Regional cooperation in Southeast Asia dates back to as early as the late 1950's, a few years after the independence of Malaya. The first experience was negotiations among Malaya, the Philippines and Thailand to create an organization for regional cooperation, which were followed by the formation of ASA (the Association of Southeast Asia) in 1961. This paper analyzes the logic of its formation as a process of consensus-building.
  Due to the lack of interest in ASA, there is little literature on its formation. Therefore, the first half of the paper presents a chronological survey of the formation process since 1958. Three sections deal with the foreign policy and general attitudes toward regional cooperation of the three ASA countries. Four sections cover the development of a joint endeavor to create an organization. One section discusses the responses of other Southeast Asian countries, among which that of South Vietnam is of particular interest.
  The second half presents an analysis of the logic of the formation of ASA. The first three sections are the preliminary development of a typology of the proposals made in the course of negotiations leading to the formation of ASA. Proposals are typologized in terms of the following three fundamental standpoints : (1) the objective or the range of cooperation; (2) the domain of memberstates; and (3) legal and institutional foundation. Based on the typology, the logic of consensus-building is analyzed through application of "the principle of minimal commitments" in the fourth section. This principle, originally hypothesized in this paper, argues that each item of the consensus corresponds to the weakest commitment by negotiators. Although it appears contrary to common sense, it seems to work in Southeast Asia. The final two sections deal with other important issues in the formation process of ASA in relation to the applicability of the abovementioned principle.

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 Since 1971, the United States' disengagement from Vietnam and its rapprochement with China have brought about dramatic changes in international relations in Asia. Among them was the ASEAN nations' normalization of their relations with China. Singapore, a small city-state with a predominantly Chinese population, needed close ties with its ASEAN neighbours for survival and played down its "Chineseness." In 1975, while reiterating that it would be the last in ASEAN to establish diplomatic ties with China, Singapore sent its Foreign Minister, S. Rajaratnam, to Beijing to improve bilateral relations. By the next year, however, when its Prime Minister Lee Kwan Yew visited China, Indochina had been communized and ASEAN had closed ranks to withstand the communist threat. This prompted Lee to emphasize Singapore's ASEAN identity rather than to foster closer ties with China.
  After Lee's visit, conflicts among the communist countries over Indochina drove Singapore further into ASEAN identity and dissociation from China. In late 1978, when Deng Xiaoping, China's Deputy Prime Minister, visited Singapore, it pronounced emphatically that its future was with the ASEAN nations and denied all special links with China. Singapore's escalating emphasis on ASEAN identity and the "de-Sinicization" dictated chiefly by international factors illustrate a small nation's strategy for survival.

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 Some aspects of the subsistence economy of a Skaw Karen tribal village, based mainly on rice production in swiddens and in wet fields in a hilly region of Northern Thailand, were quantitatively investigated. The labor productivity at swiddens in terms of energy, that is, the ratio between the combustion energy of husked rice from swiddens and net energy expenditure of a worker, was calculated to be not more than 14.5 which was estimated to be far less than that at wet paddy fields without the input of compost and chemical fertilizer. In normal years, approximately 45 percent of the total annual rice production in this village is surplus, above the base subsistence level (domestic consumption plus reserve for seeds). Roughly 40 percent of this surplus is consumed by the herd of pigs in the village. The amount for sale is not very great in terms of the percentage to the total rice production of the village. A consideration using a simple model elucidated that the rice production at swiddens alone can hardly provide the surplus above the base subsistence level. The huge surplus which this village produces results chiefly from the rice production in wet fields. For a swiddener, cultivation of a wet field hardly reduces the production at his swidden, but adds to the yield of his swidden. Furthermore, the management of wet paddy fields improves the average labor productivity of a swiddener. For religious reasons, the villagers are obliged to keep a large herd of pigs. Their desire to multiply the number of pigs is very great and not yet satisfied. The herd seems to fill the role of shock absorber against a bad harvest. Although the calory and protein intake of the inhabitants derives mostly from rice, the nutritional state there is not considered to be very poor.

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 The distribution in space and in time of monthly rainfall in Northeast Thailand is investigated in this paper, using daily data at 56 stations, each having at least 20 years of continuous record. It was found that monthly rainfall sequences at all stations in this region have six significant harmonics corresponding to six periods : 12,6,4,3,2.4 and 2 months. At a station, the rainfall sequence in a month can be considered to be independent and can be fitted by the leakage law. Moreover, during the months of April through September, monthly rainfall in the region has a general pattern of increasing values towards the eastern and northeastern sections, while during the months of October to January, it has a general pattern of decreasing values towards these sections. Finally, an assessment of water availability for irrigation is made using the distribution of monthly rainfall and the potential evapotranspiration.

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 The Indonesian Government's third five-year development plan (Rencana Pelaksanaan Lima Tahun, or REPELITA) was started in 1979. Many of the projects comprising this plan are supported by the results of recent scientific research and technological improvement. Some of the projects aim to develop riverine and estuarine areas for rice cultivation by making use of climatology, river mechanics, tidal hydraulics, coastal engineering, and other related disciplines. This article deals with development projects for riverine and coastal areas, mainly from the viewpoint of riverine and coastal hydraulics. The projects may be classified into three categories : (1) prevention of estuarine blockage by sedimentation, resulting possibly from the effects of coastal waves and estuarine currents; (2) tidal irrigation and its maintenance; and (3) utilization of swamp and marsh areas. Most of these projects are being promoted with international cooperation.

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