​Shea, eds., Interpretation and Method: Empirical Research Methods and the Interpretive Turn, 2nd ed. (New York City: Routledge, 2014). 8 Hopf, Social Construction, 25; Pouliot, International Security, 58–​59, 66. 9 Jarrod Hayes and Patrick James, “Theory as Thought: Britain and German Unification,” Security Studies 23 (2014): 406; Pouliot, International Security, 59. 10 Adler and Pouliot, “International Practices,” 22. 11 Clifford Geertz, “Thick Description: Toward an Interpretive Theory of Culture,” in The Interpretive Cultures: Selected Essays, ed. Clifford Geertz (New York City: Basic Books, 1973), 15. 12 Peregrine Schwartz-​ Shea and Dvora Yanow, Interpretive Research Design: Concepts and Processes (New York City: Routledge, 2012); Jessica Soedirgo and Aarie Glas, “Toward Active Reflexivity: Positionality and Practice in the Production of Knowledge,” PS: Political Science and Politics 53, no. 3 (2020): 527–​531.

Uncovering Meaning and Practice in Regional Diplomacy  63 characteristics and how these elements of self are perceived by others. These characteristics are vast and variably salient across contexts. They may include demographic attributes—​like race, gender, age, sexuality, and nationality—​or elements of our social biography or “lifeworld” including personal and professional experiences, political and ideological stances, education, and training.13 As Black feminist and critical scholars have long recognized, however, the intersectional nature of identity renders reflections on positionality and its effects on research a challenge.14 Appraisals of these interactions and their consequences will always be contingent and uncertain.15 Nonetheless, reflecting on the role of self in research and research interactions is an important element in generating the thick descriptions central to interpretive research, including accounts of meaning-​making and practice.16 With this interpretive and reflexive foundation in mind, three methods appear as plausible tools to explore ways of knowing and doing within communities: participant observation, in-​depth interviews, and documentary analysis. To some degree, these are ordered in preference. However, their use—​for induction, interpretation, and historicization—​is neither a unidirectional or linear progression, nor possible in all cases.17 I explore each method and their role in this book in turn.

Observing Practice To uncover meaning-​making and background knowledge, and to view practices in action, participant observation appears to be the most immediately plausible and useful approach.18 Immersion within communities is an 13 Roni Berger, “Now I See it, Now I Don’t: Researcher’s Position and Reflexivity in Qualitative Research,” Qualitative Research 15, no. 2 (2015): 220. See also Lahoma Thomas, “Dear Political Science, It Is Time for a SELF-​REFLEXIVE Turn!,” Duck of Minerva, December 18, 2018, http://​ duckof ​mine​r va.com/​2018/​12/​dear-​p oliti​cal-​s cie​nce-​it-​is-​time-​for-​a-​s elf-​reflex​ive-​turn.html; Yanow, “Thinking Interpretively.” 14 Devon W. Carbado, “Colorblind Intersectionality,” Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society 38, no. 4 (2013): 811–​845; Kimberle Crenshaw, “Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color,” Stanford Law Review 43, no. 6 (1991): 1241–​ 1299; bell hooks, Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center (New York City: Routledge, 2014). 15 Lee Ann Fujii, Interviewing in Social Science Research: A Relational Approach (New York City: Routledge, 2017); Dvora Yanow, “Ways of Knowing: Passionate Humility and Reflexive Practice in Research and Management,” American Review of Public Administration 39, no. 6 (2009): 579–​601. 16 Cai Wilkinson, “On Not Just Finding What You (Thought You) Were Looking for: Reflections on Field Data and Theory,” in Interpretation and Method: Empirical Research Methods and the Interpretive Turn, 2nd ed., eds. Dvora Yanow and Peregrine Schwartz-​Shea (New York City: Routledge, 2014), 395. 17 Pouliot, International Security, 65–​72. 18 Pouliot, International Security; Hopf, Social Construction.

64  Practicing Peace ideal starting point to make sense of sense-​making—​of understanding the thinking and practice of groups of people like communities of diplomatic practice.19 However, a number of complications tend to limit this possibility when studying diplomatic practice here and in other settings. First, given the historical nature of the cases—​they are “long” after all—​direct observation across each case is simply not possible. Second, many diplomatic interactions occur beyond the view of a researcher. The action, to speak, of diplomacy in these regional cases and many others, often occurs within closed institutional settings and as private communication between officials outside of the view of researchers.20 Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Permanent Council meetings, for example, are private, as are most discussions within foreign ministries or the halls of regional organizations. Even when meetings are public, this may not be where much of the action lies. The Organization of American States (OAS) Permanent Council and many of its subsidiary councils and working groups, for example, meet in public. Here, however, decisions are often predetermined at the private meetings of subregional groupings, rendering the public forums largely scripted illustrations of previously arrived at consensus. This is apparent through the simple fact that voting in these meetings is rare—​the deliberations and decision-​making occur prior and privately. Across settings, negotiation and interaction is often through private discussion in corridors prior to formal meetings, during breaks, over meals at restaurants, or through recreational activities. As a senior ASEAN interviewee noted, diplomacy is something “you do on the golf course.”21 The lesson here is that observing diplomacy in action is not a straightforward proposition and most studies of practice and habit in 19 Edward Shatz, ed., Political Ethnography: What Immersion Contributes to the Study of Power (Chicago: Chicago University Press, 2009). 20 See Pouliot, International Security, 67, 83, and Pouliot “Practice Tracing,” 245–​246. There are some excellent exceptions, including Deepak Nair, “Saving Face in Diplomacy: A Political Sociology of Face-​to-​Face Interactions in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations,” European Journal of International Relations 25, no. 3 (2019): 672–​697. See also Joseph MacKay and Jamie Levin, “Hanging Out in International Politics: Two Kinds of Explanatory Political Ethnography for IR,” International Studies Review 17, no. 2 (2015): 163–​188; Deepak Nair, “ ‘Hanging Out’ while Studying ‘Up’: Doing Ethnographic Fieldwork in International Relations,” International Studies Review 23, no. 4 (2021): 1300–​1327. Of course, past and private relations are not the only restrictions in this regard. Research in violent settings, for example, may be limited by ethical and logistical considerations. See Jason Lyall, “Process Tracing, Causal Inference and Civil War,” in Process Tracing: From Metaphor to Analytic Tool, eds. Andrew Bennett and Jeffrey T. Checkel (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), 204; and Susan Thomson, “Getting Close to Rwandans since the Genocide: Studying Everyday Life in Highly Politicized Research Settings,” African Studies Review 53, no. 3 (2010): 19–​34. 21 Interview with ASEAN official, Jakarta, July 10, 2014. See also Deepak Nair, “Sociability in International Politics: Golf and ASEAN’s Cold War Diplomacy,” International Political Sociology 14, no. 2 (2020): 196–​214.

Uncovering Meaning and Practice in Regional Diplomacy  65 this context turn to alternative approaches. My approach is similarly limited, as I detail below, and I rely on interviews rather than observational analysis. However, some limited observational dynamics are important to this study. Attending meetings, social events, or even lingering in the halls and lobbies of organizations offers some insight into diplomatic interactions. However, it is by no means sufficient to elucidate background knowledge and practice and this project does not rely on deep and immersive ethnography. That said, all these things I did, and did purposefully. Following the political ethnographic-​like “sensibilities” described by Ellen Pader and others,22 I endeavored to observe as closely as possible, when possible, within and beyond the confines of interview research.23 During my two months at the ASEAN Secretariat (ASEC) in the summer of 2014, for example, I was a fixture on the couches in the airy foyer, so much so that I was allowed access without the formalities of security checks during my last few weeks. My experience at the OAS in the fall of 2014 was similar. In each location I felt I was viewed relatively innocuously, as one of many outsiders present in these spaces.24 While offering only a limited glimpse into diplomatic interactions, this was nonetheless useful for two reasons. First, engaging in some observation allowed me to see relationships between many of my interviewees, particularly at the OAS, where I could see first-​hand interactions between ambassadors and permanent representatives whom I had interviewed within and outside formal meetings. Second, it made possible follow-​up conversations to supplement interviews. Many interviewees, but not all, approached me to discuss issues that had returned to their minds or to chat about how my research was progressing. These impromptu chats often reinforced observations made during interviews (described below), but also offered new insights and details. It is possible that the change of context, from a relatively formal interview to a casual run-​in, may compel some interviewees to offer different or complementary discussions. These chats, I felt, were made possible by the “working 22 Ellen Pader, “Seeing with an Ethnographic Sensibility: Explorations beneath the Surface of Public Politics,” in Interpretation and Method: Empirical Research Methods and the Interpretive Turn, eds. Dvora Yanow and Peregrine Schwartz-​Shea (New York City: Routledge, 2014), 194–​ 206. See also Schatz, Political Ethnography; Lisa Weeden, “Ethnography as Interpretive Enterprise,” in Political Ethnography: What Immersion Contributes to the Study of Power, ed. Edward Schatz (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2009), 74–​94. 23 My efforts, as described, were limited. This was not a core component of my data collection for reasons outlined. 24 See also Aarie Glas, “Power, Positionality, and Positions of Power: Reflexivity in Elite Interviewing,” PS: Political Science and Politics 54, no. 3 (2021): 438–​442.

66  Practicing Peace relationships” I developed with many of interviewees and interlocutors and the positionality I attempted to present.25 Foregrounding honesty and transparency and approaching interactions from a social and engaged foundation, I attempted to present myself as a competent, credible, and trustworthy visitor to these spaces. I found this resonated well with the many interviewees and a number of interviewees invited me to informal gatherings and were enthusiastic to maintain contact over Skype or email, a further means of offering insights into the dynamics I was eager to explore with them. Many of these gatherings were useful for observing social interaction as well. Attending various events—​such as working lunches, a goodbye reception for an ambassador at the OAS, and a Canada Day Celebration hosted by the embassy in Jakarta—​provided opportunities for casual and candid off the record conversations. Again, elements of positionality as a competent, friendly visitor to these spaces were useful to mingle and engage. These situations also offered insight into relationships among interviewees and the potential for both preliminary and follow-​up conversations. I also found that the casual setting made possible conversations with a number of practitioners who had declined a formal interview and others who raised issues they had been less keen to speak on in a formal setting.26 That a change in setting made people more willing to speak or to speak about other topics was explicitly noted to me by a number of practitioners themselves, remarking that they were happy to speak but had been too busy or would prefer a casual conversation. Thus, while observation was not central to my exploration of these communities of practice, even in this very limited way, it complements the core method of this investigation: interviews.

Talking Practice Given challenges and limits for participant observation and still seeking the nearest possible vantage point to the action of diplomatic 25 Lee Ann Fujii, “Five Stories of Accidental Ethnography: Turning Unplanned Moments in the Field into Data,” Qualitative Research 15, no. 4 (2014): 525–​539; Fujii, Interviewing in Social Science. 26 On elite interviewing dynamics, see Glas, “Power, Positionality;” William S. Harvey, “Strategies for Conducting Elite Interviews,” Qualitative Research 11, no. 4 (2011): 431–​441; Andrew Herod, “Reflections on Interviewing Foreign Elites: Praxis, Positionality, Validity, and the Cult of the Insider,” Geoforum 30 (1999): 313–​327; Robert Mikecz, “Interviewing Elites: Addressing Methodological Issues,” Qualitative Inquiry 18, no. 6 (2012): 482–​493.

Uncovering Meaning and Practice in Regional Diplomacy  67 interaction, this book relies primarily on in-​depth qualitative interviews in tandem with documentary analysis. This aligns with a number of recent and similarly oriented investigations into diplomatic practice. This includes Pouliot on NATO–​Russian relations and the multilateral relations at NATO and the UN,27 Rebecca Adler-​Nissen on European integration,28 Brooke Coe and Joel Ng on comparative regionalism in the Global South,29 and Stéphanie Martel on ASEAN’s discursively constructed community.30 Following Pouliot, a foundational interest in these interviews is to “(imperfectly) make up for the impossibility of participant observation.”31 This is a methodological move that distances this study from a number of related accounts of regionalism and regional diplomacy. Much of this scholarship unearths the bounds of appropriate diplomatic conduct from the official declarations of states, proclamations from leaders, or codified organizational principles. In his work on African regionalism, for example, Michael Williams explores official statements to unearth a common African Union (AU) “security culture.”32 Similarly, Acharya relies largely on documentary sources and official proclamations to uncover the norms of the “ASEAN way” of regionalization.33 This sort of textual investigation is well-​suited to showcase codified and actively referenced norms of diplomatic relations. It therefore matches the interest of much of the existing literature. However, it is less able to explore the habitual and practical aspects of regional relations.34 For example, scripted rhetoric and official releases may not reflect genuine beliefs or offer insight into background knowledge (to say nothing of the practice) that informs behavior for a host of reasons, from purposeful dishonesty to a divide between the meaning of norms or competent behavior between one 27 Pouliot, International Security; Pouliot, International Pecking Order. 28 Rebecca Adler-​Nissen, Opting Out of the European Union: Diplomacy, Sovereignty, and European Integration (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014). 29 Coe, Sovereignty in the South; Joel Ng, Contesting Sovereignty: Power and Practice in Africa and Southeast Asia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2021). 30 Stéphanie Martel, Enacting the Security Community: ASEAN’s Neverending Story (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2022). 31 Pouliot, International Security, 70. Others have been critical of this means to uncover practice and habit. See Nair, “ ‘Hanging Out.’ ” I adopt an interpretive and reflexive approach to interviewing as one means to address some of these limitations. See also Pouliot, International Security, c­ hapter 3. 32 Michael C. Williams, Culture and Security: Symbolic Power and the Politics of National Security (New York City: Routledge, 2007), 258. 33 Acharya, Constructing a Security Community. 34 Jeffrey T. Checkel, “Regional Identities and Communities,” in Oxford Handbook of Comparative Regionalism, eds. Tanja A. Börzel and Thomas Risse (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), 6; Jacobs, “Process Tracing the Effects of Ideas,” 45–​46.

68  Practicing Peace community and another.35 Better suited, while still imperfect, are in-​depth interviews carried out with an interpretive sensibility. As Pouliot again suggests, interviews “may take the researcher some distance in the recovery of practical perspectives and subjective meanings.”36 Conversation may allow entry into how officials reconstruct and represent their thinking and behavior and those of others.37 However, and as Pouliot continues, “because such conversations mostly verbalize reflexive knowledge, background dispositions must be read between the lines and distilled from the analysis of practices.”38 As Antje Wiener suggests, “even if we know the words and speak the same language, a word in and by itself provides insufficient information about its meaning.”39 Lee Ann Fujii similarly cautions that interviews yield only “shades of truth” to be reflexively interpreted by researchers.40 The central aim of the interviews undertaken for this book, then, was to generate lines to read between and to offer means of arriving at imperfect understandings of thought and practice. This is an inherently interpretive enterprise. I had two central ambitions in my interviews. First, I hoped to explore what practitioners know and how they know it—​to gleam some insight into the assumptions and dispositions of a community. Second, I hoped to solicit description of what is done—​the practices that are enacted therefrom—​ and logic by which interviewees made sense of these behaviors. Often, these seemed to be reflections on the rather mundane and everyday aspects of interstate relations that make up the lauded “ASEAN way”41 or the South American “diplomatic culture”42 in practice. The aim of such interviews, then, was the generation of situational and dispositional knowledge and the recovery, as “faithfully” as possible, of the habitually enacted practices of diplomatic interaction.43 Further, the interest of my interviews was less to derive a personal account from a number of individual practitioners, but rather an account of the collective dispositional knowledge and practices of a community 35 See Bennett and Checkel, Process Tracing, 33. 36 Pouliot, “The Logic of Practicality,” 285. 37 Bueger and Gadinger, “The Play of International Practice,” 457. 38 Pouliot, “The Logic of Practicality,” 285. 39 Wiener, “Enacting Meaning in Use,” 178. 40 Lee Ann Fujii, “Shades of Truth and Lies: Interpreting Testimonies of War and Violence,” Journal of Peace Research 47, no. 2 (2010): 231–​241. 41 Acharya, Constructing a Security Community. 42 Holsti, The State. 43 Yanow, “Neither Rigorous nor Objective?”

Uncovering Meaning and Practice in Regional Diplomacy  69 of practitioners; what others in the community do most of the time and why.44 To this end, I attempted to follow Pouliot’s suggestions and to ask, (1) questions that address daily practice and solicit description; (2) questions that address a practitioner’s view of the practices of others over their own; (3) questions that destabilized practitioners’ assumptions and forced reflection; and (4) questions that proposed hypothetical scenarios.45 Centrally, I wanted to solicit deep descriptions of events—​to hear stories. To this end, I attempted to signal that I had the necessary understanding of participants and their work to be taken seriously, but, as an outsider, that I required detail to make sense of the lived world and perspectives of those I spoke with. As Fujii describes, The value of these stories lies in the causal logics, worldviews, cosmologies, values, feelings, and shared understandings they reveal. Through the stories they tell, people locate themselves as agents in the various social worlds they identify with, aspire to, imagine, or inhabit. People’s stories provide insight into why they think certain events happened one way and not another.46

These stories also allow insights into the “structured discourses of identity that imply . . . kinds of habitual categorizations,” as Hopf describes.47 In soliciting these descriptions and stories, I did not follow a common questionnaire. Each conversation was structured around the particularities of the interviewee’s professional life, based on my reading of their background and the flow of the interview as it progressed. These conversations provided the “meta data” from which I could interpret thinking and behavior.48 At the onset of an interview after talking through questions of informed consent and attribution, I often began with questions about recent activities—​the most pressing issues of the embassy, permanent mission, or department. These questions attempted to solicit description of daily practice and, in particular, the practice of others. These were tailored to the interviewee. I attempted to solicit a broader range of practices—​in the South American interviews, for example, I often asked whether these daily priorities 44 See also Davide Nicolini, “Articulating Practice through the Interview to the Double,” Management Learning 40, no. 2 (2009): 195–​212. 45 Pouliot, International Security in Practice, 68–​69. 46 Fujii, Interviewing in Social Science, 3. See also Pouliot on “narrative causality.” Pouliot, International Security, 64. 47 Hopf, “The Logic of Habit,” 551. 48 Fujii, Interviewing in Social Science.

70  Practicing Peace and experiences were the same at other institutions or organizations that interviewee was familiar with. Do their colleagues in other missions or embassies have similar views or priorities? These sorts of questions attempted to recover the lived experience of the particular interviewee, but also probe for how far the interviewee assumed it traveled to others’ experience. From questions about daily priorities and activities, I then ask why things were done the way they were and sought examples or stories that would help me, as a visitor to the community, understand what was done here and why. This was means to prompt both reflection on backgrounded knowledge and to solicit deep description. Often, I was given scripted responses that closely followed official lines regarding organizational priorities, formal initiatives, and accomplishments. Responses also often explicitly referenced codified norms and principles. Among ASEAN practitioners, for example, there was frequent reference to the “ASEAN way” to articulate and justify both what was done and why. Most interviewees upheld this phrase as the means by which they confront regional challenges of all kinds. However, the make-​ up of this amorphous set of norms was rarely clear from conversations and often changed across interviews—​something itself suggestive that a single, coherent set of established norms of appropriate behavior may not be as consequential as many scholars attest.49 To solicit deeper reflection and more nuanced stories, I often tried to signal a depth of knowledge on issues that an outsider may not generally be assumed to know. On many occasions, I would listen for quite some time to a rehearsed exposition of what the interviewee thought about the issue, only to interrupt after a few minutes (or more) and offer a question or piece of information that thoroughly destabilized the interviewee’s thinking—​and often readjusted their perceptions of me as an interviewer. Within the bounds of ethics and respecting anonymity and off-​the-​record conversations, I would occasionally raise rumors or details of private meetings. This knowledge often came from prior interviews. In this way I demonstrated my own competence and credibility and signaled that others within the community found me trustworthy. Raising bits of insider knowledge sometimes caused surprise and shifted conversations away from official lines to more candid discussions. On a number of occasions an interviewee who had not previously requested anonymity at this point requested anonymity before continuing. This was a sign that both more nuanced and candid discussion was

49 See Martel and Glas, “The Contested Meaning-​Making.”

Uncovering Meaning and Practice in Regional Diplomacy  71 likely on the way, and that perceptions of my positionality as an interviewer had shifted. During my 2014 ASEAN interviews, for example, I would raise particulars of the failed 2012 Leaders’ Summit Joint Communiqué, Indonesia’s response to the 2008 Cyclone Nargis, or the limited debate around a common ASEAN statement in reaction to 2014 Russian annexation of Crimea (episodes discussed in ­chapter 4). Raising substantive issues that an interviewee felt were not so public was one means of gaining a more candid response, often leading to detailed retellings of interactions to correct my interpretation of events. This often led to the kinds of stories I was seeking. Further, this served, in part, to shift our discussion from what an interviewee was thinking about to unearth what she was thinking from. Rather than actively reflecting on a scripted rhetoric or relying on what she may have perceived as “safe” discourse, interviewees often shifted to explicate their own narrower experiences or perspectives and seemed less encumbered by the buzzwords of official rhetoric. To further destabilize taken-​for-​granted assumptions, I would also often allow an interviewee to respond at length with their thinking on an issue (e.g., the rationale for ASEAN’s limited response to China’s territorial claims in the South China Sea), only to punctuate it with a question that would trouble this line of thinking (e.g., a European practitioners’ critique of this approach). This would cause reflection not only on assumptions deeply ingrained in the practitioner’s thinking but also a reassessment of statements she had just made. Finally, I would attempt to bring into further relief the assumed knowledge and practices by proposing hypothetical scenarios—​“what if ” questions—​based on our discussion during the interview. Through these means, my interviews attempted to uncover the unproblematic assumptions communities of practitioners think from and the practices that derive habitually therefrom.

Interview Location and Participants In the summer and fall of 2014, I undertook a series of interviews with practitioners at both the ASEC and the OAS headquarters, and the embassies and permanent missions of respective member and observer states over four months. Follow-​up interviews and email correspondence were undertaken in the months after each research trip and over four weeks in June 2019 at the ASEC. The two sites were selected for three reasons.

72  Practicing Peace First, for practitioners themselves these organizations represent core multilateral institutions in each region concerned with political and security matters. This is clearest in regard to ASEAN. Southeast Asia is a region largely defined by ascent to the organization, and regional state officials know the organization to be singularly consequential for regionalism. In practice, the ASEC is the hub of regional dialogue through the wider summitry of ASEAN, and the Committee of Permanent Representatives (CPR) therein is a central feature.50 Rather than the public ministers and leaders’ summits, it is working groups and the CPR that coordinate and establish regional policy, particularly in political, security, and sociocultural matters. As one ASEAN official underscored, ‘The SOM [senior officials’ meeting] is only one or maybe two days [long] because the work is already done. The AEM [economic ministers’ meeting] is longer, three, four days. They have the technical and nitty gritty still to do, the working groups. But it’s a different breed on the political side. The CPR and groups have already done it all [for the SOM].’51 This was echoed in conversations with other regional officials who suggested that the important “discussions happen at the bottom, at working groups, with the CPR sometimes, but with working groups and sectoral bodies. Then they go up and higher and higher and higher to the ministers and leaders at the summit. But the leaders, at the summits, they want things settled before. They don’t want to be seen as in disagreement.”52 A third official summarized it more succinctly by stressing that the ASEC and its CPR “is the focal point” of the region.53 South America, on the other hand, is a region with a multitude of overlapping organizations. However, there are few panregional institutions and none with the long history and diverse focus—​politically, economically, and socially—​of the OAS.54 At first thought however, this panhemispheric organization may seem a puzzling site to explore the norms and practices of South American diplomacy. OAS membership includes not only the 12 states of South America but also the states of the Caribbean, Central America, and North America. Two interests animate the choice to center attention on the 50 See also Glas and Balogun, “Norms in Practice.” 51 Interview, ASEC official, Jakarta, June 2019. 52 See also Monica Herz, Maira Siman, and Ana Clara Telles, “Regional Organizations, Conflict Resolution and Mediation in South America,” in Power Dynamics and Regional Security in Latin America, eds. Marcial A. G. Suarez, Rafael Duarte Villa, and Brigitte Weiffen (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017), 123–​148; Interview ASEAN member state official, Jakarta, June 7, 2019. 53 Interview, ASEC official, Jakarta, June 2019. 54 To address this interest, however, I spoke with a number of practitioners (9 of 23 interviewees) explicitly regarding UNASUR, many of whom had direct working experience within the organization.

Uncovering Meaning and Practice in Regional Diplomacy  73 OAS. First, South America is puzzlingly devoid of the organizational density and permanence of other regions—​chiefly Europe, of course, but also the region-​defining and permanent organization, as in ASEAN. While the Americas are home to the longest lasting organization, the OAS, and South American history demonstrates myriad of attempts at both Pan-​and South American unity, many attempts have been fleeting. For example, given its explicit focus on political and security cooperation, over economic issues, the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR) and its secretariat in Quito, Ecuador, was a candidate for this investigation. However, given UNASUR’s relative novelty (entering into force only in 2011 and its secretariat under construction in 2014, to say nothing of its subsequent collapse) and the lack of extraregional engagement directly with it, the OAS was privileged as a primary site for research. Second, the OAS offers an opportunity to observe regional communities and to place them into relief with others. Within this setting it is possible to glimpse the self-​evident sense of normal diplomatic practice for particular state practitioners (e.g., South American state representatives) and to contrast that with the self-​evident sense of normal according to other state practitioners working closely with them (e.g., North American representatives officials). In this way, the limits and bounds of a community of practice can be deciphered. As ­chapter 5 explores, South American officials see themselves as a community defined in exclusive terms vis-​à-​vis their Caribbean and North American colleagues within the organization. Through this means one can observe rather acutely what Acharya describes as “commonly held notions about who is included and who is excluded” from a regional community.55 Thus, while the OAS does not represent the locus of South American diplomacy itself, it does offer insight into the practices and thinking of practitioners from across the region and its organizations. Similarly, while ASEAN is indeed the hub of diplomacy in Southeast Asia, my research design sees it as a focal point from which to explore relations beyond the strict confines of the ASEC. In this way, the insights uncovered through interviews at each discrete location extend beyond the confines of the organizations—​ these are regional habitual dispositions apparent within the wider institutionalized diplomatic context of each case. These two organizations were selected for a second, and pragmatic reason. Both afford a researcher a concentration of regional practitioners. Each is

55 Acharya, Constructing a Security Community, 25.

74  Practicing Peace host to embassies and permanent missions from regional states, and the diplomats working within each often have a wealth of regional experience when they arrive. At the OAS, for example, interviewees had worked within other subregional organizations, like Mercosur, the Andean Community, and UNASUR. Third, each location affords the researcher access to a pool of practitioners from beyond the region of interest that interact daily with regional practitioners. ASEAN has 11 dialogue partners, with ambassadors and staff consistently engaged with the 10 Southeast Asian states.56 The OAS includes the other 23 states of the hemisphere in continued relations with the 12 South American states. This book draws on interviews with 77 regional officials. This includes 54 interviews with practitioners within and working alongside ASEAN in Jakarta in 2014 and 2019, and 23 officials within the OAS in 2014. In Jakarta in 2014 I conducted interviews with 39 practitioners and had more than a dozen informal and off-​the-​record conversations with officials. Additional interviews were conducted in 2019 and included repeat interviews with six officials interviewed years prior and 15 new interviews with ASEAN member state and ASEC officials. In Washington in 2014, I interviewed 23 practitioners at the OAS. Most had experience at other regional organizations in South America as well. At each location, formal interviews were supplemented and expanded on by a number of follow-​up conversations and through subsequent phone, Skype, and email correspondence or through more casual run-​ins within the organization or at social events, as described. In addition, at each location a number of off-​the-​record conversations and supplemental interviews with local scholars and journalists added to the body of knowledge.57 Interviewees included ambassadors and permanent representatives, senior diplomatic officials and staff within embassies and missions, and many prominent individuals working within security and political issues in senior roles at each secretariat, including various deputy secretaries general 56 These include Australia, Canada, China, India, Japan, Republic of Korea, New Zealand, Russia, the United Kingdom, the United States, and the European Union. The status indicates a formal mission to the organization in Jakarta and high-​level and extensive exchanges (see Merced 2017). 57 As I explore elsewhere, despite organizational similarities, my experience conducting “elite” interviews varied. My interviews in Jakarta varied in their settings. For example, in 2014, of 39 practitioner interviewees, 15 requested interviews outside of their workplace. Most of these suggested meeting in a Starbucks in one of the many and massive malls Jakarta offers. Four suggested that we meet over a meal, including one ambassador at his home for breakfast, two American officials out for hamburgers, and one ASEC official for dinner at a very loud Chinese restaurant. Generally, senior officials requested meetings in their offices, while lower-​level officials requested meeting outside of the workday and often far from their place of work. Understandably, they may have less freedom with

Uncovering Meaning and Practice in Regional Diplomacy  75 and directors. Similar investigations often focus on conversations with similarly high-​ranking officials (and states): those with the “loudest voice.”58 This was my impulse as well. However, snowballing necessitates openness and, somewhat to my surprise, I found that interviews with lower-​level diplomatic staff often provided exceptional insight into diplomatic practice. This is for two reasons. First, working as advisors, note-​takers, or assistants during closed-​door meetings, these individuals were in a privileged position and often willing to share insights into dynamics I could not directly glimpse. Further, and often as a result of their professional interest in advancement, many told me that they actively survey the diplomatic action and record it mentally for reasons outside, but aligning with, my interest. They want to learn, and their lessons and reflections make for useful narrative data. Second, I often found these individuals willing to pass along (anonymously, whether they wished it or not) rumors or privy information that their superiors seemed less willing to address. In this regard, I perceived that my age played a role and facilitated working relationships and rapport. Many junior diplomatic officials appeared to be in their late 20s or early 30s, my age during interviews as well, and I believe this influenced the candidness and candor of many discussions.59 However, as with many research projects, I could not gain access to all the practitioners I wished to speak with. Again, salient aspects of my positionality were likely at play. As I was an outsider and scholar from Canada, a number of interviewees seemed to have little time for me or a disinterest given national antagonisms, particularly among officials from a number of states at the OAS. There, my focus was the 12 South American state embassies and their workday and perhaps worried more about being spotted speaking to a researcher by colleagues. These non-​office-​setting meetings offered a number of benefits and a few restrictions as well. They often ran longer than those during the workday and in formal settings. In general, my ASEAN interviews in both 2014 and 2019 were much longer than one hour (my requested time commitment), less formal in tone, and with considerable informal discussion on a range of personal and professional issues after the conclusion of the formal interview than were my interviews with OAS officials. Most interviews with Southeast Asian practitioners lasted 1.5 to 2 hours, and some extended beyond 3. At the OAS, none of the interviewees requested a meeting outside of their office or the lounge of the OAS Main Building, and all limited their time in ways I was not accustomed to at ASEAN. Few went beyond the hour I requested, although many were available for follow-​up meetings and many volunteered for follow-​up email or phone conversations. My interviews at ASEAN generally ended when the conversation did, rather than when our allotted time expired. Rare was the meeting that was cut short by a secretary or a glance at a watch. At the OAS, most of my interviews concluded precisely at the scheduled end point (often with a secretary announcing the arrival of the interviewee’s next appointment). See Glas, “Power, Positionality and Positions of Power.”

58 Pouliot, International Security.

59 See also Soedirgo and Glas, “Toward Active Reflexivity.”

76  Practicing Peace their permanent representatives, given their likely wealth of experience. I was able to gain formal interviews with representatives from nine of 12 states. The three I was unable to speak with were Venezuela, Bolivia, and Uruguay. Again, my identity, as a Canadian, likely did me no favors there. To both supplement and provide for comparisons across overlapping communities of officials, I conducted additional interviews with OAS officials and with Canadian and American officials at the OAS. With ASEAN, my interest was also largely with the permanent representatives and senior ASEC officials. The ASEC serves as a hub for wider ASEAN diplomacy, grounding and coordinating the work of the leaders’ and ministers’ summits and high-​ranking officials from both member states and the ASEC themselves would have a wealth of insight and experience. I interviewed six permanent representatives as well as officials from 8 of 10 member states and senior ASEC officials at the directorate or deputy secretary-​general level, including 7 of 9 ASEC directorates across each of the four pillars with a focus on the political security community pillar.60 I also spoke with a number of member state officials, including former Indonesian Foreign Minister Dr. Hassan Wirajuda and a number of senior officials from other member states. As a proxy for access that was not easily forthcoming, I attempted to focus some of my questions of officials on their retelling of the practices of certain state officials. For example, I found it challenging to speak with senior Vietnamese officials at ASEAN or at all with any Venezuelan officials at the OAS (a state actor, who as central to the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America (ALBA), has a “loud voice” at the OAS even when silent). Both of these states became recurrent topics I asked other interviewees directly about. The aim was to recover at least a semblance of the interests, thinking, and practices of officials from states I was not able to directly engage with. At each location formal interviews were supplemented with other less formal conversations that provided important insight. As noted, many fruitful conversations were had at events on the sidelines of each organization and within the small coffeeshop in the lobby of ASEC and in the halls of the OAS main building after meetings of the Permanent Council. These conversations allowed for quick and candid chats and often informed the rumors and “insider” information that could be used strategically in formal interviews. These run-​ins included meeting officials from ASEAN member states that I was 60 I phrase this in a purposefully vague manner to maintain anonymity of senior staff and representatives. Given the relatively small number of representatives and senior ASEC officials, providing details may compromise that principle.

Uncovering Meaning and Practice in Regional Diplomacy  77 unable to interview formally for confidential background conversations, or casual off-​the-​record conversations with ASEC officials. I also had a number of conversations with OAS officials, journalists, and scholars. Further, I sought to gain insights from nonregional practitioners who worked consistently with regional states. For the South American case, this includes North American officials working alongside South American officials in the OAS. For Southeast Asia, it meant members of the now-​11 dialogue partners, including officials from the United States, Australia, and Europe. I conducted a series of interviews with these extraregional practitioners as well as a number of informal and off-​the-​record conversations that further informed my thinking. As explored below, this is in line with a comparative element of this research design. To see a community of practice we must identify its intersubjective qualities—​shared knowledge, identity, and discourse.61 One means of doing this is to seek out the boundaries of shared like-​mindedness and common repertoires of action: who is in and who is out. Contrasting what is unproblematically assumed to be given and natural by one group of practitioners (e.g., organizational members) with what is similarly assumed by a group of practitioners who engage with that community as external others (e.g., organizational partners) can bring into stark relief the contours of a community of practice. I rely on this level of comparison. Contrasting what is assumed as given and natural by a community of practitioners (e.g., ASEAN member state diplomats and staff) with a group of practitioners who engage this community as external others (e.g., ASEAN dialogue partners) serves to further bring into relief the distinctive and habitual aspects of community practices.62 This also serves as a check on claims that the habitual qualities of diplomacy of a community are distinct from others. Comparing and contrasting the sense of “normal” diplomatic practice is a first step in demonstrating this distinctiveness. Further, particularly at the OAS, this dual level of interviewing serves another function. This helps distinguish a set of regional practices and dispositions from potential organizational qualities shared by practitioners of and beyond the region.63 As noted, South American officials 61 See Glas, “African Union Security Culture,” 1124. 62 See also Glas “Habits of Peace.” Following Pouliot, this is one way to address, at least in part, the “Mauss problem.” To recognize a given, habituated practice it must be “both native and alien to a researcher’s own system of meanings.” See Pouliot, “Practice Tracing,” 244. 63 Stephen C. Nelson and Catherine Weaver, “The Cultures of International Organizations,” In The Oxford Handbook of International Organizations, eds. Jacob Katz Cogan, Ian Hurd, and Ian Johnstone (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014), 920–​939.

78  Practicing Peace see themselves as a community at the OAS, distinct from their Caribbean and North American colleagues. Extraregional interviewees reinforced this division starkly by contrasting what they saw as normal and effective diplomatic practice with how their South American colleagues confronted challenges. In terms of selection of interviewees, my approach was not exhaustive.64 Nor was it random. However, it offers sufficient insight into the habitual and dispositional qualities of the regional practitioners through both their own narratives and by unearthing in stark relief variation in “the normal way diplomacy works,” as one American interviewee termed it.65 I find these qualities largely representative of those within the communities of practice as well. I follow Hopf, among others, and recognize that “Interpretivism is committed to the principle that additional evidence is always available and that its presence can affect the meaning of whatever has already been assembled. As a result, we can never assert confidence claims to validity, except within the narrow confirms of the evidence we have already assessed.”66 However, once the meaningful information we generate within interviews or other sites of inquiry regarding the knowledge and practice of members of some community become repetitive, as it was at each location, we may assume a kind of saturation—​that we have generated some knowledge about a wider community.67 I discuss the limits as to how far the understandings and practices uncovered in each regional case can extend in the respective empirical chapters.

Reading Practice Finally, I rely on some element of reading practice from texts. Approaching the practical and dispositional qualities of interstate relations in these cases, particularly given the time scale, precludes the possibility of relying solely on interviews and limited observation. As Pouliot describes, 64 See Alexander L. George and Andrew Bennett, Case Studies and Theory Development (Cambridge: MIT Press, 2005), 233. On selection of interviewees versus sampling, see Fujii, Interviewing in Social Science, ­chapter 3. Like Fujii, I prefer “selection” because it emphasizes the process of identifying and accessing interviewees, rather than “sampling,” which in positivist research assumes some prior set of criteria for deciding whom to interview. As with Fujii’s experiences, the criteria for interviewees shifted and expanded during my research as I became privy to the thinking and experience of each regional community. 65 Interview with American official, Jakarta, July 3, 2014. 66 Hopf, Social Construction, 29. 67 Bennett and Checkel, Process Tracing, 27–​ 28; Pouliot, International Security, 85; Hayes, Constructing National Security, 44.

Uncovering Meaning and Practice in Regional Diplomacy  79 While inductive interpretation is necessary for recovering subjective meanings and practical logics, contextual and historical interpretation is required for their objectification in a larger context of intersubjectivity, social relations, and patterns of domination. This sobjective-​with-​an-​o methodology aims at overcoming the epistemological duality of subjectivism and objectivism by restoring the practical logic of social life and casting it under the analytical light of its intersubjective context and history.68

Building on this insight, I examine various texts—​agreements, treaties, and joint communiqués from each region. The aim in studying these kinds of documents is threefold. First, they provide the necessary stock of background information in planning interviews and seeking a preliminary glimpse into regional relations. However, the iterated norms and principles enshrined in such official texts quickly proved—​from my own external view—​at odds with much of the discussion in interviews themselves.69 Nonetheless, they were a useful first step in designing research questions and familiarizing myself with the regions and the organizations I visited. Second, and similar in aim to the interpretivist interviews, it allows imperfect insight into the assumptions of regional practitioners themselves. Third, it affords insight in the often-​abstract nature of regional—​and global—​norms and principles themselves. Hopf offers a useful example of a similar approach in his intertextualized reading of Russian texts.70 He relies on textual analysis to induce the collective identities and discursive formations that constituted social cognitive structures in Moscow in both 1955 and 1999. Brian Rathbun offers another example, making use of speeches, memoirs, diaries, and biographies to assemble the “core beliefs” of US policymakers in his search for evidence of generalized trust.71 Adler and Pouliot hint at a similar approach when they note that practices “congeal in a variety of social things, such as institutions, objects, taboos, laws, rites, etc.”72 Following this lesson, 68 Pouliot, International Security in Practice, 64. 69 See Glas, “Habits of Peace”; Glas and Balogun, “Norms in Practice.” 70 Hopf, Social Construction. Hopf was “out of his mind” in his approach to texts—​engaging them without an ambition to “test” theory or apply existing categories. Hopf, Social Construction, 26. This is challenging with interview research. One does not easily have the ability to revisit participants, and some structure is necessarily imposed due to these constraints. However, I attempted to impose only a general structure on my questions, allowing interviewees to address issues—​cooperation and disagreements, critical appraisal of progress and accolades, etc.—​as they saw fit without narrow impositions on the subject or language used. 71 Rathbun, “Before Hegemony,” 254. See also Oelsner, “Friendship, Mutual Trust.” 72 Vincent Pouliot, International Security in Practice, 19.

80  Practicing Peace documentary sources, along with the extensive secondary literature on each case, were used to two main ends. First, they offer a first glimpse at those aspects of regional relations that may be taken for granted or as part of the stock of background knowledge in each community. Second, they allow me to—​again imperfectly—​examine how or whether the habitual, dispositional, and practical qualities of community relations that I observe in each case in 2014 and 2019 manifest over time.

Summary The central interest of this book is to explore and account for the conflictual peace of Southeast Asia and South America. To do so, I first seek to uncover habitual dispositions of diplomatic communities of practice by examining, as closely as possible, what practitioners think from and do as a matter of course. This section has offered one means to uncover these dynamics. My interest here is to generate and showcase “experientially faithful” accounts of these dynamics, “seeing and portraying the situation as situational actors . . . understood it,” as well as being “analytically faithful, in keeping with the researcher’s theoretical and conceptual ‘priors’ and insights.”73 The approach and methods outlined here allow for such an investigation. I center attention on a fine level of analysis in the thinking and behavior of communities of practice in order to infer the role of habit as a mechanism in shaping behavior, from regional conflict management to regionalism more generally. In doing so, my approach also allows for a degree of analytical falsifiability. Through interviews in particular, one can assess whether conscious or instrumental reflection on the qualities of the regional habitual disposition by members of the community exist. If, during an interview, an interviewee reflects critically on how they did, or hypothetically would, respond to a regional crisis, this would call into question the habituation of certain regional qualities of relations.74 For example, many Southeast Asian interviewees suggested that a particular version of procedural consensus dominates how they approach discussions regarding regional crises. In a number of accounts it was clear that informal consensus was “the only game in town,” as one Thai diplomat put it, and that there was

73 Yanow, “Neither Rigorous nor Objective?,” 110–​111. 74 See also Hopf, “The Logic of Habit,” 550–​551.

Uncovering Meaning and Practice in Regional Diplomacy  81 no reflection on other means of coming to agreement.75 In this interview and many others, there was an automaticity in language and manner of response that suggested little or no reflection on other potential processes of interaction, such as consensus-​seeking through debate and voting. There was a commonly expressed sense of “of course” in the language and manner in which Southeast Asian interviewees spoke about issues of consensus, like all aspects of their habitual disposition outlined in the following chapter. Absent this “of course” manner apparent in the narrative data derived from interviews, I would not “see” this habitual quality of ASEAN consensus-​seeking practices. This is not to suggest that interviews—​or myself as interviewer—​are some neutral “conduit” to knowledge in a positivist sense.76 Rather, through the interpretivist framework described in the preceding chapter and methods outlined in the previous section, I can offer faithful insights into the existence of habitual and dispositional qualities of members of these diplomatic communities. After exploring means of showcasing the existence of habitual dispositions, my aim in the next section is to explore how we might explore the effects of these qualities.

The Effect of Habitual Dispositions The second aspect of my research design is to elucidate the effects of habitual dispositions on regional conflict management and regionalism more generally in each case. As discrete sets of cognitive and practical qualities of diplomacy, as ­chapter 2 explored, habitual dispositions structure behavior and have a “constitutive causal” effect, making possible the long and conflictual peace explored.77 The axiomatic repetition of behaviors by and within communities—​their habitual qualities—​are the mechanism implicitly at work in this account. By responding to and understanding crises in particular ways as a matter of course, these underlying habitual dispositions make possible and shape patterns of interaction and regionalism in meaningful ways. Andrew Bennett and Jeffrey T. Checkel remind us that all mechanisms are, at some, level unobservable.78 We cannot, of course, see real-​time brain waves nor directly witness behaviors in the past. In what follows, however,

75 Interview with Thai official, Jakarta, July 1, 2014. 76 Yanow, “Neither Rigorous nor Objective?,” 110. 77 Lebow, “Constitutive Causality.”

78 Bennett and Checkel, Process Tracing, 11–​13; Jacobs, “Process Tracing.”

82  Practicing Peace I detail one means of exploring the effect of habitual dispositions on regional conflict response and regionalism more generally. That habit is a mechanism by which relations are structured has precedent in the literature on which this book builds. For example, Mitzen argues that routinization79 or procedural habituation80 of behavior undergirds trust in the European security community. As she suggests, “if communicative action is the ‘micro-​mechanism’ of this [European] security community . . . it would seem that this mechanism, and the substantive promise of deliberative processes overall, rest on the procedural habituation to them. Participants must take for granted that they will be exchanging reasons again and again, in order to allow themselves to be persuaded to learn.”81 Pouliot suggests a similar and inherent mechanism when he asserts that a security community rests on the existence of diplomacy as “the only thinkable or self-​evident practice in mutual dealings.”82 Bjola and Kornprobst suggest much the same when they propose that the “enduring disposition” toward restraint, or particular “habitus of restraint,” is the glue that holds security communities together.83 Traditional constructivist accounts make similar claims as well, drawing attention to the mechanisms of persuasion and social influence within a broader understanding of socialization.84 Robert Axelrod, for example, suggests a number of mechanisms that explain pro-​norm behavior in groups, in the absence of exogenous material (dis)incentives:85 the degree to which an actor identifies with the group, the legitimate authority of a norm and its sponsor, social proof or the mimicking of a valued in-​group’s behavior,86 and voluntary membership through assumed defection costs of self-​esteem.87 Richard Price and Checkel both

79 Mitzen, “Ontological Security.” 80 Mitzen, “Anchoring Europe.” 81 Mitzen, “Anchoring Europe,” 278. 82 Pouliot, International Security, 280. 83 Bjola and Kornprobst, “Security Communities,” 286, 291. 84 See Alastair Iain Johnston, “Conclusions and Extensions: Toward Mid-​Range Theorizing and beyond Europe,” International Organizations 59, (2005): 1013–​44; Michael Zürn and Jeffrey T. Checkel, “Getting Socialized to Build Bridges: Constructivism and Rationalism, Europe and the Nation-​State,” International Organization 59, (2005): 1051–​1054. 85 Axelrod, “An Evolutionary Approach to Norms.” 86 See also Jan Beyers, “Multiple Embeddedness and Socialization in Europe: The Case of Council Officials,” International Organization 59, (2005): 899–​936. 87 See also Liesbet Hooghe, The European Commission and the Integration of Europe: Images of Governance (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001); Frank Schimmelfennig, “Strategic Calculation and International Socialization: Membership Incentives, Party Constellations and Sustained Compliance in Central and Eastern Europe,” International Organization 59, no. 4 (2005): 827–​860.

Uncovering Meaning and Practice in Regional Diplomacy  83 focus on social learning to this end,88 something that is inherent within the security community literature as well.89 As explored in ­chapter 2, these social constructivist accounts all suggest some kind of identification with a group and the active recognition of the appropriateness of behavior therein.90 In all these accounts, two analytic assumptions are made: actors recognize their community or group and then actively reflect or assess the content of norms, the identity of actors with whom they are interacting, and or the assumed instrumental costs of those interactions.91 Habituation assumes the former but not the latter. It assumes actors know they are part a community—​a regional diplomatic community, for instance—​but that actors’ thinking and behavior is then unreflexively, and consequentially, delineated as a result of this inclusion. Habitual dispositions emerge from an intersubjective context and lead to repeated and relatively automatic behaviors. Communities just do them as a matter of course. However, as noted above, recognizing habitual action from reflected on action is a challenge. By following the research design outlined, certain “observable clues” of both the existence and effects of habitual dispositions can be identified.92 To do this, I offer two central means: articulating habitual dispositions as particularly “robust” and thus logically of particular consequence for community interactions and tracing them in action within each case. Both build on suggestions that researchers ought to move toward the “finest level of detail” possible in exploring the operation of causal—​or other—​mechanisms.93 Given this interest, each of these means of showcasing the effects of habitual dispositions center attention on the thinking and behavior of communities of practice themselves.

Robustness Habitual dispositions are likely to be particularly consequential when they are not only deeply held as normal and natural by members of a community 88 Jeffrey T. Checkel, “Why Comply? Social Learning and European Identity Change,” International Organization 55, no. 3 (2001): 553–​588; Richard Price, “Reversing the Gunsights: Transnational Civil Society Targets Land Mines,” International Organization 52, no. 3 (1998): 613–​644. 89 E.g., Adler and Barnett, Security Communities, 43–​44. 90 See also Johnston, “Treating International Institutions,” 495. 91 See Johnston, “Treating International Institutions,” 496–​ 498; Johnston, “Conclusions and Extensions,” 1034, fn41. 92 See Jacobs, “Process Tracing,” 48. 93 Bennett and Checkel, Process Tracing, 11.

84  Practicing Peace but also themselves self-​evidently understood or known to be effective or assumed to work and work well by practitioners when they pushed to reflect on them. I see this as a “robust” quality of habitual dispositions. This may seem a contradiction in terms. Habitual and practical elements of community relations are not reflected on, but they may be known to be effective or competent by the communities which enact them. Here, the reliance on interpretive-​oriented interviews, as outlined above, is the core methodological tool to offer insight. In my interviews with members of both regional communities, diplomatic officials recognize not only a discrete set of practices as normal and natural, but when pushed they have faith in their efficacy and are critical of alternatives. Interviewees often stress that alternatives to their ways of doing are inappropriate, functionally ineffective, or even implausible. As practice theorists have shown, practices are themselves functional in that they may serve the instrumental interests of practitioners.94 In this case, officials in both regional communities simply know that their approach to regional conflict management and regionalism more generally works and “works most effectively,” as one ASEAN official suggested.95 This common assertion is unpacked in more detail in ­chapter 6. While officials attest to the efficacy of their habits, their robustness is particularly clear when pushed to interrogate just why this is the case. Near the conclusion of my interviews, I often asked why particular practices work. For ASEAN regional officials, for example, I would ask why informal dialogue, rather than recourse to formal channels, is effective at mediating disputes, even when ASEAN seems unable to resolve them. No interviewee could offer a clear response. It seemed the majority found it difficult to grapple with these questions, mentally unpacking the taken-​for-​granted knowledge that the particular means of regional relations, as they know it, simply worked. This robust but inherent knowledge as to what is appropriate, effective, or even possible shapes behavior not through active reflection on other possibilities but precisely because it precludes active reflection on other courses of action. Three assumptions are made in this formulation of the robustness of habitual dispositions, and each is observable through the method of interpretivist interviews as described above: (1) a set of diplomatic normal practices exists as self-​evident; (2) it is similarly self-​evident that these

94 See also Glas, “African Union Security Culture.”

95 Interview with ASEC official, Jakarta, July 2, 2014.

Uncovering Meaning and Practice in Regional Diplomacy  85 practices are effective, even if practitioners cannot articulate how or why that is the case, and; (3) that these regional relations are, in practice, so effective as to not require critical reflection on alternative courses of action. Through this formulation it is also clear that a self-​evident assumption of competence is inherent. Practitioners who engage in robust habitual behaviors know that practices are effective vis-​à-​vis some intersubjective understanding of both efficacy and normative standard. As outlined above, interview questions were designed to assess whether practitioners commonly thought from assumptions as to particular means to respond to crises and in so doing, they also unearthed that practitioners assumed these practices to be effective. In short, through the narrative data derived from interviews one can see that regional communities of practice assume their particular brand of diplomacy is not only the “only game in town,” but also what “works most effectively” for their particular community, as one Southeast Asian official put it.96 This reality is explored in the empirical chapters that follow. This is a preliminary means to observe the effect of habitual dispositions: using interviews to show that practitioners allude to their habitual dispositions not only through their description of daily practices and their responses to crises but also attest to their effectiveness when pushed to reflect on alternatives. To examine the role of habitual dispositions more directly, however, I turn to a means of tracing habitual dispositions in action.

Habitual Dispositions in Action By exploring a within-​ case illustration of habitual dispositions in action, practitioners’ responses can be studied for evidence of enacting their “normal way diplomacy” works and to posit habit as a mechanism at work in the production of patterns of peace.97 Crises confronted by each regional community are a useful vantage point for this study. As Glenn H. Snyder and Paul Diesing suggest, “it is useful to conceive of a crisis as an intermediate zone between peace and war.”98 When a crisis interrupts an otherwise stable set of relations, this intermediate zone can be explored to see how and why a community responds the way they do—​and in doing so, what habitual, 96 Interview with ASEC official, Jakarta, July 2, 2014. 97 For a discussion of this kind of within-​case evidence, see Bennett and Checkel, Process Tracing, 8. 98 Glenn H. Snyder and Paul Diesing, Conflict among Nations: Bargaining, Decision Making, and System Structure in International Crisis (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1977), 10.

86  Practicing Peace practical, or dispositional qualities are at work (or not) in shaping these understandings and responses. Richard Lebow suggests a similar logic in regard to recovering constitutive causality more generally: “we must work back from behavior to understandings and goals and show they in turn were the product of particular identities or cognitive frames.”99 Borrowing his language, the cognitive frame of interest here is the habitual disposition of a community of practice. The rationale for this approach borrows from a particular view of process tracing. While the term is often ill-​defined and amorphous, recent accounts understand process tracing as “the analysis of evidence on processes, sequences, and conjunctures of events within a case for the purposes of either developing or testing hypotheses about causal mechanisms that might causally explain the case. Put another way, the deductive theory-​testing side of process tracing examines the observable implications of hypothesized causal mechanisms within a case to test whether a theory on these mechanisms explains the case.”100 With an understanding of mechanisms as constitutive rather than strictly causal, and their existence as limited to the analytical constructs of researchers, a particular understanding of habituation and its effect on regional relations may be parsed out from the historical record and the reflections of social agents.101 Further, and inherently, this focus within a case allows for a degree of falsification to my approach, showing or not the habitual mechanism at work in each regional case. As noted above, through the interpretive approach to interviewing, observation, and reflection on documentary sources, a researcher can assess conscious or instrumental reflection on the aspects of regional habitual dispositions or see them expressed as a given and enacted as a matter of course. Each within-​case case, then, probes for this potential as well. This approach is adopted in my exploration of each within-​case illustration in the empirical chapters that follow.102 The first is the regional response to a particularly violent and recent case of interstate militarized disputes in Southeast Asia: the 2011 Preah Vihear conflict. This case is series of violent militarized interstate disputes between Cambodia and Thailand that saw sustained use of heavy weapons and led to the displacement of some 100,000 people. This was not only the most severe intraregional conflict in recent

99

Lebow, “Constitutive Causality,” 217. Bennett and Checkel, Process Tracing, 7–​8. See also Pouliot, International Security, 76–​77. 101 See Lebow, “Constitutive Causality.” 102 See also Bennet and Checkel, Process Tracing, 8. 100

Uncovering Meaning and Practice in Regional Diplomacy  87 decades, but it also risked escalation to a wider intra-​ASEAN war at the same time that the Association was deepening its regional Community integration. I suggest that the habitual disposition of Southeast Asian diplomacy both made possible this puzzling dynamic and itself played a deflationary role, limiting the escalation of this violent conflict by a natural recourse to informal dialogue and mediation but not formal resolution. To demonstrate this claim, I trace the diplomatic habitual disposition at work during this crisis by examining secondary sources and interviews with many officials directly involved in crafting the regional response and managing the conflict. In this way, the within-​case case suggests the Southeast Asian habitual disposition as a proximate cause of the wider regional conflictual peace. Similarly, in the case of South America I investigate dynamics in the 160-​year-​long border dispute between Ecuador and Peru. As outlined in ­chapter 5, this is a particularly important regional conflict, comprising dozens of militarized disputes, and demonstrates the particularities of regional solutions to regional crises. Here, however, I rely largely on secondary accounts of decades-​long violence, and center attention on the most recent episode of violence in 1995 and the regional response. Once again, exploring the role that the habitual disposition played in the management of the conflict after the 1995 violence illustrates a proximate cause of wider patterns of conflict management and the long, conflictual peace of this region. In both of these illustrations I demonstrate the deflationary effect of particular regional habitual dispositions. However, each also suggests that these habitual dispositions may have prolonging impacts on violence. This is particularly clear in the case of Southeast Asia’s informal practices of regional conflict management. While these practical and dispositional qualities of regional relations may mute and diffuse conflict and undergird long-​term regional peace absent escalation to war, they also may allow conflicts to linger unresolved, making possible the conflictual long peace. Thus, in each of these cases I suggest that the particular habitual disposition of regional diplomacy shaped regional relations in particular ways. Each illustration assumes a number of things as a starting point. First, we would expect to see discrete dispositional qualities collectively held and inherent among members of the regional community of practice. This is straightforward in the Southeast Asian case, as the crisis under study is contemporary for many interviewees. Speaking with these practitioners about both the rationale and behavior of their community members during the crisis under study is a means to generate narrative data and

88  Practicing Peace stories to investigate for this level of detail. In the South American investigation, the case examined is historical. Here, inference is used to explore both the stories derived from narrative data and related public statements. Using the interpretivist lens outlined and focusing on practitioners and documentary evidence is a means to get at this level of data and to recover the background on which practice rests in each within-​case case. Second, we would expect to see this assumed set of knowledge to be applied unproblematically during the crisis. We would expect to see practitioners unreflexively enacting the practices that are known to be natural, normal, and effective for each respective community of practice. However, neither is a test of the framework developed here in a strict sense and I do not provide some kind of counterfactual analysis to demonstrate its veracity as explanation.103 Rather each is offered as an illustration to showcase an instance of how regional relations function and peace is practiced within these particular communities.

Conclusion In this chapter I explored the research design, methodology, and methods of this investigation. This book adopts an interpretivist framework and relies largely on interviews to bring into relief disparate regional habitual dispositions in order to account for the conflictual long peace of Southeast Asia and South America. My aim here is to uncover both the existence of habitual dispositions in each regional diplomatic community and to glimpse their effect on regional conflict management and regionalism more generally. This chapter has outlined an account of methodology and method to do so. My focus on the habitual dispositions of regional diplomacy narrows analytical attention to two aspects of social relations. First, it centers attention on practitioners themselves, examining the stock of background knowledge they hold as rather self-​evident or commonsensical. To this end, I rely largely on interviews to uncover the particular brand of “normal” diplomacy within a particular community. Second, this focus directs analysis to a set of practices that unproblematically and relatively axiomatically derive from

103 See Bennett and Checkel, Process Tracing; James D. Fearon, “Counterfactuals and Hypothesis Testing in Political Science,” World Politics 43, no. 2 (1991): 169–​195; Martin Hollis and Steve Smith, Explaining and Understanding International Relations (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1990).

Uncovering Meaning and Practice in Regional Diplomacy  89 this taken-​for-​granted knowledge. To this end, I rely on a demonstration of the robustness of regional diplomatic habitual dispositions and probe their role in a crucial case of regional conflict management in each case. In the following two chapters I apply this approach and narrow analytical focus to examine the practice of peace in Southeast Asia and South America.

4 Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia Introduction The states of Southeast Asia have experienced a decades-​long conflictual peace. Regional interstate relations have long been marked by both pervasive but limited interstate violence and dense and growing institutionalization of relations among states. The aim of this chapter is to shed light on cooperation and conflict in this region by exploring how a Southeast Asian community of diplomatic practice understands and responds to regional conflict and pursues regionalism more generally. Building on the previous two chapters, in this chapter I explore the foundation of the Southeast Asian conflictual peace. I uncover the existence and effect of a Southeast Asian habitual disposition—​a set of habitual and dispositional qualities of regional relations that meaningfully inform regional conflict response and predispose regional officials toward both particular means of responding to crises and a toleration of limited intraregional violence. Southeast Asian practitioners know and practice a distinctive means of conflict management that makes possible the long and conflictual peace of the region. Collectively, regional officials think from, rather than about, particular ways of confronting and managing regional problems and furthering their individual and collective interests.1 To explore and understand the conflictual peace of this region this chapter is structured over three parts. First, I briefly reintroduce this case by surveying the history of the long conflictual peace of Southeast Asia. In the second section I outline the existence of a Southeast Asian habitual disposition, paying particular attention to the relationship between regional practices and codified norms. In the third section, I explore the effects of the Southeast Asian habitual disposition in two ways. First, I demonstrate the robustness of these qualities. I show that practitioners not only know these qualities to be self-​evident but also know that they work and work effectively. Put simply, they are “a necessity that works most effectively.”2 I then 1 An early and abridged version of this chapter is published as Glas, “Habits of Peace.” 2 Interview with ASEAN Secretariat (ASEC) official, Jakarta, July 2, 2014. Practicing Peace. Aarie Glas, Oxford University Press. © Oxford University Press 2022. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780197633229.003.0004

Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia  91 turn to observe the regional habitual disposition in practice by exploring a crucial case of regional conflict management, the 2011 Preah Vihear conflict. This was not only the most severe regional conflict in recent decades but also risked escalation to war between these Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) member states. I show that the habitual disposition of Southeast Asian diplomacy had both a pacifying and protracting effect on this conflict and that these dispositional qualities of regional relations undergird the wider conflictual peace of the region.

Conflictual Regional Peace in Southeast Asia As I explored in c­ hapter 1, all regions are subjective constructs—​for those both within and external to them. What counts as a region and who, or what state, is in or is out is the product of perceptions of geography, history, culture, and connections of all kinds. Southeast Asia as a region of exclusively 10 states is the product of collective experience and the perspectives of officials themselves. Central among these experiences has been varied experiences with colonialism and the subsequent conflictual peace of the emergent states of the postcolonial period as they wrestled with establishing the form and function of national governance and pursued varied attempts at regional development and integration. When the states of the region emerged from colonial rule over the two decades after the end of World War II, regional integration was not a driving concern among state elites. In the “chaos” of the cultural and linguist variation of the region, the central concern of political elites in the decade after independence was the national consolidation of state borders and state authority, not the regionalization of their relations.3 Given this focus, regional relations were characterized in large part by distrust and violence between states. Most notably, divisive territorial claims between Malaysia and the Philippines over Sabah and wider hostilities between Indonesia and the expansive Malaysian Federation shaped regional relations for years. The conflict between Indonesia and Malaysia was particularly pronounced and prolonged. In 1958, the Malaysian-​supported failed coup in northern Indonesia sparked a series of disputes between the two states.4 The formation of the Malaysian 3 Acharya, “Collective Identity,” 206. 4 See Ramses Amer, “Expanding ASEAN’s Conflict Management Framework in Southeast Asia: The Border Dispute Dimension,” Asian Journal of Political Science 6, no. 2 (1998): 33–​56.

92  Practicing Peace Federation in 1963 and its short-​lived inclusion of Singapore, from 1963 to 1965, led to three years of Indonesian policy of opposition, the Confrontasi, aimed at dismantling a federation it viewed as a “colonialist conspiracy.”5 As Ba summarizes, “independence did not free states to cooperate so much as make conflict with each other.”6 While conflict characterized the relations of the nascent states of region into the early 1960s, this is also the period when the seeds of varied attempts at regionalism grew.7 Centrally, a number of state leaders and political elites began to perceive a need for a regional organization wherein distrust and divisive territorial claims could be managed. Their interest was in large part driven by a recognition of the need to temper growing and sustained interstate conflicts in order to better focus energy and resources on domestic matters and the consolidation of states, particularly in the face of what was perceived as growing communist threats. This drove Malaysia in 1961 to propose the Association of Southeast Asia (ASA), a short-​lived forerunner to ASEAN.8 The ASA was envisioned as a panregional association, inclusive of all 10 regional states, and, unlike the US-​led 1954 Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO), it was not to be an explicitly anticommunist effort. Rather, in 1961 it emerged as a largely economic organization uniting the Federation of Malaya, the Philippines, and Thailand. However, nonaligned regional states, chiefly Indonesia, remained skeptical of the organization’s Anglo-​American sympathies and fearful of its potential to infringe on the independence of regional states.9 Similar notions of regional unity drove the short-​lived pan-​Malay Maphilindo union in 1963. Formed as a nonpolitical union to unite the three ethnically Malay states of the region, Malaya, the Philippines, and Indonesia, it too succumbed quickly to intraregional divisions with the rise of Sukarno’s policy of confrontation. Centrally, regional interests in a wider Malayan Federation, inclusive of North Borneo and Singapore, were at odds with Filipino and Indonesian interests in limiting growing Malaysian power.10 The failed union and the ASA demonstrate just two examples of a number of regional organizational forms envisioned in a period characterized by violence and uncertainty. 5 Kivimäki, “The Long Peace,” 9; Rattasenvee, “Leadership in ASEAN,” 115. 6 Ba, [Re]Negotiating, 45. 7 See Ba, [Re]Negotiating, ­chapter 2. 8 See Vincent K. Pollard, “ASA and ASEAN, 1961–​1967: Southeast Asian Regionalism,” Asian Survey 10, no. 3 (1970): 244–​255. 9 Pollard, “ASA and ASEAN,” 252; Smith, “Indonesia’s Role in ASEAN,” 240. 10 See Ba, [Re]Negotiating, 46–​47.

Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia  93 In the late 1950s and 1960s, as Ba details, many regional elites also aspired to varied and wider “Asian” institutions for cooperation or more narrow intraregional unions.11 Policy elites in Burma, for example, envisioned a unified federation from India to Southeast Asia to China, a number of Thai politicians envisioned a union of Buddhist Mekong states, and various other proposals were advanced for pan-​Malay unions between Malaya, Indonesia, the Philippines, Borneo, and New Guinea, and Southern Thailand.12 While many elites flirted with broader regional organizational means to pursue national interests, these were limited in effort and defined along distinct lines from the regional bounds that are largely taken for granted today. Following on the organizational impulse of the ASA, in 1967 ASA’s three members were joined by Indonesia and Singapore in offering a novel proclamation. Although similar in intention to ASA’s six years prior, the Bangkok Declaration of August 196713 that founded ASEAN affirmed a broader regional unity on economic and social issues, and signaled a wider political interest in the neutrality of member states in the context of the Cold War.14 That, this time, the regional impulse resulted in a lasting organization does not suggest the disparate interests, distrust, or indeed conflict among its members disappeared in 1967. At the time many external observers saw this new organization as likely to be another short-​lived manifestation of fleeting elite interests.15 For many, the region remained too socially and politically diverse, its lingering territorial disputes too divisive, and its member states too weak, ineffectual, and inward-​looking for a regional organizational to be of much consequence.16 The establishment of ASEAN was made possible by shifting political priorities within would-​be member states and shared threat perceptions.17 A change of leadership in both Indonesia and the Philippines brought the possibility of cooperation among these states, while the American war in Vietnam bolstered the growing interest in regional unity to balance against 11 Ba, [Re]Negotiating, ­chapter 2. 12 Ba, [Re]Negotiating, 44–​45. 13 Association of Southeast Asian Nations, “The ASEAN Declaration (Bangkok Declaration). Bangkok, August 8, 1967, http://​www.asean.org/​news/​item/​the-​asean-​decl​arat​ion-​bang​kok-​decl​ arat​ion. 14 See Pollard, “ASA and ASEAN,” 254. 15 See Ba, [Re]Negotiating, 43. 16 This claim persists still in some corners of ASEAN studies. See David Martin Jones and M. L. R. Smith, ASEAN and East Asian International Relations: Regional Delusion (Cheltenham: Edward Elgar, 2006), especially c­ hapter 2. 17 See Acharya, “Collective Identity,” 203–​205; Amer, “Expanding ASEAN’s Conflict Management Framework,” 34–​35.

94  Practicing Peace external influence. More important, however, was a shared perception of internal threats to the political stability of these still nascent states. It was the growing threat of communist revolution in Indonesia and Suharto’s rise to power that shaped elite interest in devising a bulwark against both Chinese and US influence in Southeast Asia and in an interstate means of maintaining national economic and political stability.18 Collectively, regional states sought to legitimize state-​led economic development and domestic political consolidation, and also ensure regional security with less reliance on external powers.19 In short, ASEAN’s creation was driven less by friendship than by fear. The core aims of the organization were articulated in the founding Declaration. Therein, the five founding members agreed to “to accelerate the economic growth, social progress, and cultural development in the region through joint endeavors in the spirit of equality and partnership in order to strengthen the foundation for a prosperous and peaceful community of Southeast Asian Nations.”20 Centrally, the Declaration and subsequent 1976 Treaty of Amity and Cooperation (TAC)21 affirmed the interrelated principles of noninterference and national sovereignty of member states. Many observers have recognized that while the aim in regionalizing interstate relations may be similar to the European experience at the time, the means that ASEAN members assumed necessary to do so were rather distinct.22 The organization was envisioned as a means to entrench member state sovereignty, rather than bend it in the name of economic integration. As Michael Leifer observes, from its emergence ASEAN demonstrates “a strong disposition against any supranational tendency” which had been observed in Europe.23 Instead, since its inception, ASEAN has relied on procedural norms of informal, private dialogue rather than formal or public arbitration and treaty-​ making to achieve the peaceful settlement of regional disputes and protect the sovereignty of member states.24 For many observers external to the 18 See Ba, [Re]Negotiating, 49–​51; Jones and Smith, ASEAN and East Asian International Relations, 45–​47; Rattasenvee, “Leadership in ASEAN,” 115; Stubbs, “The ASEAN Alternative?,” 456. 19 Jones and Smith, ASEAN and East Asian International Relations, 46; Smith, “Indonesia’s Role in ASEAN,” 240–​241. 20 ASEAN, “Bangkok Declaration.” 21 ASEAN, “Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in Southeast Asia,” Indonesia, February 24, 1976, http://​www.asean.org/​news/​item/​tre​aty-​of-​amity-​and-​coop​erat​ion-​in-​southe​ast-​asia-​indone​sia-​ 24-​febru​ary-​1976-​3. 22 See Stubbs, “The ASEAN Alternative?” 23 Michael Leifer, ASEAN and the Security of South-​East Asia (New York City: Routledge, 1989) 109. See also Kivimäki, “Power, Interest or Culture,” 434. See also Kelly, “A ‘Confucian Long Peace.’ ” 24 See Ba, [Re]Negotiating; Katsumata, “Establishment of the ASEAN Regional Forum”; Stubbs, “The ASEAN Alternative?”

Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia  95 region, this informal and rather insular form of governance undercuts its prospects for realizing its goals of peace and prosperity.25 ASEAN’s closed and elitist nature abhors public participation and a plurality of voices, often assumed necessary to bind state interests and restrict conflict.26 Yet ASEAN has relied on these informal foundations since its inception and has not only persisted but also expanded its mandate and its organizational form and footprint in the region. One important step in this regard was the effort to underscore regional neutrality during the Cold War. ASEAN member states articulated this position the 1971 declaration of the Zone of Peace, Freedom, and Neutrality (ZOPFAN), which explicitly affirmed the region’s neutrality. The declaration signaled a shift toward an explicitly political regional organization and laid the foundations for subsequent attempts at fostering political unity and security cooperation.27 Most important in this regard were those produced during the first ASEAN Summit in 1976, including the Declaration of ASEAN Concord (Bali I) and, of particular and lasting importance, the TAC. The TAC affirmed principles established in the Charter, including the centrality of national independence, noninterference, and the peaceful settlement of disputes to the organization (Chapter 1 Article 2). It also articulated the means by which ASEAN would attempt to uphold these principles, through informal cooperation (Chapter 3) and the possibility of convening a High Council to resolve territorial disputes (Chapter 4). However, this mechanism, as I explore below, has not been used by member states to date. The principles of regional relations established and affirmed in the Declaration and TAC were to be—​and remain—​the core prescriptive norms and principles by which regional crises and conflicts would be managed and regionalism pursued. The late 1960s and 1970s, then, show increasing organizational unity, from a pledge to cooperate to the codification of regional norms and principles. At the same time, however, while a bulwark of shared norms was advanced and cooperation deepened, regional conflict did not disappear. The decades after ASEAN’s founding did not strictly lead to a zone of peace, if we define peace as an absence of militarized violence among states. Taking a broader view of conflict in the region, there were 105 miltarized 25 E.g., Jones and Smith, “Making Process, Not Progress.” 26 See Collins, “Forming a Security Community”; Ba, [Re]Negotiating. 27 See Kei Koga, “Institutional Transformation of ASEAN: ZOPFAN, TAC, and the Bali Concord I in 1968–​1976,” Pacific Review 27, no. 5 (2014): 729–​753.

96  Practicing Peace 5 4 3 2 1 1946

1956

1966

1976

1986

1996

2006

Figure 4.1.  Militarized Interstate Disputes of Southeast Asian States, 1946–​2010

interstate discputes (MIDs) between Southeast Asian states from 1946 to 2010. These are presented in Figure 4.1, with each point indicating at least one MID in a given year. The region here is defined as the current 10 member states of ASEAN. These conflicts are noted, admittedly crudely, by reference to the aggregated level of hostility. These are ordered from 1 to 5. Five (n =​3) denotes war, with 1000 +​casualties; 4 (n =​78) the use of force; 3 (n =​23) the display of the use of force; and 2 (n =​1) the threat of the use of force (level 1, which is not represented, notes disputes with no militarized action). Figure 4.1 underscores two realities. First, as explored in more detail in ­chapter 1, a focus on “war” alone belies the prevalence of violent interstate conflict among regional states in Southeast Asia. Interstate militarized violence appears a persistent reality of regional relations throughout the 1960s, a decade which scholars have recognized as a particularly “warlike” period of the region—​and into the years after the founding of ASEAN in 1967.28 In particular, the 78 level 4 MIDs indicate a pervasive level of interstate conflict in the region throughout this period. These episodes include acts of seizure, attacks, and military clashes—​conflictual relations between states that, while short of war, indicate pervasive and violent militarized interstate conflict. Moreover, of the 105 MIDs during this period, 26 are between formal members of ASEAN, including 18 level 4 and 8 level 3 disputes. This is depicted in Figure 4.2. While the fatalities in these disputes were certainly limited, given this use of force it is misleading to assume, as a number of rather optimistic accounts have, that “there has been no conflict between ASEAN members during its

28 Acharya, Constructing a Security Community, 46; Kivimäki, “The Long Peace,” 19.

Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia  97 5 4 3 2 1 1967

1972

1977

1982

1987

1992

1997

2002

2007

Figure 4.2.  Intra-​ASEAN Militarized Disputes by Intensity Level, 1967–​2010

existence.”29 This is not the case. There has been pervasive conflict at levels below that of war. Second, these figures also call into question claims from some scholars that assert a sharp, pacific shift in regional relations after the founding of ASEAN in 1967.30 A “major shift in the regional security environment” after ASEAN’s founding in 1967 is not easily observable through this measure.31 As Figure 4.2 shows, there were 28 intraregional MIDs (23 of which were level 4 or higher) in the 10 years prior to ASEAN’s founding (1958–​1967), and 20 (14 of which were level 4 or higher) in the 10 years (1968–​1977) after. While war may be an aberration, militarized interstate violence is not. Moreover, many of the divisive territorial claims between ASEAN members remain unsettled. These include territorial disputes between Malaysia and Singapore over Pedra Branca; Indonesia and Malaysia over the Sipadan and Ligitan Islands; Indonesia and the Philippines over the Miatan Islands; Malaysia and both Indonesia and the Philippines over Sabah; and Malaysia, Vietnam, and the Philippines over the Spratly Islands.32 Beyond ASEAN members, the most prominent regional tension has been the recurrent conflict and decade-​ long war from 1978 to 1989 between Cambodia and Vietnam. While neither state was yet an ASEAN member, the conflict was a threat to the stability of Southeast Asia and ASEAN member states. In short, membership in ASEAN

29 Mark Beeson, Institutions of the Asia Pacific: ASEAN, APEC and Beyond (New York City: Routledge, 2009), 17. 30 Acharya, Constructing a Security Community, 46; Ba, [Re]Negotiating, 48; Kivimäki, “The Long Peace,” 19. 31 Acharya, Constructing a Security Community, 4. 32 See Kivimäki, “The Long Peace,” 10–​11; Wain, “Latent Danger,” 54–​55.

98  Practicing Peace may have limited major conflict, but does not mean a lack of violence among members. Figures 4.1 and 4.2 also show that this conflictual peace continued into the 1990s and 2000s as ASEAN membership expanded. Vietnam ascended to the organization in 1995, Laos and Myanmar in 1997, and Cambodia in 1999. Not only did membership expand but regional organizational ties deepened. The 2007 ASEAN Charter formalized the organization and underscored established regional norms and principles.33 The document affirmed ASEAN principles of national independence, noninterference, and the peaceful settlement of disputes previously codified by the TAC (Article 2.2), and outlined the processual means to further regionalization. The Charter pledged greater economic, social, and political-​security cooperation and laid the foundations for the ASEAN Community of 2015, an ambitious and ongoing project of regional integration across economic, political, and cultural dimensions. These developments and the longevity of the organization itself have surprised many of ASEAN’s critics. As some observers suggest, “Given the failed cooperative ventures that preceded ASEAN, the mere fact that it survived intact for more than a decade testified to some sort of minimalist success.”34 Not only has ASEAN survived, but it has evolved and deepened regional cooperation for more than half a century.35 This success, however, has indeed been limited.36 ASEAN pledges of peace have not been realized in full, and the stark claims by scholars of a lasting ASEAN peace appear overstated. Given the persistent interstate conflict alongside the expansion of regional cooperation, it is clear the region has experienced a conflictual peace. This reality begs examination of how this conflictual peace is practiced in the region. Before doing so, I pause to underscore three important trends in the history of conflict and cooperation in Southeast Asia.

33 See Katja Freistein, “A Living Document: Promises of the ASEAN Charter,” Pacific Review 26, no. 4 (2013): 407–​429. 34 Jones and Smith, ASEAN and East Asian International Relations, 47. 35 See Donald K. Emmerson, “ASEAN between China and America: Is It Time to Try Horsing the Cow?” TRaNS: Trans-​Regional and -​National Studies of Southeast Asia 5, no. 1 (2017), 1–​23; Donald K. Emmerson, “Mapping ASEAN’s Futures,” Contemporary Southeast Asia: A Journal of International & Strategic Affairs 39, no. 2 (2017): 280–​287; Shaun Narine, The New ASEAN in Asia Pacific and Beyond (Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 2018). 36 See also Ian Storey, “ASEAN’s Failing Grade in the South China Sea,” in International Relations and Asia’s Southern Tier: ASEAN, Australia, and India, eds. Gilbert Rozman and Joseph Chinyoung Liow (Singapore: Palgrave Macmillan, 2018): 111–​124.

Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia  99 First, this is a region of diverse states and divisive national interests that have often been expressed through regional confrontation and conflict. While nothing unique, surely, even the more recent history of regional relations underscores only a relative long regional peace, with pervasive violence among these states. Second, this history showcases regional relations expressed through organized—​if particular—​means. ASEAN is the successor of a number of attempts at fostering regional cooperation as a means to facilitate national economic and political development, and to ensure regional stability and national independence. Third, however, it underscores the particularities of regional relations. War is rare. Conflict is widespread. And, in practice, institutionalized diplomacy within and beyond ASEAN has been largely informal, resting on “cheap talk” and pledges over formal treaty-​making and the use of formalized or legalized dispute settlement mechanisms.37 Regional elites have followed what works in and through practice for them. In what follows, I explore the habitual, practical, and dispositional qualities of regional relations in Southeast Asia and outline what role they play in the long and conflictual peace here.

The Habitual Disposition of Southeast Asian Conflict Management and Regionalism To explore regional habitual dispositions and their possible role in this long and conflictual peace, I turn now to the particularities of regional conflict management and regionalism here, starting with the norms and principles of regional cooperation in Southeast Asia. This is the focus of long-​established social constructivist research examining regional relations. Acharya, foremost among many, articulates the core norms and principles of Southeast Asian diplomacy as those found within the 1967 Bangkok Declaration, which have been reiterated and reified in the decades following.38 These include the nonuse of force, pacific dispute settlement, noninterference, regional autonomy and regional solutions to regional problems, and rejection of multilateral military pacts, as well as a broader set of sociocultural norms centered on informality, consultation and consensus, and organizational minimalism.



37 Jones and Smith, “Making Process, Not Progress.” See also Ba, [Re]Negotiating, 35–​36. 38 See Acharya, Constructing a Security Community, 43–​68.

100  Practicing Peace However, recognizing the existence of norms codified within organizational documents tells us little of practice of regional relations. Acharya himself finds that there remains “considerable room for doubt” whether ASEAN’s principles and norms—​the so-​called ASEAN way—​have been upheld in practice.39 Ba offers a similar caution. She underscores that it is “important to distinguish between ASEAN norms—​or more accurately, norms between ASEAN’s founding members—​and the founding members’ aspiration that those norms form the basis for a wider, all-​embracing Southeast Asian community.”40 This is particularly important given the rhetorical turn to espouse the importance of “ASEAN way” in service of myriad behaviors and interests.41 As explored in ­chapter 3, a focus on the habitual and practical aspects of regional diplomacy takes our analysis of conflict management and the foundations of conflictual peace beyond attention to the codified norms of appropriate conduct, and requires a particular interpretivist methodology centered on in-​depth interviews with regional practitioners themselves. From this vantage point, as will be demonstrated, there are important differences between norms referenced in the founding Declaration of 1967 or the Charter signed forty years later, and the practices that are enacted and encountered daily as self-​evident by regional practitioners. It is the latter that are most consequential for social action and most productive of patterns of interstate relations. To examine these dynamics, I begin by exploring their origins.

Origins As ­chapter 2 argued, habitual dispositions emerge from precedent and iteration. They have their origins in established practices of communities and are transmitted and internalized within the bounds of a particular institutional contexts by authoritative actors. In this way, they are not some culturally essentialized qualities of states or societies, but rather distinctive qualities of varied institutional contexts. Once pushed into the cognitive background through their practice over time within institutionalized settings—​from formal organizations to wider networks of diplomatic interaction—​these 39 Acharya, Constructing a Security Community, 63. 40 Alice D. Ba, “On Norms, Rule Breaking, and Security Communities: A Constructivist Response,” International Relations of the Asia-​Pacific 5, no. 2 (2005): 257. 41 See Martel and Glas, “The Contested Meaning-​Making.”

Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia  101 qualities of communities circumscribe thinking and doing and come to define normal and natural relations for a community. In Southeast Asian diplomacy, these habitual qualities of interstate diplomacy are apparent within the confines of a discrete community of practice within and around ASEAN. As explored, a community of practice is a relatively bounded group of individuals who share joint enterprise and like-​ mindedness, make use of common repertoires or tools of action, and engage in dense and repeated interactions.42 Regional diplomats within and beyond the confines of ASEAN are one such community. The ASEAN community of practice is a diverse but relatively bounded group of officials. These include those within the Secretariat in Jakarta, member state foreign ministry officials and staff in ASEAN working groups, permanent representatives operating alongside the ASEC, and a host of technocratic specialists working within the organization through ASEAN’s summitry and other institutional channels.43 As I show below, these officials recognize themselves as part a particular regional community and see themselves as meaningfully distinct from extraregional actors, including those they interact with regularly through ASEAN’s dialogue partner initiative. These ASEAN community members make use of institutional tools and resources, centrally around rhetorical claims as to the competent enactment of ASEAN’s norms and principles. To them, this both differentiates and unifies them as a community of practice distinct from others. These officials also recognize and laud the density and importance of their diplomatic interactions, understanding themselves to be part of a distinctive and important community of regionalism. In short, they are and see themselves as a community of diplomatic practice. As this chapter aims to show, within this community particular and collectively held understandings have been reified in and through daily interactions within the informal and formal channels of ASEAN diplomacy. However, the community’s particular practices, such as informal consensus-​seeking, did not emerge in a vacuum. They align with established notions of efficacy and appropriateness among members of the community of practice. The existence of distinctive cognitive or normative priors of regional officials have been well studied.44 In an oft-​cited example, the ASEAN understanding and practice of consensus-​seeking appears to align with traditional 42 Adler, Communitarian International Relations; Adler, World Ordering; Bueger, “Practices, Norms, and the Theory”; Glas, “African Union Security Culture”; Wenger, Communities of Practice. 43 See Glas and Balogun, “Norms in Practice,” 1021. 44 Acharya, “How Ideas Spread”; Coe, Sovereignty in the South.

102  Practicing Peace Indonesian societal practices of musjawarah (consultation) and mufakat (consensus).45 Similarly, scholars often highlight the role of common and shared regional experiences with colonialism and the threat of Chinese domination, which has generated both an apprehension toward formal organizational mechanisms and collective support for principles of noninterference and sovereignty.46 Further, ASEAN as an organizational setting is often recognized for its particularly insular level of decision-​making.47 This is the very setting in which practices are likely to see habituation. Here, the “peculiar, small world that multilateral diplomats inhabit” is just that, and the transmission of habitual dispositions likely.48 While the origins of habitual qualities of relations likely rest in common experience, it is their practice by leading regional states that has reified them as given qualities of regional relations. My focus is on how these elements of regional relations are understood and enacted by members of the regional community of practice themselves, less an account of their origins. In this regard Indonesia, and its officials within the ASEAN community of practice, is of particular importance. For many observers Indonesia has been the primus inter pares in terms of political security integration within the region, with Indonesian leaders and diplomatic officials often offering the loudest voice and driving the scope and speed of regionalism in Southeast Asia.49 This is clear to interviewees within the region and beyond. In the words of one non-​Indonesian permanent representative, Indonesia has been a “natural leader” throughout the history of ASEAN, particularly in terms of security and political issues.50 In the view of another regional official, Indonesia “always takes the lead, [and has] from the 45 Acharya, “Collective Identity,” 211–​212; Almonte, “Ensuring Security,” 81; Alice D. Ba, “The Association of Southeast Asian Nations: Between Internal and External Legitimacy,” in Legitimating International Organizations, ed. Dominik Zaum (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), 132–​161, 145–​146; Beeson, Institutions of the Asia Pacific, 21; Collins, Building a People-​Oriented Security Community, 35–​36; Kahler, “Legalization as Strategy,” 552. 46 Acharya, “How Ideas Spread”; Ba, “The Association of Southeast Asian Nations”; Haacke, ASEAN’s Diplomatic and Security Culture; Womack, Brantly, “China as a Normative Foreign Policy Actor,” in Who Is a Normative Foreign Policy Actor? The European Community and Its Global Partners, ed. N. Tocci (Brussels: Centre for European Policy Studies, 2008), 265–​299. 47 Ba, “Who Is Socializing Whom?,” 168–​169, 174–​175; Katsumata, “Establishment of the ASEAN Regional Forum,” 185–​186; Kivimäki, “Long Peace,” 14. 48 Pouliot, “Diplomats as Permanent Representatives,” 546. 49 Collins, “Bringing Communities Back,” 277. See also Rattanasevee, “Leadership in ASEAN”; Smith, “Indonesia’s Role in ASEAN”; Thompson “Leadership and Dependency.” 50 Interview with ASEAN Permanent Representative, Jakarta, June 4, 2019. She, like many other regional officials, recognizes that Singapore has been a leading state in terms of economic issues throughout ASEAN’s history. As noted in ­chapter 2, interviewees are generally anonymous and referred to using female pronouns. Some dates, locations, and/​or nationality have been withheld to ensure anonymity.

Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia  103 beginning [of ASEAN].”51 An Indonesian official echoed this as well, noting that “Indonesia is the natural leader of ASEAN. We do not consider ourselves the leader of ASEAN, it is just that we . . .”52 She was unable to and did not finish her thought. But the notion is clear. Many Indonesian officials consider themselves part of a leading state within the organization, even if they are unable or uncomfortable articulating this to others, particularly those external to the region.53 Other officials note that Indonesia may not be a leader within the organization at all times or in all issues areas, but rather emerges as a “de facto leader” at times of crisis, “like border disputes” as one ASEC official suggested.54 Extraregional officials working alongside ASEAN have similarly recognized that, in the words of one European official, Indonesia is “a kind of de facto leader because of its size. And it certainly thinks it is so.”55 Attention, then, to the thinking and behavior of Indonesian officials within this community may be of particular importance when investigating the role of a distinctive habitual disposition on conflict management in the region. The remainder of this chapter explores first the existence and then the effect of a habitual disposition of Southeast Asian diplomatic relations. Making use of the framework developed in the preceding chapters, I draw attention to the practices of regional relations within the Southeast Asian diplomatic community and view regional relations from the perspective of these officials themselves as they respond to crises and pursue regionalism.

The Particularities of the Southeast Asian Habitual Disposition Seven qualities constitute the diplomatic habitual disposition of Southeast Asia. There are three interrelated processual attributes, including a particular practice of consensus, the turn to informal dialogue, and a privileging of process over substance. Similarly, in terms of the content or substance of these dispositional qualities there are three core elements, including thinking from 51 Interview, regional state official, June 2014. 52 Interview with Indonesian official, June 2014. 53 See also Dewi Fortuna Anwar, “ASEAN and Indonesia: Some Reflections,” Asian Journal of Political Science 5, no. 1 (1997): 20–​34; Christopher B. Roberts and Erlina Widyaningsih, “Indonesian Leadership in ASEAN: Mediation, Agency and Extra-​ Regional Diplomacy,” in Indonesia’s Ascent: Power, Leadership, and the Regional Order, eds. Christopher B. Roberts, Ahmad D. Habir, and Leonard C. Sebastian (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015), 264–​286. 54 Interview with ASEC official, Jakarta, June 8, 2014. 55 Interview with European official, Jakarta, July 17, 2014.

104  Practicing Peace noninterference, an inherent recognition of equality among member states, and the importance of face-​saving. The seventh habitual element, a proclivity toward informal pacific dispute settlement, blurs the analytic divide between process and content. Many of these attributes exist as codified norms or principles within and beyond the region—​noninterference or pacific dispute settlement, for example. However, as c­ hapter 2 explored, how norms and principles are understood and enacted is not given from their codification or institutionalization. Rather, attention must be paid to how community members themselves understand and enact them as a matter of course. It is the particularity of their understanding and the automaticity of their enactment that most consequentially shapes how and why regional relations unfold the way they do in Southeast Asia. Taken together, these seven deeply ingrained qualities of regional diplomacy make up the Southeast Asian habitual disposition and shape how regional crises and conflicts are understood and responded to, and how regionalism unfolds more generally. I unpack each of these particular qualities of regional relations in turn here.

Habituated Processes in Southeast Asian Diplomacy Consensus-​based decision-​making is a fundamental principle of Southeast Asian regionalism. It has undergirded the contours of ASEAN’s development since its inception, shaping what is possible and not for the organization and its members. Its centrality as a prescriptive norm for the organization is clear from the founding Declaration to the 2003 Bali Concord II and 2007 Charter, and it is engrained in more mundane aspects of ASEAN as well, including explicit reference in the Connectivity Coordinating Committee (2011) and the yet to be utilized Protocol on Enhanced Dispute Settlement Mechanism (2004). More importantly, however, consensus-​based decision-​making is a process, and one that is assumed as a given in and through daily practice within the Southeast Asian community of practice. For officials here, consensus is the foundational process on which regionalism and ASEAN’s responses to crises rest. As one Thai diplomat described it, consensus is “the only game in town.”56 A senior Malaysian diplomat echoed this reality, and the underlying sense of community that makes it possible, when she suggested that it

56 Interview with Thai official, Jakarta, July 1, 2014.

Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia  105 was simply “how we play our game.”57 For members of the Southeast Asian community of practice, this is foundational to their sense of normal and natural regional interaction. These statements parallel the suggestion that the background knowledge that undergirds socially meaningful practice is best understood as a particular “sense of the game.”58 Consensus is how members of this community of practice manage regional issues, including conflict. However, ASEAN’s is a particular practice of consensus. Simply acknowledging the existence of this norm does little to aid in our understanding of how or if it shapes regional conflict management and regionalism. That the norm alone does not speak to behavior was made clear through conversations with officials who engage the regional community of practice as external others. One European diplomat with years of experience working alongside ASEAN noted that the practice of consensus in the ASEAN context is distinct from what, in her view, it ought to be. While she and her European colleagues understood consensus to mean processes of deliberation, persuasion, and formal, majority voting on issues, she recognized that her ASEAN counterparts understood it rather differently. In her words, ASEAN’s is not “procedural consensus in a strict sense.”59 From her perspective, the regional practice is divorced from the European principle of the same name. ASEAN consensus is a distinct and intrinsic understanding of what the norm means in and through practice. For many members of the Southeast Asian community of diplomatic practice, just what consensus means is a challenge to articulate, even if they recognize consensus as important to “how they play their game.” For many, it appears simply a given; a lived and practiced sensibility central to how they understand and engage with challenges. When pushed to explain how or why consensus unfolds, a number of Southeast Asian practitioners explicitly cite “musyawarah dan mufakat”—​the notion that consultation produces consensus through discussion—​in their articulations of the norm, and often note its historical and cultural roots in the region. Central to this understanding, and contrary to the European account, is that consensus is sought before formal deliberation rather than through it. As another European official explained, among ASEAN states they “do not search for compromise. There is either general agreement from the drafting of the agenda—​from



57 Interview with Malaysian official, Jakarta, July 22, 2014. 58 Pouliot, “The Logic of Practicality,” 275.

59 Interview with European official, Jakarta, July 17, 2014.

106  Practicing Peace the beginning—​or they just drop it [an issue].”60 Moreover, the building of consensus among regional states is done intuitively, rather than explicitly. A senior Indonesian diplomat recalled this practice in daily action. She noted that upon entering a meeting she “will map the room and [know] this and this country will be supportive of our idea, and this and this will not.”61 She knows prior to her interactions what will be possible, and what will not. It is assumed that pushing a controversial issue or agenda is simply not possible. This inherent assumption of how the process of cooperation and consultation will and ought to unfold in the ASEAN context is widely held within the community of practice. One of the results of this reality is a reluctance to pursue issues of apparent national importance when deemed outside of possible consensus prior to discussion and debate.62 An illustration of this reality in the summer of 2014 was the pressure within some member states to produce a common ASEAN statement regarding the Russian annexation of Crimea. The annexation coincided with a swell of interest at the ASEC in making good on the 2011 Bali Concord III’s ambition to collectively “promote the role of the ASEAN Community in the global community of nations.” This ambitious outward-​facing orientation was a novel notion for the organization, and in 2014 there appeared a potential means to pursue it. As one ASEC official recalled, some member states wished to see “a statement from ASEAN, not to criticize [Russia], but to state a[n ASEAN] position.”63 However, as she remarked, “I knew, sitting in the back there listening to this discussion, that it is not going to fly. After a few years in the Secretariat, you know.” What she knew was that there was no consensus at the onset and the conversation was over before it started. There was no collective ASEAN statement. This intimate knowledge of what is possible and not given prior consensus among member states was a reoccurring if inarticulate reality for many practitioners. This reality was also clear from conversations regarding the South China Sea disputes, a particularly long running and divisive issue within and among ASEAN members. In interviews with Committee of Permanent Representative (CPR) and ASEC officials privy to these conversations, it is clear that prior consensus shapes how regional officials understand and 60 Interview with European official, Jakarta, July 17, 2014. 61 Interview with Indonesian official, Jakarta, June 17, 2014. 62 See also Acharya, Constructing a Security Community, 44; Beeson, Institutions of the Asia Pacific, 21. 63 Interview with ASEAN official, Jakarta, July 16, 2014.

Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia  107 respond to this important regional concern. In one interview, I asked an ASEC official if she heard or engaged in dialogue on the issue: “No. They just know their positions. Everyone knows the positions [of member states], so we don’t have to ask. Instead, we have to focus on the harmless things . . . the things that are very technical, but harmless. I worked for [many] years on the political side [of ASEAN] and that is what happens.”64 This was echoed by a permanent representative who suggested that on such potentially sensitive issues, “We [in the CPR] know the position of each state. We don’t need to say it or be told it. We know it. So that makes it easier.”65 The inherent knowledge ASEAN officials, from the ASEC to member states, carry with them and the prior consensus they pursue shapes and delimits thinking and action. An interview with two other senior ASEC officials echoed this sentiment.66 As one explained, Let’s say, I am coming from country “A” and I propose that I want to do “this” and I am [supported] by two other countries. Then seven [countries] don’t think that this is good for us, because we’ve had problem in this way or in that way. Then, we leave it at that. We don’t come and show off or push for “yes” or “no.” Within a meeting we can already feel it, whether it is sellable or not sellable. I don’t think the country proposing it, after looking at seven countries, is going to be comfortable with it. They know this. This is how we work. This is probably what they call the ASEAN way.

At this point a second ASEC official interrupted to reinforce the point: “Even if one country feels uncomfortable with your proposal, you have to understand that.” In both statements, consensus-​seeking is a feeling of what others are comfortable with. In this example, even though a number of states may have wished to make a minor and symbolic statement upholding their view of both the importance of territorial sovereignty internationally and the precedent-​setting Bali Concord III, with any hesitation, there was no debate or discussion. This is the inherent and particular practice of prior consensus that Southeast Asian diplomacy rests on. In practice, it is something member states feel and that they think from rather than about. Deviations from it, as we can see, do exist. But they are seen as deviations from what is natural and



64 Interview with former ASEAN official, Jakarta, June 22, 2019.

65 Interview with ASEAN Permanent Representative, Jakarta, June 11, 2019. 66 Interview with two ASEAN officials, Jakarta, July 7, 2014.

108  Practicing Peace normal—​and from what is assumed not only the “only game in town” but also a fundamentally effective one. In the words of one permanent representative, “This decision by consensus works . . . it works for all. It is due to the consensus that we are together.”67 More expansively, as the first ASEC official in this conversation continued, “that [practice of prior consensus] has allowed ASEAN to work for the last 47 years.” There is a feeling or an inherent and articulate knowledge that comes from lived experience in and of the Southeast Asian community of practice. The centrality of this lived and learned feeling was brought into further focus in an interview with the first Indonesian permanent representative to ASEAN, Ambassador I Gede Ngurah Swajaya, who admonished me, as a Canadian, for Canada not having a permanent mission to ASEAN in 2014.68 Without a mission dedicated to continual and face-​to-​face interaction with the ASEC, he was skeptical of the value of Canada as a dialogue partner and the depth of knowledge and contributions Canadian officials could offer. In his view, “You can’t attend an hour and a half ministerial meeting and understand [regional relations].”69 As the ambassador continued, “Sometimes it is very difficult to explain [this] to [foreign] politicians. Unless they have been to this region and this part of the region [the ASEC itself], then they understand. For those who have never been here, it will not be easy to understand.” To understand regional relations, or feel them, they had to be lived. For officials who do so, the effect of this lived experience is to bind together the Southeast Asian community of practice. Therein, ASEAN’s practice of consensus circumscribes the issues that are debated and discussed, and, as will be explored, make possible a toleration of violence within the region. For many non-​ASEAN diplomatic officials in the region, who confront Southeast Asian diplomacy but who do not live it, ASEAN’s practice of consensus is not normal, natural, or effective but rather incompetent. An American official brought into relief her divergent understanding of the norm of consensus-​based decision-​making and the perceived challenges of the Southeast Asian understanding: “It is almost never an ‘I’m adamant against it!’ But an ‘Oh, I’m not comfortable with that.’ And that is harder to deal with.”70 In her view, this was a problem. It hindered which issues were 67 Interview with ASEAN permanent representative, Jakarta, June 4, 2019. 68 While Canada appointed an ambassador to ASEAN in 2009, it was not until 2016 that it opened a permanent mission to ASEAN. 69 Interview with Ambassador I Gede Ngurah Swajaya, Jakarta, July 30, 2014. 70 Interview with American official, Jakarta, July 3, 2014.

Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia  109 discussed and precluded detailed and productive dialogue. Her solution was not a change in ASEAN’s norms or principles, but a change in how ASEAN’s norm and principle of consensus was understood and practiced. As she continued, “they [ASEAN states] are going to have to get more comfortable getting on the phone and talking with one another and saying look: ‘can we work this out’ in the normal way that diplomacy works” (emphasis added). In her view, the practice of prior consensus within the ASEAN community of practice is not the “normal way that diplomacy works.” Rather, it is a “frustrating” and pervasive feature of regional diplomacy.71 Similarly, a European Union official remarked that it is “best to define something in reference to what it is not” and ASEAN “is not the EU—​black is not white.”72 In these views from beyond the regional community of practice, the consensus process within Southeast Asian diplomacy is distinctive and problematic. This twofold suggestion—​the naturalness of consensus for regional practitioners and opposite view for nonregional practitioners—​underscores the habitual quality of this regional practice, and also serves to further underscore the existence and bounds of a particular Southeast Asian community of practice. Second, and interrelatedly, there is an inherent focus on the importance of process over result that has been habituated among the community of practice and is expressed through a third element, a preference for procedural informality. In a common refrain among regional interviewees within the organization and working alongside it, Dewi Fortuna Anwar, then a prominent advisor to the Indonesian vice president, brought these backgrounded practices to the fore when she suggested that in ASEAN “you don’t set the goals. The journey is the important thing.”73 This was echoed by a former deputy secretary general of ASEAN who suggested, “ASEAN is a marathon without an end. You must keep on going.”74 The core means of moving ahead on this journey is through informal dialogue among members. In the words of one ASEC official, to work effectively within ASEAN, regional officials “have to be informal, very informal. No tie. Or, say, ‘Let’s have a drink and discuss this.’ Then, you can talk.”75 This focus on informality and process is widely observed, and many scholars highlight how these dispositional traits inform wider ASEAN-​led regional

71 Interview with American official, Jakarta, July 3, 2014. 72 Interview with EU official, Jakarta, July 17, 2014.

73 Interview with Dewi Fortuna Anwar, Jakarta, June 25, 2014.

74 Interview with former deputy secretary general, Jakarta, June 2019. 75 Interview with ASEC official, Jakarta, June 19, 2019.

110  Practicing Peace institutions as well.76 This includes the design of the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF) in 1994 and Asia-​Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), founded in 1989, a notoriously informal institution composed of “four adjectives in search of a noun” in the words of then Australian Foreign Minister Gareth Evans.77 The recurrent and rather automatic turn to informality in dialogue is a prominent feature in ASEAN thinking and behavior, from officials within member state foreign ministries to those within the increasingly formalized ASEC itself. This recurrent facet of ASEAN practice is apparent across issue areas as well, from contentious security issues to economic concerns. This was raised in detail by many interviewees within ASEAN and adjacent to it. For example, many interviewees adopted similar language articulate and defend what I perceived to be the slow and incomplete realization of the ASEAN Community of 2015. In doing so, many contrasted their ASEAN experience around integration and security cooperation with perceptions of European experiences. According to many Southeast Asian regional officials, community-​building is an amorphous “process.” In dismissive words, one Indonesian official reflected on the critique of extraregional officials on the lack of progress and noted that “we’ll figure that out later.”78 Across interviews it was clear that despite the thresholds and specifics of economic (and to some extent political) integration noted in the 2009 Roadmap for an ASEAN Community there was a generalized sense that its completion meant less than the undertaking. As former Indonesian Foreign Minister Hassan Wirajuda, whose tenure spans the development of the Community framework, remarked: “when people criticize that ASEAN will not be able to implement the community standards by 2015 . . . it is not the case. This is a process. It’s not that [by] January 2016, it must be one hundred percent.”79 This was echoed by an ASEC staff member, who suggested the Community is “not an event; it’s a process,”80 while another suggested observers should expect, in her words, “no [big] bang” on January 1, 2016, when the Community was ushered in.81 Indeed there was no pivotal change in the regional community in 2016 with the onset of the ASEAN Community. Rather, this has been a messy, gradual, and often informal process. As a senior ASEC official noted, 76 See Seng Tan, Multilateral Asian Security Architecture: Non-​ASEAN Stakeholders (New York City: Routledge, 2016), 20–​21, 51–​52. 77 Quoted in Tan, Multilateral Asian Security, 52. 78 Interview with Indonesian official, Jakarta, June 2014. 79 Interview with Foreign Minister Hassan Wirajuda, Jakarta, July 24, 2014. 80 Interview with ASEAN official, Jakarta, June 9, 2014. 81 Interview with ASEAN official, Jakarta, July 4, 2014.

Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia  111 the whole Community-​building process is interpreted in different ways. How deep you want to get into it, or how much under the surface you want to take it [integration], really depends on the sectors. You’d be surprised: the sectors define what it is. They may say, “what we see in the Blueprint is unachievable, and we don’t know who put it there,” and they may just go and do something else.82

For the dialogue partners, this inherent assumption of informality and the natural focus on process over precise outcome is puzzling, and problematic. Rather than an amorphous process, for European officials, in particular, community-​building including security cooperation and economic integration was often presented as end to be outlined and then realized. As one European official noted bluntly: “Process is a term used to mask ignorance.”83 In the view of another European working alongside ASEAN, the organization is simply “reactive,” “not driven by an agenda,” and “has no vision.”84 In her view, there was no set end to this “process” and no thinking analogous to the founders of the EU regionalism—​her assumed normal way that diplomacy works. This notion of the distinctly informal process of ASEAN community formation and cooperation was marked by non-​Europeans as well. As one American diplomat recalled, the “strongest words” she has heard stated to the CPR came from a Japanese ambassador during the annual and informal CPR consultation with dialogue partners after the establishment of the 2009 Roadmap. During the meeting, and echoing the sentiment of many dialogue partner representatives, the ambassador spoke with frustration. As the American recalled, the ambassador bluntly stated: “We [dialogue partners] don’t know what your [ASEAN] vision is long term; what you really want to be [as an organization]. And without that we are having a hard time thinking about how we are going to support you.”85 In the view of this American diplomat, this was a stark and blunt, but common concern among her extraregional colleagues, and again serves to bring the “normal way” ASEAN diplomacy works into juxtaposition. In all these accounts, actors external to the ASEAN community of practice recognize a lack of clear vision and a lack of real progress. They judge

82 Interview with ASEAN official, Jakarta, July 10, 2014.

83 Interview with European official, Jakarta, July 17, 2014. 84 Interview with EU official, Jakarta, July 17, 2014.

85 Interview with American official, Jakarta, July 3, 2014.

112  Practicing Peace this to be both abnormal and ineffective. For these dialogue partners, the ASEAN practice of informality and the natural focus on process over outcome is frustrating. This dispositional turn undercuts the utility of the carefully negotiated thresholds, many of which they helped to devise and monitor through financial support to the ASEC and the ASEAN Integration Monitoring Office (AIMO). However, for officials within the ASEAN community of practice, this is simply how the game is played, and known to be normal, natural, and effective. For many non-​member state diplomats, the ASEAN community’s focus on process and their turn to informal dialogue are not only abnormal and ineffective but also rather dangerous. One European official raised an example to illustrate her view. She suggested that Chinese claims in the South China Sea ought to have compelled change in ASEAN behavior and led to a collective reorientation to address the growing threat to members. This, of course, has not been the case.86 In her view, there is a “conceptual incapacity in ASEAN to understand what is at stake” in the South China Sea.87 In this view, ASEAN officials were fundamentally unable to conceptualize and respond to the threat as she, and her European colleagues, viewed they ought to. ASEAN thinking and behavior was not normal, and not effective. In her words, “The dragon that sits there is heavy and there is fire from its nose,” and yet regional unity in response is elusive. She continued, “If three or four European states had such an issue, we would come together.” For this official, “normal diplomacy” would produce a stronger and collective position. However, AESAN diplomacy—​resting on particular understandings and practices of consensus, informality, and process over substance—​restricts vision and action. These elements of the regional habitual disposition temper how states perceive risks and circumscribe responses to crises—​be it external threats to territorial sovereignty or intraregional border disputes. For regional practitioners, these three aspects of process are the normal way that diplomacy works, in practice. Through them, three other aspects of regional relations are known and enacted as normal and natural.

86 In November 2015, ASEAN defense ministers mirrored the July 2012 failure of foreign ministers to release a joint communiqué to conclude their annual meeting. On the more recent development, see Yeganeh Torbati and Trinna Leong, “ASEAN Defense Chiefs Fail to Agree on South China Sea Statement,” Reuters, November 4, 2015 https://​www.reut​ers.com/​arti​cle/​us-​asean-​malay​sia-​statem​ ent-​idUKKC​N0ST​07G2​0151​104. 87 Interview with European official, Jakarta, July 17, 2014.

Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia  113

Habituated Content in Southeast Asian Diplomacy Noninterference is a norm within and beyond the region.88 It is codified as a foundational principle of the TAC signed at the First ASEAN Summit in 1976. It recurs explicitly, if briefly, in the Bali Concord II (2003) and again with the relative formalization of the organization through the Charter, and with implicit reference in the 2009 Roadmap for an ASEAN Community (A.2.16). It is, then, a foundational and institutionalized norm for the region. It is also a centrally important feature in constructivist analyses of regional relations, which often focus how the norm has precluded ASEAN invention in members state affairs, shaping and limiting ASEAN regionalism in important ways. For many scholars, it is the defining and “cardinal principle” of the organization.89 However, as with the norm of consensus-​based decision-​ making, the recognition of the existence and codification of the norm of noninterference tells us little as to how it is understood and enacted by officials themselves. Across interviews with regional officials, it is clear that members of the Southeast Asian community of practice think from noninterference and that they do so in a particular way.90 At the same time, from an external standpoint, the ASEAN practice of noninterference seems incongruous with what the norm ought to mean and divorced from its evocation on paper. The particularity of the ASEAN practice of the norm of noninterference is clear from conversations with many regional officials. Minister Hassan begins to make the distinctiveness of the ASEAN practice of this norm clear with his suggestion that member states, in practice, know that noninterference is not “sacrosanct.”91 Rather, for regional officials, it is understood as a baseline of respect for territorial sovereignty, and in particular the deployment of uniformed military personnel within each other’s territory for humanitarian or any other purpose. This principle is malleable. It bends when the common interests of ASEAN—​however loosely defined—​are deemed to be at stake by powerful member states. As the Minister explained, ASEAN is 88 Robert H. Jackson, The Global Covenant: Human Conduct in a World of States (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000). 89 Sanae Suzuki, “Why Is ASEAN Not Intrusive? Non-​Interference Meets State Strength,” Journal of Contemporary East Asia Studies 8, no. 2 (2019): 157–​176. 90 Lee Jones rejects assumptions that noninterference has been upheld in practice. In his view, it has waned as a result of the strategic interests of powerful ASEAN states. He does not, however, explore how practitioners understand noninterference as practical sense. Lee Jones, “ASEAN’s Unchanged Melody? The Theory and Practice of ‘Non-​Interference’ in Southeast Asia,” Pacific Review 23, no. 4 (2010): 479–​502. 91 Interview with Foreign Minister Hassan Wirajuda, Jakarta, July 24, 2014.

114  Practicing Peace “a family of 10 countries. As siblings, we have the right to know what is happening in the family of our sisters and brothers. . . . If we discuss and raise an issue, say a violation of human rights in one ASEAN member, it’s not because we wish to interfere.” For members of the community of practice, the norm of noninterference is particular, and situational. It has known limits. This understanding of the norm of noninterference is distinct from that of external practitioners, however. For example, one European official critiqued this assumption of noninterference as merely a “smokescreen.”92 In her view, noninterference in ASEAN is “something they shore up in order to the do the opposite . . . like saying ‘I love you’ every day, over and over, only to stab you in the back! And then say, ‘I didn’t do that! How could I? I love you!’ ” While hyperbolic, this view underscores the perceived distinctiveness of this quality of regional relations in practice. Southeast Asian regional officials do not know it to be a hard and fast rule, despite its evocation in agreements and in public rhetoric around the ASEAN way. Rather, they understand and practice it as an inclination toward maintaining the territorial integrity and sovereignty of member states, but in so doing also preserving ASEAN coherence and credibility as the organization through which to achieve this and other regional aims.93 This understanding alludes to the second habituated aspect of content, an assumption of equality among member states. This quality informs the consensus-​seeking practices and produces a dispositional impulse toward keeping regional issues within the region. ASEAN’s response to Cyclone Nargis, which devastated Myanmar in May 2008, illustrates these dynamics. The worst natural disaster in Myanmar’s history required international attention and aid. The closed regime under the military junta refused initial offers of aid. For powerful ASEAN states officials, chiefly in Indonesia and Singapore, it was clear that if ASEAN did not facilitate the opening of Myanmar to international aid it risked losing international credibility. While the national humanitarian disaster in Myanmar was recognized as one, officials understood the cyclone primarily as a regional crisis of ASEAN’s legitimacy. A senior Indonesian diplomat explained: “ASEAN was implicated. ASEAN was blamed.”94 As she recalls of the May 19, 2008, foreign minister’s meeting immediately following the May 2 cyclone, it was clear to the room that Myanmar needed to support the

92 Interview with European official, Jakarta, July 17, 2014.

93 See also Collins, Building a People-​Oriented Security Community, 36–​37. 94 Interview with anonymous Indonesian official, Jakarta, July 2014.

Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia  115 interests of the organization, even if it meant compromising its own. There was a shared sense that “Yes, the lack of democracy and human rights [in Myanmar] certainly may inflame ASEAN, but you know, here on the very day of this emergency situation, [Myanmar’s] rejection of any international offer [means] ASEAN [is] also implicated.” Within the community of practice, prior consensus had rendered some issues largely mute—​including a lack of democracy despite the Charter’s insistence and abhorrent human rights violations. However, a tension now arose as, collectively, ASEAN’s coherence and credibility were on the line. Officials from Indonesia and Singapore, in particular, recognized the need to respond to domestic and international pressure to demonstrate ASEAN unity and effectiveness, even if it meant intervention into domestic affairs of this member state. Prior to the ministers meeting, Minister Hassan met with Singaporean Foreign Minister George Yeo in private and discussed the need to respond, and how best to do so.95 The two agreed that there was a general consensus among many members that action was required and decided a course of action. Indonesia would present three potential solutions to Myanmar, knowing this to be comfortable to the rest of the membership. In line with proclivities toward face-​saving and the pressures of noninterference, during the meeting seven member states spoke before Indonesia, offering only condolences. Then, Hassan offered the three options. First, Myanmar could follow the precedent of Indonesia after the 2004 tsunami in Aceh, and allow international aid unencumbered. Hassan cautioned against this choice—​ unfettered access by the international community could be destabilizing to the junta. The second option was for ASEAN to play a mediating role between Myanmar and the international community. The third was to simply do nothing. At this point the foreign minister of Myanmar, Nyan Win, was told to reflect carefully on Myanmar’s contribution to ASEAN and ASEAN’s support of Myanmar in the past. This was intended as a subtle signal to accept what Hassan expressed as an ASEAN position. With this, Minister Hassan was given Nyan Win’s personal agreement that option two was the favored path. The minister pushed back, asking for the official decision from Naypyidaw. After a short recess and a call to the capital, the agreement was set and Myanmar received aid with ASEAN acting as mediator. A senior Indonesian diplomat remarked upon reflection of her participation within 95 This account comes from an interview with ex-​Indonesian Permanent Representative I Gede Ngurah Swajaya, Jakarta, July 30, 2014.

116  Practicing Peace this event, that it may not have been “too ASEAN, to avoid friction and problems [and] to ensure harmonious relations. But, this was a problem . . . [and] we needed to deal with it rationally.”96 A senior Malaysian diplomat echoed this assumption by suggesting that during such moments of crisis “common sense plays a big role in our decision-​makers.”97 In these accounts what rationality means and what common sense is in practice for these ASEAN officials is distinctive. For regional practitioners, the response to the cyclone, a perceived crisis, was not inconsistent with the norm of noninterference. Rather, it was normal and natural to reconcile these perhaps immediately irreconcilable pressures—​to uphold national sovereignty by allowing the needs of the supraregional ASEAN to overstep it. From an external viewpoint, however, the ASEAN practice of noninterference appears incongruous with the norm invoked in official rhetoric and agreements. This perceived counterintuitiveness is echoed by the frustrations of our European official, and yet is lost on ASEAN practitioners. In short, the codified norm has been habituated and is practiced in a particular and competent way within this community of practice. Third, and still related, Southeast Asian diplomacy upholds a rather taken-​ for-​granted practice of face-​saving, a quality of interaction shared among members of the community of practice, and one that stems from equality and familial dynamic explored.98 There is an inherent and rather automatic apprehension to allow any member state to appear a lesser partner or to expose a member state to the critiques of actors external to the region.99 This dynamic shaped Hassan’s reluctance to suggest that Myanmar accept international aid unencumbered. Beyond this limited glimpse, it is clear that regional officials within this community assume this consistently. Across interviews, officials articulate it rather unthinkingly as a normal, natural, and effective means to pursue their national and regional interests. Anwar summarized it thusly: “Telling people what to do and expecting them to do it not acceptable. It just does not work here. . . . If you want to be more effective, you go and you do it in a way that does not cause people to lose face.”100 As she continued, “Shaming and naming is not acceptable [within ASEAN].” This was echoed 96 Interview with anonymous Indonesian official, Jakarta, July 2014. 97 Interview with Malaysian official, Jakarta, July 22, 2014. 98 See also Beeson, Institutions of the Asia Pacific; Nair, “Saving Face in Diplomacy.” 99 That the episode of Myanmar’s acquiescence to Indonesia’s three-​part suggestion was something many practitioners did not wish to speak about with me as an external observer is, itself, telling of this reality. 100 Interview with Dewi Fortuna Anwar, Jakarta, June 25, 2014.

Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia  117 explicitly in an interview with a permanent representative at the ASEC who suggested this was both normal and effective: “We must work together and so we never ‘blame and shame.’ That is important. That is the ASEAN way.”101 It is a given that saving face makes for effective regional dialogue. This commonsense assumption means that variation in economic development or in political regime, or potentially problematic changes in the latter, is often not something raised in divisive ways, even behind closed doors. As one permanent representative noted, “No one likes to be told, ‘Hey, you guys, you’ve got too many poor people, or too limited development.’ Instead, we always talk gently. We know what works. We know how to push and move. . . . We deal with each other as equals. All 10 of us in a room, and say, ‘What do we need to talk about today?’ ”102 More succinctly still, one former ASEC official suggested: “The ASEAN way is what you do to make sure other members don’t lose face.”103 Behaviors that, from an external standpoint, may appear normatively or even legally deviant from ASEAN norms and rules are rarely critiqued within the community, and states are actively sheltered from external critique. This was made clear through numerous conversations with state and ASEC officials in 2014, a time when the recent coup in Thailand was fresh in the mind of many within the organization. From an intraregional and extraregional perspective alike, the coup represented a regional crisis. From an extraregional vantage point, it was a transgression of codified norms and rules around democratic and good governance. The ASEAN Charter itself asserts the importance of “adherence to the rule of law, good governance, the principles of democracy and constitutional government” (Article 2.2.h; see also Article 1.6). The coup appeared to many observers as a contravention of the Charter. Within the community of practice however, this transgression was less clear and the crisis was conceived of primarily as a risk to the “face” of Thailand in the eyes of international actors. Within ASEAN, practitioners faced two immediate concerns. First, was an impulse to save face for Thailand and to ensure that there was no overt critique of the coup. In tension with this impulse was concern, once again, for ASEAN credibility. From an external viewpoint, this was a fine line between exclusivity in aims. As one ASEAN permanent representative described it,



101

Interview with ASEAN permanent representative, Jakarta, June 4, 2019. Interview with ASEAN permanent representative, Jakarta, June 11, 2019. 103 Interview with former ASEAN official, Jakarta, June 22, 2019. 102

118  Practicing Peace After the coup, the Thais did not want ASEAN to convene a special meeting just to talk about Thailand. But . . . Thailand is a very important member of ASEAN—​the second largest economy—​and given the developments in Thailand, I think ASEAN’s credibility would be at stake if we did not even talk about it. I think Thailand knows that. They recognize that.104

She knew, as a matter of course, that Thai officials did not want to be placed under the eye of the regional or international community and they would not be. Regarding any possible admonishment, given the transgression of Charter principles, the permanent representative stated unequivocally, “We would never do that.” This was clear to her, in practice. From an external standpoint, however, this is not clear legally or normatively, given the Charter’s insistence on democratic and good governance. In practice, the proclivity toward face-​saving overrode concerns of the possible legal implications of the coup—​namely that a breach of the Charter should be raised publicly at the ASEAN Summit (Article 5.2-​3 and Article 20). A high-​ranking ASEC political security official, indeed one of the very persons who could best recognize a breach of ASEAN norms and principles and instigate remediation through institutional means, echoed this reality: Immediately [after the coup] there were some countries that stopped their bilateral aid or any high-​level ties. . . . But, at a time like this, perhaps, what they [the Thais] need most is support, rather than derision, rather than criticism, rather than put-​me-​downs. Because, again, you have got to understand the context of where Thailand was . . . the nuance, the cultural settings of why we do certain things in a certain way. . . . I would never be in a position to criticize the Thailand military. . . . Of course, there is a provision in the Charter. It’s got something about the overthrow of the government and all that sort of stuff . . . but does anybody . . . [she gets up, walks over to her desk and picks up a copy of the Charter and waves it in the air, tapping its cover] Does the leader brandish the book and [she taps on the hardcover] say “You, you! You have violated the Charter!”? No. Nobody does it. We don’t do it in ASEAN! We talk, and say, “Let’s try and do something about it.” But, we still come to the table.105



104 105

Interview with ASEAN permanent representative, Jakarta, July 18, 2014. Interview with ASEC official, Jakarta, July 16, 2014.

Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia  119 This is precisely the habitual and dispositional character of regional diplomacy at work. Despite the blatant challenge to a principle of the ASEAN Charter, the practice is to engage in informal talk among members, to save face, and to maintain stability in relations within the community. That the very official who would be able to criticize the Thai military government for not adhering to the Charter knows that she “would never be in a position” to do so demonstrates this keenly. Developments in 2021 showcase these dynamics as well, as ASEAN officials struggle to respond to another military coup in Myanmar in the face of both international and domestic pressure within certain member states.106 The ASEAN position seems to rest on what Deepak Nair has described as “diplomacy of studied ambiguity”—​a hesitancy to recognize the junta alongside the adoption of varied tactics to delay, but not overtly reject, recognition of its claims to the Myanmar state and to membership within ASEAN.107 In this way, ASEAN again has sought to uphold its credibility, in offering some response, through its five-​point consensus, while allowing for face-​saving for the military government. This dynamic was clear at the April 24, 2021 ad hoc ASEAN leaders’ summit, when an Indonesian statement announcing the meeting described Min Aung Hlaing as the commander in chief of Myanmar’s military rather than the state’s leader.108 This dialogue produced a five-​point consensus that underscored a desire to ensure “an immediate cessation of violence” and a peaceful resolution and empowered ASEAN to play a constructive role in dialogue through the appointment of a special envoy who is to meet with all parties.109 As Sahil Mathur describes, the ASEAN engagement in the face of the coup marks another example of “a form of low-​ degree, noncoercive intervention,” again demonstrating how this community of practice tensely resolves competing norms in practice.110

106 Mathew Davies, “Myanmar Exposes ASEAN’s Cheap Talk on Democracy,” East Asia Forum, February 4, 2021, https://​www.eastas​iafo​rum.org/​2021/​02/​04/​myan​mar-​expo​ses-​ase​ans-​cheap-​ talk-​on-​democr​acy/​. 107 Deepak Nair, “ASEAN on Myanmar’s Coup: Revisiting Cold War Diplomacy on Cambodia,” New Mandala, 2021, https://​www.new​mand​ala.org/​asean-​on-​myanm​ars-​coup-​rev​isit​ing-​cold-​war-​ diplom​acy-​on-​cambo​dia/​ 108 Richard C. Paddock, “General Who Led Myanmar’s Coup Joins Regional Talks on the Crisis,” New York Times, April 25, 2021, https://​www.nyti​mes.com/​2021/​04/​24/​world/​asia/​myan​mar-​asean-​ gene​ral-​indone​sia.html 109 Sebastian Strangio, “Assessing the Outcome of ASEAN’s Special Meeting on Myanmar,” The Diplomat, April 27, 2021, https://​thed​iplo​mat.com/​2021/​04/​assess​ing-​the-​outc​ome-​of-​ase​ans-​spec​ ial-​meet​ing-​on-​myan​mar/​ 110 Sahil Mathur, “Myanmar’s Coup d’Etat: What Role for ASEAN?” The Diplomat, February 3, 2021, https://​thed​iplo​mat.com/​2021/​02/​myanm​ars-​coup-​detat-​what-​role-​for-​asean/​

120  Practicing Peace Returning to the 2014 case, in all my interviews with members of the Southeast Asian community of practice there was never any suggestion of condemning Thailand through ASEAN itself or engaging external actors to assist with the return of democracy. This dynamic again appears in 2021, as ASEAN delicately attempted to balance competing pressures. In response to each issue, that is not how the community approaches such challenges. Indeed, this reality was repeated in interviews in 2019 as well. As one permanent representative noted, “Noninterference is very strong. Take Myanmar; they don’t interfere. What about Thailand? They had a military coup and they will stay in power. But do we [in ASEAN] say, “Oh no, this not acceptable!”? No. That is not what we do.”111 Intervention is not an option for the community. It was not on the menu of options. How the community understood and responded to this crisis was shaped inherently by what was known as normal, natural, and effective by its members. Similarly, behaviors after the coup reflected this reality as well. The above ASEC official noted that post-​coup relations with Thailand within the ASEC remained “business as usual.”112 From her perspective, within the Political-​Security section of the ASEC, “I don’t think it is a major issue, from how I see it.” The basic habitual disposition of ASEAN practitioners, again, serves to limit the very “imaginability and thinkability of interests and choice.”113 It shaped how regional practitioners understood not only this crisis but the codified norms of democratic and good governance themselves. In this way, it is clear that norms are amorphous social things. What they mean and how they are assumed to be appropriately and effectively enacted is given by and through the particularities of a community. As a result, while there was a known fit between practice and norm within this community, actors external to the community perceive a disjuncture. From an external perspective the thinking and behavior of the ASEAN community of practice seems to contravene the norms and principles of the organization itself. This is clear not only from the regional reaction to the 2014 Thai coup and developments around the 2021 coup in Myanmar but also in the daily interactions between ASEAN member states and ASEAN dialogue partners at the ASEC as well. According to a source within the ASEC in attendance, in preparation for the July 2014 meeting with Canadian representatives



111

Interview with ASEAN permanent representative, Jakarta, June 4, 2019. Interview with ASEC official, Jakarta, July 16, 2014. 113 Hopf, Social Construction, 283. 112

Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia  121 an ASEAN member-​state-​only meeting was held just prior. There was common concern that the Canadians, in particular, would raise the recent developments within Thailand and thus embarrass or unsettle the Thai delegation. The ASEAN member state officials, collectively, decided that when such concerns were inevitably raised, the Thai delegation would respond just briefly, whereupon Vietnam would “immediately” interject to provide a description of the ASEAN position on the South China Sea in order to shift to a “larger issue” and “deflect any critique” of the Thai coup, leaving it to ASEAN to respond or not to the coup.114 In the words of another senior ASEC official, this “is basically [our] way of dealing with things: don’t bring your neighbors in. Solve it among family.”115 The suggestion here is twofold, and it speaks to the underlying habitual disposition of this community of practice. First, officials assume the region as a singular and exclusive community, and one of equals. They know it exists and they know it is distinct from states and actors external to their own community. A “family” of states may be flowery language, but it underscores this basic reality as given for members of their community of practice.116 Second, within this community, there is a dispositional impulse to save face for community members in the light of the international gaze and to ensure regional issues are dealt with internal to the region. It is rather automatically assumed that debate and disagreement will occur, but that they should rest within ASEAN.117 Moreover, when a compromise comes at the expense of a member state, as in the case of challenges around recognition of the junta in Myanmar in 2021, it should not be presented as such internationally. Rather, ASEAN officials attempt to reconcile apparently competing norms—​ around noninterference, face-​saving, and an interest in ASEAN credibility—​ in and through practice and do so in particularized ways. This is apparent in discussing a range of sensitive issues, including the regional response to Cyclone Nargis. Few of the dozens of officials questioned about the issue were willing to discuss it with me, given my position as an external observer to the community. Many were uncomfortable with the issue, and many were uncomfortable that I had knowledge of it myself. There was a pervasive sense

114 Interview with ASEC official, Jakarta, July 8, 2014. 115 Interview with ASEC official, Jakarta, July 16, 2014. 116 On self-​other distinctions in regard, see Hayes, Constructing National Security, 26; Pouliot, “Regional Security Practices,” 215. 117 See also Stéphanie Martel, “From Ambiguity to Contestation: Discourse(s) of Non-​Traditional Security in the ASEAN Community,” Pacific Review, 30, no. 4 (2017): 549–​565.

122  Practicing Peace not only that regional issues should be dealt with within the regional family, but that the “dirty laundry” of family members should not be discussed or shared beyond themselves. A final element to the Southeast Asian habitual disposition blurs the process-​content analytical divide. The community of practice in the region shares a discernable and important proclivity toward pacific settlement of intraregional disputes. This is already apparent in the above survey of the foundational cognitive and behavioral elements of this community’s diplomatic interactions. And, of course, this aligns with widely established norms within and beyond the region and pacific dispute settlement is enshrined as a guiding principle codified within the Charter (Article 2.2.d). However, once again, the community’s practical and habitual understanding and enactment of this norm is particular. The central legal mechanism for conflict resolution within ASEAN rests with the High Council, a grouping of ministerial-​ level representatives empowered by the TAC and upheld by the Charter. Yet, to date, this formal means of dispute mediation has never been used.118 Similarly, the 2004 Enhanced Dispute Settlement Mechanism (EDSM) for economic disputes, also outlined in the Charter, has not been employed.119 Eschewing formal and legal channels, ASEAN practitioners assume the possibility of regional conflict resolution only through informal dialogue, something that manifests in the practice of this abstract codified norm.120 Southeast Asian diplomatic practitioners know this is to be normal and natural. This is not so for officials from beyond the region, however. For one American diplomat in Jakarta, ASEAN diplomacy is simply “insane.”121 Similarly, an Australian official suggested that ASEAN has a “particular habit of cooperation, and it is a strange one.”122 From this external vantage point, ASEAN officials understand and practice diplomacy and the principled and codified norms on which it rests in a distinct way. A senior ASEC official recalled an experience in the Secretariat that makes this distinction clear:

118 See also Acharya, Constructing a Security Community, 49; Kahler, “Legalization as Strategy,” 553. 119 See Yunita Fransisca, Joseph Wira Koesnaidi, Putri Anindita Shari, and Jerry Schalmont, “For a More Effective and Competitive ASEAN Dispute Settlement Mechanism,” World Trade Institute Papers 913 (2014). 120 See also Acharya, “Collective Identity,” 211. 121 Interview with American official, Jakarta, July 3, 2014. 122 Interview with Australian official, Jakarta, July 18, 2014.

Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia  123 I remember an EU consultant once threatened us [ASEC staff]: “If you don’t do it like this you’ll never achieve what you want to do, because you have to have this [as she bangs on the table] in place and have these outputs by this time, otherwise it won’t work!’ You know what happened to him? We kicked him out! . . . We knew he was right, and that he was leading us in a [good] direction, we just didn’t like the way he said it. So, we kicked him out.123

This, again, keenly illustrates Neumann’s suggestion that “practice speaks: ‘this is how we have always done things around here.’ ”124 For the ASEAN community of practice, there is a discrete and commonsensical way to do regional cooperation. In this way, it is clear that the Southeast Asian habitual disposition is itself strategic and instrumental,125 in the sense that practitioners know it works for them in practice.126 To summarize, seven qualities inform how Southeast Asian officials commonsensically understand and respond to regional crises and pursue regionalism more generally. These are the ways that regional officials themselves understand what works in Southeast Asia. This includes engaging in prior consensus, informal dialogue, privileging process over substance, noninterference, equality among ASEAN states, an impulse toward face-​s aving, and pacific dispute settlement through talk rather than formal legal channels. While many of these qualities may appear to align with the codified norms of the region and beyond, it is the particular regional understandings that shape behavior and the particular practices of these principles and norms that are most consequential for regional relations. Each quality of this regional habitual disposition has been made discernable through interviews with regional practitioners and brought into distinctive relief through parallel interviews with extraregional officials working closely alongside Southeast Asian practitioners. This approach is useful in uncovering the existence of these qualities of regional relations. However, more is needed to show their effects.

123 Interview with ASEC official, Jakarta, July 16, 2014. 124 Neumann, “Returning Practice,” 637. 125 E.g., Kahler, “Legalization as Strategy.” 126 See also Hiro Katsumata, ASEAN’s Cooperative Security Enterprise: Norms and Interests in the ASEAN Regional Forum (New York City: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009).

124  Practicing Peace

The Effects of the Southeast Asian Habitual Disposition One glimpse into the effects of the Southeast Asian habitual disposition on state behavior is through an interrogation of the thinking of practitioners themselves—​the meaning they ascribe to events or crises and what they know to be possible and effective responses to them.127 What members of the Southeast Asian community of practice know not only as normal and natural, but also to be effective is a signifier of the effects of their habitual disposition. In the following section, I show that members of this community know that their habitual disposition works—​that the particularities of their understanding and enactment of regional and global norms is the best, most effective, and indeed only means to respond to crises and manage conflict within the community. A recognition of a deeply held faith in the form and function of ASEAN’s particular brand of diplomacy is a first means to elucidate the effect of the habitual disposition on regional relations in Southeast Asia.

Robustness Members of the Southeast Asian community of practice believe their region is peaceful and they credit the particularities of their diplomatic practice for it. While practitioners often find their habitual disposition difficult to articulate, when they are pushed to reflect on their daily practices and when their sense of normal relations is presented as problematic or destabilized, many within the community are defensive. For example, regional officials are well aware of critiques of ASEAN and its forums as mere “talk shops”128 or productive of “process not progress.”129 This critique is not limited to scholarly observers. Regional officials are aware too that extraregional officials working alongside ASEAN, such as the European and American diplomats referenced above, view regional practices as distinctive and often problematic. For example, one dialogue partner state official remarked of the “ASEAN way,” “If you want to get a lot done, it is lousy. If you want to get together and 127 See also Hayes and James, “Theory as Thought.” 128 John Burton, “Spotlight: ASEAN: SE Asia’s ‘Talking Shop’ Turns 40” Financial Times, August 3, 2007, http://​www.ft.com/​intl/​cms/​s/​0/​2f87b​7c8-​41d1-​11dc-​8328-​00007​79fd​2ac.html; Katsumata, “Establishment of the ASEAN Regional Forum.” 129 Lee Jones, “Explaining the Failure of the ASEAN Economic Community: The Primacy of Domestic Political Economy,” Pacific Review 29, no. 5 (2016): 647–​670; Jones and Smith, “Making Process, Not Progress.”

Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia  125 keep together, and to not fight? Yeah, sure, it works. But is that enough?”130 The view that ASEAN is all talk and little action is a common one among extraregional officials in Jakarta, as I unpack in more detail below. In response to questions about these sorts of critiques, members of the Southeast Asian community of practice often offer confusion, confidence, or both. Most interviewees recognize and reject these critiques. Many assert that talk itself is the foundation of effective and pacific regional cooperation. “Is it better to talk, or to shoot each other?” was a common sentiment, as one ASEAN official asked me rhetorically.131 Minister Hassan underscored both the common awareness of critiques of ASEAN practice and the community’s confident response. He suggested: On the notion that ASEAN is nothing but a forum [for] talk, well I would argue that it was because of dialogue, because of talk, that here [in Southeast Asia] we enjoy peace and security—​and continued peace and security. And people would appreciate [this] better if we [were] compared to other regions. Look at what is happening in the Middle East or some parts of Africa. It is because the[se] respective regions were not able to manage their own household [that they lack peace and security].132

For Hassan and members of his community of practice, talk is action. ASEAN’s brand of talk is central to how conflict is managed effectively. Within these perspectives, the particularities of regional practice—​maligned by many scholars and extraregional officials—​work, and work well. A recurring example from my interviews brings this dynamic into light. The long-​running tension between Malaysia and Indonesia that characterized the period of Confrontasi in the 1960s in some ways remains. This was palpable in a number of interviews with practitioners on both sides. A senior Malaysian diplomat, for example, remarked of the “mistrust” he and his government still have over issues such as the Sipadan and Ligitan Islands, despite the 2002 International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruling, and migrant workers.133 Similarly, an Indonesian official suggested that there remains a “sensitivity between Indonesia and Malaysia” that makes some policymakers “uneasy 130 Jones and Smith, “Making Process, Not Progress.” Interview with dialogue partner official, Jakarta, June 2019. 131 Interview with Indonesian official, Jakarta, July 14, 2014. 132 Interview with Foreign Minister Hassan Wirajuda, Jakarta, July 24, 2014. 133 Guerin, “Sulawesi Sea Row”; Interview with Malaysian official, Jakarta, July 22, 2014.

126  Practicing Peace to continue building relations between Indonesia and Malaysia.”134 Scholars too, highlight these dynamics. Loh, for example, finds much the same, and articulates how this “mistrust” stymies cooperation in ASEAN, including around Typhoon Haiyan in 2013 and in the search for missing flight MH370 in 2014.135 In my interviews, there were further concerns that while distrust and unease remained at the governmental level, even deeper antagonisms remained among the respective publics and militaries. However, conflicts do not escalate as a result of their management at the regional level. As Anwar reflected, Tempers flare between the navies of Malaysia and Indonesia over our maritime boundaries. But, at the higher level we say, “You know, we’ve got the TAC and we cannot resolve disputes through conflict or war.” So, when, in Indonesia or Malaysia, the president is under pressure from parliament or from the media who say, you know, “Oh, we should fight for it!” both governments will say: “We created ASEAN. We have this code of conduct in order to prevent open conflict from happening.” . . . There is no enforcement mechanism, but [ASEAN via the TAC] creates a framework in which governments can restrain themselves when facing one another, [and] also a basis of argument when dealing with their citizens.136

As explored above, while practitioners “know” they have codified norms and principles through the TAC, and beyond, the understanding and practice of these norms is particular. One such “flare” in regional violence came in March 2005, when the lingering dispute over maritime boundaries saw a standoff between Indonesian and Malaysian ships over contested oil resources in the Ambalat offshore area.137 In response, Indonesian First Admiral Abdul Malik Yusuf was quoted as saying, “We will not let an inch of our land or a drop of our ocean fall into the hands of foreigners,” and it was noted that the “Indonesian military is clearly ready to assume battle positions.”138 Anwar denotes a sense of

134 Interview with Indonesian official, Jakarta, July 23, 2014. 135 Dylan Ming Hui Loh, “ASEAN’s Norm Adherence and Its Unintended Consequences in HADR and SAR Operations,” Pacific Review 29, no. 4 (2016): 549–​572. 136 Interview with Dewi Fortuna Anwar, Jakarta, June 25, 2014. 137 See Clive Schofield and Ian Storey, “Energy Security and Southeast Asia: The Impact on Maritime Boundary and Territorial Disputes,” Harvard Asia Quarterly 9, no. 4 (2005). 138 Quoted in John McBeth, “Fighting Leopards or White Elephants?,” Jakarta Globe, January 26, 2012.

Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia  127 restraint absent recourse to formal enforcement mechanisms that is simply given.139 That many such “flares” have not been resolved and that increases in military spending after this event appeared directed at increasing security along this border, suggest that while conflicts may be muted through ASEAN practices they may not be resolved.140 In speaking with regional officials there was a shared sense that while such low-​level conflict remained a possibility it had little effect at the broader level. Indonesian Ambassador Ngurah Swajaya, makes this common suggestion clear: [There has been] no war after ASEAN has been established. Yes, there are some tensions but these tensions can be reduced. Some of the territorial disputes have already been resolved through the ICJ. But some do remain. But we have discussions. The talking is still there. . . . And, I mean, what is wrong with talking? You know, for other countries and other regions, they don’t even talk. Then a rocket is talking. A weapon is talking.141

One Indonesian official noted similarly, “Even in the last two years we can see this [the reality of tensions between member states]. For Indonesia, we have had issues with Singapore and issues with Malaysia . . . issues with neighboring countries. But we have tried to press it down when it comes to ASEAN. We’re not going to open war because we have these regular meetings through ASEAN. Besides, it’s an East Asian culture that we respect everyone and it plays an important part in ASEAN.”142 Thus, Anwar and many officials are able to accept but brush aside lingering distrust, disputes, and even violence. For these practitioners, there is a business as usual aspect to conflict within Southeast Asia. While this attitude is widely shared among regional practitioners, many were unable to articulate why or how their brand of diplomacy generates peace or manages conflict—​itself suggestive of how ingrained these qualities of regional relations and conflict management are. 139 For a similar statement on the trend toward living with rather than resolving conflict, see Kivimäki, “Power, Interest or Culture.” 140 Guerin, “Sulawesi Sea Row”; Kivimäki, “Power, Interest or Culture”; McBeth, “Fighting Leopards.” See also Acharya, “Collective Identity,” 216. Acharya notes a similar dynamic as a pervasive feature of ASEAN relations, where war is absent but military planning and arms spending indicates that peaceful assumptions of change may be fragile. 141 Interview with Ambassador I Gede Ngurah Swajaya, Jakarta, July 30, 2014. 142 Interview with Indonesian official, June 2014.

128  Practicing Peace As explored in c­ hapter 3, I often asked why regional conflicts do not escalate, despite a lack of recourse to formal channels to mediate or resolve them. I would query, for example, why is it that the “flares” remain limited or, how “regular meetings” preclude “open war.” Among regional officials, no interviewee could offer a clear response. For most, this kind of question seemed to lead to confusion.143 The majority of the officials I spoke with found it difficult to respond to questions that challenged the deeply held background knowledge on which their understanding and practice of diplomacy rested. They simply knew that their particular means of regional conflict management tempered, if not resolved, crises when they occurred or recurred. As one ASEC official remarked of the potential oddity of ASEAN conflict management practices, “It’s really not a matter of unique or not unique. It’s which one works for ASEAN. . . . It is a necessity that works most effectively.”144 Conflict management in Southeast Asia is shaped by the regional habitual disposition, and thoughts of confronting and responding to conflicts and crises in other ways are largely unfathomable and assumed unnecessary. While normal, natural, and effective for Southeast Asian officials, this robust habitual disposition remains strange and ineffective to others. One European diplomat with years of experience in the region expressed particular bewilderment with her Southeast Asian colleagues. As illustration of her frustrations, she explained that recently she had been tasked with organizing and reporting on two lunch meetings at her embassy. One was between her ambassador and the CPR, again, the highest-​level grouping at the ASEC and composed of ambassadorial-​level representatives from each member state. The second was between the ambassador and a number of ASEAN dialogue partner officials. At the latter, she was able to take studious notes. She detailed the engagement and produced what she recognized to be a comprehensive and effective report of the meeting. In her own estimation, the meeting was productive and positive, and it unfolded as these diplomatic engagements routinely do and should. The same was not so of the meeting with the 10 ASEAN permanent representatives. With frustration, she recalled of that meeting: “I couldn’t make a report. There was nothing to report.”145 As she explained, despite an hours-​long meeting and much talk, 143 Pouliot notes a similar finding from his 2006 interviews with practitioners at the NATO-​ Russia Council. Pouliot, International Security, 116. See also Marcus Holmes, “The Force of Face-​ to-​Face Diplomacy: Mirror Neurons and the Problem of Intentions,” International Organization 67 (2013): 829–​861. 144 Interview with ASEC official, Jakarta, July 2, 2014. 145 Interview with European official, Jakarta, July 17, 2014.

Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia  129 from her perspective there was nothing to observe and nothing to report as consequential. From her particular vantage point, the kind of dialogue that came from ASEAN members was not only abnormal but ineffective; the talk simply not worth recording and reporting. This was echoed by another long-​ time serving EU official in Jakarta, who noted, “They [the CPR] meet all the time, each day. But what is the mandate? To work with the [dialogue] partners? The talk is good. Talking is important. Even in the EU we need to talk more. Even if you have rules and regulations, it is important to continue to talk. But to what end?”146 In her view, ASEAN’s talk is merely “diplomatic morphine.” It is a familiar comfort for regional officials, but ineffective. The skepticism in both of these accounts speaks to variation in knowledge and practice between diplomatic communities. For those in the Southeast Asian community, ASEAN’s talk and informal processes are ends themselves. Engaging in them is itself important and indeed effective diplomacy in action. They work. For the European and dialogue partners outside of this community, it is another matter entirely. Moreover, within each distinct community, the utility—​or lack of utility—​of these varied approaches is simply known. Neither has an inclination to vary their understanding of the effectiveness of their understanding of “talk.” Indeed, Southeast Asian interviewees consistently contest and reject the formalities in the approach known to be “normal” diplomatic process to their European colleagues. Echoing the ASEC official who “kicked out” the dissenting European, one director-​level ASEC official noted similarly that “The EU thinks differently [than ASEAN officials]. They always tell us, ‘It’s a problem without majority voting.’ They have a point, but there are good and bad to both [approaches]. After Brexit, EU officials even had to recognize this—​that we may be on to something with our approach.”147 In her view, her approach works for her community. However, extracommunity members rarely agree that the Southeast Asian approach is “on to something.” Many extraregional officials find the processes and practices of ASEAN regional diplomacy not only bizarre as they are compelled to work within and alongside them—​or “insane” as noted above—​but also less effective than they could or should be. One EU official brought a common sentiment into relief when she reflected, “Strangely, this group holds together. That is the real miracle.”148 In her view, ASEAN “is not unsuccessful, it is just not what we expect it to be.”

146

Interview with EU official, Jakarta, June 2019. Interview with ASEC official, June 2019. 148 Interview with EU official, Jakarta, July 17, 2014. 147

130  Practicing Peace This is precisely the point: What is normal, natural, and effective for the Southeast Asian community of practice is bizarre and ineffective for those external to it. These habitual and practical means of conflict management and regionalism simply work for regional member states and their officials, and do so in ways unfathomable to those external to this community. Moreover, productive and “working” conflict management in the region does not mean an absence of conflict. Rather, the habitual qualities of the region lead to a toleration of violence by regional practitioners. A deepening of regional relations is possible and attainable, despite continued regional conflict. To explore this suggestion further, I turn to a case of conflict management in action: when a territorial conflict between member states led to large-​scale violence and provoked a regional response.

The Southeast Asian Habitual Disposition and a “Small War” In 2008 and again in 2011, a period that spans the development and implementation of the 2009 Roadmap for an ASEAN Community and the Charter’s entry into force, numerous and often large-​scale military clashes occurred along the Thai-​Cambodian border between these two ASEAN members. The conflict, as with the maritime dispute between Indonesia and Malaysia explored above, has deep roots and a long history of “flares” when various domestic forces sought to fuel nationalist anger. In 2008 and 2011 tensions along the border around the disputed 11th-​century Preah Vihear temple complex were stoked by growing Thai nationalism and a rise in political violence from 2006 to 2010, and led to a tense three-​year standoff that involved thousands of soldiers. In February 2011 fighting escalated to its greatest heights and Cambodian troops used the temple complex, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, as a base from which to fire.149 Beyond mere skirmishes under brinkmanship tensions, three days of fighting included the use of tanks and multilauncher rockets in attacks “planned well in advance.”150 Artillery shells and rockets damaged villages, the temple complex itself, and an ASEAN buffer school built to facilitate regional integration, killing nine and displacing more than 33,000. Thailand was accused of using cluster munitions.151 Two months later, two 149 International Crisis Group, “Waging Peace,” 17–​18. 150 International Crisis Group, “Waging Peace,” 18. 151 Pavin Chachavalpongpun, “Thai-​ Cambodian Conflict: The Failure of ASEAN’s Dispute Settlement Mechanisms,” Asian Journal of Peacebuilding 1, no. 1 (2013): 73; International Crisis

Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia  131 weeks of clashes in April and May saw another 55,000 displaced and it was reported that more than 50,000 Thai artillery shells had been fired as far as 20 kilometers into Cambodian territory.152 This was a large-​scale militarized dispute between ASEAN members. Moreover, the scale of violence and its effects on the populations along the border were sufficient for many observers to recognize it as the “most violent clash yet between ASEAN’s members.”153 Others went further and saw it either as a war in all but name or a “small war.”154 Given the scope and scale of the clashes. observers also noted that it risked wider escalation and called into question claims of the ASEAN peace. In Acharya’s view this was “perhaps the most serious threat to ASEAN’s intra-​mural peace.”155 For others, it was sufficient to deny talk of an ASEAN security community by definition.156 In short, this militarized dispute—​one of many within the region as explored in ­chapter 1—​was particularly pronounced and dangerous. Strangely, however, this conflict has received relatively little attention in international relations. Acharya devotes passing reference to it in the third edition of his central study.157 Others pass it by entirely, given the limited fatalities involved.158 However, Acharya’s conclusion that this conflict produced only “disrupted security relations” rather than “outright military conflict,” belies the intensity and severity of the violence, as well as its potential escalatory nature.159 For those who have examined the conflict and the regional response in more detail, the swells of violence in 2011 illustrate ASEAN’s failings as a regional organization. As one observer suggests, “Years of institutionalized interaction and enmeshment in a multilayered and multitracked web of cooperation failed to produce ‘restraining effects’ on Group, “Waging Peace,” 17–​19; Terry Fredrickson, “Claim and Counterclaim,” Bangkok Post, February 8, 2011, http://​www.bang​kokp​ost.com/​learn​ing/​learn​ing-​from-​news/​220​467/​claim-​and-​ count​ercl​aim. 152 International Crisis Group, “Waging Peace,” 22. 153 Chachavalpongpun, “Thai-​Cambodian Conflict,” 72. 154 Pou Sothirak, “Cambodia’s Border Conflict with Thailand,” Southeast Asian Affairs 2013 (2013): 87–​100; Wain, “Latent Danger.” 155 Acharya, Constructing a Security Community, 125. 156 Collins, “Bringing Communities Back,” 284. See also Pushpa Thambipillai, Sophal Ear, Bernhard Platzdasch, Martin Stuart-​Fox, Johan Saravanamuttu, Robert H. Taylor, Felipe B. Miranda, Terence Chong, Supinya Klangnarong, and David Koh, “The ASEAN 10: Political Outlook,” in Regional Outlook Southeast Asia, 2010–​2011, eds. Michael J Montesano and Lee Poh Onn (Singapore: Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, 2010), 23. 157 Acharya, Constructing a Security Community, 125, 157. 158 E.g., Kivimäki, “Southeast Asia and Conflict Prevention.” 159 Acharya, Constructing a Security Community, 125.

132  Practicing Peace members tempted to use force to settle differences, long an article of ASEAN faith.”160 Yet, that the conflict did not escalate further is itself testament to the deflationary effect of regional conflict management practices. During the surge of violence in 2008, ASEAN failed to engage directly. Citing the norm of noninterference, there was a general apprehension to involve the organization while at the same time an interest in ensuring the conflict remained managed within the region—​a similar tension to that apparent in ASEAN’s responses to the 2014 Thai coup and 2021 Myanmar coup as discussed.161 Indonesia in particular, at the time a nonpermanent member of the UN Security Council (UNSC), sought to ensure this dispute remained regionally contained. As a member of the Indonesian delegation at the UNSC remarked, the Indonesians as well as the Vietnamese, who were also on the UNSC, were “alarmed by the move” by Cambodia to approach the UN, via France, for assistance.162 The general feeling among many ASEAN practitioners was that the violence was a regional concern, rather than a broader international one. In the words of the Indonesian official, such a conflict should lead to “talk amongst us” rather than bringing in “outsider partners.”163 The US delegation supported the Indonesian-​led move by ASEAN, and the matter was not added to the Security Council agenda. ASEAN was left to pursue intraregional conflict management. When the conflict escalated in February of 2011, member states acted to, once again, halt the internationalization of the conflict and then to engage in a mediating diplomatic role. Interestingly, when the Council agreed on February 14, 2011, to hear the issue after waiting on Indonesian informal mediation, it decided to do so in a private meeting inviting the Thai, Cambodian, and Indonesian foreign ministers to engage in dialogue off the public record, and to preempt the possibility of a binding resolution to emerge.164 If ASEAN states were to engage another multilateral body, it would be, as one senior ASEC official noted, with the assumption that “we’ll deal with it, and we’ll do it our own way. But we don’t want to be stuck with too much on the legal side.”165 Already, the particular practices of regional conflict management were shaping the regional response. It was decided that an informal meeting would occur a week later in Jakarta among ASEAN

160

Wain, “Latent Danger,” 39. International Crisis Group, “Waging Peace,” 14. Interview with Indonesian official, Jakarta, July 23, 2014. 163 Interview with Indonesian official, Jakarta, July 23, 2014. 164 International Crisis Group, “Waging Peace,” 19–​20. 165 Interview with ASEC official, Jakarta, June 30, 2014. 161 162

Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia  133 foreign ministers, marking the first time the ministers had met to discuss an intra-​ASEAN conflict and keeping conflict management strictly within regional confines. During this period, the regional habitual disposition informed how conflict management unfolded. Two potential options were off the table from the onset. Never was there a suggestion to use force to bring about a regional solution, nor was there a move to make use of the formal mechanisms provided for in the Charter and TAC. Members of the Southeast Asian community of practice did not see these as potential options for regional conflict management. Rather, member states attended an explicitly “informal” meeting of foreign ministers in Jakarta on February 22.166 For many regional practitioners, this was a return to normal, natural, and effective conflict management. As one official noted, returning the crisis to the region ensured that member states would “deal with it [ourselves] without having to embarrass anyone.”167 Already, it was clear that means to respond and manage the conflict were inherently shaped by the habitual disposition of the region. While ASEAN Secretary General Surin Pitswan lauded this as the first time the organization had made formal use of “those [dispute resolution] mechanisms already in the Charter,” in practice this is not entirely clear.168 Given the proclivities of the community of practice, no formalized ASEAN High Council was convened. Rather, the habitual disposition of the region meant a focus on informal dialogue, a recognition of noninterference and equality among members, and a clear impulse toward face-​saving within the attempt at pacific dispute settlement. ASEAN and state officials set the modest aims of continued assurances using informal dialogue processes—​to manage, rather than resolve, the conflict. A senior ASEC official noted that the common assumption at the time was that a formal mechanism “has never worked,” and thus was not considered. However, she admitted, “It has never worked because no one has really wanted to try it.” Again, the habitual disposition and its effects on the management of this conflict drove early considerations as to what was both possible and effective. The community’s disposition toward prior consensus meant that, procedurally, informal dialogue would be the only means to respond to this crisis. Noting the preference to engage in informality the ASEC official continued, “within ASEAN you would never have 166 See International Crisis Group, “Waging Peace,” 21. 167 Interview with ASEC official, Jakarta, June 30, 2014. 168 “ASEAN Secretary-​General Cites Progress in Thai-​Cambodian Resolution,” Jakarta Post, May 5, 2011.

134  Practicing Peace that [a formal mechanism]. Believe me, you’d never. Every time there is a dispute . . . you’ll never go [with a formal mechanism].”169 This was indeed the case. Through this February meeting and a series of follow-​up discussions, member states agreed that bilateral dialogue should be maintained between the two combatant states, and that Indonesia would play a facilitatory role given its leading role in ASEAN.170 There was a set process, and that process must be maintained. Moreover, this allowed the dialogue to occur exclusively within the regional community and in ways normal and natural to officials. As an ASEC official remarked, Indonesia had the “ability to act and be accepted as acting on behalf of ASEAN” throughout the crisis.171 It was seen as a “natural leader” of the regional response, in the words of one, non-​ Indonesian, permanent representative.172 Through Indonesian leadership and informal dialogue, the conflict would remain firmly within the regional context, and within the bounds of what was assumed normal, natural, and effective for regional practitioners. ASEAN would indeed “do it our own way” and “not be stuck with too much on the legal side.” For a number of external observers this was disappointing, even dangerous. In the words of one observer, the informality of the regional conflict management process at this stage signaled that “hope placed in ASEAN’s dispute settlement mechanisms [was] proven to be disappointing.”173 This sentiment echoes that of the European official above, who found ASEAN “not unsuccessful, it is just not what we expect it to be.”174 Given the habitual disposition of the regional community, faith in a turn to formal dispute settlement mechanisms was misplaced. That is not the way conflict management works in Southeast Asia, regardless of regional principles and norms codified within ASEAN. Moreover, that is not how officials within the regional community of practice understand effective conflict management. This was made clear in a conversation with Ngurah Swajaya, then Indonesian permanent representative to ASEAN. He recounted the logic and effect of the February 22 impromptu ASEAN foreign ministers meeting and saw it as both an automatic turn to established and proven process, and an effective one. In his view:

169

Interview with ASEC official, Jakarta, June 30, 2014. International Crisis Group 2011, 14. Interview with ASEC official, Jakarta, June 8, 2014. 172 Interview with ASEAN permanent representative, Jakarta, June 4, 2019. 173 Chachavalpongpun, “Thai-​Cambodian Conflict,” 82. 174 Interview with EU official, Jakarta, July 17, 2014. 170 171

Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia  135 They [attendees] stopped the exchange of fire and pushed them [Cambodian and Thai officials] to sit at the negotiating table. . . . We’re not going to stick to the words and letters there in the agreement [the TAC]. So long as the objective is reached, the cessation of fire, and [we see] the coming back [of parties] to the negotiation table, then the objectives have already been achieved, right?175

It is clear that regional officials manage conflict through their habitual disposition. They understand and enact the principles and norms of regional agreements, like the TAC, through their own lived experiences. While an external appraisal may see a disconnect between norms and practice, for members of the regional community there is a fit. This is what works “around here” in Southeast Asia. This view is mirrored by that of another official who took part in the talks: “At the meeting we were able to solve the problem [of the border dispute]. We were able to obtain assurances from both sides that any disputes would be resolved peacefully.”176 Successful conflict management was the talk itself and engaging in this informal process a goal that was realized through Indonesian leadership and the regional habitual disposition. Furthering underscoring Indonesian’s de facto leadership in this time of crisis, the parties also agreed to the Indonesian offer to provide observers. This proposal was intended to allay Cambodian fears and thereby ensure the continuance of informal dialogue. As one Indonesian official recalled, “we declared to both sides that, if needed, Indonesia was willing to deploy a monitoring group along the border.”177 It was not assumed it would be accepted, but “The Foreign Ministry had selected a number of persons just in case we needed to deploy.” However, as the official continued, “with the political assurances from both sides—​and it seems that both sides abided by the commitments—​we became very much confident [they would not be needed].” Again, in these assessments, and for the community of practice more widely, the solution was the process. Conflict management was continued through informal dialogue. This was the habitual disposition of the region at work. This was not the view of external observers, however. The International Crisis Group reacted pessimistically to these informalities,



175

Interview with Ambassador I Gede Ngurah Swajaya, Jakarta, July 30, 2014. Interview with Indonesian official, Jakarta, July 23, 2014. 177 Interview with Indonesian official, Jakarta, July 23, 2014. 176

136  Practicing Peace noting that “the ceasefires in place are mostly verbal and unsigned” and therefore “this conflict is not over.”178 From this overview, it is the clear that regional habitual disposition may have helped pacify the parties. It made possible continued dialogue and assurances of restraint. However, at the same time, this focus on process may have also prolonged the crisis, as the parties failed to formally resolve the territorial division through ASEAN efforts. Indeed, the “objective reached” according to regional officials seems at odds with external observers who find that the regional response did little to halt the potential of recurrent violence along the border, to say nothing of the ability to resolve the conflict. During the following months of informal discussions tensions and violence along the border again flared. In the two weeks leading up to and during the May 3 ASEAN Summit, large-​scale clashes occurred yet again, displacing tens of thousands and killing 11.179 The May Summit became the focal point for renewed ASEAN dialogue on the issue and an impromptu extra day of discussions was held between the Thai, Cambodian, and Indonesian ministers. Once again, the recourse was to informal dialogue and to keep conflict management within the region. These discussions produced yet more assurances and the promise of continued dialogue. Ultimately, however, the ASEAN efforts lead by Indonesia came to little perceptible outcome beyond sustained talk. While regional conflict management may have restrained the conflict, it did little to resolve it. Despite the view of ASEAN practitioners that they “solved” the crisis, it was only with Cambodia’s break with regional practices and its successful internationalization of the crisis by turning to the ICJ that resolved the crisis in a formal sense. After the April violence, Cambodia skirted the regional process, breaking with what many regional observers saw as not only natural but also effective. As one ASEAN official suggested, there remained a shared belief that “We can do within ASEAN. So why don’t we just do within ASEAN?”180 This was not the view of the Cambodians at this stage. By applying to have the ICJ reinterpret the original 1962 judgment, and thus pursue international legitimacy for its claims outside the ASEAN processes, Cambodia again broke with habituated regional practice. After three years of conflict and slow, ineffectual regional solutions, in July of 2011 the court rejected the Thai claims to the temple complex, provided Cambodia access,

178

International Crisis Group, “Waging Peace,” i–​ii. International Crisis Group, “Waging Peace,” 23–​24. 180 Interview with Indonesian official, Jakarta, July 23, 2014. 179

Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia  137 and compelled both parties to accept Indonesian monitoring over much of the disputed territory.181 Troops were removed the following July in line with the demilitarization of the area.182 This episode illustrates the Southeast Asian habitual disposition at work, shaping regional conflict management in crucial ways. It also exposes its limitations. Attention to the role of the regional habitual disposition does not suggest that practitioners reacted unthinkingly to the crisis. Rather, this episode shows that practitioners’ thinking and behavior were shaped by the habitual and dispositional qualities of regional relations. There was a particular means of conflict management that was both necessary and effective for regional officials. As a result, the regional response was circumscribed in particular ways and ASEAN’s norms enacted through particular practices. There was an inherent and basic consensus among members that allowed Indonesia, as ASEAN Chair, to take its de facto leading role. Throughout the crisis, Indonesian and member state officials demonstrated a rather automatic recourse to informal dialogue, abhorring the use of existing formal mechanisms of dispute settlement. Further, in large part this process of continued and informal dialogue was assumed the end, rather than the means—​ however ineffective this appeared to external observers. Substantively, the regional reaction was informed by the practice of noninterference and a level of acceptance of violence. As with the Indonesian-​Malaysian flares in violence, the Thai-​Cambodian violence in 2011 was rather business as usual and while troubling, assumed manageable. In managing the crisis, there was no thought of a military solution, nor were there attempts to seek out blame for the crisis. Similarly, from the onset, ASEAN practitioners sought to contain the crisis as a strictly intraregional one, and within the region there would be no naming and shaming. Moreover, this episode illustrates that, from an external standpoint, the Southeast Asian habitual disposition is itself puzzling, and less than effective. The particular and slow regional response did not, itself, halt violence along the border, but may have made continued flares in violence possible by obviating the use of other means of resolution through the UNSC or ICJ at earlier stages. However, for regional practitioners, there remains belief that dialogue largely worked. As the officials above suggest, keeping parties at the

181 International Crisis Group, “Waging Peace,” 25–​26. 182 Terry Fredrickson, “Troops Leave Preah Vihear Area,” Bangkok Post, July 19, 2012, http://​www. bang​kokp​ost.com/​learn​ing/​learn​ing-​from-​news/​303​217/​tro​ops-​leave-​preah-​vih​ear-​area.

138  Practicing Peace table may have deescalated the crisis. Speaking in 2014, this was echoed by a number of Thai officials who, even after their loss at the ICJ, all shared the suggestion that Indonesia served as a useful “facilitator” during the crisis and that the talk enabled “trust building.”183 For external observers, on the other hand, ASEAN’s engagement was slow, ineffectual, and ultimately limited in its effect. As one European diplomat remarked half-​jokingly, “the ‘ASEAN way’ works, unless you have a temple on the border.”184 Indeed, ASEAN practices did not resolve the crisis and, given the continued violence leading up the 2011 summit, they may have prolonged it further.

Conclusion This chapter has aimed to explore and account for the conflictual peace of Southeast Asia. To do so, I made three arguments of decreasing scope. First, I argued that particular communities of regional diplomatic practitioners embody, act out, and reify discrete sets of habitual dispositions—​deeply taken-​for-​granted knowledge of the world that rather automatically shape their behavior. These are qualities that social actors, like groups of diplomats, think from, rather than about, and they lead actors to respond to conflicts and crises in particular and consequential ways. Second, I have argued that there is a particular diplomatic habitual disposition among regional officials in Southeast Asia. There, a diplomatic community of practice thinks from a particular foundation when managing regional conflicts and pursuing regionalism. These habitual and dispositional qualities include engaging in prior consensus, the turn to informal dialogue, and a privileging of process over substance. Officials think from and uphold a particular and contingent understanding of noninterference, equality or familiarity of regional states, and face-​saving among community members, and they turn to pacific dispute settlement through informal talk rather than formal conflict management tools. As this chapter detailed, while many of these qualities are codified norms that prescribe appropriate behavior to ASEAN members and states beyond the region, these norms are understood and practiced in particular and given ways by members of the Southeast Asian diplomatic community.

183 184

Interview with Thai officials, Jakarta, July 1, 2014. Interview with European official, Jakarta, July 17, 2014.

Practicing Peace in Southeast Asia  139 Third, I argued that this habitual disposition matters. It shapes conflict management and delimits regionalism in Southeast Asia in particular ways. As I detailed, this set of qualities informed how this regional diplomatic community understood and responded to important crises and challenges in the region, from Cyclone Nargis in 2008 and the 2014 Thai and 2021 Myanmar coups, to the violent 2011 Preah Vihear dispute. These dispositional traits shape the “imaginability and thinkability” of conflict management and regionalism in Southeast Asia.185 While the Southeast Asian habitual disposition appears to limit conflict in meaningful ways, this does not suggest the process and substantive content deeply ingrained therein are efficient or optimal—​at least not from an external perspective. As the Preah Vihear dispute makes clear, the region’s response may appear slow and informal, and conflict may remain unresolved, however muted. The regional habitual disposition may pacify regional relations. But it may also make possible protracted and prolonged conflicts and, thereby, shape the long and conflictual peace of the region. At the same time, while these regional practices may indeed be “strange” or “insane” to many observers external to the region, for regional practitioners themselves, they simply work, and their self-​evident effectiveness restricts the need to think about alternative forms of practice.



185 Hopf, Social Construction, 283.

5 Practicing Peace in South America Introduction The history of interstate relations in South America presents another puzzle of peace and conflict. Since the 1940s, interstate war has eluded the states of region and they have become increasingly integrated through dense organizational ties. As Marcos Valle Machado da Silva notes, “South America is usually perceived as a continent free of interstate military conflicts.”1 Scholars of the region have puzzled over the depth and breadth of this regional peace, given that the region has lacked the hallmarks of liberal peace elsewhere.2 Despite this, since the turn of the 20th century, scholars have noted that an “inertia of peace” has characterized regional relations.3 According to Holsti, South America could well be “the most peaceful region in the world.”4 However, as with the Southeast Asian case, despite a lack war, intraregional militarized disputes short of war have persisted in South America and they remain a pervasive feature of regional politics. In South America, territorial and boundary conflicts endure, and armed conflict remains a plausible means of solving disputes between states despite the lack of major conflict and growing interdependence. As Jack Child notes, while the region has been regarded as “generally peaceful” by many observers, “a closer look reveals a variety of simmering conflict situations of long standing.”5 From the end of World War II to 2010, more than 70 militarized interstate disputes occurred between regional states with 39 of these including the use of force. For Mares, the region shows merely the “illusion of peace.”6

1 Da Silva, “Interstate Conflict Management,” 199. 2 See Centeno, Blood and Debt; Kacowicz, Zones of Peace; Mares, Violent Peace; Cameron G. Thies, “Traditional Security: War and Peace,” in The Routledge Handbook of Latin American Security, eds. David R. Mares and Arie M. Kacowicz (New York City: Routledge, 2016), 113–​126. 3 Centeno, Blood and Debt, 263. 4 Holsti, The State, 155. 5 Jack Child, “Interstate Relations in Latin America: Peaceful or Conflictual?,” International Journal 43, no. 3 (1988): 378. 6 Mares, Latin America. Practicing Peace. Aarie Glas, Oxford University Press. © Oxford University Press 2022. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780197633229.003.0005

Practicing Peace in South America  141 This chapter examines and accounts for this illusory, or conflictual peace. To do so, I center attention on how recurrent regional crises are managed and, more generally, how regionalism is pursued in South America. More narrowly, I uncover the existence and effect of a particular South American diplomatic habitual disposition. As with the Southeast Asian case, I find that regional diplomatic practitioners in South America know and enact particular means of conflict management that make possible the long and conflictual peace of the region. A particular set of habitual, practical, and dispositional qualities of interaction shapes regional conflict response and predisposes South American state and organizational officials to a toleration of intraregional violence. To advance my argument, this chapter mirrors the three-​part structure of the preceding chapter. In the first section, I offer a brief defense of a focus on the “region” of South America and provide a historical survey of relations here to situate this investigation. Building on the exploration of accounts of regional peace in ­chapter 1, I center my attention on issues of power, organizational development, and regional norms. In the second section, I showcase the existence of a distinctive South American habitual disposition. As with the exploration of Southeast Asia, I pay particular attention to the relationship between deeply ingrained processual and substantive qualities of regional relations and the codified norms of the region. In the third section, I turn to the effect of the region’s diplomatic habitual disposition. I do this first by reference to its robustness for practitioners themselves and then by tracing the effects of the habitual disposition on the management of the long-​ standing Cenepa dispute between Ecuador and Peru.

Conflictual Peace in South America South America is a region of 12 states: Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Columbia, Ecuador, Guyana, Paraguay, Peru, Suriname, Uruguay, and Venezuela. United by geography, history, and the cultural, socioeconomic, and political linkages that stem therefrom, this grouping of states has often been recognized as its own region within both scholarship and practice. However, it is also of region of regions, and a region within regions. These 12 states are situated within the larger Latin American region. Comprising Central America and Mexico in addition to South America, this wider region shares many cultural and historical commonalities, as

142  Practicing Peace well as the contemporary manifestations of these commonalities through a number of Latin America–​wide organizations and agreements that signal a cohesive region itself. For some observers, this wider region is a useful level of analysis to observe and analyze patterns of conflict and peace. In studies of the wider Latin American region, however, the focus often ends up centering on the relations of South American states.7 Arie M. Kacowicz, foremost among scholars of the region’s peace, for example, suggests that “Latin American countries, especially those in South America, through a gradual historical and learning process have managed to establish a unique Latin ‘diplomatic culture’ that has helped their governments to resolve international conflicts short of war.”8 Broader still, South America is a part of a hemispheric Pan-​American region. Mares for example, recognizes a “security complex” within the wider Latin American region and the United States.9 Within South America there are other potential regions as well, including the Southern Cone states of Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Ecuador, Paraguay, Peru, and Uruguay, and the Northern Tier states of Colombia, Guyana, Suriname, Venezuela, and French Guiana.10 This distinction could be separated further still, given the patterns of regional relations among these states. For example, the states of the loose Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America (ALBA), which include the South American states of Venezuela and Bolivia, Nicaragua in Central America, and Antigua and Barbuda, Cuba, Dominica, Grenada, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, and St. Vincent and the Grenadines in the Caribbean, may represent a potentially coherent and unified geopolitical and social clustering of states, as might the Andean Community (CAN) of Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru.11 As explored in c­ hapter 1, regions are social and analytical constructs. They are what practitioners and scholars analyzing practitioners and practices make of them. This book focuses on the region of South America to the exclusion of these wider and narrower potential regional constructs. As with any selection, this is a choice. But it is a choice driven by the logic of the empirical 7 See Marcial A. G. Suarez, Rafael Duarte Villa, and Brigitte Weiffen, eds., Power Dynamics and Regional Security in Latin America (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017); Rodrigo Tavares, Security in South America: The Role of States and Regional Organizations (Boulder: Lynne Rienner/​First Forum Press, 2014). 8 Kacowicz, The Impact of Norms, 47. See also Kacowicz, Zones of Peace, 103. 9 Mares, Violent Peace. 10 E.g., Kacowicz, Zones of Peace, 117–​121; Hurrell, “An Emerging Security Community.” 11 See Pia Riggirozzi, “Reconstructing Regionalism: What Does Development Have to Do With It?,” in The Rise of Post-​Hegemonic Regionalism: The Case of Latin America, eds. Pia Riggirozzi and Diana Tussie (New York City: Springer, 2012), 25–​29.

Practicing Peace in South America  143 puzzle at hand and one that aligns with the perceptions and practices of diplomatic officials here. South America, as defined, offers a particularly stark puzzle to animate this investigation. As Kacowicz notes, South America “has been one of the most harmonious regions in terms of absence of international wars.”12 The relations between these 12 states are puzzling, and beckon investigation into the role of power, organizations, and norms. Second, following the methodologies described in ­chapter 2, it is clear that officials from these 12 states conceive of themselves as embedded within a regional community to the exclusion of others. This is not to suggest they see South America as the only community of which they are part. They recognize themselves as bound within the Pan-​American Organization of American States (OAS) and many recognize their embeddedness within a wider Latin American community or narrower ALBA or CAD community, for example. However, practitioners consistently recognize and articulate the importance of their membership within a distinctive South American community. With this choice in mind, there are a number of trends that are salient when examining the history of conflict and diplomacy among these 12 regional states. To explore this particular community, I turn now to offer a foundational survey of their regional relations historically. This is for two purposes. First, building on c­ hapter 1’s discussion, this descriptive account underscores the puzzling conflictual peace of the South America since 1941 by surveying a number of periods of conflict and cooperation here. Second, it offers a discussion of the origins and development of the region’s diplomatic habitual dispositions over time. As explored in ­chapter 2, habitual dispositions are themselves historically rooted in and through the institutionalized and social relations of regional practice. In South America, the dispositions, habits, and practices that characterize regional relations emerged while regional states were in their infancy and were iterated and have evolved through decades of regional relations within varied institutional contexts. Borrowing from Kacowicz’s seminal study, trends of conflict and cooperation in South America can be posited over a number of distinct historical periods:13 a war-​prone period from the emergence of national states in the 1810s to the 1870s and 1880s; a period of consolidation of states from the 1880s to the end of World War I in 1919; the interwar period to 1945,

12 Kacowicz, Zones of Peace, 68.

13 See Kacowicz, Zones of Peace.

144  Practicing Peace where depression and conflict characterized the region; the emergence of a postwar period characterized by US interventionism, authoritarian politics, and interstate rivalries, from 1946 to the 1970s; and, the current period of new regional initiatives, democratic development, and resurgent ideological divides that have characterized the region since the late 1980s. In what follows, I briefly survey these periods in order to situate this case, underscore its conflictual peace, and highlight the role of state power, organizations, and norms across each period. The states of South America achieved independence and defined their borders violently. Fifteen years of war between emergent states and Spain (1810–​1824) was followed by more than 50 years of regional conflict within and between them. From the 1830s to the 1880s war was frequent, and often devastating. Alongside pervasive minor territorial conflicts, six major regional wars occurred during this period, including the First Argentine-​Brazilian War (1825–​1828), the Gran Colombia-​Peru War (1828–​1829), the War of the Peruvian-​Bolivian Confederation (1836–​1839), and the War of the Pacific (1879–​1883).14 Of particular severity was the La Guerra Grande (1836–​1852), a series of conflict between Argentina, Uruguay, and Brazil, which also saw external interventions from both France and the United Kingdom. Similarly, the War of the Triple Alliance (1865–​1870) saw Argentina, Brazil, and Uruguay in opposition to Paraguay, in a particularly disastrous conflict that left more than 200,000 Paraguayan soldiers dead. In short, the period from independence to the 1890s was characterized by a zone of war and conflict among emergent states as they established their borders. With the conclusion of the War of the Pacific, however, the region embarked on a more peaceful trajectory where war quickly became the exception rather than the rule. As these states consolidated their national authority and grew in economic power, a relative balance of power emerged to deter conflicts that may otherwise have risked a return to large-​scale war.15 As the 19th century concluded, Argentina emerged as a major and increasingly consolidated power and joined Peru, Chile, and Brazil as the largest economic and military powers in a region recognized by many scholars as one defined through a relative balance of power made possible by a stable “ABC [Argentina, Brazil, Chile] Concert” of states.16 Interstate conflict, however, 14 Kacowicz, Zones of Peace, 71–​72. 15 Domínguez et al., “Boundary Disputes.” 16 Kacowicz, Zones of Peace, 72–​73. See also Robert N. Burr, “The Balance of Power in Nineteenth-​ Century South America: An Exploratory Essay,” Hispanic American Historical Review 35

Practicing Peace in South America  145 did not disappear. Argentina and Chile nearly came to war in both 1898 and 1901 over unresolved border demarcations in the Andes, and a formal peace between Chile and Bolivia was not concluded until 1904. Ecuador and Peru also engaged in sustained military skirmishes along their disputed border from 1900 to 1904, which led to failed arbitration by the Spanish king in 1906.17 While war and conflict characterized the first five decades of South American independence, kernels of the institutional and ideational means of restraint and cooperation existed during the violent period of independence and emergent peace in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. As Kacowicz finds, throughout this “entire period the new states entertained a lingering spirit of solidarity.”18 From this common, if undeveloped, assumption of community stemmed a core legal principle that would characterize much of regional relations: uti possidetis juris—​that states had the right to maintain colonial territorial boundaries. As Jorge Domínguez and his coauthors observe, “To be sure, considerable postcolonial warfare surfaced in the aftermath of the breakdown of the Spanish empire, some of it affected by unclear boundaries. Yet the inherited administrative boundaries were sufficiently respected in practice in South America to contribute to the process of securing early on a framework of domestic and international legitimacy in the otherwise bloody passage from the Spanish empire to its successor American states.”19 However, this lingering solidarity and ideational commonality had little effect on regional peace until the emergence of a relatively stable balance of power at the end of the 20th century.20 The limited peace of the consolidation period was broken by the Chaco War of 1932–​1935 and the Ecuador-​Peru War of 1941, as well as a series of lesser conflicts involving Peru and Colombia.21 The Chaco War was (1955): 37–​60; Robert N. Burr, By Reason or Force: Chile and the Balancing of Power in South America (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1965); Domínguez et al., “Boundary Disputes.” 17 Mares, Violent Peace, 162–​163. 18 Kacowicz, Zones of Peace, 72; see also Centeno, Blood and Debt, 86–​87. 19 Domínguez et al., “Boundary Disputes,” 21. 20 In many ways this mirrors the more global “territorial integrity norm.” See Mark W. Zacher, “The Territorial Integrity Norm: International Boundaries and the Use of Force,” International Organization 55, no. 2 (2001): 215–​20. However, it arrived in South America much earlier. For a similar point, see Domínguez et al., “Boundary Disputes,” 25; Monica Herz and João Pontes Nogueira, Ecuador vs. Peru: Peacemaking amid Rivalry (Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 2002), 22–​25. On how this common and foundational normative quality informed the management of territorial disputes see Jackson, The Global Covenant, 32. 21 Centeno, Blood and Debt, 89–​90.

146  Practicing Peace particularly violent. As Dorothy V. Jones observes of the combatants, “To the fullest extent that their resources allowed, they reenacted World War I, with trench warfare and aerial bombardments as essential elements of conflict.”22 While the Ecuador-​Peruvian conflict concluded in the same year it began, it risked wider escalation given the support offered by neighboring states for the belligerents. During the conflict, mediation efforts from the United States, Argentina, Brazil, and Chile lead to a series of negotiations that produced the Protocol of Peace, Friendship, and Boundaries between Peru and Ecuador—​the Rio Protocol. This agreement recognized Peruvian sovereignty over the disputed territory and a further 8,000 square kilometers, costing Ecuador two-​thirds of its Oriente Province and its only outlet to the Amazon River.23 The enmity between the states over this territory persisted and would shape relations between the two states, and beyond, until the turn of the 21st century.24 Lesser conflicts arose between Peru and Colombia during this period as well, including Peru’s seizure of Colombian territory in Leticia Trapezium and a series of military skirmishes in 1933.25 Ultimately, these disputes were managed through external mediation, via League of Nations, US, and Brazilian efforts. The turn to external mediation, particularly reliant on the United States, emerged as a recurrent practice in this period.26 Under the American Good Neighbor Policy, heralded by President Roosevelt, the region saw increased American engagement in regional conflicts, particularly in the Southern Cone.27 This is most apparent through US mediation efforts in both the Chaco War and the 1941 dispute.28 US intervention in regional disputes was sporadic rather than sustained, however, and it centered on facilitating mediation rather than the military interventionism apparent in Central America and the Caribbean.29 At the same time, there were continual South American 22 Dorothy V. Jones, Code of Peace: Ethics and Security in the World of the Warlord States (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991), 138. 23 See Kacowicz, Zones of Peace, 77; Mares, Violent Peace, 34. 24 Ecuador formally rejected the Protocol in 1960, leading to a series of armed conflicts including the brief conflict in 1981 occasionally referred to as the Paquisha War and the larger Cenepa conflict of 1995 explored in this chapter. 25 Kacowicz, Zones of Peace, 77. 26 David R. Mares, “The United States’ Impact on Latin America’s Security Environment: The Complexities of Power Disparity,” in Routledge Handbook of Latin American Security, eds. David R. Mares and Arie M. Kacowicz (New York: Routledge, 2016), 302–​323. 27 Whitaker, Arthur P., The United States and the Southern Cone: Argentina, Chile and Uruguay (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1976), 373–​379. 28 Martin, Militarist Peace, 85–​91. 29 See Martin, Militarist Peace, 84–​86; Bryce Wood, The United States and Latin America Wars, 1932–​1942 (New York City: Columbia University Press, 1966).

Practicing Peace in South America  147 and wider Latin American attempts to mitigate and manage conflict by signaling normative commitments to pacific dispute settlement.30 In an effort to diffuse tensions between regional powers in 1902, for example, Argentina and Chile signed the so-​called Pactos de Mayo, which compelled previously ordered Argentine and Chilean naval ships to be resold to Japan and the United Kingdom. In 1923, Latin American foreign ministers publicly pledged to prevent regional conflict and regional leaders repeated similarly ambitious declarations through the 1936 Inter-​American Conference for the Maintenance of Peace, the Bogota Pact of 1938, and the 1947 Inter-​American Reciprocal Assistance Treaty.31 Turning to the postwar period, two potentially divergent trends are apparent: the rise of an increasingly dense institutionalization of regional relations in South America and the wider region and the rise of authoritarian regimes with distinct and divisive geopolitical national security interests.32 Both of these developments further informed the normative and organizational terrain of regional relations.33 In particular, American efforts to construct hemisphere-​wide diplomatic architecture were driven by a perceived need for a bulwark against the threat of communism in the Americas. This impulse materialized with the OAS in 1948. Latin and South American state involvement in the Pan-​American system, however, was largely driven by an interest in promoting economic growth. From the 1950s and 1960s onward, South American states pursued a network of often overlapping regional integrationist projects in pursuit of this interest.34 Chief among these was the 1960 Latin American Free Trade Association (LAFTA), established to foster greater economic interconnectedness and development between Mexico and six South American states. 30 Augusto Varas, “Zonas de Paz en America Latina: Una Popouesta Factible?,” in Seguirdad, paz y desarme: Prospuestas de concertacion pacifica en America Latina y el Caribe (Santiago: FLACSO-​ CLADDDE, 1992): 81–​87. 31 During the height of the Cold War in 1969, this took on a particular nonaligned tinge, with the South American pledge to maintain itself as a “zone of peace” similar to the Southeast Asian pledge in 1976. See Varas, “Zonas de Paz en America Latina,” 81–​87. This was repeated in 2002 by the South American presidents, in 2003 through the OAS, and in 2014 through CELAC. See World Peace Council, “CELAC Declare a Zone of Peace” (2014), http://​www.wpc-​ in.org/​news/​celac-​declare-​ zone-​peace; United Nations, “General Assembly Welcomes Declaration of South America as Zone of Peace and Cooperation,” General Assembly Plenary, 50th Meeting, November 14, 2002, http://​ www.un.org/​press/​en/​2002/​ga10​099.doc.htm; Organization of American States, “Resolution 1969, Recognition of the South American Zone of Peace and Cooperation,” 2003, http://​www.oas.org/​sap/​ peacef​und/​reso​luti​ons/​Resolution_​1969​_​Zon​e_​fo​r_​Pe​ace_​Engl​ish.pd 32 Kacowicz, Zones of Peace; Varas, “Controlling Conflict in South America.” 33 Domínguez et al., “Boundary Disputes,” 22. 34 Riggirozzi, “Reconstructing Regionalism,” 20–​25.

148  Practicing Peace For observers of the wider region, this effort was “first serious effort to promote regional integration” in the Americas.35 Similarly, in 1969, Peru, Chile, Ecuador, Colombia, and Bolivia signed the Treaty of Cartagena, establishing the Andean Pact as a customs union that would evolve into the wider CAN in 1996. The grouping was, in many ways, more expansive than the LAFTA that preceded it, incorporating supranational political institutions, the Commission and Junta, and it signaled a subregional integrationist project that remains impactful today despite the abandonment of its original integration plans.36 In the same year, 1996, the La Plata Basin Group or Cuenca del Plata was agreed by Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Paraguay, and Uruguay to pursue the development of common hydroelectric power and water resources. In short, this period saw a blossoming of regional organizations, and the field of diplomatic interaction was increasingly institutionalized. However, alongside the increasingly dense institutionalization of regional cooperation, South American states continued to experience sustained levels of regional conflict. Of particular note was the 1978 the Beagle Channel Dispute between Argentina and Chile. The divisive territorial claims over the channel were of importance for both states: Securing the channel would make Chile both a Pacific and Atlantic naval power and provide access to potential oil resources, while its loss for Argentina would mean restricted access to the South Atlantic, a threat to the junta’s interest in hegemony over the western South Atlantic and its domestic political support. Following the norm of external mediation, since 1971 the United Kingdom’s Queen Elizabeth II had been the recognized arbiter of the dispute by both of these political and ideological adversaries—​ at the time, Salvador Allende led a socialist-​communist coalition in Chile, while General Lanusse led a military dictatorship in Argentina.37 In June of 1977 the Pinochet dictatorship was awarded the territory by decree from the United Kingdom. This decision was rejected by Argentina in January of 1978, and a vitriolic propaganda campaign and active military show of force from both sides followed. One aircraft carrier, two cruisers, seven destroyers,

35 Andres Malamud and Philippe C. Schmitter, “The Experience of European Integration and the Potential for Integration in South America,” IBEI Working Papers (2006/​7), 13. This would be later transformed into the Latin American Integration Association (LAIA) in 1980, which largely served the same purpose. 36 Gordon Mace, “Regional Integration in Latin America: A Long and Winding Road,” International Journal 43, no. 3 (1988): 404–​427; Malamud and Schmitter, “The Experience of European Integration,” 13. 37 See Domínguez et al., “Boundary Disputes,” 27.

Practicing Peace in South America  149 and two Argentinian submarines were dispatched to the area and were met by a Chilean fleet of three cruisers, eight frigates and destroyers, and three submarines. A general mobilization by both states along their border was ordered. Further, both sides sought military and other support from regional states. Argentina requested a Peruvian invasion of Chile’s north and ordered a partial mobilization. Bolivia, too, considered an attack on Chile, with the aim of regaining access to the Pacific.38 In turn, Chile requested Ecuador to end oil exports to Peru. This was a potentially explosive crisis that threatened to escalate.39 However, regional conflict management stymied escalation. As with previous regional crises, officials from both states sought to couch their claims in precedent and turned to formal mediation. They relied on a particular legalist solution they knew was normal, natural, and effective. Holsti details the dynamics of Argentina’s search for arbitration of the dispute.40 After four tense days, a violent storm forced the battle groups apart and made possible a pause in escalation. During this reprieve, Pope John Paul II personally offered to arbitrate the dispute by directly appealing to leaders in both states. This, now second, turn to formal arbitration by an authority external to the region was accepted by officials in both states. Practitioners knew the tense standoff, however risky, could and would not lead to war once a resolution was pursued—​there was an inherent presumption of pacific dispute resolution. Practitioner thinking was couched in deep and firm legalism in this regard. As one Chilean interviewee recalled of this period, “nobody wanted a war with Argentina. They could not afford a war with Argentina! And the other side did not want war either.”41 However, it was clear that want it or not, as another Chilean diplomat recalled, “we were on the edge of war once again.”42 However risky this standoff had become, regional leaders were restrained in their thinking and their action. After foreign meditation, the crisis was finally and formally resolved six years later with the 1984 Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation and the Argentinian plebiscite to accept the loss of the islands.43

38 Holsti, The State, 159. 39 See Holsti, The State, 158–​159; Arie M. Kacowicz, “Geopolitics and Territorial Issues: Relevance for South America,” Geopolitics 5, no. 1 (2000): 89. 40 Holsti, The State, 155–​160. 41 Interview with Chilean official, Washington, October 27, 2014. As in previous chapters, the interviews quoted here are generally anonymous and referred to using female pronouns. Occasionally, details of dates, location, and nationality are removed to ensure anonymity. 42 Interview with Chilean official, Washington, November 11, 2014. 43 Domínguez et al., “Boundary Disputes,” 32.

150  Practicing Peace As Holsti summarizes of the crisis, the “conflict was characterized by many in both Chile and Argentina in terms of obligations arising from nineteenth century treaties and standard legal practices in locating sea and other territorial boundaries.”44 This meant, as Holsti continues, that this particular brand of legalism was the “intellectual milieu” in which decisions were made during the crisis. There was indeed an automatic “propensity for law,”45 as one American official recognized decades later. Thinking from this dispositional tendency toward legalism and the obligation inherent therein, both sides accepted external arbitration as regional states had done in disputes over decades. Despite the risks of the standoff, escalation beyond a show of force was muted. In this account, an active recourse to established and legalist practices maintained regional peace, but certainly did not restrain the crisis in the first place. Only with the existence of the dispositional and habitual recourse, then, could Kacowicz conclude that this conflict “did not disturb the pre-​existing fragile peace in general terms.”46 This episode begins to shed light on the interaction of power, organizations, and norms and how regional officials turn to particular means of conflict management as a matter of course. Through this means, violence short of war is tolerated, and the means to limit its escalation particular. During this period of regional relations, as this episode keenly illustrates, “regional peace was at best precarious, and war remained a real possibility.”47 Regional tensions were further heightened by a rise in authoritarian politics across the region. The arms race between Brazil and Argentina was just one aspect of this trend, which saw both develop indigenous nuclear technologies, and speaks to wider antagonisms between the two regional powers. 48 For some observers, the probability of war between these states “was not only high, but to a large extent, imminent throughout this period.”49 At the same time, however, regional institutionalization continued, particularly in the wake of common regional experiences with the lost decade of the debt crisis and the return of democracy to the region.50 44 Holsti, The State, 89. 45 Interview with American official, Washington, November 12, 2014. 46 Kacowicz, “Geopolitics and Territorial Issues,” 89; see also Joseph S. Tulchin, Argentina and the United States: A Conflicted Relationship (Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1990), 146. 47 Kacowicz, Zones of Peace, 80. 48 Martin, Militarist Peace, 62; Monica Serrano, “Brazil and Argentina,” in Nuclear Proliferation after the Cold War, eds. Mitchell Reiss and Robert S. Litwak (Washington, DC: Woodrow Wilson Center Press, 1994), 231–​55. 49 Battaglino, “The Coexistence of Peace,” 141. 50 Jose Maria Fanelli, “Growth, Instability and the Crisis of Convertibility in Argentina,” in The Crisis That Was Not Prevented, eds. Jan Joost Teunissen and Age Akkerman (The Hague: Forum

Practicing Peace in South America  151 The 1970s and early 1980s was a period of democratization across the region. This was a common experience that further unites the thinking of regional practitioners, as it did in the 1980s and still informs reflections on regional unity and experience today. For example, one Paraguayan official reflected on the historical development of the region and highlighted the common experience of the this period: “There are many countries that have come out of the same systems as with Paraguay, like Argentina, Uruguay, Chile, Peru . . . it is the same experience.”51 For many observers, common democratic development is linked to deepening and sustained economic interrelations and the pacific relations they see as coming with it.52 For others, it is linked to a change in thinking among regional elites, and the growth of a sense of “friendship” alongside the desecuritization of regional relations.53 Particularly within the Southern Cone states of Argentina, Brazil, and Chile the return of democracy and the related and growing economic integration made possible a settling of long-​standing territorial disputes and facilitated further institutionalization of pacific relations.54 This is evidenced most clearly by the end of the period of arms race between Argentina, which transitioned to democracy in 1983, and Brazil, which transitioned to democracy in 1985. While the rivalry had been mediated and rapprochement begun under authoritarian rule, the stability of relations improved markedly after democratization. Most tellingly was the establishment in 1997 of Mecanismo de Consulta y Coordinación entre Brasil y Argentina en materia de Defensa y Seguridad Internacional or the Brazilian-​Argentine Consultation and Coordination Mechanism for International Security and Defense Issues (MCC), which provides a forum within which to pursue common security issues.55 However, the relationship between the return of democracy and the pattern of regional conflict is not a clearly linear one, and democratic developments seem to have stoked tensions and led to increases in violence in a number of cases.56 Given popular revisionist interests of the publics in Peru and Ecuador, for example, the transition to democracy may have on Debt and Development (FONDAD), 2003): 32–​67; Stephen Haggard and Robert R. Kaufman, The Politics of Economic Adjustment: International Constraints, Distributive Conflicts, and the State (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992).

51 Interview, Paraguayan official, Washington, October 28, 2014. 52 E.g., Battaglino, “The Coexistence of Peace,” 141–​142. 53 E.g., Oelsner, “Friendship, Mutual Trust.”

54 Battaglino, “The Coexistence of Peace”; Buzan and Weaver, Regions and Powers, 322–​327. 55 See Flemes, “Creating a Regional Security Community,” 13. 56 Domínguez et al., “Boundary Disputes.”

152  Practicing Peace actually increased the likelihood of escalation in their enduring territorial dispute over access to the Amazon River in the 1990s.57 So, while this development between the traditional and major power rivals of Argentina and Brazil exemplifies the institutionalization of cooperative means of conflict resolution and suggests a qualitative change in their relations,58 in the wider context of the region these changes did little to diminish the pervasive level of territorial disputes, and did not translate into a regional security community.59 In short, a conflictual peace remained even as democracy developed and regional organizing deepened. However, these developments did foster increased economic cooperation and institutionalization of economic interdependence. Mercosur, the Common Market of the South, comprising Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay, and, until its 2016 suspension, Venezuela, was created through the Treaty of Asunción in 1991 as an effort to promote domestic social welfare via regional cooperation, and was further institutionalized in 1994 through the Protocol of Ouro Preto.60 Similarly, during this period the Andean Pact grew to the more formalized and ambitious CAD.61 An alternative form of cooperation also emerged in ALBA.62 More recently, and expansively, the founding of the Union of South American States (UNASUR) signaled a largely Brazilian-​led and exclusively South American integrationist strategy encompassing existing economic agreements and promoting a wider and rival attempt at integration privileging political over economic issues.63 The organization was formalized in 2008 and its secretariat constructed in 2014, rendering it a “baby” according to many South American officials in our conversations in 2014.64 However, even with its future now less than certain and its relevance increasingly diminished, it represents a particular vision of South American regionalism largely in opposition to the US-​dominated 57 Domínguez et al., “Boundary Disputes,” 29; Mares, Militarist Peace, 161–​189; Varas, “Controlling Conflict in South America,” 76. 58 Battaglino, “The Coexistence of Peace,” 141–​145; Kacowicz, Zones of Peace, 98–​99. 59 Mares, Violent Peace; Morris and Millan, “Introduction.” 60 Malamud and Schmitter, “The Experience of European Integration,” 14. 61 See Malamud and Schmitter, “The Experience of European Integration.” 62 See Joseph S. Tulchin, “Regional Security in Latin America after US Hegemony,” in Power Dynamics and Regional Security in Latin America, eds. Marcial A. G. Suarez, Rafael Duarte Villa, and Brigitte Weiffen (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017), 27–​51. 63 See José Briceño-​Ruiz, José and Andrea Ribeiro Hoffmann, “Post-​Hegemonic Regionalism, UNASUR, and the Reconfiguration of Regional Cooperation in South America,” Canadian Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Studies /​Revue canadienne des études latino-​américaines et caraïbes 40, no. 1 (2015): 48–​62; Efe Can Gurzan, “New Regionalisms and Radical Identity Formation in Latin America: Towards an ‘Alter-​Global’ Paradigm,” Journal of Social Research and Policy 2 (2010): 27. 64 Interview with two Argentinian officials, Washington, November 6, 2014.

Practicing Peace in South America  153 OAS.65 Similarly, the South American Defense Council (SADC), formed in 2009, unites the ministries of defense of UNASUR members to jointly pursue the realization of a zone of peace, to the exclusion of the US-​led OAS.66 At the same time, however the South American region has also embarked on a political economic “community” with the wider Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC), founded in 2010 to present another alternative forum from the OAS. These organizations, many still in their infancy, further underscore a history of myriad often overlapping efforts at institutionalized cooperation and regional organizing.67 The dense “institutional overlap” of the region is something recognized by regional officials as both important and frustrating.68 As one Ecuadorian official noted with some dismissal: We have CELAC and we have UNASUR [besides the OAS]. Right? In those two integration groups, we don’t have the United States and Canada, and in the UNASUR we don’t have Mexico . . . but we don’t know [how consequential they are or will be]. We will see in the coming future what we will get from them. They are just buildings now. They are being built and are developing now. Usually, it starts with a political “boom.” Someone comes and gives an initial push to integration or whatever, and it grows a little bit. Then we wait five or maybe seven years to see it continue growing. Then it will develop into something else, but we don’t know.69

That an official can react with such apathy to a regional project is telling itself of the propensity of regional schemes and institutionalization throughout the history of the region. Indeed, many interviewees with experience at 65 See Riggirozzi, “Reconstructing Regionalism,” 29–​31; Pia Riggirozzi and Jean Grugel, “Regional Governance and Legitimacy in South America: The Meaning of UNASUR,” International Affairs 91, no. 4 (2015): 781–​797; Jose Antonio Sanahuja and Francisco Javier Verdes-​Montenegro Escánez, “The Copenhagen School in South America: The (De)Securitization of UNASUR (2008–​2017),” Revista Brasileira de Política Internacional 64, no. 2 (2021): 1–​20. 66 See Battaglino, “The Coexistence of Peace.” 67 See also Daniel Flemes and Michael Radseck, “Creating Multi-​Level Security Governance in South America,” in Comparative Regional Security Governance, eds. Shaun Breslin and Stuart Croft (New York City: Routledge, 2012), 154–​180; Glas and Zarnett, “Regional Organizations”; Brigitte Weiffen, Leslie Wehner, and Detlef Nolte, “Overlapping Regional Security Institutions in South America: The Case of OAS and UNASUR,” International Area Studies Review 16, no. 4 (2013): 370–​389. 68 See Brigitte Weiffen, “Institutional Overlap and Responses to Political Crises in South America,” in Power Dynamics and Regional Security in Latin America, eds. Marcial A. G. Suarez, Rafael Duarte Villa, and Brigitte Weiffen (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017), 173–​198. 69 Interview with two Ecuadorian officials, Washington, November 7, 2014.

154  Practicing Peace various organizations expressed a sense of exhaustion at the multiplicity of groupings and the long history of regional organizing. With a sense of bewilderment, one official noted that “[in terms of] promoting peace and stability, there are so many organizations. You can see this. . . . There are so many legal organizations in the same region.”70 A Chilean official suggested much the same when she noted that there remained “big question marks” over the efficacy of UNASUR.71 In another common assertion, one OAS official suggested: “Regionalism has a long history [in South America], and I think it’s positive. I think the jury is somewhat still out on UNASUR and CELAC, which are pretty recent organizations. We’re in a process . . . [so it] is not wise to reach hasty conclusions [on UNASUR or CELAC].”72 A Peruvian official suggested much the same when reflecting on the rise of UNASUR: We don’t want either [the OAS or UNASUR] to disappear. We want them all! Even the Andean Community, something most people don’t even talk about it anymore! We’re still part of it. There is always something workable in these things. Even the stuff that you don’t really care about, well someone started it and there was huge inertia in the organization, but there is always one or two things that remain important. And that is why they survive. For the Andean Community, we do have two or so, or maybe one or two things that we still care about there, even if it is just these two things. On UNASUR, and the OAS, we get different things from different groups and you just need to keep them all in order in your mind! Then we have the Pacific Alliance, something that is small in size and doesn’t require this huge bureaucracy. It doesn’t even have a secretariat, and yet it is working.73

For this official, the myriad overlapping institutions were a necessity. Indeed, across interviews there was a shared sense of both the utility of regional organizing and the plethora of competing and overlapping organizational forums in which this has manifested over time. In short, reflecting on the developments of this period, it is clear that neither democratic nor organizational changes have ensured the resolution of regional territorial conflicts, nor have they generated a sense of wider regional identity that abhors violence as a means to effect change. However, they have helped to entrench

70 Interview with Paraguayan official, Washington, October 28, 2014. 71 Interview with Chilean official, Washington, October 27, 2014. 72 Interview with OAS official, Washington, November 10, 2014.

73 Interview with Peruvian official, Washington, November 3, 2014.

Practicing Peace in South America  155 5 4 3 2 1 0 1946

1956

1966

1976

1986

1996

2006

Figure 5.1.  Militarized Interstate Disputes of South American States, 1946–​2010

or make possible the continual turn to particular means of conflict management among these states. To summarize, there appear two central trends in South American regional relations across the periods explored. First, the history of South American relations shows a violent region, with conflict short of war characterizing relations throughout the periods surveyed. More narrowly, this conflictual peace is apparent in the post-​1945 period, summarized in Figure 5.1. As explored in ­chapter 1, the figure depicts the 70 intraregional militarized interstate disputes between regional states. These include 39 disputes at hostility level 4 (the use of force), 30 at level 3 (the display of the use of force), and one at level 2 (the threat of the use of force). Indeed, while war has eluded the region since at least 1941, regional states have engaged in persistent conflicts short of war throughout the contemporary period—​a “rude shock” of reality for scholars and officials who assert the inherent peacefulness of the region.74 Second, alongside this conflictual peace has been the development of regional norms and organizations to manage regional relations and regional conflict. These have been used and supported by regional powers, centrally Brazil, in particular ways and with particular effects: restricting escalation, but less the recurrence of crises. Indeed, the history of the region showcases that the “ubiquity of the use of force in interstate relations” in the region, as Mares recognizes,75 is matched by a ubiquity in regional organizations and in the regional norms and principles that underpin them.

74 Mares, “The Zone,” 238.

75 Mares, Violent Peace, 47.

156  Practicing Peace In the next section, I examine the existence and the effect of a discrete South American diplomatic habitual disposition; what members of the South American community of practice think from rather than about and enact as a matter of course when managing regional conflict and pursuing regionalism. As with the Southeast Asian study in ­chapter 4, I do this over two sections and two steps. First, I articulate the existence of a South American habitual disposition, with attention to its origins and its processes and content. Second, I explore its effects by examining the robustness of this habitual disposition and by tracing its role within a crucial case of regional conflict management.

The Habitual Disposition of South American Conflict Management and Regionalism Given the overlapping organizations, shared ideas, and collective regional experience, many scholars have recognized distinctive and shared interstate norms within the South American region. A number of these accounts stress the role of regional norms in defusing conflict and fostering cooperative relations between states.76 Many accounts of regional norms begin from the observation that South American relations showcase a particular and legalistic “diplomatic culture”77 or “security culture.”78 This suggests the existence of a unique set of legal principles that practitioners actively reference and rely on in their decision-​making. As Kacowicz summarizes of the wider Latin American region, “In few other parts of the world is the culture of a given region perceived to be so distinctive, identifiable, and at the same time so influential in the political processes, both domestic and international.”79 As examined in the preceding section, since independence, South American states “have gradually built a highly developed system of regional international law” that has constrained behavior through conscious reference to a set of legal norms.80 This recognition is a useful entry point to exploring what, if any, qualities of regional relations are dispositional and habitual in the minds and behavior of regional officials when they confront crises and 76 E.g., Herz, Siman, and Telles, “Regional Organizations”; Kacowicz, The Impact of Norms; Tussie, “Latin America.” 77 Holsti, The State, 17; Hurrell, “Working with Diplomatic Culture.” 78 Weiffen, “Institutional Overlap,” 176. 79 Kacowicz, The Impact of Norms, 47. While Kacowicz surveys the Latin American region, he finds a normative or cultural community particularly stark and consequential in South America. 80 Kacowicz, The Impact of Norms, 46.

Practicing Peace in South America  157 challenges, and thereby, which elements of the normative terrain of the many organizations here may be of particular significance for understanding the scope and effect of conflict management and the wider dynamics of the South American conflictual peace. The literature on South American regional relations suggests an array of consciously referenced codified norms and principles that may be consequential in these regards. These include sovereignty and equality of states; uti possidetis juris and territorial integrity; peaceful settlement of international disputes, convivencia, and concertacion; arms control, collective security and confidence-​building measures; and political legalism, democracy, and human rights.81 Many of these foundational principles have been denoted within declarations of South American organizations, such as the 2008 Constitutive Treaty of UNASUR, and within wider Pan-​American frameworks as well, most notably in the 1948 OAS Charter. In what follows, I argue that many of these normative qualities of relations are usefully and better understood through the lens of practice and habit—​as deeply internalized and dispositional qualities of relations that are known and enacted in particular ways and that provide for unproblematic and relatively automatic behavior within the South American community of practice. Indeed, as I show in detail below, this is why many of the norms and principles codified within the OAS are understood and enacted by officials from the organization’s South American members in ways at odds with how they are understood and enacted by officials from North America. As I show below, it is the particular and largely unreflexive practice of many of these codified and often abstract norms that consequentially shapes South American conflict management and regionalism. Before I uncover the particular qualities of regional relations within this community, I pause to comment on their origins.

Origins As ­chapter 2 detailed, habitual dispositions emerge from precedent and iteration and are the properties of relatively discrete communities of practice. 81 See Kacowicz, The Impact of Norms, 59–​63, 50–​51. In applying and examining the link between the existence of these consciously referenced and often codified norms and long regional peace, Kacowicz’s excellent study focuses on the origins and impact of the norm of peaceful settlements of disputes and of uti possidetis juris. See Kacowicz, The Impact of Norms, 71–​77.

158  Practicing Peace These communities are defined through their self-​regarding identity and common enterprise, their use of shared tools of action, and their dense, repeated interactions over time. These kinds of communities are present within and around institutional settings, where socialization mechanisms are likely to develop and unite actors over time. Much of South American diplomacy occurs within one such community, with a transnational group of diplomats from regional organizations and the 12 South American states engaged in dense interactions across and between a host of institutionalized contexts. These actors are united in the common enterprise of regionalism and pursuing national interests through institutionalized settings, and they make use of both collective material resources—​institutional forums and processes—​ and commonly recognized ideational and normative resources as they pursue these interests. Moreover, as explored below, this is a group of actors who are self-​regarding. They see themselves as part of varied communities, but give particular importance to their existence within a South American community of officials that is consequentially distinct from others, including those of the wider hemispheric community at the OAS. Moreover, this community exhibits a set of shared practices. As in the case of the Southeast Asian diplomatic community of practice around ASEAN explored in the previous chapter, these practices are shaped and propagated by the behavior of powerful actors and conditioned by perceptions of efficacy within the community. The regional diplomatic habitual disposition of South America emerged through historically specific practices of regional states and has been transmitted within the bounds of the dense institutionalized context of regional relations. The particularities of the legal and normative tradition of South American states and their officials has long been recognized by scholars with varied analytical interests. For example, Benedict Anderson observes the role of common experience across the “creole elites” of emergent nation-​states of the region as foundational not only for uniting disparate national entities but also for building a common and Iberian-​styled framework of regional relations.82 As explored, Kacowicz directly examines these suggestions in reference to regional cooperation, finding a “Spanish legalistic culture, including its features of idealism, paternalism, legalism, and formalism” shapes South American relations and, crucially, a commitment to regional norms 82 Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origins and Spread of Nationalism (London: Verso, 2000[1983]), 53–​59.

Practicing Peace in South America  159 and principles of sovereignty and equality of states, uti possidetis juris, and political legalism.83 However, the long-​held legal traditions of the emergent states of South America have also been impacted by wider experiences with Bolivarianism and Pan-​Americanism. While the origins of the habitual qualities of regional relations rest with this common experience, it is their practice by powerful regional states and their officials that has reified and rendered them consequential for relations. Here, Brazil looms large, in both the historical survey above and in the views of regional officials today.84 For most regional officials interviewed, Brazil was recognized as uniquely consequential for regionalism in South America. This is for relatively intuitive reasons according to many state officials. One Peruvian official, for example, noted succinctly that “Brazil is the largest and most powerful” state in the region. Thus, it was clear it played a larger and more powerful rule in regional diplomacy.85 A Paraguayan official suggested much the same, noting that Brazil is “a big country. A powerful country . . . you can feel that. . . . That is the truth. You feel that.”86 A Chilean official suggested Brazil is “naturally” a regional leader as a result of its size.87 Moreover, as a Colombian official reflected, “it is clear they [Brazilian officials] want to be the regional power; to be like the United States in South America . . . regardless of leftist, centrist, or right-​leaning governments. It is a path in their history.”88 This, of course, does not suggest a hegemonic imposition of Brazilian authority and interests—​in the region, in the OAS, or through other regional organizations. This was noted by many interviewees with experience across both political organizations, like OAS and UNASUR, and economic organizations, including Mercosur. As a Peruvian official summarized with contemplative hesitation, “Brazil thinks they are the leader [of the region] . . . to a certain point they are so, of course. . . . But, they are not fully.”89 However, it does suggest that attention to Brazilian behavior in the long history of the long and conflictual peace may be more consequential for peace and cooperation than others.

83 Kacowicz, The Impact of Norms, 54–​55. 84 See also Daniel Flemes and Leslie Wehner, “Drivers of Strategic Contestation: The Case of South America,” International Politics 52, no. 2 (2015): 163–​177. See also Mares, “The Zone,” 236; Tulchin, “Regional Security in Latin America after US Hegemony,” 38–​40. 85 Interview with Peruvian official, Washington, November 3, 2014. 86 Interview with Paraguayan official, Washington, October 28, 2014. 87 Interview with Chilean official, Washington, October 27, 2014. 88 Interview with Colombian official, Washington, November 14, 2014. 89 Interview with Peruvian official, Washington, November 3, 2014.

160  Practicing Peace Unsurprisingly, Brazilian diplomats see this as well. As one official remarked of her South American colleagues at the OAS: “They say that ‘Brazil is a leader, a natural leader in the region, so we need you to lead this process or to go ahead and bring some ideas.’ They need the presence of Brazil in some way. [But] I don’t want to brag about it.”90 Recognizing the flipside of this assumption, the Brazilian official suggested pragmatically, “Of course, you hear complaints from Paraguay and Uruguay, but I think that’s the natural way that things are. You will always hear the complaints of smaller countries about bigger countries.” As she continued, “I remember when I served in [a South American state, redacted for anonymity]. Sometimes I was really surprised when I opened the newspaper and saw: ‘Brazil is an imperialist country that is stealing everything from [redacted].’ Now, I say to my American friends here that I understand the US much more!” Speaking to officials external to the region sheds light on this dynamic as well. One North American official, with a distinct sense of vitriol, noted that “They are the puppet masters. But you can never say where or how it [Brazilian power and leadership] works. It just is. Whenever we have a real breakdown in negotiations [with South American states at the OAS], at the end of the day, we need them.”91 Beyond common cultural historical experience and the presence of powerful regional states, the region exhibits organizational contexts and 90 Interview with Brazilian official, Washington, November 6, 2014. 91 Interview with North American official at the OAS, Washington, October 30, 2014. While it is beyond the scope of interest here, it is clear that this Brazilian regional leadership manifests itself in a spoiler role at the OAS. Here, their regional leadership is diluted and other important players—​the United States, Mexico—​also exercise particular sway. As a result, Brazil actively undermines OAS efforts at times, and consistently is disengaged in the organization’s operations. As a Peruvian diplomat (Interview, Washington, November 3, 2014) observed, “They are not even the chair of a single group [at the OAS]. They don’t even try.” At the OAS this often means Brazil is the source of impasse. The Peruvian diplomat continued: It’s because Brazil is not the guy here. They cannot control it here. There is Mexico and the US, especially the US, but Canada too. They have less influence here, so why would they want this [the OAS] to be any stronger? They want UNASUR to be the strongest one. That is their political, and their most important regional, forum. Well, Mercosur, but I think UNASUR is probably more important. Here, they cannot manage everything as they can manage it in UNASUR where is hard to balance them. I think that’s why they don’t really support it, and the ALBA countries are the same. But that’s also why we do support it, and we do care—​we do support the OAS. An American diplomat at the OAS, with experience elsewhere in the South American region, was less convinced. In her view, Brazil has “a tremendous amount of political power but they cannot make good on this potential” at the OAS or through UNASUR. In her view, Brazil is “like a teenager. They want all the privileges [of being a powerful state] and brush aside any responsibility” (Interview, Washington, November 12, 2014). Thus, when Brazil sought a seat on the UN Security Council, and established the “baby” institution that is the UNASUR while continuing to stymie progress at the OAS, it is because Brazilian officials “are hedging their bets. As a teen, they know they can be bizarre

Practicing Peace in South America  161 institutional networks in which particular practices or habits are likely to emerge. The dense, overlapping organizational architecture of regional relations means sustained interaction among regional diplomats and, as the OAS exhibits, a relatively insular transnational and transorganizational field of diplomatic practitioners. In short, there are ample reasons to query for evidence of habitual, practical, and dispositional qualities of regional relations among South American diplomatic officials. Moreover, and as has been explored in ­chapter 3, there are likely to be important distinctions between the norms, principles, and rules adopted and codified across the organizations in the region (and beyond) and those that are habituated in practice by regional officials here. In the next section I examine which, if any, of these regional norms and institutional principles have emerged as elements of a habitual disposition for regional practitioners.

The Particularities of the South American Habitual Disposition South American regional diplomatic officials conceive of and practice regional relations in a particular way. Across organizational settings, from the OAS to UNASUR, relations begin with a disposition toward legalism, rather than informal processes, and four related habitual and practical qualities of regional relations can be unpacked. In terms of process, regional relations are shaped by a rules-​based orientation, formality in dialogue, and a propensity toward external mediation of disputes. These processual attributes of interstate relations rest on a fourth element of habitual content, an inarticulate sense of regional familiarity that binds a community of practice. Each of these qualities of regional relations is deeply internalized by regional state officials and each circumscribes the behavior of regional practitioners in particular ways. In the following sections I explore these arguments in turn, beginning with an exposition of the four particularities of the South American habitual disposition. and disinterested, but won’t be kicked out of the house . . . and yet they don’t want to leave either.” This suggestion is that while Brazil wishes to be an active and powerful member of the regional, hemispheric, and even global community, for this American observer it is not yet acting as a powerful state should. This was echoed by a North American OAS official who suggested that “Brazil is big. Brazil is important,” but it is not a “constructive, mature” member state (Interview with OAS official, November 13, 2014).

162  Practicing Peace

Habituated Processes in South American Diplomacy South American diplomacy rests on legalistic foundations and assumptions as to what are natural and normal ways of doing—​of practicing diplomacy, pursuing regionalism, and managing conflict. In some ways, this claim is a less than novel one. As explored, many scholars recognize a long history of legalism in this region and highlight varied and consciously referenced norms and principles that seem to shape regional relations, from independence through attempts at novel forms of regionalism in the 1980s and 1990s. Holsti finds, for example, that “South American governments have frequently—​and uniquely—​chosen legal means for defusing actual or potential crises. There has also been a history of policy-​makers analyzing issues from a legal rather than geostrategic perspective.”92 However, as Andrew Hurrell observes, “ ‘Legalism’ seems to me to be one of the most overused and under-​analysed concepts in relation to the foreign policies of the Americas.”93 In particular, a focus on rhetoric and codified principles rather than practice has obscured understanding of how regional practitioners themselves understand and practice aspects of “legalism,” and with what effects. As examined in ­chapter 2, the divides between both a codified norm and its practice, or how external observers understand this fit versus that of members of a community are often wide. What a norm or principle means and how it ought to competently be enacted depends on where one stands—​ inside or outside of a community of practice.94 As Hurrell continues, “It might be the case, for example, that law has been very important in the background of many elites in Latin America; but this has often been divorced from the actual practice or influence of law.”95 Kacowicz suggests much the same regarding the wider normative framework he uncovers in the Latin American context, casting doubt as to whether consciously referenced norms of appropriate conduct inform regional behavior in practice. As he suggests, “the paradox remains that this battery of norms has not always been applied and

92 Holsti, The State, 170. See also Jorge G. Castañeda, “Morning in Latin America: The Chance for a New Beginning,” Foreign Affairs 87, no. 5 (2008): 126–​139; Herz, Siman, and Telles, “Regional Organizations”; Kacowicz, “Geopolitics and Territorial Issues”; Rafael Duarte Villa, “Security Community or Balance of Power? Hybrid Security Governance in Latin America,” in Power Dynamics and Regional Security in Latin America, eds. Marcial A. G. Suarez, Rafael Duarte Villa, and Brigitte Weiffen (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017), 77–​100. 93 Hurrell, “Working with Diplomatic Culture,” 5. 94 See Glas, “Habits of Peace.” 95 Hurrell, “Working with Diplomatic Culture,” 5.

Practicing Peace in South America  163 implemented as such.”96 This recalls Acharya’s concession that the norms of the “ASEAN way” may not actually inform ASEAN behavior “in practice.”97 As with the Southeast Asian case, my interest in this investigation of South American diplomacy centers on what is upheld in “actual practice.” Exploring and conceptualizing the practices and understandings of South American diplomatic culture and understandings of “legalism” through the lens of habitual dispositions puts the onus of definition of this concept and its competent enactment in practice on the community of practice itself—​ what practitioners know to be the “normal way that diplomacy works” in the words of the previously quoted American official working alongside ASEAN.98 From this view, in practice, there are two related qualities of legalism in South American regional relations: thinking from a rules-​based foundation for interactions and engaging in formalized dialogue. From these underlying foundations, stems the third processual attribute, a turn to external mediation of regional disputes. In speaking to South American diplomats about how they understand their diplomatic craft and their experiences doing it, it is clear that this diplomatic community thinks from a rules-​based approach to relations. Officials’ thinking and behavior suggests a given, rather automatic reliance on formalized dialogue in the pursuit of their interests, including resolving conflict. And officials recognize, when pushed, that this is normal, natural, and effective. Moreover, there is a common and unproblematized assumption that established legal principles and rules-​based processes are the means available and effective in pursuing their interests at the regional level. This was made clear when speaking to a Chilean diplomat who, after discussing her approach to regional issues through the OAS and beyond, seemed puzzled at my suggestion that informality—​akin to that described in the case of Southeast Asia—​“works” in other contexts. In reaction, she described her working life as “quite simply, very rule-​oriented” and “legalistic” and was largely unable to think of an alternative as effective or even possible.99 A Peruvian official echoed this puzzlement, by suggesting that the legalism her colleagues had noted was simply “how it is that we approach problems.”100 These suggestions were mirrored in the observations of many diplomats external to the regional

96 Kacowicz, The Impact of Norms, 72.

97 Acharya, Constructing Security Community, 63. 98

Interview with American official, Jakarta, July 3, 2014. Interview with Chilean official, Washington, October 27, 2014. 100 Interview with Peruvian official, Washington, November 4, 2014. 99

164  Practicing Peace community, but who work alongside South American officials within the OAS. In the words of one American diplomat, South Americans at the OAS practice a “heavy legalism,” a version of rules-​based process that she found rather particular and alien. In her view, this particular brand shaped all her interactions with her South American colleagues.101 These quick suggestions typify the South American approach to both conflict management and regionalism more generally: a heavily legalism in practice and a rules-​based disposition. More narrowly, many South American officials articulated the naturalness and effectiveness of a recourse to formal channels for dispute resolution—​ from economic to security issues. For them, it provided what was assumed a normal, comfortable means of responding to challenges. In the words of a Chilean diplomat, formality was a means for his state to “feel safe and comfortable.”102 As she continued, “We [South American states] are small counties. We always support legalistic approaches because of our backyard. The US likes to say we are its backyard, but it is ours too. We need clear and established rules to be protected.”103 A Peruvian diplomat echoed this sentiment when she suggested that adopting rules-​based dialogue meant an “an extra guarantee” of their interests and one that facilitated stable regional relations.104 In the words of the Chilean official, “the weight of history is too heavy” to stray from what is known as safe and comfortable legalism.105 An illustration of this dynamic in the fall of 2014 was the recent experience reforming the Inter-​American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR). This was a common issue raised by South American practitioners when asked to describe their recent efforts at the OAS, and it both underscored the division within the South American region and preoccupied many officials working at the OAS. The impulse for reform came from Brazil, which had run afoul of the Commission in recent years as a result of its Belo Monte hydroelectric dam construction, and from the ALBA states, who saw the Commission as an imposition of American interests. As one Brazilian official suggested, “we have had to take a lead in one of the most important processes that we have here: the one related to the reform of the human rights system. But [we’ve] had to be very careful because this was the issue that made Brazil

101

Interview with American official, Washington, November 12, 2014. Interview with Chilean official, Washington, October 27, 2014. See also Herz, Siman, and Telles, “Regional Organizations,” 130–​131. 104 Interview with Peruvian official, Washington, November 3, 2014. 105 Interview with Chilean official, Washington, October 27, 2014. 102 103

Practicing Peace in South America  165 go away, in such a sense, from the OAS. It was an important issue for us, but [our efforts] couldn’t be so conspicuous so that people would think we were trying to get our revenge or were trying to impose on the Inter-​American system.”106 For Brazilian interviewees, and those from ALBA states alike, there was a common suggestion that, as this Brazilian official noted, “the decisions taken by the Commission were subjective and that they depended on the person who was in charge of the proceedings.”107 This perceived informality was not how normal regional relations work. For many interviewees, this explained the recent critique of Mexico in the face of missing students in the state of Guerrero and Brazil regarding the Belo Monte dam.108 As the Brazilian official saw it, then–​Commission President Dinah L. Shelton had too much autonomy and made political decisions outside the scope of legal mandate. In her words, She [Shelton] felt that the Commission had to make a stand regarding the most important countries in order to establish the independence and the autonomy of the Commission. So, the Commission hit Mexico first. They had a lot of trouble with Mexico because of a decision they took regarding that case. After that, she decided to hit Brazil. This was just to mark the position that the Commission was autonomous and that the Commission had the power to do so.109

This sparked fear for the Brazilians, but also many small South American states. They feared being targeted, but also took issue with the perceived informality and what they saw as arbitrariness that stemmed from the Commission’s autonomy. Many officials interviewed, then, felt there was a need to restrain the Commission by better formalizing the processes by which it investigated members. As the Brazilian official continued, “At that 106 Interview with Brazilian official, Washington, November 6, 2014. In 2011 in response to the request of the IAHCR that Brazil stop work on the dam, Brazilian President Rouseff formally pulled its ambassador from the OAS, leaving their permanent representative an apparently permanent interim figure, a symbolic move matched in more practical terms by a pause in paying dues and a refusal to support the OAS by chairing working groups. See Inter-​American Commission on Human Rights, “PM 382/​10—​Indigenous Communities of the Xingu River Basin, Pará, Brazil, Inter-​American Commission on Human Rights, Precautionary Measures,” 2011, http://​www.oas.org/​en/​iachr/​ind​ igen​ous/​pro​tect​ion/​precau​tion​ary.asp. 107 Interview with Brazilian official, Washington, November 6, 2014. 108 Organization of American States, “IACHR Makes an Urgent Call on the Mexican State Regarding the Murder and Disappearance of Students,” OAS Press Release, October 10, 2014, http://​ www.oas.org/​en/​iachr/​media​_​cen​ter/​PRelea​ses/​2014/​117.asp. 109 Interview with Brazilian official, Washington, November 6, 2014.

166  Practicing Peace moment, most of the countries realized that the Commission was going through a path where nobody would be safe; safe in terms of knowing what to expect. So, if the [Commission’s] president woke up one morning thinking that, ‘Well, today we will have to say something hard against the United States:’ Bam! Then they will do it, just to mark a position. And that created a lot of uncertainty and worried many countries, of course.” The initial impulse came from the ALBA countries, but Brazil joined and took a leading role assuming a common position among South American states. As the Brazilian official recalled, “Everybody agreed to go along with them [ALBA states], because everybody felt that we needed some criteria, we needed some guidance, and we needed some rules to understand or to at least establish a relationship with the Commission.” For these officials, the Commission did not represent the “normal way diplomacy works” in the region. The resulting discussions and changes to the function of the Commission are also telling. A two-​year period to refine the Commission’s rules saw the acceptance of a number of proposals, and the rejection of others. As the Brazilian official explained, the Commission reviewed the many suggestions they’d got, [and decided] which ones would be accepted. That was a decision taken by them. But, actually, what they did was to accept the decisions that had the full support of most of the countries [of the OAS]. That was quite reasonable. The ones that were rejected were recommendations made by some counties, and I don’t need to tell you which countries that I am talking about [i.e., ALBA]. These were countries that had the intention of hitting the Commission hard, and then trying to delimitate its power and put a fence around the Commission. They didn’t succeed. They didn’t succeed because most of the countries realized that it was important to have some rules, but it was also important keep the autonomy and the independence of the Commission. Because, if they don’t have this autonomy their work will not be useful. They would not be able to impose or to condemn anything done by the states. Any wrongdoing would have no penalty at all.

The result of this process, in the words of the Brazilian official recalling the developments was, that everyone was happy because from the point of view of the states we had now rules that we would know . . . in advance in order to deal with the cases. And

Practicing Peace in South America  167 the Commission had practices that they have to follow, some steps that they have to follow in order to reach a decision. And then it was good for them as well, because before this process they were accused of being very unstable in terms of decisions. Sometimes you a got a very hard decision imposed on a state, and sometimes you got an easy way so a country was almost free to go without penalty at all. So there was no defined rule or defined criteria for us, and for them, to act. So they were happy at the end of the day because they now have more objective steps to take and they know how to do it, and they know it wouldn’t depend on the president of the Commission. However they will have to follow these rules and will have to take all these steps before reaching a decision. So, it was good for everyone.

For South American officials, it was the question of the legality and the procedural rules of the Commission that led to worry. They were not normal, natural, or effective. Rather, for the regional power Brazil and the small regional states alike, a more legalist and formalized approach was necessary and “good for everyone.” Across interviews it was clear that this was the case, and interviewees agreed as to why. As a Paraguayan official suggested, “it is very important to always be in an integration system. First of all, because we are a small, local, land-​locked country. We need to be integrated.”110 As she continued, “We need to be in good relations, in all senses, with our neighbors. That is not easy. . . . The history shows us that there is always Argentina. They treat Paraguay with their hegemonía. . . . We are between two big countries: Argentina and Brazil. And that has worked against our development.” Therefore, “We need to be treated the same way by all countries, by Argentina and by Brazil.” A similar sentiment came from a Peruvian diplomat who explained the underlying assumptions that generated this propensity: We have Ecuador and Bolivia, then Chile and Colombia. They are all completely different neighbors. Then, of course the superpower of Brazil. So, for us it is a balance and balancing all the time. . . . So, for Peru it is all about dealing with different neighbors. Geography for us is just there and we have to deal with it, and to be a part of all these groups [regional organizations]. For Paraguay it is similar, but also about survival.111

110 111

Interview with Paraguayan official, Washington, October 28, 2014. Interview with Peruvian official, Washington, November 3, 2014.

168  Practicing Peace This balancing, of course, does not mean formal military balancing. Rather, and as a result of the habitual disposition at work for this official and the Brazilian official quoted above, it means relying on formalized processes of interaction with powerful neighbors. As c­ hapter 3 explored, this does not suggest a lack of reflection. Rather, these practitioners think from a particular foundation—​these officials know they represent states that are relatively small and vulnerable. As a result, they know what options are available and effective to pursue their interests. However, these options are delineated by the habitual qualities of regional relations, which in this case suggest a turn to safe, comfortable, formalized and rules-​based interactions. The expression of this disposition and focus on formality in dialogue is a particular one, however. It deviates from what a rules-​based or legalistic approach means and how it ought to be enacted for extraregional officials. In this way, as ­chapter 2 made clear, these kinds of norms and principles are inherently amorphous, understood and enacted in variable ways by different communities of practice. This was brought into stark relief through conversations with North American officials at the OAS. One American diplomat, for example, suggested that South American officials have a “propensity for law, but they don’t have the same for implementation or following law.”112 Rather, as she continued, a puzzling diplomatic focus among her South American colleagues was on merely “establishing instruments” rather than “the flip side of the coin; the implementation.” A Canadian official echoed these observations and frustrations, when she suggested, “they [South American representatives] will sign [an agreement], and then worry about it.”113 It was not just extraregional officials who noted this reality. One Chilean official mirrored almost exactly this sentiment, when she explained with a laugh that in her experience, “We tend to put everything into a treaty, and then you must apply it all. But then you often realize you are unable to do it!”114 The result of this approach is, as the American official explained, that South American officials seek and develop “many, many political implements and paper commitments.” Indeed, in her view, South American officials, have “no lack of political meetings. They are thick with regional and subregional agreements and mechanisms, at least on paper.”115

112

Interview with American official, Washington, November 12, 2014. Interview with Canadian officials, Washington, October 30, 2014. 114 Interview with Chilean official, Washington, October 27, 2014. 115 Interview with American official, Washington, November 12, 2014. 113

Practicing Peace in South America  169 A North American official working in the OAS made a similar observation when she cautioned me against assuming the understanding of “law” between the North and South Americans she worked with was the same. This foundational principle was understood and enacted in varied ways. She noted that the Canadians and Americans have a “particularly formulaic view of legalism” distinct from the South Americans.116 In her view, Canadian and American “relationships” with other states follow after necessary legal “structures and systems” are agreed to and established. For the North Americans, in her view, competent diplomatic practice requires the capacity of states to enact agreements and make good on promises made. On the other hand, in her view, “South Americans start with relationships among themselves, regardless if structures or systems align.” This observation underscores the differing understandings of what legalism itself means and the amorphous nature of norms. Their codification or espousal in rhetorical appeals tells us little as to what they mean in practice or how they are understood or enacted in practice. In this case, what legalism means and its competent enactment in practice varies across these overlapping communities. The perceived South American “penchant to profess the law” absent follow-​through is, in the view of an American official, “fascinating” because it is so divorced from what she and others recognize as competent diplomatic processes.117 Not only is this puzzling, but it is frustrating. As she noted with animation, “Mexico, Canada, and the US all understand commitments and abide by them!” For officials from those states, in her view, competent process dictates that “You don’t sign unless you know you are capable of implementing. And when it comes to ratification, the first thing that is asked is if it needs implementation legislation.” In her experience, this is simply not the case for her South American colleagues. In her view, they “sign first and then, perhaps, will think about implementation after. . . . It is just how things are done [by South American states].”118 In the words of one Canadian, this is a “clumsy multilateralism”; it is not how normal, competent diplomacy works.119 In these views, there is a distinct approach and one that is puzzlingly suboptimal for the region. For example, in these estimations, the South American understanding and practice of legalism ensured that

116

Interview with OAS official, Washington, November 13, 2014. Interview with American official, Washington, November 12, 2014. 118 Interview with American official, Washington, November 12, 2014. 119 Interview with Canadian officials, Washington, October 30, 2014. 117

170  Practicing Peace UNASUR was from its inception, “useless.”120 It rested on this particular “heavy legalism” and “clumsy multilateralism,” which are ineffective. This sentiment was echoed explicitly by another North American official, who saw UNASUR as similarly “useless” because “it exists only on paper.”121 In these extraregional accounts, the particular practice of legalism professed and practiced by South American officials is not normal, natural, or effective. The variable understandings and enactment of norms around legalism in practice are also evident in the disparate views among interviewees regarding a series of declarations on the “Zone of Peace.” In 2002, the 12 South American states signed the “Declaration Regarding a South American Peace Zone” during the second meeting of South American presidents in Guayaquil, Ecuador.122 This made good on the earlier commitment to establish a formal commitment to uphold regional peace in the Brasilia Communiqué agreed to two years earlier at the first meeting of regional presidents. Unsurprisingly, the declaration was founded on existing and formalized agreements, chiefly the 1998 Declaration of Galapagos, which had pledged the CAD states to peaceful relations, the 2002 Lima Declaration, and the corresponding 1998 Declaration of Mercosur, Bolivia, and Chile as a peace zone. For South American regional diplomatic practitioners, this served to formally anchor the declaration to established and enforceable precedents—​however aspirational they may seem to external observers. A core aspect of the short declaration was the banning of the use or threat of force in the region. In 2014, South American officials sought to expand this “zone” by making a similar declaration with the wider Latin American and Caribbean states through CELAC. The result was a 31-​state declaration of “Latin America and the Caribbean as a Zone of Peace” that pledged states to support international law (i.e., the UN Charter) and respect the sovereignty of signatories to “ensure peaceful coexistence among nations” (Article 5). For South American officials, these developments were normal, natural, and effective. It was an important pledge and represented competent and effective behavior. For Canadian and American officials, however, it represented the puzzling formality and legal practices of their South American colleagues as well as a complication for existing agreements. 120 Interview with American official, Washington, November 12, 2014. 121 Interview with OAS official, Washington, November 13, 2014. 122 Organization of American States, “Declaration Regarding a South American Zone of Peace,” Virtual Library of Inter-​American Peace Initiatives, 2002, https://​www.oas.org/​sap/​peacef​und/​Vir​ tual​Libr​ary/​DeclarationS​Amer​icaZ​oneP​eace​Coop​erat​ion/​Declarationrega​rdin​gSou​thAm​eric​anPe​ aceZ​one.pdf.

Practicing Peace in South America  171 Echoing the appraisal of the “useless” UNASUR, one Canadian official suggested that the 2014 declaration “meant nothing.”123 It was an empty and incompetent agreement, and, again, a “useless” or “clumsy” exercise in ineffective formality. In this view, it served only to complicate existing tools of hemispheric of cooperation like the Inter-​ American Defense Board (IADB). In her view, the pledge undercut the legitimacy of the IADB because it suggested it was not needed. For her, the pledge did nothing but express formality where it was not required. As she recalled, when she searched for the logic as to why the 2014 pledge was sought in the first place, her South American colleagues simply suggested, “Why wouldn’t we?”124 This was perplexing to the Canadian official and mirrored the conclusions of her colleges in regard to UNASUR. In the view of Adam Blackwell, then the secretary for multidimensional security at the OAS, this dynamic showcases “simply different understandings of the practice” of diplomacy between the North and South Americans.125 Once again, it is clear that disparate communities understand and enact norms and principles in distinctive ways. The utility and the process of formalization and legalism in this case was understood and enacted in rather different ways. Understandings of competence vary. This was further underscored, once again, in interviews with North American officials regarding recent discussions at the OAS on the integration of common narcotics policies across the hemisphere. The South Americans professed an interest in a leaders-​level meeting to set the agenda and draft agreements, followed two weeks after by a meeting of national technical specialists. This meant, the Canadians suspected, that the leaders would then be more likely to have the technical specialists endorse whatever they agreed to—​it would “ensure that their leaders were right,” as one official explained.126 This official, external to the South American community of practice, found this approach bizarre, ineffective, and troubling, but she recognized that it was appropriate in the views of her South American colleagues at the OAS. In her words, the South American officials “need it this way . . . that the political statement would drive the technical solutions the way they want it.”127 The Canadians, and the Americans as well, as she assured me, pushed for the meetings to be reversed: to have a meeting of the technical experts first to

123

Interview with Canadian officials, Washington, October 30, 2014. Interview with Canadian officials, Washington, October 30, 2014. Interview, Ambassador Adam Blackwell, Washington, November 13, 2019. 126 Interview with Canadian officials, Washington, October 30, 2014. 127 Interview with Canadian officials, Washington, October 30, 2014. 124 125

172  Practicing Peace then inform the substance of the leaders’ meeting. This would allow a more nuanced and implementable agreement, she reasoned, and was normal process. This was not to be the case. At the insistence of the South Americans, the meetings were planned differently. As a Canadian diplomat summarized, “we don’t get it . . . and we get dragged along.”128 The North Americans “don’t get” how normal and natural diplomatic practice works for their South American colleagues. This deviation in approach does not suggest disinterest in effective practice, nor does it suggest a lack of faith in the legal principles that underpin them. Rather, it highlights the habitual and dispositional starting point of South American regional relations as contrasting with that of North American practitioners at the OAS. It suggests a particular and assumed normal, natural, and effective—​or competent—​practice of procedural legalism, with a rules-​based orientation and formalized dialogue. Similarly, as a Canadian practitioner cautioned, this should not suggest any difference in intent between the Canadians, Americans, and their South American colleagues. As she insisted, these states are just as committed to core OAS principles, but they understand the practice in a very different way. As further illustration, she suggested I consider Canada’s lack of ratification of the Inter-​ American Convention Against the Illicit Manufacturing of and Trafficking in Firearms, Ammunition, Explosives, and Other Related Materials (CIFTA). While Canada has not formally adopted the agreement, although it is a signatory, it is the most compliant state in her view. This is because Canada already operated under the core provisions of the agreement prior to signing. Conversely, she suggested that in terms of both small arms regulation and human rights implementation, South American states were “well behind in actually adopting what they sign.”129 In her view, it was largely “aspirational” for these states and is distinct from the self-​evident or normal way diplomacy works in her view. While this may be “testament to optimism,” in her words, she found it a “contradiction” in practice, but one her South American colleagues simply “don’t see.” In short, then, for South American officials there is a dispositional turn toward rules-​based processes and formality in dialogue, but one that that is not often matched by legal implementation—​at least not in the eyes of nonregional actors. For the South American officials, there appears a

128 129

Interview with Canadian officials, Washington, October 30, 2014. Interview with Canadian officials, Washington, October 30, 2014.

Practicing Peace in South America  173 dispositional impulse, even if absent procedural follow-​through. This distinction in thinking is a pervasive and basic one. It undergirds how South American practitioners, in contrast to their colleagues from elsewhere in the OAS, tend to view regional relations. Moreover, this particular legalistic impulse delimits action. It makes possible certain behaviors, while precluding others. In particular, it makes a recourse to formalized channels of dialogue (e.g., following the principles laid in out prior agreements) and turning to third-​party mediation in the form of formal arbitration or quasi-​arbitration and adjudication practices both possible and natural. By the latter, I mean providing for the support of third parties to offer recommendations and formally assist with facilitating the negotiation processes, but absent a commitment to binding arbitration. While not strictly adjudication, given often nonbinding status, these kinds of engagement suggest a deeper and legalistic role for a third party than mere ad hoc mediation.130 This distinctive recourse to formal dialogue and the related turn to third-​ party arbitration and adjudication has been noted by a number of other scholars as well.131 Indeed, it appears a uniquely pervasive practice to the South and Latin American regions. The wider Latin American region has had 22 territorial disputes settled using third-​party arbitration, compared to one case in Europe, two in Africa, two in the Middle East, and three in Asia and the Pacific.132 This tradition has been particularly pronounced in South America, which experienced 14 of these 22 cases. Moreover, external mediation absent binding arbitration has been a particularly prevalent means of attending to territorial disputes in South America. For example, during the particularly violent interwar period from 1925 to 1942, of the 28 territorial disputes in South America, 13 saw mediation by actors external to the region.133 As I explore below, the 1941 Ecuador-​Peru conflict saw mediation from Argentina, Brazil, Chile, and the United States, in a typical South American practice. The 1942 Rio Protocol, which attempted to formally conclude the conflict, bound these guarantor states to the conflict 130 See David Scott Palmer, “The Search for Conflict Resolution: The Guarantors and the Peace Process in the Ecuador-​Peru Dispute,” in Security Cooperation in the Western Hemisphere: Resolving the Ecuador-​Peru Conflict, eds. Gabriel Marcella and Richard Downes (Coral Gables: North-​South Center Press, 1999), 21–​44. 131 E.g., Palmer, “Overcoming the Weight of History”; Herz, Siman, and Telles, “Regional Organizations.” 132 Simmons, “In Search for Conflict Resolution,” 6–​7. 133 Domínguez et al., “Boundary Disputes,” 22–​23.

174  Practicing Peace in a way congruent with recent regional attempts at varied forms of arbitration.134 Most notable here are the failed arbitration by the Spanish king Alfonso XII of the same dispute (concluded in 1910), the Swiss arbitration of the Colombian-​Venezuelan border dispute in 1916, and the international Conciliation Commission convened to arbitrate the Paraguay-​Bolivia Chaco-​Boreal dispute (concluded in 1929).135 From the particularized and given proclivity to a rules-​based orientation and formalized dialogue, South American practitioners have distinctively turned to formal means of dispute resolution and mediation of regional disputes. These processual qualities of regional relations are informed by an important substantive quality of relations—​a common assumption of familiarity between South American states, despite the important and persistent differences and rifts between them.

Habituated Content in South American Diplomacy South American diplomatic practitioners recognize themselves as part of a particular community of practice. As with regions, diplomatic communities of practice are messy constructs. They overlap and blur. But their boundaries are perceptible in the thinking and behavior of individuals. South American practitioners think from a basic and often inarticulate sense of community. They are self-​regarding, and their members recognize what Etienne Wenger describes as a community’s “shared practices and interlocked identities.”136 This, however, is distinct from the “we-​ness” recognized in security communities as it does not necessarily imply a consciously held assumption of trust within the community, nor, an assumption of peaceful change.137 The collectively held South American sense of community is a basic, but important one, because it delineates thinking prior to reflection. South American practitioners just know they are part of distinct regional community, for better or for worse, and one that—​through inarticulate but obvious ways—​ structures their relations.

134 See Ronald Bruce St John, “Ecuador Peru Endgame,” Boundary and Security Bulletin 6, no. 4 (1998/​9), 79–​85. 135 See Mares, Violent Peace, 48–​49; Simmons, “In Search for Conflict Resolution,” 4–​7; Wood, The United States and Latin America Wars, 149–​151. 136 Quoted in Adler, World Ordering, 113. 137 Adler and Barnett, Security Communities.

Practicing Peace in South America  175 This is perceptible, once again, in speaking with South American officials about their understanding and practice of diplomacy. Some explicitly referenced common “experiences”138 with other South American states as a means to signal a form of unity. Others used the term “friends”139 or described a South American “friendship club.”140 Two noted themselves as part of a “community”141 in reference to their South American colleagues in Washington. However, many more made this clear less explicitly through the use of “we” to describe South American states in exclusion of others within the OAS, or though detailed allusions to this in other ways. For example, many officials articulated a “feeling”142 or “sense”143 of being “home” in various South American state contexts other than their own, and many had lived across the region in their foreign service. Most felt the opposite when living and working abroad, in Washington, European capitals, and elsewhere. This parallels the arguments made in a wider sense by Adler, who argues that this sense of home is indicative of a “cognitive region.”144 One Brazilian official, for example, described a history of diplomatic postings from Europe to the United States and back to a number of South American states.145 Returning to South America, she “was at home” in a number of countries, including Paraguay. As she described, “Even though some people are anti-​Brazilian . . . there are papers there [in Paraguay] that label us imperialist. But even here . . . I felt at home.” To her mind, South America was one “world” distinct in largely inarticulate ways from that external to it. When reflecting the variation of membership at the OAS, between South Americans, Central Americans, the Caribbean states, and North Americans, she suggested, “They are totally different worlds in this sense. That’s why we try to have different levels of groups in the regions.”146 In her view, within the South American group, she simply “feel[s]‌something stronger.”

138 Interview with Paraguayan official, Washington, October 28, 2014. 139 Interview with Colombian official, Washington, November 14, 2014. 140 Interview with Peruvian official, Washington, November 4, 2014. 141 Interview with Argentinian officials, Washington, November 6, 2014. 142 Interview with South American official, Washington, 2014; Interview with Brazilian official, Washington, November 13, 2014; Interview with Argentinian officials, Washington, November 6, 2014. 143 Interview with Brazilian official, Washington, November 6, 2014. 144 Adler, “Seizing the Middle Ground.” 145 Interview with Brazilian official, Washington, November 6, 2014. 146 Interview with Brazilian official Washington, November 6, 2014. Similarly, Centeno notes that the shared historical and cultural experiences have united regional thinking and established “shared heroes” that serve to inform regional behavior. See Centeno, Blood and Debt, 86–​88. See also Kacowicz, The Impact of Norms, 49.

176  Practicing Peace In my interviews, I would often query just how and why these apparent, but largely inarticulate, similarities existed in the minds of those who felt them. All interviewees struggled to articulate their sense of community. Many offered suggestions of a common historical “experiences” or noted a “common origin” or common “Spanish heritage.”147 More narrowly, some underscored the “common experience” with American hegemony,148 regional authoritarian systems,149 and regionalism with its “long history going back to Bolivar.”150 Others noted the “shared heroes” of South American independence as a collective reference point.151 Still others proffered that the states and peoples of the region are “culturally similar”152 and shared a distinct and “common way of life,” which influenced their interactions with officials from other states across varied diplomatic settings.153 More specifically still, some interviewees suggested it was a common “political culture”154 or even articulated a distinctive “legal culture”155 shared among South American officials that infused their interactions in meaningful ways within the OAS and other regional organizations. One Peruvian official strained to articulate just what she found common and distinctive to working with her South American colleagues, noting it could have been a common “Mediterranean style,” a particular “attitude to diplomacy,” or “a kind of old fashioned diplomacy” centered on a “specialized and pragmatic” approach to dialogue that contrasted with her experiences with nonregional others.156 In her view, “there are deep roots to everything, which makes this hard to explain” to me, given my position external to the community. Regardless of supposed source, interviewees shared a common assertion that something united them and their approach to regionalism to the exclusion of nonregional others, including myself. Moreover, this particular approach was assumed to render interactions more effective than their interactions with those external to the region. 147 Interview with Chilean official, Washington, October 27, 2014. 148 Interview with Chilean official, Washington, October 27, 2014; Interview with Brazilian official Washington, November 6, 2014. 149 Interview with Paraguayan official, Washington, October 28, 2014. 150 Interview with Argentinian officials, Washington, November 6, 2014. 151 Interview with Brazilian official Washington, November 6, 2014. 152 Interview with Brazilian official, Washington, November 13, 2014. A very similar suggestion came from an interview with Argentinian officials (Washington, November 6, 2014) as well, who noted in passing that they assumed a South American culture, as “our culture.” 153 Interview with Brazilian official, Washington, November 6, 2014. 154 Interview with OAS official, Washington, November 10, 2014. 155 Interview with Chilean official, Washington, October 27, 2014. 156 Interview with Peruvian official, Washington, November 4, 2014.

Practicing Peace in South America  177 All who articulated some sense of community agreed that this inarticulate sense was important and functional; it facilitated dialogue, which itself allowed for interstate cooperation. In a common sentiment, one Brazilian diplomat suggested, “It is easier for Brazil to think about integration when we speak about Argentina or Uruguay, Chile, Peru. And it is totally different than integration with Central America or in the Caribbean.”157 Another Brazilian official suggested, simply, that “cultural reasons” meant dialogue among her South American colleagues was “of course easier” than it was with the North Americans at the OAS.158 A Peruvian diplomat underscored this point when reflecting on the intractable differences between her dealings with South American states and the other states in the OAS, particularly when the United States and Canada were present. While she struggled to articulate why she felt this way, she felt it was the case: “Just the dynamic changes, and the way they talk.”159 In her words, compared to her North American colleagues, working with South American officials was within “a different context” that allowed more “compromisa, and I think here [in the regional context] we are more able to balance it out with others.” An Argentinian diplomat suggested a similar feeling: “We just feel more comfortable [with South American officials]” and it makes “talking easier.”160 Another Peruvian diplomat offered a humorous description in trying to impress on me, a Canadian, why it was easier and more effective for her to interact with her regional colleagues than my compatriots. As she suggested with a laugh, “It’s a personal approach that we have. You have a phrase that I hear very much from Americans and Canadians here: ‘It’s not a personal thing’ or ‘It’s not a personal issue.’ But for us, Latin Americans, we always know, ‘It is a personal issue!’ ”161 As she continued, “Every time you mix that personal and professional position, it mellows because of the personal relations. Now, this is something ‘very unprofessional.’ But it is what we do.” In this account, there is a particular and important difference in relations between her South American colleagues at the OAS and her dealings with nonregional officials.

157 Interview with Brazilian official, Washington, November 6, 2014. 158 Interview with Brazilian official, Washington, November 13, 2014. 159 Interview with Peruvian official, Washington, November 3, 2014. 160 Interview with Argentinian officials, Washington, November 6, 2014. 161 Interview with Peruvian official, Washington, November 4, 2014. This sentiment has been discussed in detail by Centeno, who notes it is foundational to the cultural unity of the region and traces it to the emergence of postcolonial states. Centeno, Blood and Debt, 91.

178  Practicing Peace This was made all the clearer in a conversation with a South American official who recounted the time she spent in a post in the United Kingdom. As she reflected, South Americans have a different way of thinking. We are more—​and Latinos in general—​are more easy going. When you meet a Latino guy, we normally say that in five minutes this guy tell you all about his life, everything about his life, and he will invite you to his house. This is an affectionate way of having a relationship. In London, what I felt was that people were very kind. They were very polite. But they have a way of living that imposes a distance from the others. I mean, people normally say that there was a line around each and every citizen and you should not cross that line, not touch that person or get too close to someone. And for us, this is the way of living!162

As she continued, “Here [in Washington], people are not as circumspect as in London, but they have some distance as well. I mean, to become a friend to an American, a person has to know you really well. So, I won’t become friends with an American in five minutes as I would in Buenos Aires or Asunción, or wherever.” As she continued, this produces very different relations: “It is because you feel more involved with these [South American] people. You feel more accepted by them. When you have contact with someone that you feel that the person is all the time trying to show you that you have to be there, and I’ll be here, okay. . . . After some years, maybe we will get along very well but not immediately. That is different.” A Brazilian official echoed this point, suggesting that compared to working with officials external to the region, among her South American colleagues, “It is just easier to communicate. We feel more comfortable having frank conversations.”163 Although she cautioned against assuming this meant it was any easier to come to consensus: “It is easier to talk but also easier to disagree, and engage in frank and earnest conversations . . . but it is a kind of friendship that makes it easier to explain differences.” The depth and consequence of this dispositional sense of community and the ease of dialogue it is known to make possible should not be overstated, however. This community does not parallel the unity of security communities, as seen within the European context.164 Stark divisions and distrust

162

Interview with South American official, Washington, 2014. Interview with Brazilian official, Washington, November 13, 2014. 164 Alder and Barnett, Security Communities. 163

Practicing Peace in South America  179 between states remain within the community, and there is no shared expectation of peaceful change that precludes the use of force. This was brought into relief by a number of practitioners external to the region, but who engage with regional officials regularly. As an OAS official suggested, “Like a lot of families, [the region] has a lot of tensions and a lot of fights. There is a certain commonality there, but also huge, huge differences and tensions.”165 As with the Southeast Asian case, a number of regional officials explicitly noted that distrust remains a feature of South American regional politics. One Peruvian official, for example, suggested that Bolivian officials representing a general disposition among ALBA states, “are more suspicious. They don’t tend to trust” her South American colleagues.166 A second Peruvian diplomat suggested much the same, noting the centrality of “political tensions and divisions” among South American states.167 In speaking to a number of Ecuadorian officials, they went further, suggesting more generally that regionally, “countries are not trusting” of each other.168 Another South American official summarized the common assertion thusly: “There is a lot of long-​standing distrust, and there is the pursuit of national agendas, as well as a lack of a real will to really work together. That is just striking when you see a lot of examples; how presidents never went to other countries, or the provincialism and parochialism [of state interests].”169 In discussing the long-​standing distrust and the history of antagonisms between Peru and Chile, for example, one Chilean official noted succinctly that cooperation exists “but only so far. The people remember their history. . . . People don’t forget that.”170 In her experience working in Peru, she noted that children still learned of “Chilean cowards” in school, and that while she was, by her own description, “friendly and pragmatic” when working with Peruvians there, she could feel lingering animosities. In these conversations there was a sense of hesitancy to explore this suggestion further, but it served to underscore the limits of the “community” shared by these regional practitioners. A Peruvian official made the underlying divisions apparent by suggesting, “We [South American states] are the most divided group [at the OAS].”171 165 Interview with OAS official, Washington, November 10, 2014. 166 Interview with Peruvian official, Washington, November 3, 2014. This point was echoed in an interview with an OAS official, Washington, November 10, 2014. 167 Interview with Peruvian official, Washington, November 4, 2014. 168 Interview with Ecuadorian officials, Washington, November 7, 2014. 169 Interview with OAS official, Washington, November 10, 2014. 170 Interview with Chilean official, Washington, November 11, 2014. 171 Interview with Peruvian official, Washington, November 3, 2014.

180  Practicing Peace These divisions between regional states are clear at the OAS. As one regional diplomat reflected of South American states within the OAS and the region more generally, “We have two visions of development—​two visions of politics. One is denouncing capitalism and imperialism as a constraining factor. . . . The other says that we can use openness and capitalism, investment, as a way to develop.”172 This was echoed by an OAS official who recognized deep divisions between the South American states in the organization: “You have the Pacific Alliance and you have the Mercosur countries, and they have real differences; in economic policy, in governance style, you know? You can just go through the list of major issues. . . . They are going in different directions and there are profound differences.”173 Similarly, in the words of a Brazilian official, there are “different points of view” between regional states.174 As she explained, “you have the Pacific Alliance working very hard. And you have the ALBA countries. You have Mercosur. And so, you have different interests. Sometimes they are able to be together, and sometimes it is impossible to reach an agreement.” A Peruvian official with experience across various regional organizations explained this sort of division, “For me it is a given. We already know what we can and can’t do, especially with ALBA countries, but with Brazil too. They have their two or three issues, and we know ‘this is it’ and we just know. And I try never to confront those sorts of issues.”175 As she continued, there are “totally different social and economic policies” between regional states. One OAS official working in the area of political affairs at the organization brought these divisions and their implications into relief when she suggested, That sort of division [ideologically and in terms of policy priorities between regional states] is real, and it impacts everything we do here [at the OAS]. You know, even things that we do here as a matter of course, like election observation missions. It is complicated. We don’t get an invitation from Venezuela. We haven’t received an invitation from Venezuela since 2006. . . . So, even in the case of election observation missions, which in a way should be routine and for a lot of countries is routine, it is not the same thing. It requires a different approach according to the group of countries



172

Interview with South American official, Washington, 2014. Interview with OAS official, Washington, November 10, 2014. 174 Interview with Brazilian official, Washington, November 6, 2014. 175 Interview with Peruvian official, Washington, November 3, 2014. 173

Practicing Peace in South America  181 you are dealing with. So, yeah, that division is real and it impacts what we do here.176

This statement underscores the limits of the regional familiarity and community itself. Officials within this community of practice recognize the community, understand it as rooted in common experiences, and see that is has been reified through organizational cooperation over decades. There is, then, a basic unity to the region—​a sense of regional familiarity that officials know exists and assume matters. However, this unity should not be overstated. It is a rather thin veneer, rather than a dense collective identity infusing relations between regional states. Major divisions and mistrust between states remain. These divisions are certainly not removed or resolved through a collective habitual disposition and the common regional familiarity assumed therein. As an Ecuadorian official summarized, “We have the same culture, but we are very different countries.”177 A Colombian official lamented succinctly that regional unity is “such a mess.”178 One South American official with experience working alongside the EU illustrated this reality by reference to her experiences in Europe. As she suggested, it was clear that European and South and Latin American regionalism “started differently. You can see that in Latin American groupings. They are less formal. You can feel it. You can feel that you’re in the region. In the European Union, the organization is much harder. They are more formal, and all that. But the systems are different. In the European Union, they are thinking supranational. That is another style. It is another kind of organization. It is different, and it is different from the OAS too, absolutely.”179 An Argentinian official explained the differences between her understanding of the supranational EU model and her experiences over decades of work in South America: “We are like a neighborhood, and we are happy to have parties every night all together in all the homes. But we need our own homes to return to.”180 Across these appraisals three commonalities are clear. They suggest a common but basic assumption of community, and a community with regional boundaries. There exists a South American diplomatic community of practice. Second, all assume that immersion in this

176

Interview with OAS official, Washington, November 5, 2014. Interview with Ecuadorian officials, Washington, November 7, 2014. Interview with Peruvian official, Washington, November 4, 2014. 179 Interview with South American official, Washington, 2014. 180 Interview with Argentinian officials, Washington, November 6, 2014. 177 178

182  Practicing Peace community facilitates dialogue—​somehow, as none could articulate just why this was the case. Finally, all cautioned against assuming that easier communication meant a lack of divisions or immediately led to consensus. Division within the South American community remained and remains. In sum then, there are four related attributes of the South American diplomatic habitual disposition—​how South American diplomatic officials “have always done things around here,” to return to Neumann’s suggestion.181 Practitioners think from a foundation of a given regional community. This is a distinctive notion of community from that the lauded “we-​ness” of security communities. It does not provide for common expectations of peaceful change as commonly understood. Rather, it undergirds a basic set of legalistic habitual and dispositional qualities that are known to be normal and natural, and enacted largely outside of reflection as a matter of course. It is just what is known to work within the community. These include rules-​based thinking and a predilection for formality in dialogue, and the possibility of external mediation, including arbitration and adjudication. To explore the effects of this South American habitual disposition, I turn now to a two-​part investigation: further underscoring the robustness of these qualities and then tracing the impact of these cognitive and behavioral qualities of relations by examining the regional response to the 1995 Cenepa conflict between Ecuador and Peru.

The Effects of the South American Habitual Disposition The preceding section uncovered the existence of a four-​ part South American diplomatic habitual disposition. These qualities shape the meaning regional officials give to the challenges they face and the contours of what they see as possible responses and why. This distinctive and practical sense of what constitutes normal, natural, and effective regional relations for South American officials facilitates cooperation and makes possible distinctive conflict management, absent the development of collective identity, or we-​ness, as often conceived in international relations literature. To explore the effects of this multifaceted habitual disposition in more detail, I now turn to examine how practitioners themselves view the pacific character of their relations.

181

Neumann, “Returning Practice,” 637.

Practicing Peace in South America  183

Robustness As defined in ­chapter 3, robustness refers to the strength of dispositional traits of communities. The qualities of a habitual disposition are robust when they are not only the product of background knowledge and enacted largely as a matter of course but also, when pushed to reflect on them, are those qualities that practitioners know to “work” for their community. In this regard, the South American habitual disposition is robust. As explored above, many regional officials assert that their brand of diplomacy simply works; it makes dialogue easier and facilitates cooperation in meaningful ways.182 Moreover, South American practitioners recognize the relative peace of their region and credit the particularities of their regional relations for that reality. They know these qualities are functional and effective, serving their interests. More narrowly, across my interviews there was a sense not only that pacific dispute resolution was possible but also that it was only possible through their particular brand or “style” of region relations.183 To illustrate the pacific effects of the particular South American brand of diplomacy, a number of interviewees suggested I compare the lack of war in their region to elsewhere. One Chilean official, for example, confidently asserted that, “in South America we resolve conflicts in a peaceful and negotiated way, more than Europe, more than Africa, and even more than in East Asia too.”184 Another South American official suggested that “most of the [regional] conflicts have been contained. There have been flash points of tensions and potentials of eruptions, but most have been managed and kept under control.”185 A Brazilian diplomat credited the patchwork of regional institutions in South America for this reality, and suggested it was a unique experience in the hemisphere: “I think in South America we have something that is unique from the other regions in terms of integration. . . . All regions [in the hemisphere] talk about integration, but I think South America is the one that has more of the conditions to really get to a concrete result.”186 For interviewees, their practices work, and perhaps uniquely so.

182 Interview with Brazilian officials, Washington, November 6 and 13, 2014; Interview with Argentinian officials, Washington, November 6, 2014. 183 Interview with South American official, Washington, 2014. 184 Interview with Chilean official, Washington, October 27, 2014. 185 Interview with OAS official, Washington, November 10, 2014. 186 Interview with Brazilian official, Washington, November 6, 2014.

184  Practicing Peace Kacowicz recognizes a similar rhetorical claim to what he terms a “strong strain of South American exceptionalism.”187 As he continues, “South American diplomats and international lawyers usually assert that they have managed to develop a distinctive way of managing international relations in a peaceful way and much better than their European and Third World counterparts.” I found much the same in my interviews with South American officials. Many take pride in the legal and juridical history of their region. A Paraguayan official made this clear when she suggested that That there is a very rich contribution from the Inter-​American system of law [to regional relations]. Private law, now human rights, asylum rights, for example. And, there were important advances in diplomacy [from the region]. . . . You need to recognize that the diplomacy tradition in some countries [of the region] is very rich. In Chile, for example, they are very rich [in diplomatic history and practice]. In Argentina, too. . . . No doubt about it.188

This is telling of the robustness of the regional habitual disposition: Regional officials know their approach works, and know it works more effectively than others. As one non–​South American OAS official made this clear: “take a country like Venezuela, and Colombia. They have a dispute, and especially during the Uribe and Chavez years, it got pretty tense. But . . . people are restrained because they know that it could have tremendous consequences and, on the one hand they move closer to the brink [as a result].”189 As she continued, “There are a lot of these countries: Peru and Chile, Chile and Bolivia, and all these countries where there are still disputes and distrust, but still there is a recognition that they have to be managed and they have to be under control.” In her estimation, this was the result of a “culture of restraint” among regional leaders and practitioners. Thus, “there may be difficulties [between states], but this is not a continent where there are major wars. . . . So, while there are problems or tensions and conflicts, it usually doesn’t manifest in massively violent ways.” Members of the regional community of practice know that conflict and distrust remain among regional member states. However, they also know that distinctive conflict management practices work to diffuse and restrain them. These are the normal,

187 Kacowicz, Zones of Peace, 119. 188 189

Interview with Paraguayan official, Washington, October 28, 2014. Interview with OAS official, Washington, November 10, 2014.

Practicing Peace in South America  185 natural, and effective means to manage regional conflict and pursue regionalism. To examine the particular effects of this habitual disposition I turn now to a crucial case of regional conflict management.

The South American Habitual Disposition and a 160-​Year-​Long Conflict An important glimpse into the effect of the South American habitual disposition for regional conflict management comes from an examination of the regional response to the long and violent dispute between Ecuador and Peru over the territory of the Mainas or the “Oriente” in the Cenepa Basin along their Amazonian border.190 The divisive territorial claims span more than 160 years, and represent the most sustained and violent territorial dispute in the region.191 Major military clashes occurred in 1941, 1981, and 1995, and each time brought states to “the brink of major war.”192 Beyond the risks of escalation, the 1995 Cenepa conflict is a particularly compelling and crucial case for this study for three reasons. First, it represents the climax of a 160-​year-​long conflict that characterized regional relations beyond the scope of the two rival states directly involved. Second, it is a conflict between two democracies that engaged in near-​war level of violence.193 Third, since the 1980s the growing economic interdependence of these states and rising political cooperation seemed to have little impact on the risks of territorial violence.194 This conflict, then, is a particularly important case of violence in the long conflictual regional peace in which to explore the role of regional conflict-​management practices. The history of the 1995 flare in violence has its roots in the independence of Peru and Ecuador (as part of Gran Colombia) from Spain in 1821 and 1822, respectively, when the ill-​defined colonial borders were first assumed by the emergent states.195 Violence along this disputed border region 190 See also Herz and Nogueira, Ecuador vs. Peru; Martin, Militarist Peace, 87–​97. 191 See Domínguez et al., “Boundary Disputes”; Kacowicz, The Impact of Norms, 101; Mares, Violent Peace, 161; David Scott Palmer, “Overcoming the Weight of History: ‘Getting to Yes’ in the Peru-​Ecuador Border Dispute,” Diplomacy & Statecraft 12, no. 2 (2001): 29–​46. 192 Martin, Militarist Peace, 88. 193 Gabriel Marcella, “War and Peace in the Amazon: Strategic Implications for the United States and Latin America of the 1995 Ecuador-​Peru War,” US Army War College, 1995; Mares, Violent Peace, ­chapter 7; Palmer, “The Search for Conflict Resolution.” 194 Mares, Violent Peace, 168. See also Herz and Nogueira, Ecuador vs. Peru. 195 For a survey of the historical origins of the dispute, see Herz and Nogueira, Ecuador vs. Peru, 25–​31; Simmons, “Territorial Disputes and Their Resolutions.”

186  Practicing Peace escalated into war in 1828–​1829, and saw formal negotiation with a fully independent Ecuador in the 1840s. Despite occasional attempts at negotiating a formalized border, no diplomatic solution was found to the divisive claims and violence recurred sporadically into the 1930s. Since 1884 there have been as many as 34 violent clashes along the Amazonian border between the two states.196 By most accounts, the lack of ability or interest in formally settling the borders until the 1930s was largely the result of indifference—​the Amazonian borderlands being largely unsettled and of little economic or geopolitical significance.197 However, from the 1930s onward, a boom in the rubber trade increased the potential significance of the territory and the militaries of both states engaged in limited disputes in attempts to demonstrate their effective occupation of the areas.198 In the summer of 1941, a surge in violence occurred with a 15,000-​strong invading force of Peruvians attacking the smaller 3,000-​strong Ecuadorian force along the border with the aim of settling the border through force.199 With a larger, more sophisticated force invading deep into Ecuadorian territory, the military victory was Peru’s and Ecuador was compelled to accept the 1942 Protocol of Rio de Janeiro, which provided for the removal of Peruvian troops and entry of external military observers from four states.200 The Protocol was supported and guaranteed by four states: the United States, Argentina, Brazil, and Chile, who retained a legal obligation to mediate future disputes (Articles III, V, and VII). The newly demarcated border meant that Ecuador lost much of the Oriente Province, long considered sovereign territory, including an important outlet to the Amazon River, while Peru ceded territory further north. The net exchange of territory was roughly 13,000 square kilometers in Peru’s favor.201 Politically, at the domestic level, the outcome was seen as a major success for Peru, and major loss for Ecuador.202 At the regional level, the Rio Protocol served to formally bind a four-​party group of third-​party states to the future management of the conflict.203 Explicitly, the states were to “provide assistance” if and when the conflictual parties required it (Article V and Article 196 Simmons, “Territorial Disputes and Their Resolutions,” 10. 197 Palmer, “Overcoming the Weight of History.” 198 Herz and Nogueira, Ecuador vs. Peru, 32–​33. 199 Marcella, “War and Peace in the Amazon,” 6. 200 “Rio Protocol” (1942), United States Institute of Peace, http://​www.usip.org/​sites/​defa​ult/​files/​ file/​resour​ces/​coll​ecti​ons/​peace​_​agr​eeme​nts/​ep_​rio0​1291​942.pdf 201 Kacowicz, The Impact of Norms, 102. 202 Herz and Nogueira, Ecuador vs. Peru, 33–​35; Kacowicz, The Impact of Norms, 103. 203 See Domínguez et al., “Boundary Disputes,” 23.

Practicing Peace in South America  187 VII). The agreement was ratified by both states and became the foundation for thinking about the conflict over the next fifty-​six years. However, one lingering issue remained with the Rio Protocol and would prove divisive for decades. A 78-​kilometer stretch of the borderlands, the Cordillera del Condor area, was left out of the agreement and was to be formally arbitrated by Brazil.204 Three years after the establishment of the Protocol, the Brazilian naval officer in charge, Captain Braz Dias de Aguilar, laid down a decision largely ceding the area to Peru. Initially, this decision was accepted by both Peru and Ecuador. However, two years later aerial photographs complicated the affair, as they seemed to suggest geographic features used to inform the demarcation were different than assumed in 1942. In 1948, demarcation efforts were halted as a result, and in 1960 Ecuador formally rejected the Rio Protocol under claims of both geographic flaws in the demarcation process and duress from the Peruvian occupation in 1942. The claim from Educator, under President Jose Maria Velasco Ibarra, was that the agreement was thus both illegitimate and null under international law.205 However, Peru and the four guarantor powers maintained its legitimacy and legality. In the decades that followed, Ecuador maintained its rejection of the Protocol on legal grounds in hope of altering the disputed 78-​kilometer-​long border area and gaining access to the Amazon. For thirty years, Ecuador attempted a number of times to alter the legal standing of the treaty itself through a series of formal, external means.206 The issue was raised through the OAS in 1959, 1965, 1980, and 1981, and through the UN in 1976, 1980, and 1991, and in 1968 Ecuador proposed an amendment to the Vienna Conference on Treaty Rights to null treaties signed under the threat or use of force.207 Peru, however, supported the 1942 Protocol throughout this period and deferred to the guarantor states to assert the agreement’s legal standing and force. The impasse is summarized by Mares and David Palmer: “For Ecuador, no solution would be acceptable that did not include sovereign access to the Amazon River. For Peru, no solution would be acceptable that did not adhere to international law and define the boundary in terms of the precise points specially laid out in the 1942 Rio Protocol. Such positions on both



204

See Kacowicz, The Impact of Norms, 103. See Herz and Nogueira, Ecuador vs. Peru, 40; Kacowicz, The Impact of Norms, 103. 206 see Kacowicz, The Impact of Norms, 103–​104, 106–​107. 207 See Mares, Violent Peace, 166–​67; Herz and Nogueira, Ecuador vs. Peru, 51. 205

188  Practicing Peace sides had wavered little between 1948 and 1995.”208 The thinking and behavior of both sides in the dispute, then, were continuously couched in the perceived legal foundations of the Protocol. Moreover, their attempts to uphold or alter the Protocol and its standing were also pursued through legalistic channels. As Kacowicz observes, “Throughout their 160 years of disputing the Oriente, Ecuador and Peru articulated their conflict claims in distinctive normative and legal terms.”209 Moreover, at the same time, this divisive and lingering territorial dispute did not stymie their regional integration. Most starkly, in 1969 both states joined in the Andean Pact, which promoted trade and economic integration between the two rivals. Despite legalist appeals on ongoing elements of integration, periodic violence persisted. In January 1981 this peaked with fears of open war when national mobilization occurred on both sides of the border. The “Paquisha incident,” as it was to be known, saw Ecuadorian troops driven from their outposts by the Peruvian military in a move largely unilateral and outside of civilian government control.210 As many as 200 were killed.211 This underscored both the reality of sustained tensions and violence between these states, and also the limited control the emergent civilian governments on both sides had over their militaries’ aggression.212 In response, Ecuadorian officials turned to the OAS in search of intervention. Peruvian officials returned to the Rio Protocol and the four guarantor states.213 On both counts, once again, the recourse among officials was to turn to formalized means of dispute resolution involving third parties within established legal frameworks. The OAS demurred, given the precedent established by the Rio Protocol, and left the guarantor states to mediate.214 Their engagement was slow and incomplete. In response, the four guarantor states—​or “friendly countries”

208 David R. Mares and David S. Palmer, Institutions, Power, and Leadership in War and Peace: Lessons from Peru and Ecuador, 1995–​1998 (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2012), 104. See also Mares, Violent Peace, 165–​167; Herz, Siman, and Telles, “Regional Organizations,” 132. 209 Kacowicz, The Impact of Norms, 105. 210 Herz and Nogueira, Ecuador vs. Peru, 36. 211 Mares, Violent Peace, 167. 212 See Herz and Nogueira, Ecuador vs. Peru, 56; Marcella, “War and Peace in the Amazon,” 6; Mares, Violent Peace, 183; Varas, “Controlling Conflict in South America,” 76. 213 See David Scott Palmer, “Peru-​Ecuador Border Conflict: Missed Opportunities, Misplaced Nationalism, and Multilateral Peacekeeping,” Journal of Interamerican Studies and World Affairs 39, no. 3 (1997): 109–​148; Ronald Bruce St John, “The Ecuador-​Peru Boundary Dispute: The Road to Settlement,” in International Boundary Research: Unit Boundary and Territorial Briefing, eds. Rachel Bradley and Clive Schofield, 3, no. 1 (1999). 214 St John, “Ecuador-​Peru,” 30.

Practicing Peace in South America  189 as they termed themselves so as not to evoke the language of Rio—​proposed a ceasefire and halted the fighting. However, they refused to do more until Ecuador formally recognized the Protocol, which was refused. The turn to formalized channels of mediation quelled the conflict for only a brief time, and a series of nine further and limited disputes occurred leading to 1995, when war again seemed likely. Still during this period of violence, as Mares observes, “Relations between the two countries did not deteriorate.”215 Economic cooperation accelerated, and Alberto Fujimori became the first Peruvian president to travel to Ecuador in 1991. At the same time, both parties maintained support for divergent legal frameworks to manage simmering tensions, which did not dissipate. Peruvian officials continued in their support for the provisions of the Rio Protocol, while Ecuadorian officials continued in their repudiation of the agreement in favor of utilizing processes within the OAS. The issue was thus left to fester, even while economic and political relations grew. In 1995 tensions reached their peak. On January 26, 1995, Ecuadorian troops attempted to dislodge a Peruvian outpost along the disputed stretch of border at Tiwintza.216 Without civilian political oversight, the Ecuadorian provocation was seen by many as far more severe than the routine patrol skirmishes that had characterized the conflict in recent years.217 In the 34 days of violence that followed, fatality estimates range from as low as 47218 to perhaps 200,219 500,220 or as high 1,000,221 or 1,500.222 Some observers suggest “unconfirmed estimates” of as many as 4,000 dead.223 Beyond the debated fatalities, it is clear that both sides engaged in large-​scale military clashes including the use of helicopters, fighter-​bomber aircraft, and artillery, and as many as 6,000 soldiers were deployed to the area of the fighting with wider mobilization efforts elsewhere.224 Given the scale and technological sophistication of the conflict, many scholars see the violence as a war in all but name. Gabriel Marcella concludes that “a new threshold has been

215 Mares, Violent Peace, 168. 216 Herz and Nogueira, Ecuador vs. Peru, 43–​44. 217 Herz and Nogueira, Ecuador vs. Peru, 46. 218 Martin, Militarist Peace, 93. 219 Simmons, “Territorial Disputes and Their Resolutions,” 12. 220 Kacowicz, The Impact of Norms. 221 Mares, Violent Peace, 168. 222 Herz and Nogueira, Ecuador vs. Peru, 47. 223 Palmer, “Overcoming the Weight of History,” 32. 224 See Kacowicz, The Impact of Norms, 104; Marcella, “War and Peace in the Amazon”; Simmons, “Territorial Disputes and Their Resolutions,” 12.

190  Practicing Peace crossed” in terms violence in the region.225 Monica Herz and João Pontes Nogueira rely on an intuitive qualitative assumption to suggest it ought to be seen as a “war,” “given the level of mobilization of the armed forces, the risk of escalation, and the relevance of the issue of the national security of both countries in a long history of rivalry.”226 In response, from the outbreak of fighting in January to its conclusion in February 1995 there was a concerted regional diplomatic effort to manage the conflict. Initially these efforts centered on de-​escalation with later attempts to formally resolve the disputed territorial claims. Throughout this regional response, as it had been throughout the preceding decades, the South American diplomatic habitual disposition of regional relations both shaped and sustained these efforts. For both states, the bounds of a competent diplomatic response meant turning to established, legal precedents. Both Peruvian and Ecuadorian leaders sought to couch their claims firmly within regional and extraregional legalist channels, just as they had in response to the 1981 crisis and in keeping with long-​held proclivities throughout the 160-​year history of the conflict. The Peruvian preference was, as was long-​standing practice, to defer to the Rio Protocol. Officials sought formal support and arbitration from the four guarantor states as outlined in the agreement. For Ecuadorian officials, the menu of options again appeared wider, but all formal and legalistic in nature. Fearing escalation, Ecuadorian officials pursued three channels of diplomatic solutions. Mirroring their long-​ held deferral to the UN and OAS, Ecuadorian President Sixto Duran Balle sent a communiqué to the president of the UN Security Council and sought an extraordinary meeting of the OAS Permanent Council.227 At the same time, however, he signaled a change from previous repudiations of its legal status dating back to 1960, and embraced the Rio Protocol, publicly seeking mediation from the Rio Protocol guarantors as a means to de-​escalate the crisis.228 Rather than accepting the Protocol in full, however, the Ecuadorian position was that it should be renegotiated.229 Unsurprisingly, it is clear that 225 Marcella, “War and Peace in the Amazon,” 12. 226 Herz and Nogueira, Ecuador vs. Peru, 47; see also Domínguez et al., “Boundary Disputes,” 13. Interestingly, Holsti largely ignores the conflict, describing it as a mere skirmish with limited casualties and consequence. However, he does recognize it as indicative of “the extent to which crises and border incidents remain a part of the South American diplomatic and military landscapes.” Holsti, The State, 160. 227 See Herz and Nogueira, Ecuador vs. Peru, 50. 228 Mares, Violent Peace, 168. 229 Kacowicz, The Impact of Norms, 104; Gabriel Marcella and Richard Downes, “Introduction,” in Security Cooperation in the Western Hemisphere: Resolving the Ecuador-​Peru Conflict (Coral Gables: North-​South Center Press, 1999), 7.

Practicing Peace in South America  191 all options both parties sought to mediate the conflict were formal and couched in existing legal principles both internationally and regionally. In this way, the crisis was internationalized almost immediately. These attempts to seek the mediation of the guarantor states came early in the conflict, and it was on February 17 that the first ceasefire was planned between the parties and the guarantor states with the Peace Declaration of Itamaraty or Declaración de Paz de Itamaraty. Not only did this suggest an immediate turn to internationalizing the conflict and drawing in foreign mediation but also it suggested a broader framing of the issue from within the established legal precedent. Thinking from the Rio Protocol and the established practices of regional conflict management was clear early in the crisis. Indeed, it appeared another case in what Holsti sees as the long “history of policy-​makers analyzing issues from a legal rather than geostrategic perspective.”230 The first discussions between the parties and the guarantor states centered on a three-​part plan to halt and then resolve the conflict: stabilize the military conflict, primarily through the establishment of a demilitarized zone and the introduction of military observers, the Military Observer Mission, Ecuador Peru (MOMEP); provide formal definition of outstanding issues of disagreement; and facilitate substantive negotiations of those issues.231 These followed the principles enshrined in the Rio Protocol. However, this preliminary set of agreements did not automatically instill trust, nor did it stop the fighting. Skirmishes broke out along the border in the following week, despite the introduction of observers. Again, the guarantors sought a ceasefire and both sides signed the Declaration of Montevideo eleven days after the intial Itamaraty Declaration on February 28. This agreement authorized further deployment of military observers in an effort to restrain the militaries of each state and solidified the Rio Protocol and the guarantor states as the only mechanism to address the conflict.232 Again, thinking from the established legal precedent shaped the means to address the crisis. This preliminary series of dialogue following the means laid out in Rio further formalized the framework for resolution and shaped the coming years of negotiations. Over the series of negotiations in 1995, the parties halted the use of force and concretely had begun to establish the framework to address the lingering disputes, which would take much longer.233 In particular, the

230 Holsti, The State, 170. 231

See Palmer, “Overcoming the Weight of History,” 35–​36. Herz and Nogueira, Ecuador vs. Peru, 46–​47, 51. 233 Herz and Nogueira, Ecuador vs. Peru, 52–​53; Palmer, “Overcoming the Weight of History,” 36. 232

192  Practicing Peace decision was reached to defer to the recommendations of guarantor states. In January 1996 the foreign ministers of Peru and Ecuador met alongside representatives from the guarantor states to agree to a framework for further negotiations: it would be held in Brasilia with the delegation conducting discussions in secret. At the same time, the observation mission would continue. A series of further agreements were devised to outline the issues that would be discussed and the framework by which any agreement might be implemented. This included a series of preparatory meetings from January to June of 1996. During these meetings the decision to address the lingering disputes was agreed to be nearly arbitral. Ecuador and Peru would provide a list of disagreements and disputed items, the guarantor states would support bilateral formal, secretive discussion of these issues, and remaining impasses would be passed to the guarantor representatives for recommendation. While these recommendations would not be binding at this stage, it did signal both acquiescence to formal mediation from parties external to the conflict and external to the region (the United States), and the support of both states for third-​party-​designed means of conflict resolution.234 This decision, agreed in the Santiago Accord of October 1996, laid out the means for formal bilateral negotiation over the impasses noted in the prior Itamaraty Declaration, affirmed the support of the four guarantor states, and provided for their increased involvement wherein they would “propose the procedures best suited to definitively resolve those points of disagreement that the parties will have been unable to resolve themselves.”235 Thus, again, while not formal arbitration, it demonstrated a willingness to both continue the internationalization of the conflict and directly engage the four guarantor states in the settlement of the dispute. Formal substantive negotiations began in April 1997 and, over six rounds, concluded in November 1997. They saw the direct involvement of the guarantor states at all stages. After months of slow progress and the resignation of both the Ecuadorian foreign minister Francisco Tudela and the head of its delegation, Alfonso Arias Schriber, the guarantor states took a further leading role in refining the agenda and structuring the discussions around four key pillars of issues with corresponding

234 See Herz and Nogueira, Ecuador vs. Peru, 53. 235 Nicholas Burns, “Press Statement: Nicholas Burns, Office of the Spokesman, US State Department,” October 30, 1996.

Practicing Peace in South America  193 commissions.236 This was formally adopted in January 1998. Four commissions were launched, each focused on a different issue of contention and each hosted in a different guarantor state, and a formalized mechanism was designed to allow the Peruvian and Ecuadorian foreign ministries to evaluate the recommendations of these institutional recommendations was agreed to.237 During the months of work by the commissions, tensions along the border again were stoked, but the leadership in both states attempted to mitigate the risks. In particular, the announcement of the Ecuadorian purchase of Israeli Kfir fighter-​bombers was seen as a potential disruption of the process. However, Peru did not respond and there was no claim of breaching the terms of the established ceasefire.238 Restrained rhetoric and the pursuit of the legalist channels developed characterized the relationship between Presidents Fujimori and Mahuad throughout the crisis. The two leaders and their officials quickly developed working relationships, and the leaders met seven times between August and September to reinforce the work of the commissions and to demonstrate continued support for these formal processes.239 Ultimately, this series of discussions led to an agreement on issues of commerce and navigation, but impasses on the others. In particular neither president could agree to that lingering issue which had stymied cooperation since 1941: Ecuador demanded access to the Amazon, and Peru refused.240 At this point, again, it is clear that the particularities of conflict management within this community of practice shaped behavior. Officials from both states, again, turned to support from the guarantor states as means to breaking the impasse. Rather than merely flirting with a formal arbitration process, officials now embraced it and agreed to accept binding arbitration on the remaining issues, deferring to the recommendations of the guarantor states. Both presidents wrote letters to Brazilian President Alfonso Cardoso noting the impasse and pledging to accept formal and binding arbitration from the four guarantor states as a means forward.241 This culminated in the Act of Brasilia 236 These concerned navigation and commerce (Commission I), border economic integration (Commission II), land border demarcation (Commission III), and confidence-​and security-​ building (Commission IV). See Herz and Nogueira, Ecuador vs. Peru, 55–​58. 237 Herz and Nogueira, Ecuador vs. Peru, 55–​58; Simmons, “Territorial Disputes and Their Resolutions,” 15–​16. 238 See Simmons, “Territorial Disputes and their Resolutions,” 17. 239 See Herz and Nogueira, Ecuador vs. Peru, 59. 240 Palmer, “Overcoming the Weight of History,” 40–​41. 241 Kacowicz, The Impact of Norms, 104.

194  Practicing Peace and was agreed to by both Peru and Ecuador. Formal demarcation of the border concluded in May 1999. Of this final agreement Palmer remarks that it “highlight[s]‌the significance of individual leadership and the personal role of key participants in diplomacy in working through difficult, historically intractable issues between two countries.”242 While it does so, it also shows the habitual and dispositional thinking that binds this particular regional community. Throughout the conflict, the thinking and behavior of members of the regional diplomatic community was shaped by commonly held and largely unproblematic assumptions around legalism, rules-​based processes, and external mediation. The pervasiveness of this habitual disposition can be underscored further, given that in both states there were changes in domestic politics during the course of the crisis and its resolution. While there was relative continuity in terms of the formalized and legalistic approach to diplomacy from officials in each, and while there was sustained political support for these efforts, there were important political changes in each. There were two successive Fujimori administrations in Peru during this period, and Ecuador saw four presidents during the three-​year period of negotiations, including the replacement of Abdalá Bucaran after less than one year office in February 1997 for “reasons of insanity.”243 Yet as Herz and Nogueira find, there remained a “striking continuity of Ecuador’s general disposition to come to terms with the problem and sign a definitive peace in a context ripe with opportunity to use the conflict with Peru for political purposes.”244 Beth Simmons notes this continuity as well: In this case, a popularly elected president whose economic policies sparked a violent national strike was removed from office by congressional vote for “mental incompetence” after serving only six months, without either a setback for the border talks or disturbances at the border. This political crisis certainly would have been an opportunity for either the soon-​to-​be-​ deposed president, the congress, or even the military to use the territorial issue to unite the country, but none did.245

242 Palmer, “Overcoming the Weight of History,” 41; See also Simmons, “Territorial Disputes and Their Resolutions,” 16. 243 Herz and Nogueira, Ecuador vs. Peru, 77. 244 Herz and Nogueira, Ecuador vs. Peru, 77. 245 Simmons, “Territorial Disputes and Their Resolutions,” 14.

Practicing Peace in South America  195 Throughout the crisis, regional conflict management was shaped by the South American diplomatic habitual disposition. This centered on a recourse to a particular legalistic approach to formalized dialogue and the reliance on external mediators, with the assumption among a recognized community of practice that a peaceful solution was possible. This was the normal, natural, and effective means of regional conflict management. While this case illustrates the particular habitual and dispositional qualities of regional relations here, it also illuminates both the strength and limits of these qualities of diplomatic relations. The recurrent crises that finally led to the 1995 near-​war were made possible by an inability to formally resolve the conflict in the decades prior. Borrowing the language from skeptical North American officials at the OAS, it was clear that “paper” agreements were just that. From the 1940s to the 1990s agreements were reached and provisions established which became the basis for thinking and action on the agreement, but were not strictly observed.

Conclusion This chapter explored and accounted for the conflictual peace of South America. To do so, I again made a series of arguments of decreasing scope. As with the investigation of Southeast Asian conflict management and regionalism, this chapter began with the claim that disparate communities of regional diplomatic practice embody, act out, and reify discrete and particular habitual dispositions—​deeply taken-​for-​granted knowledge of the world that, relatively automatically, shapes their behavior in important ways. In the South American diplomatic community of practice, I have shown there exists a long-​held and discrete set of habitual and dispositional qualities of relations that inform how officials manage regional conflict and pursue regionalism more generally. This particular habitual disposition or given understanding of the “normal way that diplomacy” works in South America is centered on four qualities. It comprises a particular understanding of legalism, which includes a rules-​based orientation, a disposition toward formality in dialogue, and the propensity toward external mediation of disputes. These processual attributes of interstate relations rest on a fourth basic quality in the inarticulate sense of familiarity between regional states and their officials. Within this regional community of practice, each of these qualities is deeply internalized as normal, natural, and effective. It is the way that competent

196  Practicing Peace diplomacy works. However, while these elements of regional diplomacy are normal, natural, and effective to South American officials, for external observers they appear strange and ineffective. More narrowly, I have argued that these qualities shape regional relations in important ways, informing how officials pursue national interests, from that of regional human rights through the IACHR to rendering the region a “Zone of Peace.” To showcase their effects on the wider conflictual peace of South American, I centered attention on how these qualities shaped the regional management of the 1995 Cenepa conflict between Ecuador and Peru. There, the habitual disposition delimited regional thinking and practice in response to the crisis, making possible the long and conflictual peace of the region.

6 Comparisons, Contributions, and Conclusions Introduction My interest in this book has been to explore the conflictual long peace of both Southeast Asia and South America—​the coexistence of pervasive interstate violence alongside sustained and real efforts at cooperation and integration in these two regions of the Global South. To account for these dynamics, I drew attention to how peace is practiced in each region and to the existence and effects of regional diplomatic habitual dispositions—​sets of processual and substantive qualities of relations that are understood and enacted largely as a matter of a course by officials. The preceding chapters highlight the diversity of these habitual dispositions and showcase their myriad effects on regional relations, from shaping conflict management at times of crisis to informing the contours of regionalism in each case more generally. What are normal, natural, and effective—​or competent—​means of responding to regional conflict, of pursuing regional cooperation, and of regionalizing state relations for Southeast Asian officials is distinct from their South American counterparts. In each regional case, however, particular and perhaps peculiar habitual dispositions have a deflationary effect on regional conflict and make possible regional cooperation in ways that often appear unfathomable to practitioners from beyond the region in question. My interest in this concluding chapter is twofold. The first is to bring these habitual dispositions of conflict management and regionalism into comparison. As the preceding chapters have hinted, there are both similarities and differences in the particular processes and content of the habitual dispositions of these disparate regional diplomatic communities. I take this comparison on directly in the chapter in order to underscore a key lesson of this study: that practices of peace vary widely across regions of the Global South. The second interest in this chapter is to highlight the substantive, methodological, and theoretical contributions of this book. In what follows, Practicing Peace. Aarie Glas, Oxford University Press. © Oxford University Press 2022. DOI: 10.1093/​oso/​9780197633229.003.0006

198  Practicing Peace Table 6.1.  Regional Diplomatic Habitual Dispositions

Process

Content

Southeast Asia

South America

Prior consensus Informal dialogue Process over substance Noninterference Equality of members Face-​saving Peaceful settlement of disputes

Rules-​based Formal dialogue External mediation Regional familiarity

I explore these comparisons and contributions and then offer some brief conclusions.

Comparisons In both Southeast Asia and South America regional diplomatic practitioners embody, act out, and often reify discrete habitual dispositions. In practice, background knowledge circumscribes behavior and informs how codified regional—​and indeed global—​norms of appropriate conduct are understood and enacted in each regional community. It is through particular habitual dispositions that regional officials from states and organizations recognize crises and perceive potential solutions. As I have argued in each empirical case, regional practitioners in Southeast Asia and South America think from, rather than about certain ways of confronting and managing regional challenges and furthering their individual and collective interests. However, as the two preceding chapters make clear, the composition of the habitual disposition of each regional community is distinct. The disparate habitual and dispositional qualities of the two regions under study here are summarized in Table 6.1. In Southeast Asia, regional relations are understood and enacted through a seven-​part habitual disposition shared by officials from ASEAN member states and the organization itself. Practitioners here engage in distinctive processes of prior consensus and informal dialogue in their interactions, and they tend toward privileging process over substance; seeking a continuation of dialogue over the realization of discrete outcomes. As ­chapter 4 detailed,

Comparisons, Contributions, and Conclusions  199 these habitual elements of regional relations are at odds with how ASEAN’s European and North American dialogue partner state officials understand normal, natural, and effective diplomacy to unfold. In addition, in Southeast Asia regional officials are disposed toward a particular practice of codified norms of noninterference and equality among ASEAN member states, and they share an impulse toward face-​saving and pacific dispute settlement through talk rather than formally-​established legal mechanisms, even those codified through ASEAN itself. Together, these seven elements form the foundation from which Southeast Asian diplomatic practitioners think and act. In South America, another set of habitual, dispositional, and practical qualities of regional relations is perceptible and important to regional relations of all kinds. However, here practitioners think and act from a rather different foundation than do those in Southeast Asia. In South America a community of diplomatic practitioners tends to confront and respond to changes in and through a four-​part habitual disposition. This habitual disposition rests on a given understanding of regional familiarity and ascribes a particularized approach to rules-​based and formalized dialogue in regional relations. From this thinking, regional officials practice a distinctive recourse to formal, external mediation and arbitration of disputes. As is apparent, these are distinct orientations toward action, and they have led to distinct means of regional conflict management and the pursuit of regionalism more generally. In particular, Southeast Asia’s informality is in stark contrast to the legalistic impulses and the formalities of dialogue that characterize the relations of South American states. As the empirical chapters detailed, Southeast Asia’s rather ad hoc, informal regional dialogue to manage the Preah Vihear dispute in 2011 is at odds with the South American turn to legalism and formal mediation in response to the Cenepa dispute in 1995. So stark are these distinctions in conflict management practices that little illustration is required to bring them into relief. However, the variable foundational thinking of practitioners in each region can be further glimpsed by bringing into comparison how and why regional diplomats and organizational officials understood and enacted what they knew to be competent, effective regional conflict management practices in each case. As explored in c­ hapter 4, Southeast Asian officials responded to the outbreak of hostilities along the Thai-​Cambodian border in 2011 between these two ASEAN members by turning to what they inherently knew as normal, natural, and effective means of interstate relations. This does not

200  Practicing Peace suggest there was no reflection or agency on the part of regional officials. Rather, agency was delineated and shaped within the bounds of a distinctive habitual disposition. With the recognition of a crisis, regional practitioners turned readily to engage in what they knew was possible and what they knew worked in practice. In stark contrast to the assumptions of “normal diplomacy” from their European and North American colleagues working alongside the ASEAN Secretariat (ASEC) in Jakarta, Southeast Asian practitioners turned to sustained but informal means of dialogue. Officials actively attempted to keep the management, mediation, and limited efforts at resolution of the crisis within the bounds of the region. For most intraregional practitioners, there was little consideration of alternative means to respond to this regional dispute as they defined it. Recalling an ASEC official quoted in c­ hapter 4, it was clear regional officials knew that “we’ll deal with it, and we’ll do it our own way. But we don’t want to be stuck with too much on the legal side.”1 The given, ready-​made means toward a possible solution was to attempt slow and informal dialogue outside of established regional or global legal frameworks. This led to a series of informal dialogues through Indonesian leadership within ASEAN and, ultimately, relatively limited tangible outcome. Rather, dialogue centered on sustaining more dialogue, and resolution occurred only beyond the bounds of regional diplomacy. The particular and rather limited means of responding to the conflict in 2011 shape the contours of regionalism in Southeast Asia more generally as well, from the slow and informal realization of the ASEAN Community of 2015 to the particularities of the regional response to the 2014 Thai military coup and 2021 coup in Myanmar, to regularized interactions within the ASEC between member states and their external dialogue partners. For members of the Southeast Asian community of diplomatic practice, a particularized practice of conflict management and regionalism “work” and there has been limited reflection on alternatives. Across the Pacific in South America, a similar community of regional diplomatic officials similarly knows what are the normal, natural, and effective means to manage conflict and pursue regionalism. And, similarly, these qualities shaped the regional response to the outbreak of hostilities along the Ecuador-​Peru border in 1995. While the processes and the content of this regional habitual disposition stand in contrast to the practices enacted 1 Interview with ASEC official, Jakarta, June 30, 2014.

Comparisons, Contributions, and Conclusions  201 by Southeast Asian officials in 2011, in both cases, conflict management was shaped by perceptions of precedent and established and codified rules. What this meant is rather different in South America, however. Recalling the succinct—​and commonly-​held—​assumption of a Peruvian official, South American officials “need clear and established rules to be protected.”2 In the words of one Brazilian official, legalization and the setting of “objective steps” and “rules” was “good for everyone” within the South American community of practice.3 Just as this practical sense drove South American officials to seek to further formalize the Inter-​American Human Rights Commission and placed them at odds with their North American colleagues in the Organization of American States (OAS), it shaped the regional response to the Cenepa conflict in 1995. As Palmer concludes of the Ecuador-​Peru case, “It demonstrates that even the most deeply ingrained differences between states can be resolved with patient and persistent efforts by both the countries immediately involved and other interested parties as well. It suggests the importance of recourse to international legal principles and the documents that underlie them.”4 The recourse to legalized means of responding to challenges at the heart of the South American habitual disposition is markedly distinct from that of Southeast Asia. The distinctive approaches to conflict management and regionalism of these two communities of practice also inform the role of extraregional actors in conflict management within each as well. The South American habitual disposition makes possible a rather automatic internationalization of conflict management and a turn to mediation and arbitration by states external to the region. Throughout the decades of crises along the Ecuador-​ Peru border and during the 1995 Cenepa conflict as well, regardless of a preference for the Rio guarantor states or OAS mediation, regional officials knew external mediation to be normal, natural, and effective. In resolving the crisis, formal arbitration through extraregional actors was agreed to as a matter of course. Conversely, the Southeast Asian habitual disposition necessarily leads to attempts to manage conflict internally to the region, and largely through rather ad hoc and informal dialogue as exemplified by those held in Jakarta in response to the Thai-​Cambodian conflict in 2011. The eventual break from this means of conflict management and turn to the United

2 Interview with Chilean official, Washington, October 27, 2014. 3 Interview with Brazilian official, Washington, November 6, 2014. 4 Palmer, “Overcoming the Weight of History,” 44.

202  Practicing Peace Nations in this case was seen as just that—​a break from what was normal, natural, and effective for regional practitioners. Similarly, there is a divide between the means of consensus-​seeking within each regional community of practice. In South America, consensus is not perceived and articulated as a central feature of diplomacy. It is not a necessity where legal channels to mediate and arbitrate disagreements exist. While, according to one interviewee, it is a “golden rule” of regional affairs, for all practitioners it was assumed to emerge or be reconciled in and through legalistic processes.5 For them, consensus is reached or resolved through rational, established channels of debate and dialogue, as was the case in the negotiations in response to the Cenepa conflict. Divisive preferences were compromised in and through formalized dialogue and external mediation. For Southeast Asian officials, this is not how consensus works. Among Southeast Asian officials, consensus is central to thinking and practice, but is not understood in terms of rational-​legal processes. Rather than being acquired through formalized dialogue, in Southeast Asian diplomacy, as detailed in ­chapter 4, consensus is an inherent sense of the ASEAN game and a core aspect of regional diplomatic process that emerges largely prior to institutionalized dialogue. The habitual dispositions of Southeast Asia and South America are, then, distinctive, and they make for different approaches to conflict management and regionalism more generally. However, there are important commonalities between them as well. First, there is a similarity in terms of perceived necessity of the particular means of practicing peace in each case. In each case, members of a community of practice just know that there is one means of pursuing peace and cooperation, however varied this thinking and behavior is across the regional cases. Moreover, members of each regional community of practice commonly understand a need to adopt particular conflict management practices as a result of their relatively limited material power. Across both communities, officials see themselves as representatives of small, weak states.6 However, what this common perception of need means for each community in practice is distinct. To “feel safe and comfortable” as one South American diplomat put it,7 South American practitioners rather automatically turn to the particular 5 Interview with Chilean official, Washington, October 27, 2014. 6 See also Atena S. Feraru, “Regime Security and Regional Cooperation among Weak States,” International Studies Review 20, no. 1 (2018): 101–​126. 7 Interview with Chilean official, Washington, October 27, 2014.

Comparisons, Contributions, and Conclusions  203 “heavy legalism”8 and “clumsy multilateralism” of the region that is so distinctive and puzzling to a Canadian official at the OAS.9 Legalism, formality, and external mediation are inherent necessities for this community, given perceptions of their relatively limited power. Similar perceptions of weakness necessitate very different practices in Southeast Asia. Here, officials from similarly small and potentially vulnerable states find safety or comfort in their relations in the absence of formality. Rather than a recourse to legalism, for members of the Southeast Asia community of practice it is normal, natural, and effective to turn to practices of conflict management that ensure they will not be “stuck with too much on the legal side.”10 Second, there is a commonality in terms of perceived efficacy of these distinctive approaches to regional conflict management and regionalism. Across both communities there is a common and robust faith that the particularities of regional diplomacy are uniquely effective. In each region, officials rather uncritically know that their habitual disposition is effective—​ it “works.” More narrowly, members of each community credit their particular approach to conflict management or brand of diplomacy for producing what many see as distinctively pacific regional relations. Across interviews with both Southeast Asian and South American practitioners there was a common belief that their respective region was uniquely peaceful and that the particularities of their regional diplomacy, as they knew and practiced it, was uniquely effective. As one ASEC official suggested, Southeast Asia’s particularly informal approach to diplomacy and dialogue is “a necessity that works most effectively.”11 One ASEAN permanent representative in 2019 made this clear: Compare us to Europe, to the EU. We don’t have a European Parliament. We don’t have a common currency. We have unity in diversity. Diversity in everything. Look at the culture and traditions? Different. Look at the religions? Different. Political systems? Different. Development? Different. So we have these ten members that are so different. But compare that with Europe. They have Brexit! We won’t have Myanmar-​exit!12 8 Interview with American official, Washington, November 12, 2014. 9 Interview with Canadian officials, Washington, October 30, 2014. See also Monica Herz, “Segurança Internacional na América do Sul,” in Segurança Internacional: Perspectivas brasileiras, eds. João Paulo Alsina, Sergio W. Etchegoyen, and Nelson A. Jobim (Rio de Janeiro: Editora FGV, 2010), 332; Herz, Siman, and Telles, “Regional Organizations.” 10 Interview with ASEC official, Jakarta, June 30, 2014. 11 Interview with ASEC official, Jakarta, July 2, 2014. 12 Interview with ASEAN permanent representative, Jakarta, June 4, 2019.

204  Practicing Peace The same suggestion came from former Indonesian Foreign Minister Hassan, as noted in ­chapter 4, when he asked me to consider other regions: I would argue that it was because of dialogue, because of talk, that here [in Southeast Asia] we enjoy peace and security—​and continued peace and security. And people would appreciate [this] better if we [were] compared to other regions. Look at what is happening in the Middle East or some parts of Africa. It is because the[se] respective regions were not able to manage their own household [that they lack peace and security].13

South American practitioners similarly assert the uniquely peaceful qualities of their region and they, like their Southeast Asian counterparts, credit the particularities of their regional diplomacy for this perceived reality. For a Brazilian official quoted in the previous chapter, in South America there is “something that is unique from the other regions in terms of integration.”14 In words that mirror Minister Hassan almost precisely, a Chilean diplomat asserts confidently that “in South America we resolve conflicts in a peaceful and negotiated way, more than Europe, more than Africa, and even more than in East Asia too.”15 These common sentiments suggest that not only are the discrete and varied habitual dispositions of regional relations and conflict management normal and natural within their respective communities but also they are known to be uniquely effective in the minds of regional practitioners. Finally, despite a common belief in the pacific effects of each community’s disparate regional practices, in reality there is a common limitation to their effects. In both communities of practice there remains distrust among member states and each case showcases a toleration of a limited level of violence between members of each region. While each community of practice sees itself as a community, with equality of members or a regional familiarity, practitioners recognize lingering and consequential tensions, divisions, and distrust between them. For example, for South American officials there was a recognition that regional states—​“Peru and Chile, Chile and Bolivia, and all these countries”—​have and will continue to have “disputes and distrust.”16 An Ecuadorian official summarized this reality: “We have the same culture,

13 Interview with Foreign Minister Hassan Wirajuda, Jakarta, July 24, 2014. 14 Interview with Brazilian official, Washington, November 6, 2014. 15 Interview with Chilean official, Washington, October 27, 2014. 16 Interview with OAS official, Washington, November 10, 2014.

Comparisons, Contributions, and Conclusions  205 but we are very different countries,” and therefore these “countries are not trusting.”17 As explored, this renders the South Americans the “most divided group” at the OAS, in the appraisal of one official.18 Another South American official summarized it thusly, “there a lot of long-​standing distrust, and there is the pursuit of national agendas, as well as a lack of a real will to really work together.”19 The picture emerges of a region united, but also divided, and interstate violence remains a possibility. Much the same was apparent in the thinking of Southeast Asian officials. While officials from ASEAN and member states clearly recognized the existence and importance of their diplomatic community, and saw ASEAN as its institutional hub, they simultaneously saw it as a community characterized by distrust and lingering disputes. This was less pronounced than in the South American community, but, as explored in c­ hapter 4, officials articulated lingering “mistrust”20 and “sensitivity”21 in relations between ASEAN member states. Moreover, officials in Southeast Asia consistently articulated their understanding that disputes and violence are likely but manageable. In both communities there is a deeply internalized knowledge that while disputes and distrust linger, effective and given conflict-​ management practices exist to successfully contain and limit them. In the words of one Indonesian official, while disputes remained there was a clear “recognition that they have to be managed and they [the disputes] have to be under control.”22 In the words of another, “talking is still there” in order to manage them.23 As with Southeast Asian officials, in the view of an OAS official, the South American regional “culture of restraint” ensured that “difficulties” did not “manifest in massively violent ways.”24 For both communities, distrust and conflict were a given reality, but limited violence was tolerated. In this way, for Anwar and other Southeast Asian officials, it was simply known that “tempers flare”25 between ASEAN member states and lead to limited violence, as they do between the Malaysian and Indonesian navies or between Thailand and Cambodia in 2011 over Preah Vihear. However, there was both a dismissal of their importance—​they were “business as usual” for

17 Interview with Ecuadorian officials, Washington, November 7, 2014. 18 Interview with Peruvian official, Washington, November 3, 2014. 19 Interview with OAS official, Washington, November 10, 2014. 20 Interview with Malaysian official, Jakarta, July 22, 2014.

21 Interview with Indonesian official, Jakarta, July 23, 2014. 22 Interview with Indonesian official, Jakarta, July 23, 2014.

23 Interview with Ambassador Gede Ngurah Swajaya, Jakarta, July 30, 2014. 24 Interview with OAS official, Washington, November 10, 2014. 25 Interview with Dewi Fortuna Anwar, Jakarta, June 25, 2014.

206  Practicing Peace the region—​and a faith in the effectiveness of particular regional practices to manage them. The same was the case for South American officials, who recognized persistent distrust and conflict between states as well as the ability of their particular regional practices to manage them, as they had with the 1995 violence in the Cenepa region. Both the “flares” in violence between Thailand and Cambodia in 2011 and Ecuador and Peru in 1995 were understood largely as business as usual by these respective regional communities, and regional practitioners in each turned to a given and automatic course of action to manage them as a result of the particular habitual dispositions of these regional diplomatic communities. In sum, practitioners in both regions think from a variable set of habitual and dispositional qualities but similarly understand them as normal, natural, and effective. In both cases, communities of diplomatic practice unthinkingly know what competent and efficient interstate relations look like. In both cases this is distinctive but similarly recognized as effective, both limiting violence and leading to its toleration. As such, these habitual and dispositional qualities of regional relations suggest an important element in our understanding of long-​term patterns of conflict and cooperation in each regional case. There are, then, many normal ways that diplomacy works. This conclusion foreshadows the contributions of this book, which I turn to now.

Contributions This book makes three related contributions to international relations and to our understanding of how regional communities manage conflict and pursue regionalism. First, and substantively, as the preceding section details, it has shed light on the cognitive and behavioral foundations through which regional conflictual peace is made possible in both Southeast Asia and South America. To do this, I have examined the thinking and behavior of regional officials, unearthing and articulating what they know to be possible and effective and highlighting their views and experiences. In this way, this book adds to a growing chorus of voices that aim to highlight the voices and experiences of actors in global politics beyond what has traditionally centered on Western-​centric experiences and perspectives.26 My own positionality 26 See Amitav Acharya, “Advancing Global IR: Challenges, Contentions, and Contributions,” International Studies Review 18, no. 1 (2016): 4–​15; Audrey Alejandro, Western Dominance in International Relations: The Internationalisation of IR in Brazil and India (New York City: Routledge,

Comparisons, Contributions, and Conclusions  207 necessarily mediates my presentation of these voices and experiences, but drawing attention to a practitioner-​oriented account of the dynamics of conflict management and regionalism in each case showcases the variable means by which communities of diplomatic practitioners manage regional crises and pursue regionalism. Particular habitual dispositions make possible a toleration of a limited level of interstate violence and shape the long and conflictual peace of each region. The qualities of relations that are natural and normal, that work effectively, and that shape conflict management in the two regions under study here are very different. This conclusion presents a complication to many conventional IR perspectives. Rather than particular—​Western, liberal, democratic—​norms and communities, this book demonstrates the possibility that a wide variety of norms, practices, communities, and indeed states may generate peaceful interstate relations. It is the habituation of particular and distinctive qualities of interaction that is key to account for pacific patterns of regional relations and conflict management. Practices of peace vary widely. This argument has implications not only for how to understand myriad paths to peace in these regions and beyond—​and the conflictual realities of peace—​but also for how external attempts at crisis response may interact with practices of peace and security cooperation from other regions or globally. Clearly, distinctive habitual dispositions mean distinct understandings of what each region requires to solve problems or respond to crises. In South America, officials see the need for greater technocratic and legal expertise to make better use of the legalistic processes and precedents that undergird regional relations there. As one official suggested, “What I think my country needs is very well prepared experts in international law and in the litigation before the International Court of Justice. That is very important. Chile is very well equipped. Chile has 23 of the best lawyers in the country for this, and that is what I think my country needs: trained experts.”27 However, a Chilean official remarked similarly, suggesting that a major and growing concern

2018); Yong-​ Soo Eun, “An Intellectual Confession from a Member of the ‘Non-​ White’ IR Community: A Friendly Reply to David Lake’s ‘White Man’s IR,’” PS: Political Science and Politics 52, no. 1 (2019): 78–​84; Stuart J. Kaufman, Richard Little, and William C. Wohlforth, The Balance of Power in World History (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007); Arlene B. Tickner, “Core, Periphery and (Neo)Imperialist International Relations,” European Journal of International Relations 19, no. 3 (2013): 627–​646; Thomas Tieku, “The Legon School of International Relations,” Review of International Studies 47, no. 5(2021): 656–​671.

27 Interview with Paraguayan official, Washington, October 28, 2014.

208  Practicing Peace was that there was “no luxury of expertise” to be had.28 A Colombian official lamented similarly: a “weakness of our diplomatic services is politicization [rather than specialization]. Even though we have excellent people, they must accept, and often, political appointments.”29 This was a common refrain among South American officials. To navigate and support the given way of doing diplomacy in the region, technocratic and legalist professional diplomats with particular competencies were required. In Southeast Asia, there was no expression of this particular need for expertise, and no lament for a lack of this kind of professionalism. Rather, time and again the personalistic nature and lived experience of Southeast Asian regionalism was highlighted. Often interviewees hinted at a concern that too few dialogue partner state officials invested sufficient time in the face-​to-​face and informal channels of ASEAN diplomacy. Recalling Ambassador Ngurah Swajaya’s words quoted in c­ hapter 4, “it is very difficult to explain [this] to [foreign] politicians. Unless they have been to this region and this part of the region [the ASEC itself], then they understand. For those who have never been here, it will not be easy to understand.”30 Rather than a set of legalistic rules to be taught and learned, to effectively support Southeast Asian regional efforts, one must live them. States seeking to support conflict management in each region, then, should recognize the particularities of competent, effective support. Second, and in terms methods and methodologies, the preceding exploration provides one means of uncovering the existence of habitual and practical qualities of interstate relations and tracing their effects. This approach complements a “sobjective” approach to studying community relations31 and draws from related interpretive and relational32 methods of uncovering meaning through interviews.33 Ethnography and participant observation are not often possible for studies of diplomacy, and indeed it was not possible to observe conflict-​management practices directly for this study. Interview research, however, offers a second-​best option to explore the cognitive and practical issues of concern to many in the field. This is a limited approach, particularly because it is a challenge for members of a community to articulate their own understandings of community practices and

28 Interview with Chilean official, Washington, October 27, 2014.

29 Interview with Colombian official, Washington, November 14, 2014.

30 Interview with Ambassador I Gede Ngurah Swajaya, Jakarta, July 30, 2014. 31 Pouliot, “The Logic of Practicality;” Pouliot, International Security. 32 Fujii, Interviewing in Social Science.

33 See also Soedirgo and Glas, “Toward Active Reflexivity.”

Comparisons, Contributions, and Conclusions  209 thinking. Thus, through interview research “representations of practice . . . have to be carefully interpreted” by a researcher.34 The methods employed here, and methodology described in detail in ­chapter 3, offer a means to this end. By exploring the practices, habits, and background knowledge of regional practitioners through detailed interviews and by contrasting the thinking and behavior of one community of practitioners with another existing alongside it, it is possible to uncover and document the existence of a habitual disposition that each community embodies, acts out, and reifies in action. To explore the latter suggestion, and view the effects of these habitual and practical qualities of relations, this research relied on two means. The first was to explore the robustness of these habitual qualities. When officials not only view certain practices as self-​evident but also, when pushed to reflect on their efficacy, know them to be effective it is likely that these qualities of relations inform community behavior in particularly meaningful ways. Further, tracing the existence and effect of these habitual and practical qualities of relations within particular and crucial cases of crisis response and regional conflict management serves to illustrate their consequence more directly. This two-​part approach to elucidating the existence and effects of such dynamics could be applied elsewhere. This may include examining the normative and practical foundations of communities of diplomatic officials, like that at the African Union.35 It may also complement and extend similar explorations of overlapping communities of practice, like those within the World Bank, allowing observers to unearth where and how contestation over norms and practice unfold or learning and social change occur.36 Third, and relatedly, this book contributes to our collective understanding of the interrelationship between norms and practice. The relationship between norms and practice is something that has escaped many existing accounts of stability and change in social constructivist literatures, as detailed in ­chapter 2. Scholars who examine axiomatic habits37 or relatively thoughtless practices38 have tended to actively distance their analyses from an interrogation of how actors understand and enact norms. However, it is clear that the practices and habits of both Southeast Asian and South American diplomatic relations and the distinctive approaches

34 Bueger and Gadinger, “The Play of International Practice,” 457. 35 E.g., Glas, “African Union Security Culture.” 36 E.g., Sondarjee, “Collective Learning.” 37 E.g., Hopf, “The Logic of Habit.”

38 E.g., Adler and Pouliot, International Practices.

210  Practicing Peace to conflict management are not divorced from the codified norms of these regions. Rather, the habitual and practical qualities of regional relations represent self-​evident and inarticulate understandings and competent performances of norms in action. In each case, members of the respective community of practice know they are bound by a set of prescriptive norms and confident of their competent enactment of these norms as a matter of course. However, what these norms mean and what constitutes their competent practice is varied and particular. Standards of competence have an inherently normative quality, and these standards may vary widely. As the empirical cases made clear, the practical expression or enactment of a norm may be self-​evident and effective for one community, but a puzzling and counterproductive choice for actors within another community.39 For nonregional officials in Jakarta, for example, Southeast Asian regional practices are divorced from their appraisal of ASEAN’s own norms and principles. For many dialogue partners, ASEAN officials do not practice ASEAN norms competently. For European and American officials alike, much of ASEAN diplomatic practice is “insane.”40 Similarly, at the OAS, South American legalism is seen by North American officials as an aberration from what the very legal norms and principles therein ought to mean and how they ought to affect behavior. Again, from an external vantage point, regional practice is incompetent. For them, South American officials practiced a peculiar and ineffective legalism built on “paper commitments” divorced from competent and effective legal practice and diplomacy more generally.41 In both cases, what were known as self-​evident and effective expressions of common norms for South American or Southeast Asian officials were recognized as inconsistent from the “normal way diplomacy works” for both European and North American officials and, thus, incompetent.42 In this way, this book adds to a growing array of studies seeking to place norms and practice in productive dialogue to explore both continuity and change in social and political relations.43 Collectively, then, this book has sought to extend our understandings of how peace is practiced in Southeast Asia and South America among respective communities of diplomatic practice, illuminate how we can

39 See also Glas and Balogun, “Norms in Practice.”

40 Interview with American official, Jakarta, July 3, 2014.

41 Interview with American official, Washington, November 12, 2014. 42 Interview with American official, Jakarta, July 3, 2014. 43 See Bernstein and Laurence, “Practices and Norms.”

Comparisons, Contributions, and Conclusions  211 uncover particular habits and practices within these kinds of communities, and to draw attention to the often-​overlooked interrelationship between norms and practice.

Conclusions This book has argued that interstate cooperation and peace should be understood not merely as the absence of war. Rather, peace is a process. It is practiced through iterated, if often mundane, relations between states as they pursue their individual and collective interests. It unfolds and is shaped by the less than articulate and relatively automatic thinking and behavior of diplomatic communities of practice. This book has unearthed the discrete sets of thinking and behavior of two regional communities, in Southeast Asia and South America. Each exhibits particular understandings of normal, natural, and effective conflict management and of the means to pursue regionalism more generally. Each particular and given approach to regional relations is known to work and to work well for officials in these communities, even when they appear incompetent or “insane” to those external to them. Despite this view, it is clear that distinctive habitual dispositions matter. They shape how regional diplomatic communities of practice understand and respond to challenges, including territorial conflict among regional members, and pursue further institutionalization of their regional relations more generally. More narrowly, each habitual disposition explored in this book leads regional communities to tolerate limited levels of violence and provides the given means of responding to violence. In this way, these deeply internalized and relatively automatic ways of thinking and doing make possible the puzzle at the heart of this book—​ the coexistence of violence and cooperation among regional states in both Southeast Asia and South America. In each region, this conflictual peace is sustained in and through the particular habitual dispositions of regional relations. While in Europe, particular practices of regionalism may have been productive of a rather classical security community, elsewhere in the Global South distinctive practices inform particular patterns of conflict and cooperation. In Southeast Asia, cooperation rests on a habitual disposition toward informal consensus-​building and a rejection of formal dispute-​settlement mechanisms, even those codified within ASEAN itself. Regional diplomatic practitioners view interstate conflict with a “business as usual” disposition

212  Practicing Peace that informs a tolerance of limited regional conflict. The region’s habitual recourse to informality and slow consensus-​building restricted the escalation of the bloody Thai-​Cambodian Preah Vihear border dispute in 2011, but also prolonged it and hindered its formal resolution. While Southeast Asian officials know that a turn to informality and particular consensus-​seeking practices are the normal way that diplomacy and conflict management work, it is at odds with the views of their European and North American counterparts working alongside ASEAN. Across the Pacific, South American practitioners rather automatically think from the context of legal obligation and turn to practices of formal mediation and extraregional arbitration of disputes. However, unlike the European traditions on which these practices are founded, the legalist South American habitual disposition is without recourse to a singular institutionalized multilateral forum, reliant instead on deeply internalized assumptions of procedural formality. It is from this foundation that regional practitioners respond to crises, such as the 1995 Cenepa conflict, and continue to pursue deeper integration. While South American officials know that a particular brand of legalistic practice works for them and generates the pacific realities of their regional relations, it is puzzlingly incompetent for their North American counterparts at the OAS. In both regional cases, particular diplomatic habitual dispositions circumscribe crisis response and shape regionalism in important ways.

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Index For the benefit of digital users, indexed terms that span two pages (e.g., 52–​53) may, on occasion, appear on only one of those pages. Note: Figures are indicated by f following the page number ABC (Argentina, Brazil, Chile) Concert of states, 144–​45 Acharya, Amitav, 5–​7, 18, 51–​52, 57–​58, 67–​68, 73, 99–​100, 131–​32, 162–​63 active learning, 26 Act of Brasilia, 193–​94 Adler, Emanuel, 26–​27, 35, 41–​42, 47–​ 48, 56–​57 Adler-​Nissen, Rebecca, 66–​67 African regionalism, 67–​68 African Union (AU), 67–​68, 208–​9 agency, 12, 43–​45, 55–​57, 199–​200 Aguilar, Braz Diaz de, 187 ALBA. See Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America Alfonso XII, King, 173–​74 Allende, Salvador, 148–​49 American Good Neighbor Policy, 146–​47 Andean Community (CAN), 24–​25, 73–​ 74, 141–​43, 147–​48, 154 Andean Pact (1969), 15–​16, 147–​48, 152–​ 53, 187–​88 Anderson, Benedict, 158–​59 Anwar, Dewi Fortuna, 109, 126–​27, 205–​6 Archer, Margaret, 49, 56–​57 Argentina Beagle Channel dispute, 7–​8, 147–​48 dispute with Brazil, 13, 144–​46, 150–​ 52, 167 dispute with Chile, 7–​8, 147–​52 as emerging power, 144–​45 La Plata Basin Group (Cuenca del Plata), 147–​48 Pactos de Mayo, 146–​47 Argentine-​Brazilian rivalry, 7–​8, 9, 11, 13 ASEAN norms, 100, 101, 108–​9, 116–​17, 118, 209–​10

ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF), 10, 109–​10 ASEAN Secretariat (ASEC), 71–​78, 102–​3, 106–​8, 109–​10, 120–​21, 122–​ 23, 128–​29 ASEAN way face-​saving, 166–​17 governance and diplomacy, 34–​35 habitual dispositions and, 67–​68, 70, 162–​63 importance of, 16–​18, 100 Asian regionalism, 17–​18 Asia-​Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), 109–​10 Association of Southeast Asia (ASA), 92–​93 Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Bali Concord II, 104, 113 Bali Concord III, 106, 107–​8 Charter of, 1, 39–​40, 98, 104, 117–​19, 122, 133–​34 community-​building, 109–​11 community of practice, 101, 111–​ 12, 121–​22 Connectivity Coordinating Committee, 104 consensus-​seeking practices, 80–​81, 101–​2, 104–​10 constructed community of, 66–​67 Declaration of ASEAN Concord, 95 economic development of, 11, 19–​20 founding of, 5–​7, 8, 10, 34–​35, 39–​ 40, 93–​98 habitual dispositions, 21, 53 institutions and, 14–​15 Integration Monitoring Office, 111–​12

236 Index Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) (cont.) intra-​ASEAN war, 86–​87, 90–​91, 97f member states of, 4–​5, 23–​25, 95 noninterference in, 113–​23 Permanent Council meetings, 63–​65 practitioner interviews, 71–​78, 83–​84 Protocol on Enhanced Dispute Settlement Mechanism, 104 regional relations among, 198–​ 200, 204–​6 security community framework, 57–​58 Thai-​Cambodian border conflict, 1, 130–​38 Australia, 23–​24 authoritarianism, 12–​13, 143–​44, 147, 150–​52, 176 Axelrod, Robert, 82–​83 Ba, Alice, 14–​15, 26–​27, 91–​93, 94–​95, 100 balance of power, 9, 11, 144–​45 Bali Concord II (2003), 104, 113 Bali Concord III (2011), 106, 107–​8 Ballen, Sixto Durán, 190, 194 Bangkok Declaration (1967), 99 Beagle Channel dispute, 7–​8, 147–​48 Bennett, Andrew, 78, 81–​82 Bjola, Corneliu, 55–​56, 82–​83 Blackwell, Adam, 171 Bogota Pact (1938), 146–​47 Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America (ALBA), 141–​43, 152–​53, 164–​66, 179–​80 Bolivarianism (Bolivar, Simón), 158–​59 Bourdieu, Pierre, 43, 44–​45 Brazil Argentine-​Brazilian rivalry, 7–​8, 9, 11, 13 dispute with Argentina, 13, 144–​46, 150–​52, 167 Pactos de Mayo, 146–​47 role in OAS, 144–​45, 159–​67 as major power, 9–​10 role in UNASUR, 160, 160–​61n.91 Brazilian-​Argentine Consultation and Coordination Mechanism for International Security and Defense Issues (MCC), 151–​52

Britain, 55–​56 Bucaran, Abdala, 194 Buddhist Mekong states, 92–​93 bureaucracy, 49, 154 Burma. See Myanmar Buzan, Barry, 22–​23 Cambodia, 1, 86–​87, 97–​98. See also Thai-​ Cambodian border conflict Camic, Charles, 31, 35–​36, 44–​45 Canada, 108, 120–​21, 172 capitalism, 180 Cardoso, Alfonso, 193–​94 Cenepa conflict (1995), 182, 185–​96, 199, 200–​2 Centeno, Miguel, 10–​11 centrality, 24–​25, 95, 104, 108, 179 Chaco conflict (1941), 173–​74 Chaco War (1932-​1935), 5, 145–​47 Checkel, Jeffrey, 78, 81–​83 Child, Jack, 140 Chile, 7–​8, 144–​45, 146–​47, 207–​8 China, 71, 74n.56, 92–​93 Coe, Brooke, 66–​67 cognitive region, 175 Cold War, 25, 50–​52, 93, 95 collective security, 51–​52, 157 Colombian-​Venezuelan border dispute, 173–​74 colonialism, 16–​17, 91, 101–​2 committee of permanent representatives (CPR), 72, 106–​7, 111, 128–​29 communicative action, 82–​83 communities of practice conflict-​management practices, 19–​22 definition of, 19–​20 diplomatic communities of practice, 38, 45–​48, 51–​52, 60–​61, 80–​81 habitual dispositions of, 30–​31, 58, 60–​ 61, 85–​86 intersubjective qualities, 77–​78 introduction to, 28 regional, 22, 61, 87–​88, 101–​2, 105, 108–​9, 134, 184–​85, 195–​96, 202–​3 within South America, 19–​22, 181–​82 within Southeast Asia, 19–​22, 101, 111–​12, 113–​23, 124–​25, 130, 133–​34, 138

Index  237 community-​building, 2–​3, 19, 109–​11 Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC), 152–​ 54, 170 comparative regionalism, 66–​67 Conference on Peace Consolidation (1936), 146–​47 conflict management communities and, 19–​22 dispute settlement, 16–​17, 99, 103–​4, 122–​23, 133–​37, 138, 146–​47, 198–​ 99, 211–​12 habitual dispositions and, 30–​31, 87, 88–​89, 128 in South America, 141, 150, 154–​55, 156–​82, 184–​85, 192–​96 in Southeast Asia, 90–​91, 128, 134–​36 summary of, 197–​98 understanding of, 206–​11 conflictual peace. See also peace role of habitual disposition in, 87 in South America, 2–​3, 28–​29, 141–​56 in Southeast Asia, 2–​3, 28–​29, 90–​99 understanding of, 206–​11 Confrontasi, 91–​92, 125–​26 Connectivity Coordinating Committee (2011), 104 consensus-​based decision-​making, 104–​ 12, 113 consensus-​building, 211–​12 consensus-​seeking practices, 21, 80–​81, 101–​2, 104–​10, 114, 202, 211–​12 constitutive causal effect, 81–​82 Constitutive Treaty of UNASUR (2008), 157 constructivist approaches importance of norms, 32–​33 logic of appropriateness, 36–​37 to regional relations, 113 social constructivism, 3–​4, 16, 26–​27, 49, 51–​53, 82–​83, 99, 209–​10 Convention Against the Illicit Manufacturing of and Trafficking in Firearms, Ammunition, Explosives, and Other Related Materials (CIFTA), 172 Cossley, Nick, 44–​45, 55–​57

Council of South American Defense (SADC), 152–​53 creole elites, 158–​59 Crimea, 106 culture diplomatic culture, 16–​18, 68, 141–​43, 156–​57, 163 regional culture, 18 of restraint, 184–​85, 205–​6 security culture, 16–​17, 67–​68, 156–​57 Cyclone Nargis, 114–​15, 121–​22, 139 da Silva, Marcos Valle Machado, 140 Declaration of ASEAN Concord, 95 Declaration of Galapagos (1998), 170 Declaration of Mercosur, Bolivia, and Chile as a zone of peace (1998), 170 Declaration of Montevideo, 191 “Declaration Regarding a South American Peace Zone” (2002), 170 decolonialization, 16–​17 democracy, 12, 13, 114–​15, 117, 120, 150–​ 52, 157 democratic regimes, 2 democratization, 12–​13, 151–​52 deterrence, 8, 25 Dewey, John, 43, 45–​46 dialogue partner states, 77 Diesing, Paul, 85–​86 diplomacy ASEAN way and, 34–​35 institutionalized diplomacy, 73, 99 normal diplomacy, 88–​89, 199–​200 observing practice of, 63–​66, 206–​11 regional diplomacy, 60–​61, 108–​9 South American diplomacy, 72–​73, 157–​58, 162–​82 Southeast Asian diplomacy, 86–​87, 90–​ 91, 99–​101, 104–​23, 202, 203 diplomatic communities of practice. See communities of practice diplomatic culture, 16–​18, 68, 141–​43, 156–​57, 163 diplomatic interactions, 26, 34–​35, 100–​1 dispositional knowledge, 43, 68–​69 dispositional thinking, 42, 54–​55, 193–​94

238 Index dispute settlement, 16–​17, 99, 103–​4, 122–​23, 133–​37, 138, 146–​47, 198–​99, 211–​12. See also conflict management Domínguez, Jorge, 145 Doty, Roxanne Lynn, 50–​51 Durkheim, Emile, 31, 35–​36, 45–​46 economic development, 11, 19–​20, 93–​ 94, 116–​17 economic interdependence, 2, 12–​15, 151–​52, 185 Ecuador, 7–​8, 13, 144–​45 Ecuadorian-​Colombian War, 5 Ecuador-​Peru War (1941), 145–​46 Eingestellthiet, 45–​46 Elizabeth II, Queen, 148–​49 emergent nation-​states, 158–​59 Enhanced Dispute Settlement Mechanism (EDSM), 122 ethnography, 63–​65, 208–​9 European security community, 82–​ 83, 211–​12 European Union (EU), 181–​82 Evans, Gareth, 109–​10 external mediation, 145–​49, 161–​63, 173–​ 74, 182, 193–​94, 195–​96, 199, 201–​3 face-​saving practice, 116–​17, 121–​22 Fawcett, Louise, 24–​25 field of diplomatic interaction, 147–​ 48, 160–​61 field-​specific dispositions, 44–​48 Finnemore, Martha, 50–​51 formality, 21, 161, 164, 168, 171–​73, 182, 195–​96, 202–​3, 211–​12 Fujii, Lee Ann, 68–​69 Fujimori, Alberto, 188–​89, 192–​93, 194 fundamental norms, 36–​37 Gaddis, John, 25 geographic proximity, 22–​24 geometry of power, 9 Global South, 2–​3, 66–​67, 197–​98, 211–​12 habitual dispositions. See also South American habitual disposition; Southeast Asian habitual disposition

in action, 85–​88 ASEAN and, 21, 53 ASEAN way and, 67–​68, 70, 162–​63 of communities of practice, 30–​31, 58, 60–​61, 85–​86 conflict management and, 30–​31, 87, 88–​89, 128 definition of, 3, 40–​55 diplomatic communities of practice, 45–​48, 63–​71, 80–​81, 84–​85 effect of, 81–​88 existence of, 61–​81 habits and practice, 35–​55 importance of, 55–​58 in international relations, 52–​53 in interstate relations, 30, 59 noninterference and, 99, 101–​2, 103–​4, 113–​23, 133–​34, 137, 138 norms and, 31–​35, 40–​55 origins of, 48–​54 power and, 50–​51 process and content of, 43–​45 reading practice, 78–​80 regional diplomacy, 60–​61 regional habitual disposition, 73, 80–​81, 87–​89, 90–​91, 99, 112, 123, 128, 133–​34, 135–​39, 184–​ 85, 200–​1 robustness of, 28–​29, 60, 61, 83–​85, 124–​30, 183–​85, 202–​3, 208–​9 summary of, 58–​59, 80–​81, 88–​89 understanding of, 41–​42 habitus, 43, 44–​45, 47–​48, 55–​56, 82–​83 habitus of restraint, 55–​56, 82–​83 Hayes, Jarrod, 57–​58 Herz, Monica, 189–​90, 194 hierarchies of authority, 50–​51 Holsti, Kalevi, 1–​2, 7–​8, 13, 15–​16, 140, 149–​50, 162 Hopf, Ted, 20–​21, 30, 31–​32, 37, 44–​45, 49, 55–​56, 69, 79–​80 Hurrell, Andrew, 162–​63 Ibarra, Jose Maria Velasco, 187 identity intersectional nature of, 62–​63 structured discourses of, 69 we-​ness, 31–​32, 174, 182 illusion of peace, 140–​41

Index  239 imperialism, 160, 175, 180 Indonesia, 1, 91–​94, 102–​3, 109, 119, 125–​ 27, 134, 135–​36 inertia of peace, 140 institutionalized diplomacy, 73, 99 institutionalized regional states, 1–​2 institutions and peace, 12–​16 Inter-​American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), 164–​ 65, 195–​96 Inter-​American Defense Board (IADB), 171 Inter-​American Human Rights Commission, 200–​1 Inter-​American Reciprocal Assistance Treaty (1947), 146–​47 interdependence, 1–​2, 12–​15, 19, 140, 151–​52, 185 International Country of Justice, 207–​8 International Court of Justice (ICJ), 125–​ 26, 136–​38 International Crisis Group, 135–​36 International Monetary Fund (IMF), 49 interpretivism, 78, 87–​88 intersectional nature of identity, 62–​63 interstate relations, 2–​3, 22–​23, 26, 30, 59 intersubjectivity, 79, 83 interviewing methods, 71–​78, 83–​84 intraregional conflict, 86–​87, 132 intuitive thinking, 43–​44 Itamaraty Declaration, 192

learning, 26, 46–​48, 49, 52–​53, 82–​83 Lebow, Richard, 85–​86 legalism, 21, 39–​40, 150, 162–​64, 169–​ 72, 193–​94, 195–​96, 199, 202–​ 3, 209–​10 legitimacy, 114–​15, 136–​37, 145, 171, 187 Leifer, Michael, 94–​95 Ligitan Island, 1, 5–​7, 97–​98, 125–​26 Lima Declaration (2002), 170 localization, 18, 39–​40, 41–​42 logic of appropriateness, 36–​37 logic of habit, 49, 52–​53 logic of practicality, 26–​27, 57–​58 logic of practice, 37–​38 Loh, Dylan, 47–​48, 125–​26 long peace, 2–​8, 9, 10–​16, 25, 87–​89, 197

Kacowicz, Arie, 141–​44, 145, 150, 156–​57, 158–​59, 162–​63, 184, 187–​88 Kahler, Miles, 14–​15, 17–​18 Kahneman, Daniel, 42 Kelly, Robert E, 14–​15 Kivimäki, Timo, 10, 12–​13 Kornprobst, Marcus, 55–​56, 82–​83

Mahuad, Jamil, 192–​93 Malaysia, 1, 91–​93, 97–​98, 125–​26, 127 Malaysian Federation, 91–​93 Maphilindo, 92–​93 Marcella, Gabriel, 189–​90 Mares, David, 7–​8, 10–​11, 13, 140, 155 Martel, Stéphanie, 66–​67 Mathur, Sahil, 119 Mauss, Marcel, 44–​45 mediation of disputes, 21, 161, 163, 174, 190–​91, 195–​96 Mercosur, 15–​16, 73–​74, 152–​53, 159–​60, 160–​61n.91, 170, 180 militarized interstate disputes (MIDs), 1, 5–​7, 6f, 96f military coups, 119–​21 Military Observer Mission, Ecuador Peru (MOMEP), 191 Miller, Benjamin, 22–​23 Min Aung Hlaing, 119 Mitzen, Jennifer, 20–​21, 45, 82–​83 musyawarah dan mufakat (consultation and consensus), 101–​2, 105–​6 Myanmar, 1, 114–​22

La Guerra Grande (1836-​1852), 144 Laos, 98 La Plata Basin Group (Cuenca del Plata), 147–​48 Latin American Free Trade Association (LAFTA), 147–​48

Nair, Deepak, 119 Neumann, Iver B, 38–​39, 50–​51, 123 Ng, Joe, 66–​67 Ngurah, Gede Swajaya, 108, 127, 134–​ 35, 207–​8 Nogueira, Joao Pontes, 189–​90, 194

John Paul II, Pope, 149 Jones, Dorothy, 145–​46

240 Index noninterference in ASEAN, 113–​23, 132 habitual dispositions and, 21, 99, 101–​2, 103–​4, 113–​23, 133–​34, 137, 138 interrelated principles of, 94–​95, 98 norms of, 17–​18, 34–​36, 39–​40, 132, 198–​99 regional noninterference, 16–​17 relevance of, 36–​37 nonregional practitioners, 77, 108–​9 normal diplomacy, 88–​89, 199–​200 norms ASEAN norms, 100, 101, 108–​9, 116–​ 17, 118, 209–​10 definition of, 16–​17, 32–​33 fundamental norms, 36–​37 habitual dispositions and, 31–​35, 40–​55 importance in constructivist approaches, 32–​33 of noninterference, 17–​18, 34–​36, 39–​ 40, 132, 198–​99 peace and, 16–​19 North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), 50–​51, 52–​53, 66–​67 Norway, 50–​51 objectivism, 79 ontological security, 45 Organization of American States (OAS) Brazil’s role in, 159–​67 CELAC and, 152–​53 heavy legalism in, 163–​65, 202–​3 introduction to, 1–​2, 15–​16, 24–​25 Pan-​American community, 143, 147–​ 48, 157–​58 Permanent Council, 63–​65, 76–​77, 190 practitioner interviews, 71–​78 South American diplomacy and, 162–​82 Pacific Alliance, 24–​25, 154, 180 pacific dispute settlement, 99, 103–​4, 122, 123, 133–​34, 138, 146–​47, 149, 183, 198–​99 Pactos de Mayo (1902), 146–​47 Palmer, David Scott, 187–​88, 193–​ 94, 200–​1 Paquisha incident, 188

Paraguay-​Bolivia Chaco-​Boreal dispute, 173–​74 Park, Robert E, 44–​45 peace. See also conflictual peace as foundational concept, 22–​27 illusion of, 140–​41 inertia of, 140 institutions and, 12–​16 by irrelevance, 9 long peace, 2–​8, 9, 10–​16, 25, 87–​ 89, 197 norms and, 16–​19 power and, 9–​11 puzzle of peace, 8–​19 in South America, 1–​8 in Southeast Asia, 1–​8 understandings of, 206–​12 Peace Declaration of Itamaraty (Declaración de Paz de Itamaraty), 190–​91 peaceful settlement of international disputes, 157 permanent representatives. See committee of permanent representatives Peru, 7–​8, 13, 144–​45 Peru-​Gran Colombia War (1828-​ 1829), 144 Philippines, 1, 91–​94 Pitswan, Surin, 133–​34 Platine War, 5 political security community (ASEAN), 75–​76, 98, 102–​3, 118, 120 positionality, 62–​63, 65–​66, 70–​71, 75–​ 76, 206–​7 Pouliot, Vincent, 2–​3, 26–​27, 31–​32, 37, 52–​53, 56–​58, 66–​69, 78–​80, 82–​83 power balance of power, 9, 11, 144–​45 geometry of, 9 habitual disposition and, 50–​51 peace and, 9–​11 practice. See also communities of practice consensus-​seeking practices, 21, 80–​81, 101–​2, 104–​10, 114, 202, 211–​12 face-​saving practice, 116–​17, 121–​22 logic of practice, 37–​38 observing practice of diplomacy, 63–​ 66, 206–​11

Index  241 regional practices, 77–​78, 90–​91, 124–​ 25, 136–​37, 139, 204–​6, 209–​10 practice theory, 44–​45 Preah Vihear conflict (2011), 86–​87, 130, 139, 199 procedural habituation, 82–​83 process tracing, 86 Protocol of Ouro Preto, 152–​53 Protocol of Rio de Janeiro. See Treaty of Peace, Friendship, and Boundaries Protocol on Enhanced Dispute Settlement Mechanism (2004), 104 puzzle of peace, 8–​19 Rathbun, Brian, 79–​80 reflexivity, 62–​63 region, definition of, 22–​27 regional community of practice, 22, 61, 87–​88, 101–​2, 105, 108–​9, 134, 184–​85, 195–​96, 202–​3 regional culture, 18 regional diplomacy, 60–​61, 108–​9 regional habitual disposition, 73, 80–​81, 87–​89, 90–​91, 99, 112, 123, 128, 133–​34, 135–​39, 184–​85, 200–​1 regional hegemony, 3–​4, 9–​10, 11 regional integration, 1, 91–​92, 98, 130–​31, 147–​48, 187–​88 regionalization, 15–​16, 19–​21, 22–​23, 67–​ 68, 91–​92, 98 regional organizations, 1–​2, 3, 12, 15–​16, 19–​20, 24–​25, 32–​33, 48, 74, 147–​ 48, 153–​54, 155, 157–​58, 159, 167, 176, 180 regional practices, 77–​78, 90–​91, 124–​25, 136–​37, 139, 204–​6, 209–​10 regional relations, 3–​4 representational bias, 31–​32 Rio Protocol. See Treaty of Peace, Friendship, and Boundaries robustness of habitual dispositions, 28–​29, 60, 61, 83–​85, 124–​30, 183–​85, 202–​3, 208–​9 Rosenau, James, 38–​39, 55–​56 routine, 19–​21, 26–​27, 45, 49, 52–​53, 57–​ 58, 128–​29, 180–​81, 189–​90 routinization, 45, 49, 82–​83

rules-​based processes, 29, 161, 163–​64, 168, 172–​74, 182, 193–​94, 195–​ 96, 199 Russia, 50–​51, 106 Sabah, 1, 91–​92, 97–​98 Santiago Accord (1996), 192 Schriber, Alfonso Arias, 192–​93 security collective security, 51–​52, 157 ontological security, 45 political security, 75–​76, 98, 102–​3, 118, 120 security community, 25–​26, 49, 55–​56, 57–​58, 82–​83, 131, 151–​52, 174, 178–​79, 182, 211–​12 security culture, 16–​17, 67–​68, 156–​57 security complex, 22–​23, 141–​43 security culture, 16–​17, 67–​68, 156–​57 Sending, Ole Jacob, 36–​37 senior officials’ meeting (SOM), 72 sense-​making, 63–​65 Shelton, Dinah L, 164–​65 Sikkink, Kathryn, 50–​51 Simmons, Beth, 194 Singapore, 1, 97–​98, 127 Sipadan Island, 1, 5–​7, 97–​98, 125–​26 Snyder, Glenn, 85–​86 social constructivism, 3–​4, 16, 26–​27, 28, 49, 51–​53, 82–​83, 99, 209–​10 social interaction, 14–​15, 19–​20, 30–​33, 35, 48–​49, 56–​57, 66 socialization processes, 47–​48, 49, 82–​ 83, 157–​58 social learning, 46–​47, 82–​83 South America communities of practice, 19–​22, 181–​82 conflict management, 141, 150, 154–​55, 156–​82, 184–​85, 192–​96, 206–​11 conflictual peace, 2–​3, 19, 141–​56 militarized interstate disputes (MIDs), 6f, 7–​8, 155f peace and conflict in, 1–​8 puzzle of peace, 8–​19 sovereignty in, 16–​17, 145–​46, 157, 158–​59, 170 states of, 4 territorial disputes in, 2, 151–​52, 173–​74 war in, 5f

242 Index South American diplomacy, 72–​73, 157–​ 58, 162–​82 South American habitual disposition Cenepa conflict, 182, 185–​96, 199, 200–​2 comparisons to, 198–​206 conflict management, 156–​82 diplomacy, 162–​82 effects of, 182–​95 introduction to, 140–​41 origins of, 157–​61 particularities of, 161 robustness of, 183–​85 summary of, 195–​96 Southeast Asia communities of practice, 19–​22, 113–​ 23, 124–​25, 130, 133–​34, 138 conflict management, 90–​91, 128, 134–​ 36, 206–​11 conflictual peace, 2–​3, 19, 28–​29, 90–​99 culture of, 17–​18 militarized interstate disputes (MIDs), 5–​7, 6f, 95–​98, 96f peace and conflict in, 1–​8 puzzle of peace, 2 sovereignty in, 16–​17, 94–​95, 101–​2, 107–​8, 112–​14, 116 states of, 5–​7 territorial disputes in, 2, 5–​7, 93, 95, 97–​98, 127 war in, 5f Southeast Asian diplomacy, 86–​87, 90–​91, 99–​101, 104–​23, 202, 203 Southeast Asian habitual disposition, 28–​ 29, 86–​87, 90–​91, 103–​4, 122–​38, 139, 201–​2 comparisons to, 198–​206 conflictual peace, 2–​3, 28–​29, 90–​99 consensus-​based decision-​making, 104–​12, 113 effects of, 124–​38 introduction to, 90–​91 management and regionalism, 99–​123 noninterference and, 113–​23 origins of, 100–​3 particularities of, 103–​4 robustness of, 124–​30

Southeast Asian diplomacy, 86–​87, 90–​ 91, 99–​101, 104–​23, 202 summary of, 138–​39 Thai-​Cambodian border conflict, 1, 130–​38, 199–​200, 201–​2 Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO), 92–​93 sovereignty nation-​building and, 8, 14–​15 norms of, 36–​37 in South America, 16–​17, 145–​46, 157, 158–​59, 170 in Southeast Asia, 16–​17, 94–​95, 101–​2, 107–​8, 112–​14, 116 stability in social relations, 56–​58 Stanovich, Keith, 43–​44 Stein, Arthur, 25 territorial disputes in South America, 2, 151–​52, 173–​74 in Southeast Asia, 2, 5–​7, 93, 95, 97–​ 98, 127 Thai-​Cambodian border conflict, 1, 130–​ 38, 199–​200, 201–​2 Thailand, 1, 86–​87, 92–​93, 118–​22 Treaty of Amity and Cooperation (TAC), 34–​35, 36–​37, 95, 113, 122, 126 Treaty of Asunción (1991), 152–​53 Treaty of Cartagena (1969), 147–​48 Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation (1984), 149 Treaty of Peace, Friendship, and Boundaries (Rio Protocol), 145–​ 46, 173–​74, 186–​92 trust, 26, 79–​80, 137–​38, 174, 179, 191 Tudela, Franisco, 192–​93 Typhoon Haiyan, 125–​26 UN Charter, 36–​37, 170 UNESCO World Heritage Site, 130–​31 Union of South American Nations (UNASUR), 1–​2, 15–​16, 72–​74, 152–​54, 157, 160, 160–​ 61n.91, 169–​71 United Kingdom, 55–​56 United Nations (UN), 32–​33, 52–​ 53, 66–​67

Index  243 United States, 55–​56, 77, 141–​43, 145–​ 47, 176–​77 UN Security Council, 132, 190 uti possidetis juris, 145, 157, 158–​59 Vietnam, 1, 97–​98, 120–​21 Vietnamese-​Cambodian War, 5, 9 Vietnam War, 5 War of the Pacific, 5 War of the Triple Alliance (1865-​1870), 5, 144 Weber, Max, 45–​46 Wiener, Antje, 68 we-​ness, 31–​32, 174, 182

Wenger, Etienne, 174 West, Richard, 43–​44 Win, Nyan, 115–​16 Wirajuda, Hassan, 75–​76, 109–​10, 113–​14, 115–​16, 125, 204 World Trade Organization (WTO), 49, 55–​56 World War I, 143–​44, 145–​46 World War II, 5–​8, 91–​92, 140 Yeo, George, 115–​16 Yusuf, Abdul Malik, 126–​27 Zone of Peace, Freedom, and Neutrality (ZOPFAN), 95, 170, 195–​96