The Hedging Trap

At the recently concluded World Economic Forum in Davos, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney propounded a more provocative and unspoken take on a reframing of the stance of middle powers within the current state of international relations.

Middle powers, he argued, do not stabilise the international system by hedging endlessly or positioning themselves as neutral intermediaries. However, global stability comes from the discipline of states consistently and respectfully binding themselves to the workings of the international global order, absorbing short-term costs and offering predictability in an increasingly multipolar world.

This was not simply a clarion call for such rhetorics as ideological alignment or moral posturing. Instead, Carney’s speech was a realistic pivot on how great powers redefine the international order (some more opportunistically). As such, the strategic value of middle powers lies in their willingness to treat commitments as constraints rather than conveniences.

Carney’s framing is uncomfortable for Malaysia and ASEAN. Malaysia (and Southeast Asia as a whole) largely positions itself as an active upholder of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM). During Malaysia’s helming of its chair in 2025, ASEAN also led to the diplomatic agility and convening power of the regional bloc. On the same breadth, however, these same qualities providing agility present a risk of producing an entirely adverse outcome, that is, an ASEAN that is consensus-based but increasingly shaped by external forces rather than redefining neutrality.

The question is no longer whether ASEAN remains relevant, but whether it is becoming something closer to a geopolitical coworking space.

The “Coworking Space” Metaphor

The ASEAN approach has historically derived its strength from openness and ambiguity. Consensus decision-making, non-alignment and an emphasis on process have allowed it to convene competing powers and avoid overt confrontation. These features have enabled ASEAN to survive periods of intense geopolitical rivalry and should not be dismissed lightly.

Therefore, the root problem is not that ASEAN conv

Meetings proliferate. Declarations multiply. Yet when the curtains draw, the distance or divide between process and consequence grows wider save for truly meaningful commitments.

This is where the “coworking space” metaphor becomes analytically relevant. Like a shared office environment, ASEAN offers neutral space, procedural access and reputational benefits. Everyone – should they be interested – can be offered a seat at the table.

Nevertheless, no state is required to commit beyond attendance. Responsibility for outcomes remains diffused. The infrastructure is valuable and brings together great powers while reconciling their relationships with middle powers, but it does not enforce discipline for the international global order.

This shift does not reflect irrelevance. On the contrary, ASEAN is in high demand. However, over-usability without authority carries risks. When an institution becomes primarily a platform rather than a rule-shaper, it risks professionalising flexibility at the expense of institutional gravity.

Carney’s argument rests on a simple but demanding premise. Middle powers cannot outcompete great powers materially, but they can reduce uncertainty through credible self-constraint.

The Canada Model

Within this framework, Canada’s posture under Carney is not neutrality but consistency. Commitments across trade, climate, security and finance are treated as mutually reinforcing rather than siloed. Red lines are not always explicitly drawn, but they are legible. Most importantly, reversals on international commitments carry reputational and political costs that send a message to partners and adversaries alike. A self-constrained model does not preclude flexibility but offers solace.

Carney’s intervention invites a comparison. Canada’s credibility as a middle power does not stem from hosting dialogue or maintaining maximal manoeuvring space. It stems from being predictably constrained. Partners know what Canada will not do, what it is willing to bear costs for and where its commitments are likely to endure beyond electoral cycles.

ASEAN’s ambiguity, by contrast, is often treated as an end in itself. Non-alignment becomes synonymous with optionality. Commitments are framed cautiously to preserve consensus, sometimes to the point where external actors struggle to identify substantive limits. Over time, ambiguity that is not backed by institutional consolidation risks being interpreted as indecision.

This also explains why hedging, long treated as a prudent middle-power strategy, is increasingly strained. Hedging worked best in an environment where issue areas could be compartmentalised—where security, trade, technology and regulation could be managed in parallel without forcing alignment across domains.

The Breaking Point of Strategic Hedging

That assumption no longer holds water. Today’s strategic competition is cross-cutting; supply chains and digital standards alike. In such conditions, attempting to hedge everywhere often results in being credible nowhere and ironically self-seeking in nature. What once preserved manoeuvring space now risks signalling indecision, particularly to actors seeking reliable partners rather than flexible interlocutors. Hedging has not become illegitimate, but it has become more costly, demanding a degree of internal coherence and prioritisation that many middle powers have yet to institutionalise.

The issue is not rhetorical ambition but coherence. How often do Malaysia’s regional commitments translate into binding domestic frameworks? Where do partnerships generate enforceable expectations rather than aspirational signalling? To what extent are policy choices aligned across ministries, rather than managed in parallel?

Carney’s midd

By committing more deeply in specific domains, states can increase credibility overall even if it narrows short-term options. For ASEAN, the lesson is similar but more complex. ASEAN’s diversity and consensus-based structure make wholesale institutional hardening unrealistic. Where ASEAN chooses to lead, it must move beyond hosting and toward structuring, clarifying implementation pathways, consequences for non-compliance and the limits of ambiguity.

Without this shift, ASEAN risks becoming indispensable but inconsequential: a venue everyone uses, but few take seriously as a source of constraint. In a geopolitical environment defined by sharper competition and thinner trust, that is a precarious position.

Carney’s framing also challenges a deeper assumption about middle powers. Influence is often equated with room to manoeuvre. Yet as great powers become less predictable, manoeuvring room without credibility becomes less valuable. What others increasingly seek is not mediati

This is where ASEAN’s neutrality narrative begins to fray. Neutrality without institutional depth does not insulate middle powers from pressure; it delays confrontation without resolving it.

Canada’s experience suggests that choosing constraints earlier may preserve autonomy later by reducing the frequency and intensity of external testing.

From Hosting to Structuring

None of this implies that ASEAN should replicate Canada’s posture. The contexts are fundamentally different. But the underlying principle that middle powers derive influence from disciplined self-binding rather than unlimited flexibility is transferable

The strategic risk for ASEAN is not marginalisation but dilution. By becoming a permanent coworking space for global powers, ASEAN may retain visibility while losing leverage. The process will continue, but authority will thin. Malaysia, operating within this environment, will face increasing pressure to choose where credibility matters most.

Carney’s Davos address should therefore be read less as a prescription than as a provocation. It asks whether middle powers want to be endlessly usable or selectively reliable. In a world where great powers increasingly treat rules as optional, the middle powers that matter may be those willing to treat commitments as costly and therefore credible. For Malaysia and ASEAN, the strategic question is no longer whether flexibility is useful. It is whether flexibility without discipline can sustain influence. The answer, increasingly, appears to be no.

Introduction

Malaysia’s new unity government under the leadership of Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim of Pakatan Harapan (PH) sparked calls for reform in the country’s education system. With the appointment of Mohamed Khaled Nordin as Minister of Higher Education (his second stint in the job), it is expected strides will be made particularly through a revisiting of reform proposals of former Education Minister Maszlee Malik.

Malaysia’s education roadmap, entitled “The Way Forward for Private Higher Education: Education as an Industry (2020-2025)”, outlines changes to the private higher educational institutions (PHEIs) landscape, among others. These changes are based on the government’s acknowledgement that there is a public-private divide between higher educational institutions. Notably, the public higher educational institutions (HEIs) and PHEIs are regulated by different authorities, hence distinct functions are given to the operation of the respective sectors (public or private). For context, HEIs are considered as statutory bodies whereas PHEIs are considered as an emanation of a registered company. This is despite both providing the same services (i.e., tertiary education).

Innovation of the Co-Partnership Model

Historically, the role of PHEIs as an education provider began in the 1970s in which private colleges are offering diploma courses. In the 1990s, there was a boom in private universities and colleges due to the enactment of the Private Higher Educational Institutions Act (Act 555), aimed at facilitating educational reform and competitiveness of graduates. At the time, the goal was to achieve a 40% participation rate in tertiary education and 25% for postgraduate education by 2010. HEIs alone could not account for this projected increase and the number of PHEIs have soared since then thus making the private sector a focal point for tertiary education.

The presence of private education sector in Malaysia is validated by the logic of the 1980s, which sees PHEIs as a solution to ease HEI’s burdens of student surplus and lack of resources. However, this should no longer be the case. Instead, PHEIs’ role should be elevated a credible, viable option for tertiary education (i.e., not as a last resort).  

Demonstrating this is the roughly similar student population in both PHEI and HEI. Currently, there are approximately 20 public universities in Malaysia. Conversely, there are 53 private universities, 38 private university colleges and 10 branch campuses of foreign universities. Furthermore, there are 349 college-level PHEIs. Despite the vast differences, a total of 666,167 students (51%) are studying in more than 400 PHEIs while the remaining 659,082 students are scattered in 20 HEIs and their own branches.

The large student population in PHEIs, thus, signify a need to foster a co-partnership model between the public and the private education sectors. This is reinforced by an increasing student market and prospective students’ attraction towards the prospects of studying abroad. Fostering a co-partnership model begins with refining Malaysia’s education policies.

An important reform can be undertaken by harmonizing the University and University Colleges Act (UUCA) which regulates HEIs and Act 555. The latter caters for the administration of private universities, university colleges and colleges.

When PH first came to power in 2018, the harmonization of the higher education regime was reviewed closely by the government with the intention to reform. Back then, a co-partnership model was the goal: the Education Ministry acknowledged that HEIs can be complemented by PHEIs to make Malaysia a regional education hub. To achieve this, the previous PH government proposed the abolishment of the UUCA as well as other higher education legislations. In their places instead, there would have been a more comprehensive framework granting autonomy to higher education institutes, academic freedom as well as freedom of speech and association.

This reform brought some successes despite PH government’s short tenure. For example, there was the establishment of a law faculty in the University of Reading Malaysia, Johor Bahru. Furthermore, there was also an agreement between the Malaysian and Japanese governments to establish a Japanese university branch in Malaysia.  The formation of foreign university branches empowers Malaysia to obtain research and development (R&D) opportunities, which are not readily available in Malaysia, and an international education system.

Reform came to an abrupt end upon the inception of the Perikatan Nasional (PN) government. Consequently, PHEIs’ status was relegated to that prior to PH government.

A Consistent Regime for Higher Education in Malaysia

There is now an opening to restart educational reform in Malaysia, considering the new unity government is led by reform-minded Anwar. While working towards a co-partnership model, the current government must also ensure the independence of Malaysia’s education institutions, free from any external meddling. A reform of the governance system in higher education, guided by the principles of autonomy and accountability, is necessary to achieve this.

Towards this, as proposed by the previous PH administration, a National Higher Educat

Similarly, despite what Act 555 provides for the constitution of a PHEI, it is not a body capable of acting on its own, with powers on its own. In PHEIs, there is a lack of separation of power between academic governa

The regulation of HEIs and PHEIs under the proposed National Higher Education Act would ensure that these institutions can operate autonomously under the governance of another independent body, the National Council on Higher Education (NC

Independent Governance Through the National Council on Higher Education

The NCHE should be drawn from a spectrum of members from the government and local academic community and external experts – vice-chancellor or its equivalent shall not be members of the governing body. The NCHE will be the main policy-coordinating and regulating body in the higher education sector. Thus, functions such as national policies and strategic directions for the development of higher education, as well as allocation of funds t

The endgame is to create a body which is independent of government agenda and serves as an institution to ensure that academic quality is preserved and growth is maintained to future-proof students for the more competitive working world.

The independence of the NCHE will come from its statutory status mandated by an Act of Parliament. While it derives its funding from the government, there must be political will to ensure that checks and balances are in place to elevate the NCHE as a single policymaking body for higher education in Malaysia. These counterbalancing measures are the inclusion of academics and policymakers as members, which would provide more representation to ensure that the government agenda is more in touch with reality. However, the inclusion of government members is still important as it also allows a two-way channel between the NCHE and the Ministry of Higher Education.

As the new administration begins its work, there are calls from academicians and civil society groups to restore the NCHE. However, the NCHE does seem like a distant goal as there is no plan currently to reintroduce it back to the higher education system. It is highly unlikely that we will see the NCHE as part of the Ministry of Higher Education’s direction which will be unveiled soon.

Notably, these reforms – of which the NCHE is one of them – which were highlighted by former Education Minister Maszlee Malik might not be picked up by the incumbent Minister of Higher Education. There is considerable animosity between them during recent exchanges and from recent press conferences it seems that the latter is looking more at bread-and-butter issues such as student financing, cost of tuition fees and graduate employability rather than a reformist agenda.

Picking up Where We Left Off

The literature on the proposal to form a co-partnership model – which includes harmonization of regimes as well as the formation of the NCHE – to address the issue of governance of the tertiary education sector is not new. Malaysia’s political crisis in the past few years, and the multiple governments that came and went, meant that reforms were put on the backburner as governments of the day were too preoccupied with maintaining power. Nevertheless, it is with great hope that today’s PH-led administration, along with the centrist Barisan Nasional (BN) and Gabungan Parti Sarawak (GPS), components of the unity government, to wisely use its newfound strength in numbers to level up Malaysia’s credibility as an excellent provider of academic services.