Abstract
Despite two decades of multilateral effort, the ASEAN Agreement on Transboundary Haze Pollution (AATHP) has failed to produce the tangible outcomes its architects envisioned. The persistent failure to operationalise the ASEAN Coordinating Centre for Transboundary Haze Pollution Control (ACCTHPC) reveals a deeper problem that legal text alone cannot resolve: the collision between regional environmental governance and entrenched norms of national sovereignty. This paper presents a conceptual framework that underpins a qualitative study through document analysis, investigating three interrelated problems: the political factors shaping AATHP negotiations, the barriers ASEAN Member States (AMS) face in using scientific knowledge, and the potential of science diplomacy as a governing logic for future deliberations. Drawing on two theoretical traditions, neorealism and regionalism, the framework situates the AATHP within the structural tensions of ASEAN's consensus-based and non-interference architecture. This paper then suggests science diplomacy as a conceptual bridge to reconcile those tensions by embedding scientific expertise in the diplomatic process. Evidence from the Arctic Council, the European Union's S4D4C programme, and national science diplomacy strategies in the United States, United Kingdom, Japan, and Germany is examined to substantiate the feasibility of this approach. The paper concludes by outlining how the proposed framework could yield a practical guideline for integrating science diplomacy into AATHP negotiations, thereby contributing to both international relations theory and regional environmental governance practice.