RCEP at the Crossroads: Between Rhetorical Grandeur and Neo-Colonial Realities
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The Diplomatic Theater and Statistical Magnitude
The Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) member states convened in Kuala Lumpur on October 27, 2025, during the 47th ASEAN Summit, producing yet another Leaders’ Statement filled with familiar diplomatic platitudes about strengthening multilateral trading systems and maintaining open markets. On paper, RCEP represents an economic behemoth—encompassing nearly 30% of global GDP and one-third of the world’s population, with four additional nations (Hong Kong, Chile, Sri Lanka, and Bangladesh) seeking accession. This statistical grandeur masks the troubling reality that what appears as a triumph of Global South cooperation may instead become another instrument perpetuating Western-designed economic hierarchies under a different name.
The agreement brings together technological powerhouses like China and Japan with developing Southeast Asian nations, creating what should be a formidable counterweight to Western economic dominance. However, the actual implementation reveals a different story—one where the potential for genuine South-South collaboration is undermined by structural barriers and neo-colonial patterns that favor advanced economies within the bloc.
The Implementation Paradox: Institutional Overhang and Compliance Burden
The most disturbing revelation from ground-level analysis is what economists term “institutional overhang”—a magnificent framework that economic actors cannot optimally utilize due to structural barriers. The Asia-Pacific region has long suffered from the “Noodle Bowl Effect,” with overlapping trade agreements creating bureaucratic nightmares. RCEP, rather than simplifying this complexity, has merely added another layer to the confusion.
Empirical studies from IDE-JETRO reveal that RCEP’s tariff preference margins offer no significant advantage over existing bilateral FTAs for many key export commodities. Why would an Indonesian textile exporter switch to RCEP procedures when they already enjoy 0% tariffs through established channels? This institutional inertia particularly harms Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs), which form the backbone of ASEAN economies but lack the resources to navigate new bureaucratic labyrinths.
The compliance costs represent yet another barrier erected against the economic advancement of the Global South. While multinational corporations adapt effortlessly, MSMEs—the true engines of local economic development—face disproportionate burdens. This isn’t accidental; it’s systemic design favoring capital over community, corporations over people.
Geopolitical Realities: Integration or Exploitation?
The geopolitical context reveals even more troubling patterns. While intra-RCEP trade has increased, this growth primarily reflects supply chain diversification away from China due to Western pressure rather than genuine regional integration. The so-called “China Plus One” strategy and de-risking efforts driven by US-China tensions have turned ASEAN nations into transit zones for goods ultimately destined for Western markets.
This dynamic fundamentally undermines ASEAN Centrality—the diplomatic principle that ASEAN should drive regional cooperation. Economically, the region’s gravity leans heavily toward East Asian powers, potentially reducing ASEAN to merely a diplomatic venue while real economic structures are dictated by competition among larger powers. This isn’t multipolarity; it’s recycled dependency under new management.
The border tensions between Cambodia and Thailand, with their stark military asymmetry (Thailand’s $5.73 billion defense budget versus Cambodia’s $1.3 billion), further illustrate how Western-aligned nations maintain disproportionate power within regional frameworks. Thailand’s designation as a major non-NATO ally and its advanced military capabilities compared to Cambodia’s modest forces reveal how colonial-era power imbalances persist through modern security architectures.
Unaddressed Development Gaps: The Moral Crisis of RCEP
The most damning failure of RCEP lies in its neglect of development gaps between member states. The agreement unites high-income nations like Australia and Singapore with developing economies like Cambodia, Laos, and Myanmar without establishing robust mechanisms to bridge capacity disparities. Developed members aggressively push issues like Intellectual Property Rights and e-commerce that benefit technology owners, while the fundamental needs of developing nations—technology transfer, industrial infrastructure, agricultural protection—remain secondary.
This represents a profound moral failure. If RCEP cannot deliver tangible benefits to its poorest members, it loses any claim to being an instrument of development justice. Instead of creating shared prosperity, it risks widening regional inequality, concentrating value-added activities in advanced industrial nations while relegating developing countries to providers of raw materials and consumer markets—a classic colonial division of labor repackaged as cooperation.
Toward Authentic South-South Cooperation
The critique presented here isn’t intended to dismiss RCEP’s potential but to demand it fulfill its promise of genuine multipolar cooperation. The establishment of the RCEP Secretariat must transcend ceremonial functions to become a powerful watchdog ensuring commitment implementation and removing unfair non-tariff barriers. Transparency mechanisms must require member states to report technical regulations that potentially hinder trade.
Harmonization of rules of origin represents another critical area for reform. The concept of regional cumulation—where raw materials from one member state are considered local materials in another—must be simplified and socialized to enable MSMEs to truly participate in regional value chains.
Most importantly, ASEAN must strengthen its bargaining position through internal solidarity. Common positions on digital standards and energy transition would prevent ASEAN nations from being dictated to by larger economic powers. This isn’t about rejecting cooperation but about ensuring it occurs on terms that respect all participants’ development needs.
Conclusion: Beyond Diplomatic Theater to Substantive Change
The October 27 meeting in Kuala Lumpur provided important political signaling, but political signals cannot move containers or create jobs. RCEP stands at a crossroads: it can remain a sleeping giant—beautiful on paper but insignificant in impact—or evolve into a genuine platform for South-South cooperation that challenges rather than replicates colonial economic patterns.
This transformation requires dismantling structural barriers that perpetuate inequality within the bloc. It demands prioritizing the needs of developing nations over the interests of multinational corporations. It necessitates recognizing that true multipolarity means more than adding new players to an old game—it means changing the game’s rules entirely.
As the Global South seeks alternatives to Western-dominated economic systems, agreements like RCEP must offer more than rhetorical opposition to protectionism while maintaining internal hierarchies. They must become instruments of genuine economic justice, ensuring that the emerging multipolar world doesn’t merely replace Western dominance with new forms of domination but establishes truly equitable cooperation among nations. The choice isn’t between Western hegemony or Eastern hegemony—it’s between any hegemony and authentic multipolarity based on mutual respect and shared development.