The Association of Southeast Asian Nations
(Asean), which is seeking economic integration by 2015, should heed the lessons
learned by the European Union on common labour and financial markets, economist
Joseph Stiglitz warned yesterday.
“The
important lesson is, if you don’t have a certain cohesion in design of
institutions, you can get into problems,” said Stiglitz, an economist at
Colombia University and Nobel laureate.
“The
reason they can’t get out of the mess is there isn’t enough political
cohesion,” said Stiglitz, in an address to the World Economic Forum on East
Asia, hosted this year by Bangkok.
Asean
is not interested in a common currency like the euro, but is seeking to
integrate its member states’ labour markets and service sectors by 2015. Even
these goals carry risks, Stiglitz warned.
“You
could have all the talented people leaving some of the poorer countries and
moving to Singapore and creating a hollowing-out of those economies,” the
economist warned.
Another
risk could be Asean citizens migrating in order to avoid their home country’s
growing national debt, a phenomenon witnessed in Europe.
“You
can escape that debt by moving, but escaping one’s parents’ mistakes is not a
good cause for labour mobility,” Stiglitz said.
Asean
Secretary General Surin Pitsuwan noted that the labour mobility in Southeast
Asia will start with skilled labour, and progress step by step.
He also
argued that the EU and Asean had different beginnings, which could lead to
different outcomes.
“From
the beginning, the European Union has been built on the model of trying to
integrate their similarities,” Surin said. “But for Asean from the beginning it
has been built on how to manage our diversity.”
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