The organisational efficacy of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), characterised by cooperation, flexibility, inclusiveness, openness and consensus-building, has enabled its acknowledgement as the most successful regional organisation of the global South. ASEAN has emerged as an exemplar of regional cohesion, tethering ten diverse and disparate Southeast Asian states and accommodating regional and extra-regional actors as Dialogue Partners and/or members of ASEAN-led institutional mechanisms like ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF), ASEAN Plus One, ASEAN Plus Three (APT), East Asia Summit (EAS), ASEAN Defence Ministers Meeting-Plus (ADMM-Plus) etc. Established on August 8, 1967, during the height of the Cold War as an instrument for ensuring regional stability and security, primarily by containing great power interference, ASEAN was envisaged as an organisation cementing “common problems among countries of South-East Asia”, while “strengthening the bonds of regional solidarity and cooperation.” ASEAN’s aims and purposes hinged on accelerating the economic, social, and cultural profile of the region, simultaneously prioritising and promoting the “stability and security from external interference in any form or manifestation” and enabling “peaceful and progressive national development” of the five founding members The subsequent induction of five regional states consolidated its regional identity as the custodian of the aspirations, interests, and priorities of its members, while judiciously upholding and safeguarding the organisation’s norms and imperatives.