You are right, a lot of Asian cuisines rely on other strong flavors like fish sauce, tamarind, seaweed, and fermented pastes. With these you will not miss browning. You know you have learned how to cook Asian food when you can make delicious meat dishes without browning.
I have well-regarded Indian, Thai, and Chinese cookbooks, and they routinely brown meat for braise and stew dishes. I'm curious why browning would ever be a bad thing in a dish that uses tough meat (ie, stew meat).
I absolutely believe you that there are authentic dishes that don't rely on browning for flavor. I'm just curious what they are.
Off the top of my head adobo and many Korean stews like kimchi and pork stew (Dwaejigogi Kimchijjigae). Browning isn't a bad thing, you just don't need it for all dishes.
