European Business Presence in Southeast Asia What is the real economic weight of Europe in Southeast Asia? That is the question this book tries to answer. This pioneering work challenges the conventional wisdom including claims that European companies have abandoned the region's growing economic markets in favor of markets closer to home. This is not the case. Europe as a whole is very much present in Southeast Asia. For example, how many people know, that since the mid-1990s the EU has been the largest investor in the region, ahead of the U.S. and Japan? If the attraction of the Chinese market is indisputable, European firms are far from giving up on South-East Asia. This region, the potential of which is still not widely known, is at the heart of the economic rivalry among the great powers. Rejecting the pessimism often displayed by European ?lites, this regional study shows that Europe still has many cards to play in this part of the world. This study was founded by the Research Institute on Contemporary Southeast Asia (IRASEC), a CNRS unit based in Bangkok, Thailand. www.irasec.com