UPCOMING EVENT: Southeast Asia's challenges to sustainable and inclusive development [Online, 1 October 2021]

Round table 3 - Mekong: how to ensure biodiversity preservation in the context of a river in permanent transformation?

14.00 BKK Time, Friday, 1 October 2021 via Livestorm

Carl Middleton from CSDS will be one of the speakers

Millions of people from Myanmar, China, Lao PDR, Cambodia, Thailand and Vietnam depend on Mekong River water resources for agriculture and fisheries. However, the Mekong Basin and especially its biomass is impacted by many dam-building projects, overfishing, intensive aquaculture, pollution from growing cities, excessive groundwater extraction and sand mining. This environmental degradation is compounded by climate change, which makes the region even more fragile.

This session will attempt to discuss how biodiversity in the Mekong Basin can be protected, despite its constant evolution, notably through integrated management and community-based approaches.

Speakers :

• Anoulak Kittikhoun, Chief Strategy and Partnership Officer, Mekong River Commission

• Carl Middleton, Director at the Center for Social Development Studies, Chulalungkorn University (TH)

• Jake Brunner, Head of IndoBurma Group, IUCN

To join this online conference, you can register on the organizer’s webpage here.

UPCOMING EVENT: The Belt and Road Initiative, hydropolitics, and hydropower [Online, 7 June 2021]]

16.00-17.30 am BKK Time, Monday, 7 June 2021 via Zoom

Carl Middleton from CSDS will be one of the speakers

Carl Middleton from CSDS will be one of the speakers for the webinar "Contrasting China's Relationship with South and Southeast Asia: the Belt and Road Initiative, Hydropolitics, and Hydropower."

Carl will speak on ‘Reworking the Mekong River Regime: The Geopolitics and Hydropolitics of Competing Regionalisms’.

About the webinar:

"In this webinar we examine the role of new and planned hydropower projects financed by China in shifting geopolitics between China and South and Southeast Asia. We ask how hydropolitics and dams are enabling new forms of economic, social and political regional institutionalisation through the Belt and Road Initiative, how these play out differently in South and Southeast Asia and what these mean for local communities and nature in particular locales across South and Southeast Asia."

To join this webiner, you can register on the organizer’s webpage here, or register via Zoom on this link https://zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_vBmdcT0nRXCLne0iWFlD8A.

UPCOMING EVENT: The Mekong, China, & SE Asian Transitions Series-Mekong Dams: Debates and the Politics of Evidence [Online, 29 April 2021]

07.00-08.30 am BKK Time, Thursday, 29 April 2021 via Zoom

Carl Middleton from CSDS will be one of the panelists

In recent decades, people living in the Lower Mekong Region have witnessed major shifts from predominantly subsistence agriculture to industrializing economies, with attendant changes in migration, crop production systems, and major infrastructure (roads, dams, industrial estates). This series of four webinars will explore how communities in the region are experiencing the economic, social, and cultural dislocations of these transformations.

Full webinar series schedule:

• Panel 1 : Jan 27 - Markets for Mekong Commodities

• Panel 2 : Feb 24 - Migration, Mobility, and the Mekong

• Panel 3 : Apr 7 - The Spirits and Spiritual Life of the Mekong

• Panel 4: Apr 28 - Mekong Dams: Debates and the Politics of Evidence

Carl will be one of the panelists on Panel 4.

To register for this event, please visit the Zoom link here. For more information about this event, please visit the organizer’s website here.

This event is organized by Asian Studies Center at Michigan State University.

UPCOMING EVENT: Low Flows, Drought, Data and Geopolitics on the Mekong-Lancang River [Online, 28 April 2021]

10.00 pm BKK Time/ 05.00 pm CEST, Wednesday, 28 April 2021 via Facebook Live from UPF Lund

Public Lecture with Carl Middleton from CSDS

The Mekong-Lancang River flows from the Tibetan Plateau through Yunnan Province of China, Myanmar, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam. Since the early 1990s, the river has been increasingly engineered by large hydropower dams. In this seminar, Carl Middleton assesses conflict and cooperation in transboundary water governance, with a focus on the Mekong River Commission established between the four lower basin States, and the China-led Lancang Mekong Cooperation. Heavily influenced by geopolitical tensions between the US and China, Carl Middleton analyzes the heated regional debates over China’s dam cascade and low river flows downstream since 2019, and the impact on peoples’ lives.

Dr. Carl Middleton is an Assistant Professor and Deputy Director on the Master of Arts and Doctor of Philosophy in International Development Studies (MAIDS-GRID) Program, and Director of the Center for Social Development Studies (CSDS) in the Faculty of Political Science of Chulalongkorn University. Dr. Middleton’s research interests orientate around the politics and policy of the environment in Southeast Asia, with a particular focus on nature-society relations, the political ecology of water and energy, and environmental justice. He has lived in Southeast Asia for fifteen years, with much of his work focused onto the Mekong River.

For more information, please visit the event page here.

UPCOMING EVENT: 3rd International Conference on Burma/Myanmar Studies [Online, 5-7 March 2021]

12:30-14:00 Myanmar / 13:00-14:30 Thailand on 5 March, 2021, Online and at Chiang Mai University, Thailand

Carl Middleton (CSDS) and Vanessa Lamb (University of Melbourne) will convene a roundtable session titled: “Knowing the Salween River: Reflections on activism, resource politics and peace” for the 3rd International Conference on Burma/Myanmar Studies. The session will be held on 12:30-14:00 Myanmar / 13:00-14:30 Thailand on 5 March, 2021.

The Salween River basin, shared by Myanmar/Burma, Thailand and China, is dynamic system and a site of long-standing contests over territories, resources, and governance. More recently, it is also increasingly recognised as a site for peace and collaborative water governance. This panel will provide inter-disciplinary perspectives by civil society and academic researchers on the unfolding dynamics on the Salween River in and from Myanmar and in a regional context. We will discuss the politics, activism, and policies linked to intensifying resource extraction, hydropower dam construction as well as conservation and development schemes, and how this is unfolding within a complex terrain of local, national and transnational governance and activist networks. Panellists were all contributors and researchers linked to the 2019 collaborative book, “Knowing the Salween River: Resource Politics of a Contested Transboundary River”, which was also the first book dedicated to understanding this complex river system.

Panelists

 Speakers:

• April Kyu Kyu, Researcher, SaNaR (Save the Natural Resource)

• Saw John Bright

• Pianporn Deetes, Thailand and Myanmar Campaigns Director, International River

• Alec Scott, Independent Researcher

Discussant:

• Professor Saw Win, Senior Research Associate, Center for Social Development Studies, Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University 

Co-Chairs:

• Vanessa Lamb, Senior Lecturer, School of Geography, University of Melbourne

• Carl Middleton, Director, Center for Social Development Studies, Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University

The conference will be hybrid: 80% online and 20% onsite. As most sessions will be organized online, the registration fee is waived for all conference participants. All participants, please register here to participate in the conference.

For more information about this conference, please visit the organizer’s website here.

The International Conference on Burma/Myanmar Studies was first organized in July 2015 at Chiang Mai University in collaboration with the University of Mandalay. ICBMS was attended by 543 participants from 29 countries, with 48 sessions of paper presentation and 7 roundtables. The conference brought together scholars, researchers, journalists, NGO workers and observers from Burma/Myanmar, as well as from around the world to engage in discussion on Myanmar’s transition.

ICBMS is organized every two years, with Chiang Mai University and the University of Mandalay taking turns as conference host, and with the possibility of extending collaboration with other universities in both Myanmar and Thailand.

ICBMS3 will happen onsite, in person, at Green Nimman CMU (Uniserv), in Chiang Mai, from 5-7 March 2021.

UPCOMING EVENT: CRISEA Final Conference – Competing Regional Integrations in Southeast Asia: The Project and its Findings [Online, 22 February 2021]

17.00 - 19.10, Monday, 22 February 2021 via Zoom

Carl Middleton from CSDS will be presenting on this event.

Competing Regional Integrations in Southeast Asia (CRISEA) is an interdisciplinary research project funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Framework Programme that studies multiple forces affecting regional integration in Southeast Asia and the challenges they present to the peoples of Southeast Asia and its regional institutional framework, ASEAN.

CRISEA innovates by encouraging ‘macro-micro’ dialogue between disciplines: global level analyses in international relations and political economy alongside socio-cultural insights from the grassroots methodologies of social sciences and the humanities.

CRISEA Final Conference – Programme (05) Competing Regional Integrations in Southeast Asia: The Project and its Findings

Part Two – Research Findings: Case Studies (17.26 - 18.16))

• Carl Middleton, Chulalongkorn University (Environment – WP1) – Southeast Asia and China: Transnational Water Issues on the Mekong

• Dennis Arnold, University of Amsterdam (The Economy – WP2) – The Impact of Covid-19 on Special Economic Zones in Southeast Asia

• Pham Quynh Phuong, Vietnam Academy of Social Sciences (The State – WP3) – State-Society Relations and the Rise of the LGBT Movement in Vietnam

• Jayeel Cornelio, Ateneo de Manila University (Identity – WP4) – Christianity and the War on Drugs in the Philippines

• Kyawt Kyawt Khine, University of Mandalay (The Region – WP5) – Southeast Asia Regionalism and Myanmar’s Relations with ASEAN

For the complete program, please visit here.

The conference will be conducted online via Zoom. To attend, please visit this link here. It will also be broadcasted via YouTube Live on the channel here.

UPCOMING INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE PAPER: Demarcating the public and private in hydropower in the Mekong Region

Virtual conference: The third biennial conference of the Political Ecology Network (POLLEN) - Contested Natures: Power, Possibility, Prefiguration

22-25 September 2020 , Virtual Conference at https://event.pollen2020.exordo.com/

Abstract for: Demarcating the public and private in hydropower in the Mekong Region

By Carl Middleton*

In this paper, I critically analyze the generation of plural demarcations of 'public' and 'private' through large hydropower projects in the Mekong region. Different conceptual and material meanings of public are considered, including the public sphere, the public interest, public goods, public knowledge, and various 'publics' as group identity, and in each instance how they relate to – or merge with – notions of private. I show that the meaning of public and private is contextual, relational, and often hybrid rather than distinct, for example regarding: the corporatization of state-owned enterprises; the construction and operation of large dams as various types of public-private partnerships; the merging of public and private sources of finance; and in the definition and legitimation of resource and property rights. These plural meanings of public and private hold consequences for water governance that requires critical problematization, including in relation to: the configurations of state and non-state actors and their power relations that shape how collective and individual interests are defined and acted upon; the types of knowledge that are generated, by who, and for what purpose; the spaces/ places within which projects, plans and policies are discussed, contested and governed; and how benefits, costs and risks are ultimately distributed amongst different groups within society. The paper will present case studies from large hydropower projects within the Lancang-Mekong basin, analyzed in the context of partially-fulfilled plans for economic regionalization and cross-border electricity trade.

* Center of Excellence on Resource Politics for Social Development, Center for Social Development Studies, Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University (Carl.Chulalongkorn@gmail.com)

This paper will be presented as a pre-recorded presentation. View more details on the conference here: https://pollen2020.wordpress.com/.

UPCOMING ONLINE EVENT: Low Flows, Drought, Data and Geopolitics on the Mekong-Lancang [Online, 6 August 2020]

14.00-16.00, Thursday, 6th August 2020 at Institute of East Asian Studies, Thammasat University Facebook Page

Carl Middleton from CSDS will be presenting on this event.

Institute of East Asian Studies, Thammasat University, invites everyone to listen to a talk via online media (Facebook Live) to keep an eye on the movement of the situation of East Asia and Southeast Asia on the issue.

Speaker:
Asst. Prof. Dr. Carl Middleton
Center for Social Development Studies, Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University

Moderator:
Asst. Prof. Dr. Soimart Rungmanee from Puey Ungpakorn Institute of Development Studies, Thammasat University

For more information about this event, please visit the event page here.

UPCOMING ONLINE PANEL DISCUSSION: New Research on COVID 19 and its Consequences: People, Planet and Inclusive Society

Public Session organized for the International Conference on New research in international development, human rights, and international relations at a time of disruption

Institute of Asian Studies and Center of Excellence in Resource Politics for Social Development, Chulalongkorn University

Thursday 30 July 2020, start from 09:00-10:45 GMT+7/Thailand Time

Speakers:

• “COVID-19: Risks of Lives and Emerging of Social Movement of Migrant Workers in Chiang Rai Borderland” by Suebsakul Kidnukorn, Area-based Social Innovation Research Center (Ab-SIRC), Mae Fah Luang University [Read Abstract]

• “Tamsang-Tamsong: Social Distancing Promotion and Job Security for Motorcycle Taxi and Food Vendors during the Covid-19 Crisis” by Akkanut Wantanasombut, Mekong Studies Center, Institute of Asian Studies, Chulalongkorn University [Read Abstract]

• “Rethinking the Future of Thai Fisheries: COVID-19 and Vulnerable Groups in Thai Fisheries Sector” by Nithis Thammaseangadipa, Asian Research Center for Migration, Institute of Asian Studies, Chulalongkorn University [Read Abstract]

• “COVID- 19, Civil Society in Thailand’s Deep South and the Weak State” by Alisa Hasamoh, Faculty of Humanities and Social Development, Prince of Songkla University [Read Abstract]

Moderator: Naruemon Thabchumpon, Institute of Asian Studies and Center for Social Development Studies, Chulalongkorn University

THIS PANEL WILL BE HOSTED ON ZOOM

This panel will be an online panel discussion hosted via Zoom and you can join by clicking on the link below:

ZOOM MEETING LINK

You can also join using the details below:

• Meeting ID: 916 1843 6974

• Password: 166390

For any inquiries about this event, please contact Anisa Widyasari at communications.csds@gmail.com.

UPCOMING ONLINE PANEL DISCUSSION: Haze and Social (In)Justice in Southeast Asia: Past Experience and What Next?

Public Session organized for the International Conference on New research in international development, human rights, and international relations at a time of disruption

Organized by the Center for Social Development Studies (CSDS) as part of the Political Ecology in Asia Seminar Series.

Wednesday 29 July 2020, start from 13:00-14:30 GMT+7/Thailand Time

Over the past couple of decades, various sources of air pollution have become major issues of public concern in Southeast Asia and risen to the highest levels of public policy and politics. For example, annual forest fires were especially severe in Northern Thailand this year and raised tensions between vocal urban residents and rural ethnic communities who are regularly blamed due to their use of fire in agricultural practices. Yet, the latter have tried to demonstrate that they themselves are some of the most severely affected and, far from being to blame, are actually at the front line of trying to manage the wildfires risking their lives in the process.  Meanwhile, transboundary haze linked to burning peatlands in palm oil plantations in Indonesia causes harm – and frustration - in Singapore and Malaysia, also stoking inter-governmental tensions and blame games even as at least part of the responsibility links back to transnational companies based in Singapore and Malaysia. Also significant across the region is air pollution in expanding major and secondary urban areas produced by vehicles and other economic activities within them, including in Bangkok, Manila, Jakarta, Vientiane, Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City. Whilst it is commonly narrated that urban air pollution affects all residents, in practice there is a strong social justice dimension as those who work outdoors– such as motorcycle taxi riders or street vendors – are significantly more exposed and with less resources to protect their health. The recent pandemic, and resultant lockdowns, resulted in some respite for the typically harmful pollution even as it is only temporary, and at great cost to livelihoods in general. Within these heated public discussions, many types of knowledge are produced and circulated influencing contesting discourses – including scientific studies, monitoring apps, media analysis, and community knowledge. Whilst a range of divergent solutions are regularly proposed by government agencies, politicians, academics, civil society, and community leaders, year after year air pollution continues to remain a challenge.

In this our first Political Ecology in Asia Seminar, coinciding with the International Conference on New Research in International Development, Human Rights, and International Relations at a Time of Disruption, we focus on the issue of social justice and air pollution. The discussion will examine how various economic, social and political inequalities intersect in relation to air pollution in terms of its creation and exposure, and the consequences for individuals, families and society as-a-whole. We situate the seminar in relation to the past experiences of air pollution and the heated debates that have ensued, but also look to the future given that the COVID-19 pandemic is disrupting and has the possibility to transform many aspects of future society-environment relations.

Speakers:

• Daniel Hayward, Regional Centre for Social Science and Sustainable Development, Chiang Mai University

• Dr. Helena Varkkey, Department of Strategic and International Studies, University of Malaya

• Benjamin Tay, PM Haze

• Tara Buakamsri, Greenpeace Southeast Asia

Chair: Asst. Prof. Dr. Carl Middleton, Center for Social Development Studies, Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University

THIS PANEL WILL BE HOSTED ON ZOOM

This panel will be an online panel discussion hosted via Zoom and you can join by clicking on the link below:

ZOOM MEETING LINK

You can also join using the details below:

• Meeting ID: 988 1750 8760

• Password: 418715

For any inquiries about this event, please contact Anisa Widyasari at communications.csds@gmail.com.

UPCOMING ONLINE PANEL DISCUSSION: Confronting the Triple Trap in the Mekong Region: The Pandemic, Economic Downturn, and Climate Crisis

This panel is convened by the Center for Social Development Studies, Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University for the Seventh South-South Forum on Sustainability (SSFS7) hosted by Lingnan University, Hong Kong.

Thursday 16 July 2020, start from 14:00-16:00 GMT+7/Thailand Time

In this session, we will discuss how the ‘triple trap’ - the pandemic, economic downturn, and climate crisis – have affected communities across the Mekong region, and how these challenges have been responded to by them, as well as by civil society and state. We also examine the long-term implications of the triple trap, asking what transformations have already occurred and what could happen in the future.

Speakers:

• "The Implications of Covid 19's Disruption of Global Supply Chains for Southeast Asia" by Walden Bello, Focus on the Global South

• "Inequality, migration and Covid 19 in Thailand and the Mekong Region" by Naruemon Thabchumpon, Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University

• "The pandemic in Northeast Thailand and implications for communities and (post)development” by Kanokwan Manorom, Faculty of Liberal Arts, Ubon Ratchathani University

• "The impact of Covid 19 in rural Myanmar: Community, civil society, and state responses" by Nwet Kay Khine, Paung Ku, Myanmar

Discussant: Pianporn Deetes, International Rivers, Thailand

Moderator: Carl Middleton, Center for Social Development Studies, Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University

REGISTRATION IS REQUIRED.

This panel will be an online panel discussion hosted via Zoom and is a public session of the SSFS7 conference. Registration is required on the link below:

ZOOM WEBINAR REGISTRATION

On the registration page, please choose 'No Registration Fee Required' and 'Invited Participant' and choose the ’16 July: Workshops on Venezuela, Mexico and Mekong Region‘ to receive the Zoom link for this session.

For more information about this conference, please visit the conference website here.

ANNOUNCEMENT: MAIDS-International virtual conference on “New research in international development, human rights, and international relations at a time of disruption"

Our affiliate taught program, MA in International Development Studies, Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University (MAIDS-Chula), is organizing an international virtual conference on “New research in international development, human rights, and international relations at a time of disruption” , which will be held on 27 July 2020.

The challenge of the COVID-19 pandemic since early 2020 has brought widespread harm across societies in Asia and globally. Amidst acts of solidarity, the pandemic has placed into intense focus the consequences of inequality, the resilience of social welfare systems, and the responsibilities of governments as well as society at large. It has also led to a critical scrutiny of the current economic system together with the relationship between people and nature. Thus, this ‘time of disruption’ has intersected with existing issues in international development, human rights and international relations.

For more information, please visit the conference webpage here.

UPCOMING ONLINE PANEL DISCUSSION: Building Power from Within: Rural and Indigenous Community Organizing

The 2020 Rotary Peace Fellows’ Working Group and the Center for Social Development Studies at the Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University present an interactive dialogue with community leaders from Lower-Mekong countries on participatory processes to decrease power disparities and foster meaningful social change.

Tuesday 31 March 2020, start from 14:00 GMT+7/Thailand Time (the panel will be for 90 minutes)

Due to the current public health measures, this event will be an online panel discussion hosted via Zoom. You can join the event via the link provided here. The meeting room will be open before 14:00 so please be prepared to be online and join the meeting room beforehand so you can be ready to join the discussion on time. Following brief presentations by the panelists, participants can engage in a group discussion.

Topics:

• Rural people's issues in the greater Salween River basin near the Thai-Myanmar border with Shan State

• The growth of community organizations and networks within and between ethnic communities in Northern Thailand's three Mekong border districts

Speakers:

• Pianporn Deetes, International Rivers Thailand Campaign Coordinator

• Kru Tee Niwat Roykaew, Chair of Chiang Khong Conservation Group and Director of Mekong School - Institute Of Local Knowledge (in Thai with consecutive translation to English)

• Nang Shining, Founder and Director Mong Pan Youth Association

Moderator: Andrew Stone, 2020 Rotary Peace Fellows' Working Group

Concluding Remarks: Carl Middleton, Center for Social Development Studies

The Panel will be in English.

For inquiries about this event, please contact communications.csds@gmail.com.