Unlike the process of EU integration, 'East Asia Integration Process' has been criticized for its lack of clear political will and institutionalization, mostly driven by economic purposes. However, East Asia can toughen its political willingness to its regional integration by bringing the agenda of North Korea issue with a holistic perspective of "New Regionalism".
Traditionally, under the mechanism of power politics, we have often utilized the strategies of 'nuclear deterrence and economic sanctions'(often regarded as old-fashioned and outdated) and six-party talks had been regarded as a possible regional security mechanism based on the softer approach to the issue through dialogue. But, it has failed to overcome the boundaries of the US perspective in sake of the US national interests, not of the Asian countries, and it was to contain Asian way of regionalism and foster that of the US, in response to the nuclear provocations by the DPRK and the effectiveness of those has been questioned by many for decades as a failed approach.
Different from the representative strategies of power politics, new regionalism(in this paper) empowers itself with the centrifugal force of 'symbiosis', not the 'national survival' of each nation-state. Even though both the power politics and new regionalism share their starting point of seeking national interests, which are blueprinted and implemented accordingly under the leadership of each administration, they each are on separate tracks of striving for hegemony on the BOP and sustainable development on the new regionalism respectively (more specifically political elite-led approach to local and regional sustainable development).
New regionalism is often described as a brainchild of post state-centric advocates, which is likely come about not through top-down regional government, but through incremental development of social capital, institutions, ad hoc partnerships, and frameworks of incentives and mandates between existing levels of government.
Yet, here in this paper, new regionalism embraces the contrasting concepts of "top-down" (as a stimulus) and "subnational" as more of a hybrid version of new and old regionalism, perceived as more of social process of various entities involved from business to politics.
New regionalism in Northeast Asia has just initiated to take its own form through China's initiatives such as One Belt One Road (OBOR) with the mechanism of Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank(AIIB) and its numerous transnational domestic policies like Northeast China Revitalization Plan in combination of contrasting concepts of "top-down" and "subnational".
In particular, the development of Northeast China has undergone numerous strategic adjustments and the Changjitu Plan is one of those core strategies, which will gradually encourage North Korea to take its route to 'opening up and reforms' and invite her to the world of market economy. Furthermore, this economic liberation in the DPRK will lead to democratization and peace in the Korean Peninsula, and ultimately it will accomplish its final goal of the so-called 'perpetual peace'.
We live in the 21st century of 'Globalized and Cosmopolitan' era with core values of harmony and coexistence, not stuck in the era of 'Cold War and Trade War', where power talked. In other words, it is definitely time to shift the theories of politics from the combination of 'Politics and Military' and to that of 'Politics and Economy(as the liberated market)' by pursuing the transformation of the traditional mechanisms, and to upgrade them to fit into the new era of Northeast Asia.