The first step toward a lasting peace is the creation of a sense of international community. Thus the challenge for Northeast Asia is to embrace a variety of multilateral arrangements that will encourage a habit of dialogue and co-operation, and thereby forge a sense of community. Precedents have shown that a functional approach to co-operation in the marine sphere can help the growth of constructive common work and of common habits and interests, decreasing the significance of boundaries or conflicting claims by overlaying them with a natural growth of common activities and administrative agencies. This research will compare and contrast successful regional maritime regimes and the conditions that enabled their success with the conditions pertaining in Northeast Asia. The goal of this work is to contribute to regime theory by identifying conditions and policies that both constrain and enhance regime formation in the maritime sphere, and to recommend specific policy changes that would enhance regime formation in Northeast Asia. Further, the research, through an interactive consultative process, will design a specific regime for co-operative marine management in Northeast Asia.