Adaptive Protection of Human Rights: Stealth Institutionalisation of Scrutiny Functions in ASEAN’s Limited Regime

Abstract

Established as a limited regime that mainly carries out promotional activities of public education and roadshows on human rights, strengthening the ASEAN human rights system seems impossible when member states remain sovereignty-centric and thus wary of instituting protective mechanisms of scrutiny such as data transparency, reporting, monitoring, and complaints portals. This challenging outlook is compounded by human rights taking a backseat to economic development in the ASEAN Community’s agenda. However, tracking the rarely examined ASEAN human rights reports reveals that a counter-phenomenon quietly arising. This article presents Adaptive Protection as a process where ASEAN human rights officials, by building upon member states’ growing familiarity with the ‘intrusive’ oversight of the UN human rights system, have stealthily adapted (albeit loosely) similar functions of protective scrutiny—namely, data transparency, reporting, monitoring, and hearing complaints— into their limited mandates. Surprisingly, this process has not encountered pushback but instead has garnered grudging acquiescence by ASEAN states.