Taiwan’s 2016 elections: An exercise in generational change
Memo #359 By J. Michael Cole – jmichaelcoleintaipei [at] gmail.com More than ever before in Taiwan’s history, political contention is not defined by ethnicity. A clash of generations, rather, is shaping the positioning of the two leading parties in the 2016 elections. The opposition Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) has understood, and then embraced, this shift […]
Pageantry Politics: Beauty Queens Challenging the Chinese Government
Memo #358 By Jonathan Brasnett – jonathan.brasnett [at] alumni.ubc.ca While beauty contests have often been analyzed as sites of gendered oppression or commodification, they have actually long been sites of political contestation and to a lesser degree, activism by the contestants. In November 2015, when the People’s Republic of China faced two beauty queens raising controversial […]
For Love of Languages, Travel, and Fieldwork: A tribute to Benedict Anderson
Memo #357 By Apichai W. Shipper – apichai.shipper [at] georgetown.edu There will never be another Ben Anderson but he has left a part of himself in all who knew him. He instilled in our DNA, among many other things, a love of languages and fieldwork. In an age where regressions and generalizable models sometimes seem to shunt careful […]
Where are the voices and the interests of rural Lao women in ASEAN?
Memo #356 By Carly Teng – c.teng [at] alumni.ubc.ca The primary focus of ASEAN has been on economic development, with some attempts since 2014 to include “women’s economic empowerment” through support of female entrepreneurship in its member countries. ASEAN’s recognition of the need for women’s economic empowerment is necessary, but not sufficient to advance women’s rights, especially […]
Permanent Neutrality Debate in Mongolia
Memo #355 By Mendee Jargalsaikhan – mendee [at] alumni.ubc.ca Since September 2015, when President Tsakhiagiin Elbegdorj and his foreign policy team launched a campaign both domestically and abroad to institutionalize a “permanent neutrality” status, foreign policy pundits in Ulaanbaatar have been intensively debating whether or not Mongolia should enact such a policy. Beijing and Moscow have committed […]
Preparing for Taiwan’s Future? KMT’s Keys for Reducing the Margin of Defeat
Memo #354 By: Justin Kwan – justin.kwan [at] alumni.ubc.ca In one of Taiwan’s latest opinion polls, Kuomintang (KMT) Presidential Candidate Eric Chu is projected to only have 20% of national support, a distant second place for a party that has traditionally dominated Taiwan’s political scene. While the party’s chances of winning the upcoming January election look […]
Taiwan’s Elections: Tsai Ing-wen’s Race to the Finish
Memo #353 By: Justin Kwan – justin.kwan [at] alumni.ubc.ca While the historic meeting between Ma Ying-jeou and Xi Jinping, the first between the leaders of the two sides of the Taiwan Strait, has been described as Beijing’s way to “pre-emptively constrain the Democratic Progressive Party [DPP] ahead of its likely victory,” its effect on the upcoming […]
Taiwan’s Water Shortage: Surrounded By Water That It Can’t Access
Memo #352 By: Denea Bascombe – denea.bascombe [at] alumni.ubc.ca Although its average annual rain fall is 2.6 times the global average, Taiwan is classified by the United Nations as an area where water resources are scarce. In the summer 2015, Taiwan faced its worst water shortage on record. What happens between when the rains fall […]
Non-government path of engagement with North Korea
Memo #351 By: Avram Agov – avram.agov [at] gmail.com The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) is widely perceived as isolated and rogue state with nuclear weapons. The political standoff on the Korean peninsula begs the question: to engage or not to engage? The answer is: this is not the question, particularly in the humanitarian field, which is […]
Investigating Evidence: Japan’s War Responsibility in Southeast Asia (A Video Memo with Dr. Nobuyoshi Takashima)
Memo #350 Featuring Nobuyoshi Takashima [youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gyKGbIXU2OM[/youtube] A few weeks ago the Asia Pacific Memo sat down with Dr. Nobuyoshi Takashima, Professor Emertius at the University of the Ryukyus. He is a noted scholar in the areas of history education, textbook issues, war responsibilities and war memory, including those of Okinawa. Professor Takashima has been leading study tours to Malaysia and Singapore […]