The Deadlock of ASEAN Dispute Settlement Mechanisms and Why ASEAN Cannot Unlock It?

Abstract

The objective of this work is to answer the questions that “What is the deadlock of ASEAN Dispute Settlement Mechanisms (ASEAN DSMs)?” and “Why can’t ASEAN unlock it?” by comparative study between ASEAN DSMs and European Union Dispute Settlement Mechanisms (EU DSMs). A result of this work found that a positive consensus in decision making mode of ASEAN Summit under Article 20 of ASEAN Charter (Charter), which is seriously designed to protect the political security of ASEAN, also created a deadlock of ASEAN DSMs as a whole. Finally, in order to bypass this dead-end, the ASEAN needs to reverse the process by using the model of reverse consensus (negative consensus). However, even the Charter opens a gap to unlock its deadlock by re-interpreting of law, the ASEAN Summit still keep seriously staying on an ASEAN way to protect the political security. Hence the deadlock of ASEAN DSMs cannot be solved in practice until the political mindset of ASEAN is changed.