South–South Cooperation and the Promise of Experimentalist Governance: The ASEAN Smart Cities Network

Abstract

This article considers the impact that increasing pragmatism and pluralism are having on South–South cooperation (SSC). Focusing on the growing sway of multilateral platforms for cooperation between cities and the reinvigoration of regionalism, it identifies experimentalist design principles for fostering autonomy‐enhancing initiatives between developing countries that have the capacity to learn from and scale up locally‐informed, adaptive problem solving. The first part of the article frames SSC in light of experimentalist governance theory. The second part provides a case study of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Smart Cities Network, an initiative that captures the promise and challenges of enhancing SSC through regional experimentalist governance of city‐to‐city partnerships.