The second East Asian Summit (EAS) was held a month after it was originally scheduled to convene. Delay may have served the EAS well: The leaders in attendance appear to have listened to criticism that being a talk shop is not enough, that their meetings must produce tangible results. Their new mindset was evident at the ASEAN summit that preceded the EAS, while the EAS itself produced an agreement on energy policy.
There was considerable hubbub when the first East Asian Summit was held a year ago. Some saw the group as the core of a new Asian community that would give voice to Asian hopes, aspirations and concerns on the global stage. Others saw it as an exclusionist bloc in the making, one that would compete with and inevitably diminish the broader Asia-Pacific community embraced by the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation forum or the ASEAN Regional Forum.
Some critics worried that the EAS was an instrument of Chinese domination of the region. More objective observers noted that the group seemed to be a work in progress, and complained that far more attention was devoted to who would be attending the meeting rather than what they would be discussing.