This book volume is a result of the ASEAN Roundtable 2012 on “Examining the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) Scorecard” organized by the ASEAN Studies Centre (ASC) at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies (ISEAS), along with the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung (KAS) on 25 May 2012 at York Hotel, Singapore. The primary objective of the roundtable was to evaluate the current status of and the progress towards the milestones described in the AEC Blueprint. The policy recommendations necessary to meet the end-goals of AEC was expected to help the policy-makers in the future years.

Before elaborating on the progress of implementing the blueprint, let me first give a brief background on AEC. The ASEAN Leaders signed the Declaration of ASEAN Concord II in October 2003 aiming at AEC as an end goal of its economic integration to be achieved by 2020. The Leaders agreed to accelerate AEC establishment to 2015 during the Summit in January 2007 and adopted the AEC Blueprint in the following Summit in November 2007. The end-goal of the AEC is to create a single market and production base where there is free flow of goods, services, investments, capital and skilled labour.

The AEC Blueprint is the first of its kind for ASEAN. The Blueprint is defined by its four main characteristics, namely a single market and production base, a highly competitive economic region, a region of equitable economic development, and a region fully integrated into the global economy. It is further elaborated like a grand plan, consisting of roadmaps to deliver specific outcomes (objectives of the AEC). The Blueprint identified 17 “core elements” to be carried out by 176 “priority actions”, all of which are to be undertaken within a “strategic schedule” of four implementation periods (2008–09, 2010–11, 2012–13; and 2014–15). The 17 core elements are listed in Table 1.

The implementation of the Blueprint, as indicated in the AEC Strategic Schedule, is monitored through the AEC Scorecard. The objective of the Scorecard is to follow specific actions that must be undertaken by ASEAN collectively and by its Member States individually to establish AEC by 2015. Till 2012, the ASEAN Secretariat has issued two AEC scorecards, which stipulates that ASEAN has achieved 68.2 per cent of its targets during 2008–11.