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There is greater recognition in Washington of the importance of Southeast Asia. Located in the middle of Indo-Pacific, it will be a contested zone between China and the US and its allies. The US will step up its public diplomacy to better promote its own narrative in Southeast Asia.

Examines the 2018 Malaysian elections from three angles: campaign dynamics; important trends among major interest groups; and local-level dynamics and developments in key states. This analytical work is complemented by personal narratives from a selection of GE-14 participants.

In 2002, ASEAN made history when two of its founder members - Indonesia and Malaysia - amicably settled a dispute over the ownership of the two Bornean islands of Sipadan and Ligitan. This book covers in detail the historical roots of the issue as well as the law dimension pertaining to the process of legal proceedings and the ICJ deliberations.

Explores the challenges facing progressive voices in Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore today. It examines their discourses, which delve into how multiculturalism and secularism are the way forward for the diverse societies of these three countries.

Analyses the rise of the settlement system in the heartland of the Minangkabau region in the highlands of West Sumatra. The book provides the first attempt to place the archaeological remains and the landscape of Tanah Datar, a fertile plain in the highlands of West Sumatra, in a cultural historic synthesis.

China's policy towards its diaspora is primarily governed by its national interests and foreign policy imperatives. In general, since the establishment of the People's Republic of China in 1949, the Chinese government has treated the diaspora as an asset, rather than a liability.

Advances the question as to what Asia is, and as to whether there existed one or many Asia(s). The book seeks to explore Asian societies as interconnected formations through trajectories/networks of circulation of people, ideas, and objects in the longue duree.

The United States launched a new Free and Open Indo-Pacific (FOIP) strategy in late 2017 after reluctantly concluding that its patient effort to engage and socialize China to the rules-based order since 1972 had failed.

Explores the politics of Myanmar under the reformist president Thein Sein. The book is not about the successes of the Thein Sein administration. Rather, it examines the reasons behind the lost opportunities in the transition to democracy. It draws on the author's experiences as a member of Thein Sein's cabinet.

Examines the establishment of the domestic intelligence service known as the Malayan Security Service (MSS), the colourful and controversial career of Lieutenant Colonel John Dalley, and the little-known rivalry between MI5 in London and MSS in Singapore, which led to the demise of the MSS and Dalley's retirement.

Presents an overview the Myanmar's contemporary media landscape, providing a critical assessment of the sector during the complex and controversial political transition. Moving beyond the focus on journalism and freedom of the press, this volume also explores developments in fiction, filmmaking, social movement media and social media.

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) account for about 97-99% of total enterprises and 60-80% of total employment in ASEAN countries. This volume contains selected ASEAN country studies on the participation of SMEs in regional economic integration based on primary microdata.

Now in its forty-sixth edition, Southeast Asian Affairs offers an indispensable guide to this fascinating region. Lively, analytical, authoritative, and accessible, there is nothing comparable in quality or range to this series."" - Hal Hill, H.W. Arndt Professor of Southeast Asian Economies, Australian National University

Explores the complex historical and contemporary dimensions of Indonesia's religious, ethnic, LGBT and disability minorities from a range of perspectives, including historical, legal, political, cultural, discursive and social. The book addresses fundamental questions about Indonesia's tolerance and acceptance of difference.

Malaysia established the Digital Free Trade Zone (DFTZ) to facilitate the development of e-commerce and the country's small and medium enterprises' (SMEs') exports. The data revealed thus far indicates an increasing number of SMEs coming on board the DFTZ e-commerce platforms.

Malaysia pulled itself back from the brink on 9 May 2018, when the majority of its voting population decided to topple the Barisan Nasional government that had been in power for over 60 years. This present volume discusses some of the challenges facing the new government, and the Malaysian population in general, now that the Barisan Nasional has imploded.

The triumph of Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy at the 2015 election was supposed to mark the consolidation of a reformist trajectory for Myanmar society. What has followed has not proved so straightforward. This book takes stock of the mutations, continuities and fractures at the heart of today's political and economic transformations. We ask: What has changed under a democratically elected government? Where are the obstacles to reform? And is there scope to foster a more prosperous and inclusive Myanmar? With the peace process faltering, over 1 million people displaced by recent violence, and ongoing army dominance in key areas of decision-making, the chapters in this volume identify areas of possible reform within the constraints of Myanmar's hybrid civil-military governance arrangements. This latest volume in the Myanmar Update Series from the Australian National University continues a long tradition of intense, critical engagement with political, economic and social questions in one of Southeast Asia's most complicated countries. At a time of great uncertainty and anxiety, the 13 chapters of Myanmar Transformed? offer new and alternative ways to understand Myanmar and its people.

Brings together the work of a group of leading Thai intellectuals to equip readers to anticipate and understand the developments that lie ahead for Thailand. Contributors offer findings and perspectives both on the disorienting period following the Thai coup of May 2014 and on fundamental challenges to the country and its institutions.

Increasing tensions in the South China Sea have propelled the dispute to the top of the Asia-Pacific's security agenda. Featuring some of the world's leading experts on Asian security, this volume explores the central drivers of the dispute and examines the positions and policies of the main actors including China, Taiwan, the Southeast Asian claimants, America and Japan.

Provides complete, yet non-technical, analyses of production fragmentation effects and thus targets a wide range of readers -- including academics, researchers, policy makers, students, entrepreneurs, and anyone who is interested in this subject. It investigates the economic impacts of production fragmentation in Southeast Asia with a focus on Thailand's experience as an emerging global hub.

Gathers essays from admirers and friends who add their own contributions on legal pluralism, transnationalism and culture in Asia. The book opens with an account of M.B. Hooker's colourful and prolific career. The authors then approach legal pluralism through legal theory, legal anthropology, comparative law, law and religion, constitutional law, and Islamic art.

Written by two Burmese researchers, this study investigates the underlying factors behind the ceasefires, explores the nature of the secretive agreements, and identifies the consequences affecting stakeholders in the larger context of peacebuilding, political settlement, democratisation, and the state-building process.

This volume seeks to foreground a "borderless" history and geography of South, Southeast, and East Asian littoral zones that would be maritime-focused, and thereby explore the ancient connections and dynamics of interaction that favoured the encounters among the cultures found throughout the region stretching from the Indian Ocean littorals to the Western Pacific, from the early historical period to the present. Transcending the artificial boundaries of macro-regions and nation-states, and trying to bridge the arbitrary divide between (inherently cosmopolitan) "high" cultures (e.g. Sanskritic, Sinitic, or Islamicate) and "local" or "indigenous" cultures, this multidisciplinary volume explores the metaphor of Monsoon Asia as a vast geo-environmental area inhabited by speakers of numerous language phyla, which for millennia has formed an integrated system of littorals where crops, goods, ideas, cosmologies, and ritual practices circulated on the sea-routes governed by the seasonal monsoon winds. The collective body of work presented in the volume describes Monsoon Asia as an ideal theatre for circulatory dynamics of cultural transfer, interaction, acceptance, selection, and avoidance, and argues that, despite the rich ethnic, linguistic and sociocultural diversity, a shared pattern of values, norms, and cultural models is discernible throughout the region.

Gerald de Cruz's life overlapped many of the spheres of Singapore's history after World War II. This book seeks to portray his place in time, particularly for younger Singaporeans who did not live in an era that has inaugurated the history of independent Singapore.

Indonesia was founded on the ideal of the "Sovereignty of the People", which suggests the pre-eminence of people's rights to access, use and control land to support their livelihoods. Yet, many questions remain unresolved. The contributors to this volume presents case studies from across the archipelago.

The creation of ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA) in 1992 and decentralization in 1999 mark the state restructuring in Indonesia. This book analyses the impact of state restructuring on regional economic development in Indonesia between 1993 and 2010. Regional economic analysis shows persistent and severe regional disparities throughout the period.

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) account for more than 90 per cent of all businesses in the Asia-Pacific region - an area which is rapidly updating its competition laws and regulations to encourage greater entrepreneurship and open, dynamic economies.Yet SMEs are almost invisible when those competition policies and laws are developed and enforced. SMEs are often quite different businesses than large, multinational corporations, but their nature, significance and characteristics are often overlooked. This book seeks to rectify the relative neglect in research and policy discussions on the role of the SME sector in competition policy and law. Drawing on contributions from a wide range of competition regulators, lawyers, academics, consultants and advisers to the SME sector, it addresses such important issues as:- perceptions and views of small businesses about competition law;- regulator engagement and education of the SME sector;- the link between competition law and economic growth;- franchising, SMEs and competition law;- issues in enforcing competition law against SMEs;- the role of Chinese family firms;- trade, professional and industry associations;- country case studies from Vietnam, Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, China, South Korea, Hong Kong SAR, Japan and the Pacific Islands. "This book is an important step in remedying the gaps in our knowledge and policy of this important area." -- Dr Alan Bollard, Executive Director, APEC Secretariat

The twelve essays in this collection represent the latest research in the field to deal with the dynamics of mainland and (pen)insular Buddhism between the sixth and nineteenth centuries C.E. Drawing on new manuscript sources, inscriptions, and archaeological data, they investigate the intellectual, ritual, institutional, sociopolitical, aesthetic, and literary diversity of local Buddhisms.

Explores the history of the modern Indian presence in Malaysia, and traces the vital role played by the Indian community in the construction of contemporary Malaysia. In this new study, Carl Vadivella Belle offers fresh insights on the Indian experience spanning the period from the colonial recruitment of Indian labour to the post-Merdeka political, economic and social marginalization of Indians.