"While this particular sacred cow has not exactly been slaughtered, it has at least seriously been roasted," said former Permanent Secretary of Foreign Affairs Bilahari Kausikan,

He was sharing his thoughts on the topic "Can We Kill Asean’s Sacred Cow of Consensus-Decision Making?" at a session during the 38th Asean Roundtable on Oct. 3.

In particular, Bilahari delved into both the importance of consensus decision making, and the rare circumstances in which it could be set aside.

Consensus decision making helps prevents differences from escalating

The Chairman of the Middle East Institute opened by acknowledging the flaws of decision-making by consensus.

He observed that this consensus decision-making is still "often slow, too often sub-optimal, and too often obsessed with form rather than substance."

But to attribute all this to consensus decision-making, in Bilahari's view, is to beg the real issue.

He brought up another factor — Indonesia. It is bigger than all other Asean countries combined, and Bilahari compared it to the unification of Germany by Bismarck in the 19th century, which created a "fundamental imbalance in the heart of Europe."

While it is not a perfect parallel, Bilahari reminded the audience that Asean was formed less than a year after Konfrontasi, or what could be described as an undeclared war between Malaysia and Indonesia.

Therefore it was formed, at least in part, as a means of managing destabilising geopolitical developments within Southeast Asia.

Consensus-making is useful for reassuring the "large" that smaller nations will not gang up against them. On the other hand, it also assures smaller nations than larger ones will not enforce their will upon them by force.

Consensus decision-making is one of the means in preventing the difference of interests, that are inevitable in a diverse organisation, from escalating into major differences.

Roasting the sacred cow

While it has its uses, Bilahari said that consensus decision-making is "not inscribed on a tablet".

"While this particular sacred cow has not exactly been slaughtered, it has at least seriously been roasted," he quipped.

He referred to the "Asean minus X" principle, which allows two or more Asean members to move ahead on certain economic matters if the  group cannot a consensus. It has since been used for non-economic matters too.

There could also be circumstances in which consensus decision making can be set aside, not permanently, but on particular issues.

However, given the importance of consensus, Bilahari said "we have to be very careful" about defining the circumstances in which it can be set aside.

He then referred to a particular situation when reaching consensus was "impossible".

When is consensus decision making not possible?

In 2012, when Cambodia was the chair of Asean, the organisation failed to adopt a joint statement for the first time in its history.

The issue at hand was the South China Sea. Bilahari said he had personal knowledge of the situation, as Singapore's then-Foreign Minister could not attend the meeting until just before the summit sessions began, so he was at the foreign ministers' meetings and was involved in the discussion.

"And I can tell you that the chair at that time, the Cambodia foreign minister, was a seriously obstinate individual, who refused to consider any formulation on the South China Sea," he said.

Despite many attempts to find a workable solution, the chair stated he would not accept any mention of the South China Sea, and was prepared to have no joint statement instead.

Bilahari added that people at the senior official level "quite easily" found a formulation that met everyone's interests, but the chair put it aside.

National interests, regional interests

After the "fiasco", then-Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen defended his foreign minister by saying it was Cambodia's strategic choice.

But Bilahari believed he "missed the point entirely."

"Asean is a diverse organisation. We have different strategic outlooks, therefore we have different national interests. And that's why you need consensus decision making.

Nobody was saying that Cambodia could not make the choices it made. What was wrong about how it made the choices was that there was no consideration at all of the regional influences in his definition of national needs.

I'm not saying that the regional interest must always be the main consideration...but it has to be some part of the consideration. Otherwise why join a regional organisation in the first place?"

Bilahari added that if there is another exceptional situation where the chair "completely disregards" the regional interest, then consensus decision making could be considered to be set aside.

Still, Asean is not a supranational organisation, and has no supranational ambitions. And he believes Asean should not have supranational ambitions, as that would be the "end of Asean."

Top image from Keyla Supharta.

@mothershipsg Missed out on the news? Try 2 weeks in 2 minutes. #tiktoksg #floods #sgnews ♬ original sound - Mothership

Related stories