In contrast, confidence in US leadership appears to be “more unevenly distributed” across ASEAN member states although levels remain high especially in Cambodia, the Philippines and Timor-Leste.The EU, meanwhile, was among the top choices for Singapore, Myanmar and Timor-Leste. Besides international law, ASEAN also ranked first in championing the global free trade agenda, with 25.5 per cent of respondents saying they had the most confidence in the regional bloc as compared to other actors. On intra-regional economic cooperation, the most commonly cited impediments were ASEAN member states’ domestic technocratic implementation capacities, disparities in their economic development, and geopolitical pressures which may influence individual member states to…