Challenging Neocoloniality in Southeast Asian Higher Education

This paper argues that a decolonial response is needed in Southeast Asia to challenge the persisting neocoloniality of the higher education landscape in the region. Southeast Asia’s regional higher educational project is strongly influenced by internal (e.g., the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, or ASEAN) and external (e.g., European Union) forces that influence how higher education cooperation and collaboration are conceived. Due to the evidence of neocoloniality in the functioning of ASEAN, this paper argues that there is a decolonial imperative to challenge the existing modernity/coloniality dynamic in Southeast Asia’s higher education landscape. Utilizing an epistemic decolonization lens, this paper critically examines the role of Western (American and European) and non-Western (East Asian) neocolonial forces in charting Southeast Asia’s current higher education landscape. With decoloniality as the framework of analysis, this paper posits pluriversal possibilities grounded in three indigenous philosophies — namely, Malayan sejahtera, Papuan social ecology, and Filipino kapwa. These regional philosophies reflect a localized, collaborative, and sustainable vision for Southeast Asians that runs counter to the dominant higher education narratives of hyper-productivity and free market-oriented outcomes. Finally, this paper argues that a rethinking of the ASEAN Way is critically needed. The following three principles through which the ASEAN Way can be reimagined are proposed: the championing of equitable skills and knowledge redistribution, the development of each nation’s higher educational defining strength/s, and the investment in localized human capital. The new ASEAN Way posits a critical reimagining of existing policies to chart a decolonial Southeast Asian higher education regionalism identity.