Yesterday marked the 30th anniversary of the Association of South East Asian Nations, and today kicks off a year of celebrations and commemorations in the most lavish style to which the art and culture of the nine member-states can aspire.
Economic considerations might be more to the fore in the minds of the leaders of the ASEAN states, a number of which are the "Asian tigers" whose claws seem lately to have dulled. This week there was a vicious run on the currencies of a number of ASEAN members after Thailand, floundering in fiscal woes for weeks, was forced to beg for help from the International Monetary Fund.
An official at the Malaysian High Commission in London, in the midst of a discussion about the glories of ASEAN, had to confess "it is not really the main topic at the moment".
Often seen as little more than a talking shop, although a prestigious one, ASEAN has maintained a steady profile and been a useful "non-aligned" body for the growing economic powers of the region, whose one uniting quality has been a fear of China looming to the north. This is partly due to folk memories of ancient times when the whole region was in thrall to China, forced to pay annual tributes to its rulers.
The modern ASEAN has often found itself and its emissaries caught up in the messy experiments with democracy of this volatile region, none more so than the current imbroglio in Cambodia. Cambodia, in fact, was due to join the group on July 23rd, along with Burma and Laos.
All the indications had been that Burma would be the controversial candidate on the day, because of international opprobrium for its treatment of any opposition to the State Law and Order Restoration Council. But the power struggle between Cambodia's first and second prime ministers which erupted into violence last month and caused the ousted PM, Prince Norodom Ranarridh, to flee the country, pushed Burma off the stage.
In the 30 years since it started life as a club of five (Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and the Philippines) in 1967, ASEAN has seen the Vietnam war, the invasion and occupation of Cambodia by Vietnam, the Pol Pot terror, upheaval in Indonesia, the annexation of East Timor, and the ultimate withdrawal of all the five colonial powers which had carved up the region in the days before it was even known abroad as South East Asia.
The organisation has held together with growing stature through all these vicissitudes. It has pursued the aim of creating a Zone of Peace, Freedom and Neutrality which became a formal objective at a regional conference in 1976.
Today, from its secretariat in the Indonesian capital, Jakarta, ASEAN is attempting to punch with more weight against what some of its members seem to consider less-than-benevolent attitudes of the west.
Perhaps one of the more interesting moves the group, now taking in half-a-billion citizens, has made in recent years was its endorsement last month of a call by Malaysia for a new global attitude towards human rights.
At an annual meeting with United States and European Union representatives, the Malaysian Foreign Minister, Dr Abdullah Agmad Badawi, said the UN Charter on Human Rights should be revised to correct the "imbalance" in its formulation. This, Malaysia believes, is due to the western thinking behind its first drafting. Dr Badawi offered the interesting viewpoint that too much freedom could imperil democracy.
The suggestion was the tip of an iceberg of frosty feelings by these tigerish countries towards what they see as the patronising attitude of the rich west towards how they conduct themselves internally. At the joint meeting, the US Under-secretary of State, Mr Stuart Eizenstat, ridiculed a position which questioned values that he said were not of the east nor west, but universal.
Dr Badawi was reiterating sentiments expressed in the past by his veteran Prime Minister, Dr Mahathir Mohammad, who has been a leader in espousing the relatively new voicing of "Asian values". Malaysia won support from China and Indonesia in arguing that a new balance be struck between individual and group rights, and that black-and-white western views of "freedom" were absolutist and not appropriate in Asia.
So what are the alternative Asian values? Put simply, they emphasise the greater good of society as against the rights of the individual which many see as being paramount in western society. These Asian values have a fair bit in common with John Major's ill-fated "back to basics" but, with their commitment to family and a measure of politeness in interpersonal relations, they rest on rather firmer ground.
Cynics might say these Asian values also encompass turning a blind eye to the ditching of human rights altogether when it is politically expedient to do so.
With Burma now a member of the club, and Indonesia, with its long-running controversy over East Timor, a founder member, Malaysia has had its own censure for treatment of dissidents. Singapore also, especially under Lee Kuan Yew, was infamous for the liberality with which it doled out canings and jail terms for infractions such as long hair, matters which were hardly illegal in the west.
However, the usual ASEAN formula against criticism of dealing with repressive regimes is that it prefers "constructive engagement" to making pariahs of the offending states.
President Fidel Ramos of the Philippines said yesterday that "the way to ensure a peaceful and progressive South East Asia is to lock the ASEAN member-countries' destinies into one another's stability, security and progress".
The debate could run and run.