The Significance of "the Draft Charter of the East Asian Community" and Future Research Agenda for Comparative Study of Macro-Regionalism (<Featured Theme>Comparative Regionalism Studies : Critiques and Defences of the "Draft Charter of the East Asian Community")

本稿は「東アジア共同体憲章案」に寄せられた論評に応答する. 憲章案の意義は, 東アジア諸国の多様性を尊重しつつ実効ある共同行動を確保する法制度を, ASEANの柔軟な法制度の手法とEUの実効的な法制度に学びながら構築した点である. とくに柔軟ながら法を通した諸国・諸国民の連帯を強化する制度設計上の法的・政治的論点を初めて体系的に整理して示した点で重要であり, さらに東アジア地域主義を法制度化する思想的意義と正統性を, 普遍的に共有可能な実体的価値を反映した原則と手続準則の蓄積を通した法の秩序構築的な役割に求めた点に特徴がある.This paper, written by one of the four drafters of the proposed Charter of an East Asian Community, makes a defence against critical comments on the Charter made by three reviewers in this issue. The most important message inherent in the Charter, which the critics fail to appreciate, is that it is possible and crucial to institutionalise in a legal from a flexible but principled Community among the countries of ASEAN, Japan, China and Korea, even though they have huge diversity in many respects. With a view to establishing a tailor-made Community to respond to globalisation and regionalisation in economy and socio-political issues, the drafters distilled and applied major political practices and legal techniques developed by ASEAN as well as those developed by the EU. The paper also explains how the drafters developed the idea of having a Community of thirteen countries, comprised of the ten ASEAN countries and Japan, China and Korea, in order to be more effective in forming macro-regional cooperation in East Asia