The return of great-power competition has made economic uncertainty a defining feature of the Indo-Pacific Region. Due to the entanglement of trade with geopolitics, questions have emerged about whether major powers can provide a stable foundation for regional prosperity. The growing appeal of regional trade frameworks like the Regional Comprehensive Economic Framework and Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership suggests an alternative. By creating shared rules and flexible mechanisms for cooperation, such agreements help reduce uncertainty and strengthen economic resilience. Their emergence highlights the increasing importance of regionalism for managing the ongoing risks of the fragmented international order.

Regional Economic Cooperation as a Strategic Response to Geopolitical Instability

The years since the COVID-19 pandemic have been marked by growing instability and uneven trajectories in global economic growth. However, economic development cannot be understood through economic factors alone. Geopolitical tensions have become a major source of uncertainty affecting trade, investment, and global supply chains. Conflicts between Russia and Ukraine and the United States and Iran and Israel’s genocide in Gaza have disrupted the international economic environment and heightened concerns over energy security. The prospect of continued disruptions to critical trade routes, such as the Strait of Hormuz, has renewed fears of higher energy prices, inflationary pressures, and slowed global growth.

The international trading system also faces mounting pressures from rising protectionism and weakening support for multilateral cooperation. Following his second inauguration in 2025, United States President Donald Trump announced stronger reciprocal tariffs and expanded the use of trade measures as instruments of strategic competition. These policies represent a broader shift away from trade liberalization toward a more transactional, interest-driven approach to economic relations. This trend is further reflected in the United States’ decision to withdraw from dozens of international organizations, which the Trump administration described as ineffective and contrary to national interests under Executive Order 14199. As the major powers have increasingly begun pursuing unilateral policies and challenging established, rules-based institutions, confidence in the global economic order has weakened.

There is an increasing need for regional economic policy frameworks that can respond to these trends and handle economic uncertainty in the face of increased geopolitical fragmentation. Initiatives for regional economic diplomacy like the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), and Indo-Pacific Economic Framework (IPEF) offer mechanisms for states to balance their pursuit of economic stability with their strategic interests (Wardani et al., 2025; Wardani & Waruwu 2025; Ziltener & Wardani 2025). These frameworks provide models for how regional cooperation can serve as a stabilizing factor in an increasingly contentious global order. The creation of resilient, adaptable regional economic architecture has become a crucial concern for navigating economic dependency alongside growing geopolitical rivalry.

This column analyses academic and policy debates surrounding the RCEP, CPTPP, and IPEF. It also draws on official documents, leaders’ statements, and conversations with policymakers, experts, and Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) representatives about the goals of these initiatives, who stands to benefit from them, and how they can help countries respond to geopolitical uncertainties. These perspectives help explain the growing appeal of regional trade frameworks in the Asia–Pacific region.

The RCEP: Keeping Regional Trade Moving

The RCEP emerged from ASEAN-led efforts to streamline the region’s increasingly complex network of trade agreements and strengthen economic integration. Bringing together ASEAN, China, Japan, South Korea, Australia, and New Zealand, the agreement covers around 30% of the global GDP and population, making it the largest trade agreement currently in force internationally. One of its most significant achievements is the consolidation of the region’s “noodle bowl” of overlapping trade agreements into a more coherent framework through common rules of origin and region-wide governance.

These features have reduced business costs, strengthened regional supply chains, and encouraged investment opportunities for member economies. More importantly, the RCEP provides a platform for economic cooperation between countries that often compete strategically. Rather than eliminating those geopolitical tensions, it helps prevent them from disrupting trade, investment, and production networks and preserves regional economic integration.

The CPTPP: Advancing High-standard Economic Rules

CPTPP emerged from the original Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) following the United States’ withdrawal in 2017. The remaining members, led by Japan, then established the CPTPP as a high-standard regional trade agreement. While it is smaller than RCEP in membership and economic size, the CPTPP incorporates rules on digital trade, intellectual property, state-owned enterprises, labor standards, and environmental governance.

Its significance lies in both expanding trade and maintaining confidence in rules-based economic cooperation despite contemporary pressures on global trade governance. The CPTPP is often viewed as a benchmark for future trade agreements in the region and a potential pathway toward greater regulatory convergence. Although its economic benefits are likely to emerge gradually, the agreement helps provide predictability and policy stability.

The IPEF: Addressing New Economic Risks

The IPEF emerged from the United States’ effort to re-establish its economic presence in the Indo-Pacific region following its withdrawal from the TPP. Unlike the RCEP and CPTPP, it is not a conventional trade agreement and does not offer tariff reductions or expanded market access. Instead, it focuses on areas like supply-chain resilience, clean energy, digital governance, and anti-corruption measures. Its Supply-Chain Agreement, for example, seeks to reduce the vulnerabilities that were exposed by the COVID-19 pandemic by improving coordination among participating economies.

The IPEF reflects a growing recognition that economic resilience depends on a region’s ability to manage disruptions and respond to strategic risks. While questions remain about its long-term attractiveness given its absence of traditional trade incentives, the IPEF represents an important attempt to adapt regional economic cooperation to new geopolitical realities. Therefore, its value primarily strengthens economic security and resilience across the Indo-Pacific region.

Competing Economic Architectures in the Indo-Pacific

The coexistence of the RCEP, CPTPP, and IPEF illustrates the increasingly contested nature of economic governance in the Indo-Pacific region. Although all three seek to promote economic cooperation, they are rooted in different strategic logics. The RCEP reflects ASEAN-led efforts to preserve regional integration through inclusiveness and flexibility. The CPTPP seeks to advance higher standard economic rules and regulatory convergence. Finally, the IPEF emerged partly as a response to the growing influence of China.

Rather than eliminating strategic competition, these frameworks help manage its economic consequences. Countries across the region increasingly participate in multiple arrangements simultaneously, not because geopolitical tensions have disappeared but because economic interdependence remains too valuable to abandon. The RCEP, CPTPP, and IPEF serve as complementary mechanisms that preserve market access, strengthen supply-chain resilience, and provide a degree of predictability. Their significance lies less in resolving geopolitical rivalry than in preventing it from escalating into wider economic and regional fragmentation (Wardani et al., 2025; Wardani & Waruwu, 2025; Ziltener & Wardani, 2025).

Policy Implication

To navigate an increasingly fragmented global economy, policymakers must place a higher priority on adaptation and consistent regional collaboration. To regain credibility and bolster programs like IPEF, the United States in specific must guarantee more consistency in its trade policy. Regional economic frameworks like the RCEP and CPTPP should be utilized as supplementary mechanisms to improve economic resilience and control geopolitical risk. Sustained integration will require the promotion of regulatory convergence and preservation of institutional adaptability. Governments must also learn to better balance long-term international commitments with domestic political pressures. Fortifying regional value chains will strengthen the Indo-Pacific region’s stability and guarantee that its economic integration endures.

Author’s Note

This column is based on articles:
Wardani, R. Y., N. S. Cooray, and A. H. Waruwu. 2025. “The Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership as an Economic Architecture for the Asia-Pacific Amid Geopolitical Uncertainty.” European Journal of East Asian Studies 24 (3): 376–401; Wardani, R. Y., and A. H. Waruwu. 2025. “Limitations of the Indo‐Pacific Economic Framework in Countering China’s Economic Power.” World Affairs 188 (4): 1–14; Ziltener, P., and R. Y. Wardani. 2025. “RCEP versus CPTPP.” European Journal of East Asian Studies 24 (3): 351–375.

Author’s Profile

Ranti Yulia Wardani is an Assistant Professor at International Relations Study Program, President University, Indonesia; a former Japan Foundation Southeast Asia Partnership (JFSEAP) Program Visiting Fellow at the IDE-JETRO (June 2025- June 2026).

*Thumbnail photo: An elevated view of commercial docks at dusk (Karl Hendon / Getty Images)
**The views expressed in the columns are those of the author(s) and do not represent the views of IDE or the institutions to which the authors are attached.

©2026 Ranti Yulia Wardani

This column is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license (CC BY 4.0).
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