The ASEAN Charter was signed at the ASEAN Summit in November 2007. This project provides wide-ranging venues in which to achieve the aim of helping to draft an alternative proposal to the charter, one encompassing the viewpoints of many other actors, such as experts, civic groups, and the media, and by so doing to inspire discussions on ASEAN's future.
The official ASEAN Charter emphasizes system enhancements of the regional body through such means as establishing ministerial meetings and improving functions of the Secretariat, whereas the alternative proposal emphasizes perspectives of ecology, governance, human security, and the formation of regional identities.
In fiscal 2007 at the first working group in Bangkok April 2-5, 13 people, including former Malaysian Deputy Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim and ASEAN Secretary-General Surin Pitsuwan, discussed such matters as plans for activities and priority areas for the next two years. A draft of an alternative proposal to the ASEAN Charter was set forth at a working group in Kuala Lumpur on July 14-15 and was then debated at international conferences in Shanghai on October 12-13 and in Bangkok on March 30-31, 2008.