Paradorn Rangsimaporn

• Doctor of Philosophy in International Relations from the University of Oxford
• Minister-Counsellor at Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Thailand

Uzbekistan-Southeast Asia relations is an underexplored research topic, despite the growing significance of both Central Asia and Southeast Asia in world affairs. Uzbekistan lies at the heart of Central Asia, bordering all the four other Central Asian states, and has the largest population and thus largest potential market in Central Asia. This art...

This chapter examines the nature of Central Asia’s relations with Southeast Asia. Firstly, it analyses the multi-vector foreign policies of Central Asian states. Secondly, it examines the “Southeast Asian vector” within their foreign policies. Thirdly, it looks at how some Southeast Asian countries are seen as political and economic role models for...

The concluding chapter firstly outlines the book’s key findings and arguments. It then suggests further areas for research, provides policy recommendations to enhance Central Asia–Southeast Asia engagement, and lastly reflects on the challenges and likely directions of the relationship in light of the seismic events of early 2022, namely Russia’s i...

This chapter examines the key drivers of potential greater engagement between Central Asia and Southeast Asia. Firstly, the EAEU and ASEAN have both shown increasing interest in developing relations, including the possibility of a FTA. Secondly, Southeast Asian countries have demonstrated growing interest in using China’s BRI to connect with Centra...

This chapter examines the Central Asian states’ interest in the ASEAN model for their renewed movement towards potential Central Asian regionalism. Firstly, it examines developments in Central Asian regionalism since the collapse of the Soviet Union, and the recent growing momentum towards greater Central Asian cooperation that may lead to an exclu...

The article examines Kazakhstan’s relations with Southeast Asia, an area of study which has been given little attention so far. It firstly analyzes Kazakhstan’s multivector foreign policy, arguing that Kazakhstan has been trying to pursue an omnidirectional hedging strategy by diversifying its partners to enhance its strategic space. Secondly, it l...

Amidst China’s expanding economic influence in Central Asia, one of the challenges facing the region’s countries is the need to diversify their foreign relations and economic partners to avoid overdependence on one country. Southeast Asian countries and their regional organization – the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) – is increasing...

This article examines why the strengthening of Asean-Central Asia relations is important and how this could be achieved. The eastward shift of the Eurasian Economic Union, China's Belt and Road Initiative, and growing Central Asian concerns regarding Chinese economic influence have created possibilities for greater interaction and connectedness bet...

The article examines Kazakhstan’s relations with the Association for Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) thus far and prospects for their enhanced engagement. It looks at ASEAN’s place in Kazakhstan’s foreign policy and how Kazakhstan has tried to engage with ASEAN and to become part of its dialogue mechanisms. It examines areas for potential greater e...

The article examines relations between Kazakhstan and Thailand. It looks at their political, economic and socio-cultural relations as well as their cooperation within multilateral fora so far. It then examines the prospects for future cooperation and puts forward the view that relations are likely to be enhanced due to increasing interest in each o...

The article examines Kazakhstan's relations with ASEAN. Kazakhstan has often tried to engage with ASEAN and to become part of its dialogue mechanisms, but the lack of significant trade relations, vast geographical distance and logistical hurdles, and low mutual awareness have proven obstacles to more substantive relations. However, China's increasi...

This article examines Russia's relations with Southeast Asia and ASEAN, analyzing in particular the increased attempts under President Vladimir Putin to assert Russian influence in this sub-region. It looks at how Southeast Asia and ASEAN are important for Russia in its aspirations to become a major regional player.

While the desire to counterbalance US unilateralism informed Russian perceptions and advocacy of multipolarity globally, the complex and fluid balance of power in a multipolar East Asia complicates Russian perceptions and policies of multipolarity regionally and counterbalancing US power became not the sole goal. Russia's aim in East Asia was to re...

This chapter serves two purposes. Firstly, it assesses the ‘weight’ or significance of different elite actors’ statements on East Asia examined in the following chapters according to their likely influence on Russia’s East Asia policymaking and discourse. Secondly, it outlines the nature of policymaking under Yeltsin and Putin, highlighting the dif...

This chapter examines four cases that could be considered policies taken by Moscow to restore its regional influence. Our case studies have the following aims: (1) to identify the contents of the particular policy discourse and the perceptions and interests of the actors involved; and (2) to ascertain how these policies relate to Russian great-powe...

The Russian elite since the 1980s held an enduring perception of East Asia as an economically dynamic region which presented opportunities for Russia’s economic development and reassertion of influence, as encapsulated in Ivanov’s statement above. But for most of the early 1990s this policy remained largely on paper; Moscow focused more on economic...

Calls for the creation of a multipolar world, such as Yeltsin’s cited above, were a frequent feature in official statements during both the Yeltsin and Putin presidencies. Balance of power thinking informed much of the reasoning behind the Multipolarity perspective held by many of the Russian foreign policy elite. Their advocacy of a multipolar wor...

Putin’s statement above reflects the recognition that Russia’s unique Eurasian position could help enhance Russia’s engagement with East Asia. But there were many different elite interpretations of Eurasianism and their associated policy implications with regards to East Asia, which this chapter examines. How the elite perceived their Eurasian iden...

Our four main findings can be summarised as follows. Firstly, there existed an elite discourse on East Asia as a region, wherein opportunities lay for Russia to reassert itself as a great power. This belief was intertwined with the self-perception that Russia deserved to be a great power. Secondly, three major perspectives can be identified in this...

The post-Soviet Russian perceptions of East Asia discussed in the following chapters had roots in Russia’s past, particularly from the mid-nineteenth century onwards when Imperial Russia’s eastward expansion and influence reached its peak.1 Elements of Eurasianist, Economic and Multipolarity perspectives can be found among the Russian political and...

The article examines the debate among relevant sections of Russia's foreign policy elite regarding the country's military-technological cooperation policy with China and changing views under Presidents Yeltsin and Putin. Russian views are ambivalent at best and significantly affected by the dynamics of U.S.-Russian relations. © 2006 by The Regents...

This article examines the concept of Eurasianism in relation to Russia's East Asian policy from Yeltsin to Putin. It argues that there are three main interpretations of Russia's Eurasianist identity in the foreign policy discourse regarding East Asia: Pragmatic Eurasianism, Neo-Eurasianism, and Intercivilisational Eurasianism. Each interpretation e...

Although post-Soviet Russian-Chinese relations seem to have markedly improved in recent years, the relationship should be examined within the broader context of a Russian-Chinese joint concern of growing US unilateralism and opposition to a US-led unipolar international system, especially after US-NATO actions in Kosovo in 1999 and more recently th...