UPCOMING EVENT: Towards a Green and Just Recovery in Southeast Asia [28 November 2022]

Towards a green and just recovery in Southeast Asia: Climate futures, sustainable transformations, and the role of China

28 November 2022, (broadcast on CSDS Facebook page; participate via Zoom with registration) and in-person at Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok, Thailand 

Co-organized by Center for Social Development Studies (CSDS), Chulalongkorn University; Chulalongkorn University UNESCO Chair in Resource Governance and Futures Literacy; and China Dialogue Trust.

Please download the final agenda with speakers here.

Please register to join the event here.

In-person event: Alumni meeting room, 12th Floor, Faculty of Political Science Building 1 (Kasem Utthayanin Building), Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok, Thailand

Mainland southeast Asia faces a ‘polycrisis’, as climate change, conflict and Covid intersect with rising economic and geopolitical headwinds. Meanwhile, an environmentally unsustainable model of development has degraded ecosystems and biodiversity. The unequal social consequences of these crisis mirror broader socio-economic and political inequalities in the region.

In response, calls for a ‘green and just recovery’ policy agenda have grown, although its formulation is not clear or agreed upon. For example, how does it intersect with agendas at UN-led processes such as the COP27 climate talks, or the ‘UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights’? Or with China’s vision for a ‘green Belt and Road’? How does it reflect civil society-led agendas, such ‘the commons’ and ‘Rights of Nature’? These questions are important as competing calls for a ‘sustainable transformation’ also imply future visions of society, international relations, and nature-society relations.

In this public seminar, we bring together journalists, scholars and civil society to ask what a ‘green and just recovery could look like in the region and how it can be achieved. As COP27 closes in Sharm el-Sheikh, we take climate change, rivers, and energy as entry points to explore the wider socio-political opportunities and challenges towards achieving ‘sustainable transformations’.

For enquiries, please contact Dr. Carl Middleton.

UPCOMING EVENT: Towards a green and just recovery in Southeast Asia [28 November 2022]

Towards a green and just recovery in Southeast Asia: Climate futures, sustainable transformations, and the role of China

28 November 2022, Online and in-person at Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok, Thailand 

Co-organized by China Dialogue Trust and Center for Social Development Studies, Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University

[SAVE THE DATE]: Please join us and China Dialogue to discuss on climate futures, sustainable transformations, and the role of China in Southeast Asia.

The seminar will address the following themes:

• After #COP27, what next for Southeast Asia?

• What might a green and just recovery look like, & who gets to define that vision?

• What do sustainable transformations mean for water, energy, & climate?

• What role has China played to date? What might come next?

Further details will be announced shortly.

For enquiries, please contact Dr. Carl Middleton.

UPCOMING EVENT: Shifting Development Cooperation in Southeast Asia: Understanding local voice and agency [27 and 28 March 2023]

Shifting Practices and Experiences of Development Cooperation in Southeast Asia: Understanding local voice and agency

27 and 28 March 2023, Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok, Thailand 

Co-organized by Center for Social Development Studies (CSDS) and M.A. and Ph.D. Program in International Development Studies (MAIDS-GRID), Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University; Office of International Affairs, Chulalongkorn University; and Japan Society for International Development

Since the new Millennium, the development cooperation landscape has drastically changed in Southeast Asia. Actors providing, receiving, influencing and affected by development cooperation have diversified. So too has the forms and tools of development cooperation, for example South-South cooperation including by China and India, climate funds, and philanthropic foundations.

Existing development studies literature on donor competition predominantly focuses on the accounts of financiers and providers, for example their motivations and processes of competition. Far less attention is paid to the perspectives and agency of local actors in Southeast Asia, including the diverse voices within governments, as well as civil society and impacted communities. As a consequence, less is studied on how local actors evaluate and understand the shifting practices and experiences of development cooperation in Southeast Asia; and in particular, how they see opportunities and challenges within the changing development cooperation landscape to address what they define as their development challenges – and the very meaning of ‘development’. Exploring the local voice and agency in development cooperation is salient at this critical juncture as the crises of climate shock, pandemic, and the war in Ukraine have not only aggravated existing development challenges in the region but also shape the very dynamic development cooperation landscape in the region.

This WriteShop invites abstracts/ full papers from early career researchers in Southeast Asia whose work addresses any of the following themes, or related questions:

• How have increasingly established donors, such as China, and longer standing Western donors positioned themselves within the new and dynamic development cooperation landscape? How do local state and non-state actors in Southeast Asia perceive the shift in the development cooperation landscape and the issue of donor competition? How have local actors responded to this shift and the donor competition?

• In what ways and to what extent have local state and non-state actors been impacted by the shifting practices of development cooperation? What types of projects, programs, policies and politics have emerged?

• In addition to state-led approaches, what other forms of development cooperation are emerging as significant, for example from climate funds and philanthropic foundations?

• In what ways and to what extent have the changes and donor competition in Southeast Asia influenced/impacted upon strategies of the region’s own ‘new state donors’ for their South-South Cooperation, namely Indonesia, Malaysia, and Thailand?

• In what ways and to what extent have the regional process of development landscape change and donor competition been affected by recent events including the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change and the war in Ukraine?

• What are the continuities, discontinuities and emerging new (or revived) meanings of development in relation to this shifting development cooperation landscape? What are the implications?

Selected papers will be invited to the WriteShop at Chulalongkorn University and will receive feedback and support to finalize their papers for publication in English in the Journal of International Development Studies, published by JASID. Travel stipends are available to Bangkok for selected participants. The full call for papers, including timeline, can be downloaded here.

Please submit your abstract (max 300 words) or direct enquiries to Dr. Carl Middleton. In your submission, please include your name, affiliation, and current country/ location of residence.

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 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.

IN THE NEWS: #WeStandByOurPlanet

Taylor & Francis recently launched their 2019 Asia Sustainability Campaign, #WeStandByOurPlanet. For every book sold from the campaign list, they will donate SGD$1 to a local wildlife community.

Two books from CSDS, Living with Floods in a Mobile Southeast Asia and The Water-Food-Energy-Nexus are also included in the campaign listing. Please visit this link here for the catalog of books included in the list.