In the field of International Relations, I study international institutions from the perspective of states, with an emphasis on East and Southeast Asia. I investigate the dynamics of norm-initiating behavior in the context of power politics, state autonomy, coalition politics, and international bureaucracy using statistical analysis, multilingual archival research, and interviews. My recent projects explore the genesis of economic liberalization in international organizations (IOs) and investigate how the extra-institutional ties of rising powers with smaller countries constrain their preferences in turn. Empirical analyses in these projects uncover the unsuccessful attempts by East and Southeast Asian countries and regions to create new IO dynamics, whether through the creation of new IOs or through change from within.