Southeast Asia

This week, Thailand’s constitutional court found Thailand’s Future Forward Party, one of the two most prominent opposition parties, not guilty of conspiring to overthrow the monarchy. This verdict kept Future Forward from being disbanded—for now. The evidence against Future Forward was, shall we say, slight. The case that it was trying to overthrow the monarchy was based in part on bizarre, interpretive readings of Future Forward’s party platform and even its logo, mixed in with a stew of allegations about some Future Forward members’ comments on Facebook and other platforms. But the court’s decision does not put Future Forward in the clear. Far from it. Its leader, Thanathorn Juangroonruangkit, poses the clearest challenge to the ruling Palang Pracharat party and to the military. There are more than twenty cases still pending against Future Forward, including a major case that came before the Election Commission and now heads to the constitutional court. If recent history holds, the party will eventually be banned somehow. So, Thailand’s treadmill will continue running in place. If Future Forward is eventually banned, public frustration will continue to mount, especially among the young. The military and its allies appear to be using a strategy against Future Forward that they have utilized since the early 2000s, against any parties that threatened the army. For more than a decade, the military’s strategy against Puea Thai (and its predecessors in name), the other large opposition party, was to use the courts and bureaucratic agencies to harass and ban Puea Thai politicians or disband parties, while also courting some Puea Thai defectors, trying to entice them to break away and form a government with other, more pro-military parties. After overseeing a post-coup rewrite of the Thai constitution in a way that, by shifting the electoral system, seemed to make it harder for any one major opposition force to emerge, the army probably thought it was in the clear. It only had to continue to deal with Puea Thai, an opponent whose power had been whittled over the years. Yet Future Forward emerged from the election last year as a powerful force, and has more momentum as a locus of opposition than Puea Thai. Its strong electoral showing shocked the army and its proxy party. Future Forward’s leader, Thanathorn, presents a more appealing face to many young voters than Puea Thai’s leaders, tied to over a decade of political battling and inexorably linked to the Shinawatra family. In December, a leading Thai research organization, the Nida poll, found that a plurality of respondents thought Thanathorn was best suited to be prime minister, more so than the current prime minister, former coup leader Prayuth Chan-ocha. Future Forward has been able to put together large street rallies, on short notice. And in some ways Future Forward is more willing to take on the army than Puea Thai (and its similar, predecessor parties) were. Future Forward has openly called for reforming the Royal Thai Army to make it a more professional body that operates under civilian rule and does not meddle in politics—which is what the Royal Thai Army really does best. Puea Thai and its predecessors focused more on placing party allies and Shinawatra allies in the top ranks of the military than trying to reform the Royal Thai Army. (However, in the run-up to the 2019 election, Puea Thai focused more on military reform, probably in part because Future Forward had made reform a theme, and the concept seemed popular with the public.) The army and its party, Palang Pracharat, do not know any other strategies for dealing with opposition. So, it is highly likely that, via one of the court cases, Future Forward will be disbanded, and Thanathorn hit with more punishment than already has been levied against him. (He has been prevented from taking his seat in parliament in a different court case.) The military will hope that, with Future Forward blocked and perhaps even disbanded, public opinion will eventually sour on the party. Future Forward did lose a by-election in October, perhaps in part because the party could get nothing done in the current political climate. But the fact that, even as Puea Thai’s star wanes, opposition to the military and its proxies has remained solid suggests that if Future Forward is destroyed, the vacuum left will be filled by another opposition force.

In a country ruled for much of the 2010s by a repressive military junta, and where information about powerful actors can be dangerous to dig up, Khao Sod has built a reputation as one of the most respected news outlets in Thailand. Although Khao Sod is a mass market daily with a broad readership, it is known for aggressive reporting. It has hired reporters like Pravit Rojanaphruk, one of the most fearless writers in the country. Pravit resigned in 2015 from his former employer, The Nation newspaper, after being detained by the Thai army for an “attitude adjustment session” for the “offense” of writing critically about the junta. (He also claimed in a tweet that he had been essentially fired by The Nation, and that management had asked him to resign to spare The Nation from more military pressure.) Khao Sod still hired him. Khao Sod is part of the bigger Matichon Group, also known for its quality, independent journalism. Matichon’s weekly magazine, heavy on politics, is as much a must-read for Thai politicians and other Bangkok political influencers as Politico’s top stories are in Washington. Khao Sod also produces an English language website that publishes tough investigative reporting, even on sensitive topics like the military and the monarchy. Yet this reputation for quality, independent journalism did not stop Khao Sod and Matichon Group from partnering with state media from a country with one of the most repressive media environments in the world. In 2019, as Foreign Policy has reported, Khao Sod and Matichon announced a partnership with Xinhua, and Khao Sod began running Xinhua articles. Among the first Xinhua pieces Khao Sod ran, Foreign Policy noted, were articles on the Hong Kong protests that portrayed the protestors as tools of Western agitators and an article saying that China’s Xinjiang province as a place where “equality, solidarity and harmony among ethnic groups and religions have prevailed, and people are enjoying peace and stability.” After the respected Khao Sod and Matichon Group inked a content sharing deal with Xinhua, other Thai news outlets followed suit. By November 2019, as Khao Sod itself reported, outlets including Thai state broadcaster NBT, the publication Manager Online, a mass market outlet with a smaller following than Khao Sod, and Voice Online, the website of one the most progressive, toughest television stations in Thailand, had signed deals with Xinhua. (Voice TV has proven so critical of the Thai military that the armed forces had repeatedly banned Voice TV from the airwaves for brief periods of time.) In total, by the end of the year twelve Thai language outlets had signed content sharing deals with Xinhua. Meanwhile, The Nation had its own content sharing deal with Chinese state media. The Nation participates in the Asia News Network, a media colloquium in which more than twenty news outlets, from across the region, reprint stories from each other. Most, though not all, of the Asia News Network members are not owned or controlled by governments, and are not in any way state media. And yet all of these media outlets, many of which are prestigious organizations, share content with China Daily, a member of the Asia News Network. They regularly pick up content from China Daily, even though China Daily is a state media outlet with none of the editorial independence enjoyed by most of the other Asia News Network outlets. Some Thai outlets touted the deals with Xinhua, although Khao Sod and Matichon executives seemed more reluctant to publicize these agreements. “Thai media [will] receive news directly from a Chinese news agency, instead of a second hand information from Western media only,” Chaiwat Wanichwattana, a journalist who has worked at the business outlet Than Sethakit and heads the Thai-Chinese Journalists Association, said proudly at a discussion timed to some of the signings. “This kind of cooperation is most welcome.” The Thai media executives who attended the discussion with Chaiwat seemed happy about how Chinese state media stories performed on their sites, too, according to a report in Khao Sod. Some executives reportedly said that, since they started picking up Xinhua copy, Thai readers had displayed a growing interest in stories about China’s domestic affairs. Bhuvadej Chirabandhu, from the Thai site Sanook, another of the media outlets that had started picking up Xinhua copy, said that 1.4 million of Sanook’s readers had read Xinhua content posted on its site, according to a Khao Sod report. Given how many Thai news outlets are signing up for Xinhua partnerships, the Chinese government surely is happy as well.

Two months into his second term, Indonesian President Joko Widodo, or Jokowi, has announced bold new economic plans. He has vowed to push through major deregulation, and launch massive new infrastructure projects. But whether Jokowi can implement his economic agenda remains less clear. He has built a cabinet that is an uneasy mix of veteran politicians, including some with unsavory backgrounds, and younger, reform-minded technocrats. This combustible cabinet could undermine his economic plans. And Jokowi’s disinterest in political reforms could prove a hurdle as well, hindering his abilities to get anything done. For more on Jokowi’s second term, see my new World Politics Review column.

1. Continuing Political Regression In recent weeks, Southeast Asia’s authoritarian drift has continued, with several notable events. The Thai government moved to ban the opposition Future Forward Party, sparking major protests in Bangkok. The Cambodian government announced that opposition leader Kem Sokha will go on trial for treason in early 2020. And, of course, former Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi has appeared in The Hague to defend Myanmar against genocide charges. She returned home to a warm reception, suggesting that her defense enjoys wide popularity across Myanmar. Other than in Malaysia, there are few signs of hope for political progress in the region in 2020. 2. Elections: Part 1 As I noted in a previous blog post, there are two consequential elections in Southeast Asia in 2020. In Singapore, the result is essentially foretold, but the extent of the almost assured People’s Action Party (PAP) victory will be interesting to watch—as will how Singapore’s anti-fake news law comes into play. In Myanmar, the result is less certain, and there are real fears that in the run-up to national elections, the politicized environment could spark new rounds of violence. 3. Elections: Part 2 Although the U.S. presidential election does not take place in Southeast Asia, the results of the November 2020 contest will have a significant impact on the region. The Trump administration has tried to beef up links with important partners like Thailand and Vietnam, has developed a new strategy for the region, and has taken a tough stance on human rights challenges in some countries like Cambodia. But it also often has ignored the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) as an organization, sending a relatively low level delegation to recent ASEAN meetings. The White House also has had little to say about issues of major importance to the region like climate change. A Democratic president’s Southeast Asia policy cannot be foretold with certainty, but a Democratic president likely would take a greater interest in climate change and try to reinvigorate links with ASEAN as an organization. However, given growing skepticism of many trade deals in segments of the Democratic Party as well, a Democratic president still would be unlikely to make the United States a major player in Asia’s regional trade integration. And while a Democratic president might take a slightly more hands-off approach to bilateral trade disputes with Southeast Asian nations, a United States that is more hawkish on trade overall is probably here to stay. 4. U.S.-China Relations Southeast Asian countries continue to struggle with how to adapt to a regional environment in which the United States and China have become increasingly confrontational, on issues ranging from trade to cybersecurity. Some Southeast Asian countries seem to have benefited from U.S.-China trade tensions—notably, Vietnam, but also possibly Malaysia and the Philippines. Still, many of the most trade-dependent Southeast Asian economies, like Singapore, are terrified of a return to U.S.-China trade tensions, and also are furious at the overall breakdown of global trade institutions, and the United States’ increasing hawkishness on trade. And, Southeast Asian countries increasingly accept that China is the dominant regional economic actor, and will become the dominant strategic actor, too. But China’s bullying in Southeast Asia has alienated segments of the population even in countries with relatively warm views of Beijing, like Malaysia and Thailand—and it has badly strained relations with Singapore and Vietnam. Countries are adapting, and will continue to adapt in 2020. Vietnam, for instance, continues to improve its military capabilities—and likely will continue to move slowly toward a closer partnership with the United States.

Coming off a year with critical elections in Thailand and Indonesia, in 2020 Southeast Asians will go to the polls in several important countries. Most notably, both Singapore and Myanmar will hold general elections. Taiwan will hold a general election as well, in January, but I will examine Taiwan’s election prospects in a forthcoming CFR In Brief. Singapore and Myanmar sit at opposite ends of the economic spectrum in Southeast Asia; the city-state is the richest country in the region, and Myanmar is one of the poorest. Their elections, too, will have relatively little in common. In Singapore, the People’s Action Party (PAP), which has dominated the country since independence, will surely be returned to power, although probably with a new prime minister after the vote, current Deputy Prime Minister Heng Swee Keat. Singapore politics has become increasingly contested in the past decade, with opposition parties making modest gains. This year the opposition will include not only the longstanding Workers Party but a new party, the Progress Singapore Party, led by a former PAP member of parliament named Tan Cheng Bock. As a former PAP member of parliament, and a former candidate for the mostly ceremonial presidency, he has a more centrist appeal than the Workers Party, and could potentially draw voters who would never pull the lever for the Workers Party. Still, the opposition will probably be fortunate to keep the tiny fraction of seats it currently holds in parliament, and it is not impossible that the opposition gets shut out entirely. In Myanmar, meanwhile, the election is much more uncertain. Aung San Suu Kyi’s government has not delivered on its economic promises, and instead has fallen back onto appeals to nationalism, including standing up against global criticism of Myanmar’s approach to the Rohingya. This approach has had some effect, domestically, in boosting Suu Kyi’s popularity, and her National League for Democracy (NLD) remains in solid shape for the 2020 elections. The Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), the successor to the military’s mass organization during the junta period, still has not become an effective grassroots political party, and its massive loss in the 2015 general election proved difficult to rebound from. It is possible that the NLD’s failures, rising anger against Suu Kyi in some ethnic minority areas, and more effective campaigning by the USDP could work against Suu Kyi’s party in the 2020 contest. However, many ethnic minorities will not want to back what is still viewed as the military’s party, and some voters will instead turn to newly formed parties, like the one set up by former house speaker Shwe Mann. The result could be a parliament with many smaller parties, causing further instability. And the army chief Min Aung Hlaing, who seems to be acting like he wants to become president (while also standing accused of overseeing crimes against humanity) if the USDP and its allies can scratch together enough seats to place him in the presidency, could add another wild card to the equation. One common aspect, however, will be concern about disinformation. In Myanmar, that disinformation largely comes from within. The country has become a hotbed of hate speech and conspiracy-mongering online, often against ethnic and religious minorities—Rohingya, Christian ethnic minorities like the Kachin, and others. Hate speech and conspiracy theories, spread on Facebook and through other online means, helped spark several rounds of killings of Rohingya, including the 2017 ethnic cleansing. In the run-up to the 2020 election, the prospect of more massive disinformation and hate speech looms large. While Facebook has tried to crack down on the sharing of hate speech in Myanmar, the social media giant could take more steps to fight disinformation in one of the most toxic online environments in the world. The government in Naypyidaw, meanwhile, has little incentive to stop disinformation, and the prospect of a combustible election period is high. This year, disinformation might not necessarily be focused on ethnic and religious minorities—it could instead be used against political rivals—but the results could lead to violence, and could spill over and spark attacks on minorities. As James Gomez of the Asia Center in Bangkok has shown, recent election seasons in Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand have included politicians, faith-based groups and other actors using disinformation to mobilize political supporters. He believes that Myanmar could easily fall into the same pattern. In Singapore, meanwhile, the threat of disinformation comes as much from outside the city-state as from within. Singapore faces a growing threat of Chinese influence in its elections and within Singapore society in general. Prominent opinion leaders such as former Ambassador-at-Large Bilahari Kausikan have warned that the city-state must get much tougher in responding to Chinese influence, including expanding efforts to educate the public about Chinese influence operations. Partly due to growing concerns about Chinese disinformation regionally—China has spread disinformation widely in Taiwan—the Singapore government this year passed an anti-fake news law, officially known as the Protection From Online Falsehoods and Manipulation Act. However, the law is not only about China. In an environment as controlled as Singapore, the anti-fake news law, which gives the government broad powers to decide what online information is true or not, raises concerns that it will be used not only against legitimate disinformation but also to silence opposition voices. Such silencing could be particularly relevant in the run-up to the general election. Already, Facebook has complained to the Singapore government that the fake news law must not infringe upon free speech, even as Facebook went along with the law and told users in Singapore that a posting by a Singaporean dissident contained false information.

In the wake of Secretary of Defense Mark Esper’s trip to Southeast Asia, where he tried to reassure U.S. allies and partners of ongoing U.S. commitment to the region, and to highlight Southeast Asian states’ concerns about an ascendant China, there have been many stories of growing anger toward a more assertive Beijing in Southeast Asia and other parts of the world. In a column for the Washington Post, Josh Rogin succinctly captured the mood. He argued that “from Halifax to Hanoi, everyone is worried about China”—about China’s more aggressive military actions, influence strategies, and attempts to promote authoritarianism. But while much of the coverage frames the rising discontent with China as relatively new, it dates back several years in Southeast Asia and other parts of the Asia-Pacific. And at the same time, considerable survey data from Asia suggests that, while countries may worry about Beijing’s growing regional dominance, they also are already convinced that China is the region’s most influential state, and that China only will become more powerful. In research for my forthcoming book on China’s influence strategies in Southeast Asia, I have found that the hardening of regional views toward Beijing dates back at least to the mid-2010s. In part, hardening views stem from citizens of some Asian states realizing that Xi Jinping’s consolidation of power in China could make the country more unstable, and more dangerous regionally, in the long term. Under Xi, Beijing has boosted the government’s promotion of the China model, with this promotion particularly focused on authoritarian or semi-authoritarian states. But Asians from the region’s freest countries, perhaps reflecting on the freedoms gained since the fall of their own dictatorships, increasingly see China’s type of government as unstable and unappealing and dangerous. In an analysis released in 2018 and based on a region-wide survey of young men and women, Yida Zhai of Shanghai Jiao Tong University found that, while only 44 percent of young Chinese though China was politically unstable, more than 70 percent of young South Koreans believed China’s political instability was rising. Zhai further found that not only South Koreans but also high percentages of young people in free states like Japan and Taiwan saw Xi’s China as increasingly unstable. China’s 1990s and 2000s-era charm offensive of soft power stumbled as well in the 2010s, with the stumbles exposed in countries as economically, ethnically, and politically diverse as Cambodia, Myanmar, and South Korea. As China’s outbound investment and foreign aid continued to expand, it was no longer a new source of cash in many developing states. The positive public relations boost Beijing had gotten simply from becoming a large investor and donor began to fade. (China had been a donor to some developing countries during the Cold War, but not anywhere near as large a donor as it would become in the 2000s and 2010s.) Some of the real problems related to Chinese investment and aid began to be exposed in other states as well. At first, in the late 1990s and 2000s many developing states had been thrilled to welcome a large new investor and donor, and there were real economic benefits to Chinese aid. (A study by researchers from AidData at William and Mary University showed that, between 2000 and 2014, Chinese development assistance increased economic growth in recipient states.) But by the mid-2010s, media outlets in freer states were scrutinizing the downsides of China’s investments. Even in less-free states, like Cambodia or Vietnam, it was still possible for citizens to share information on social media. Cambodians and Vietnamese regularly shared stories on social media outlets about problems with Chinese-funded projects. But by the mid-2010s, many Asians also already had become deeply pessimistic about how China will wield its growing power, as Beijing undercut its own longstanding (if hardly true) narrative that its rise would be peaceful. In his analysis released in 2018, Yida Zhai found that, while South Koreans—and most of the young people surveyed from other Asian states—believed that China was now a powerful actor in Asia, a majority of the young South Koreans agreed with the proposition that “the rise of China has been threatening the global order.” Other studies, like surveys of Southeast Asians by the Institute for Southeast Asian Studies (ISEAS)-Yusof Ishak Institute, have confirmed these fears. Roughly half of Southeast Asian respondents in the most recent ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute survey of Southeast Asian attitudes said that “China will become a revisionist power with an intent to turn Southeast Asia into its sphere of influence.” The same survey found that a majority of respondents had either little or no confidence that “China will ‘do the right thing’ in contributing to global peace, security, prosperity, and governance.” And yet Southeast Asians, while taking measures to hedge against Chinese power, also seem convinced that their options are extremely limited. In the same ISEAS-Yusof Ishak study, most respondents said that China is now both the dominant economic and strategic power in Southeast Asia. Asia Barometer studies find the same. Its data, in waves of surveys, has revealed that people in even U.S. allies and staunch partners like Japan and Singapore already believe China is the most influential state in Asia, with the United States a distant second.

Rising seas will endanger more than three hundred million people in the next thirty years, according to a startling new study published in late October in the journal Nature Communications. By 2050, the impacts of rising sea levels will be much more severe than previously thought, “threatening to all but erase some of the world’s great coastal cities” in low-lying areas from Egypt’s Nile Delta to southern and eastern China to Southeast Asia, as the New York Times put it. One of those cities is Ho Chi Minh City, the economic hub of Vietnam, which could be underwater along with the rest of southern Vietnam by mid-century, as these new projections suggest. Many coastal regions across Southeast Asia would be doomed. Yet despite this imminent danger, Southeast Asian countries are lagging behind in preparing for the deluge. For more on the new research on climate change’s impact on Southeast Asia, and Southeast Asian states’ lack of preparation, see my new article in World Politics Review.

It shouldn’t really surprise that in the end, after seven long years of deliberation, India decided against joining the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP). The Narendra Modi government, despite a platform of economic growth that brought it to power in 2014, has revealed itself over the years to be skeptical about trade openness. A series of tariff increases, rumblings that current trade agreements have not benefited India, and concerns about the mounting trade deficit with China have all suggested that New Delhi would sign onto RCEP only reluctantly. And ultimately, the answer was no—at least for now. The Modi government apparently felt that it could not get enough of a reprieve on tariffs, nor enough of an opening for its services professionals, to join RCEP. This is precisely what India’s long-standing trade position has been: reluctance to reduce its own tariffs, while seeking greater services market access from other countries. I wrote about this negotiating posture in my book, citing a 2016 speech by former Minister of Commerce and Industry Nirmala Sitharaman (now finance minister) as the prime example: Commerce Minister Nirmala Sitharaman unwittingly offered a good example. Sitharaman said that blame for delays in completing trade pacts with the EU, Australia, and the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership grouping should not fall on India, and other countries’ attempts to cast India as “obstructionist” was like trash-talk in sports. To the contrary, she said, India’s negotiating partners had rejected its “ambitious” proposals to ease restrictions on movement of persons. She added, apparently without irony, that trading partners sought for India to reduce tariffs on goods like wheat and autos—but that “India will not yield” to pressure. Indian officials will need to strategize for an economic world in which their concerns for market access abroad align with what they permit at home. As the saying goes, you can’t have it both ways. It is certainly true that China has become a trade powerhouse, and India’s concerns about its trade deficit with China and a desire to prevent further “flooding” of the Indian market with Chinese goods resemble those of the Trump administration toward trade with China. But it is hard to see where India is headed: the prime minister wants to increase manufacturing in India, yet by staying out of a regional trade pact, India runs the risk of missing out on trade with parties now inside the RCEP tent. In an era in which manufacturing requires the ability to become more—not less—integrated into global supply chains, this decision appears for the moment to make it harder to boost manufacturing in India. But more to the point, the central issue for the Indian government isn’t in the wording of a trade deal, but in the competitiveness of the Indian economy. Will Indian political leaders use this time outside the RCEP to take the tough decisions needed to make the Indian economy more globally competitive—and therefore an economy that does not need protection from its own region? Asia has become, according to the World Economic Forum (WEF)’s Global Competitiveness Report, the “most competitive [region] in the world.” Singapore tops the WEF list, and all of the RCEP countries except Laos and Cambodia beat India, at number sixty-eight (Myanmar does not appear). It’s understandable that with recent news of slowing growth and rising unemployment, the Modi government was unwilling to take steps that could result in further short-term economic pain and political backlash. Farmers are protesting, the anti-trade right-wingers never wanted trade openness anyway, and the Congress party has been making anti-RCEP noises. But for the current and future prosperity of the Indian economy, someone will have to explain why further reforms will be needed for India to become a more globally competitive economy. So far, it doesn’t look like anyone’s ready to stand up to make this case.

Earlier this week, Thailand’s King Vajiralongkorn stripped his consort of all her titles, claiming that she had been disloyal and was essentially trying to take the place of the king. He had only appointed the consort, Sineenat Wongvajirapakdi, about three months ago. As consort, she was essentially another companion for the king, in addition to his wife. The practice of having an official consort, in addition to one’s wife, had not been in practice in Thailand in a century, since the era of Thailand’s absolute monarchy. In the absolute monarchy period, polygyny was common and monarchs often had many consorts, but that practice of having an official consort had not occurred since the end of the absolute monarchy in 1932. The punishment of Sineenat is about more than her, however. For one, it further suggests that the king potentially desires the powers and privileges of the absolute monarchy period, and does not care if he flaunts them openly. Besides naming (and the removing) an official consort, he also reportedly has taken more personal control of the powerful Crown Property Bureau, defanged his Privy Council of advisors, taken personal control of several units of the Thai military, and intervened more openly in politics. For more on the ways in which Vajiralongkorn has consolidated power, and the dangerous implications, see my new World Politics Review article

Brian Braun is resident program officer in Malaysia for the International Republican Institute. Follow him at @BR_Braun. Malaysia made history on July 16 when, in the country’s first unanimous parliamentary vote, it adopted a constitutional amendment lowering the voting age from 21 to 18 years of age. The amendment, also known as Undi18 (“Vote 18”), is a laudable achievement for both youth inclusion and democratic reform. In approving the measure, not only did Malaysia’s government fulfill one of the promises it made before the May 2018 general elections, it also could add an estimated 3.8 million young Malaysians to the voter rolls, making them an increasingly important part the electoral map. The ruling Pakatan Harapan (PH) coalition credits its victory in the 2018 elections in part to youth who overwhelmingly supported its insurgent campaign against the then-ruling Barisan Nasional (BN) coalition. In the 2018 election, Malaysian voters aged 21-39 constituted the country’s largest voting bloc—totaling 41 percent of registered voters, while 21-to-30-year-olds alone made up a fifth of registered voters. This is an important statistic for politicians to remember when automatic voter registration is implemented ahead of the next general elections in 2023 and the number of young registered voters likely will increase. While the constitutional amendment was a success for the governing coalition, it is a reminder to all political parties of the necessity to address issues important to young voters. According to a survey conducted by the International Republican Institute (IRI), economic growth is the most important issue for Malaysians between the ages 18 and 35. Forty-nine percent of Malaysians in that age group think the economy should be the top priority for the national government, while majorities believe the government is doing a “bad” or “very bad” job reducing unemployment (54 percent) and addressing the cost of living (50 percent), respectively. To make meaningful progress on young Malaysians’ top priorities, political leaders will need to identify ways to provide more employment opportunities for youth and to slow the rising cost of living, which disproportionately affects the young. Since 2011, the unemployment rate for Malaysians between 15 and 24 has been rising. In 2018, the national unemployment rate stood at only 3.3 percent, but the unemployment rate for youth between the ages of 15 and 24 was 10.9 percent, making jobless 15-24-year-olds nearly 60 percent of Malaysia’s total population of unemployed. At the same time, surveys about wages and standards of living show that unmarried diploma and degree-holders earn less in entry level wages than what is necessary to live in peninsular Malaysia, which is where the majority of jobs are being created. In addition, the starting pay for graduates with a basic degree has remained virtually stagnant since 2010.  One reason for this stagnation in starting pay for new graduates is that the Malaysian economy is not producing enough high-skilled and high-paying jobs. Between 2010 and 2017, the number of diploma and degree holders in Malaysia’s workforce increased by an average of 173,457 annually, outnumbering the 98,514 high-skilled jobs created over the same period. Indeed, a 2016 report by the Penang Institute shows, an increasing share of Malaysian graduates are working in mid- or low-skill occupations that do not require the degrees they obtained at university. Malaysia’s top job-creating industries between 2011 and 2015—retail, agriculture, accommodation and food, education—employ mid-to-low-skilled workers. However, many Malaysians graduating from university do not have the skills to take these higher-value jobs, and political leaders need to take measures to ensure that universities are setting students up for success as competitive job candidates. According to a 2014 survey by the World Bank and Talent Corporation, Malaysia’s graduates are entering the job market without the skills employers are seeking. Of the businesses surveyed, 80 percent think Malaysian universities need to revise university curricula “to reflect the current realities of the labor market,” including strengthening students’ critical thinking, problem solving and communication skills. Political parties should not wait until the next general elections in 2023 to address these challenges. In Sarawak, where the PH coalition specifically called out low wages as “unjust” and promised in its election manifesto to create more employment opportunities, will hold state legislative assembly elections as early as mid-2020. Hoping to make gains in a state long dominated by local parties that once were aligned with Barisan Nasional, the elections may be a key test of PH support among youth. Although it is still uncertain whether the voting age amendment will be implemented in time for 18-to-21-year-olds in Sarawak to vote in state elections, Malaysian youth are undoubtedly a crucial constituency. Asked in the same IRI survey how likely they are to vote in the next general election, 84 percent of Malaysian youth indicated they are likely to vote, a staggering percentage within the electorate’s largest voting bloc. The question for Malaysia’s politicians is who will get their vote.

By Hunter Marston and Joshua Kurlantzick Hunter Marston is a doctoral candidate at Australian National University. In the run-up to Myanmar’s elections next year, there is little positive news to report about a country that seemed like a democratic success story less than five years ago. On Aung San Suu Kyi’s watch, over the past four years the country has seen a regression in press freedom, expanded usage of anti-defamation laws and a general crackdown on speech, and massive rights abuses in western Myanmar’s Rakhine State. Although over one million Rohingya have already fled Rakhine, and chaos is engulfing the state again, as the military battles the Buddhist, ethnic Rakhine Arakan Army; the fighting is spreading, as army units reportedly have been attacking civilians as well. Fighting has ramped up in other ethnic minority areas as well, in the north and northeast, and Suu Kyi’s government also has made little headway towards serious economic reform either. Her government has shown little ability to develop or implement economic policy, tourists are scared off by the country’s deteriorating international image, inbound investment is falling, and Suu Kyi reportedly remains focused on the shaky peace process with ethnic rebels, not paying enough attention to the country’s dire economic needs. (To be fair, in recent months the National League for Democracy (NLD) has appeared to take up some reformist ideas, calling for changes to Myanmar’s constitution that would dilute the power of the military and potentially foster democratic progress.) The situation is unlikely to improve this year or next. Although army chief Min Aung Hlaing has embarked upon a goodwill tour of the country that apparently aims to polish his image and possibly prepare him to be nominated for the presidency, he already has been linked to attacks in Rakhine State for which a UN special fact finding panel has said top Myanmar military commanders should be prosecuted for genocide. If he were to be elected, the country’s international image will probably get worse (although Suu Kyi has done it no favors by minimizing rights abuses and defending crackdowns on freedom of speech), and it is hard to imagine Min Aung Hlaing resolving the conflicts in the north and northeast, or the spiraling battle between the military and the Arakan Army. Meanwhile, with the situation still miserable for Rohingya in Rakhine State, and for Rohingya in camps in Bangladesh, there is a greater possibility of a more organized, armed Rohingya group emerging as compared to the shadowy, seemingly small group that has already launched attacks. When Suu Kyi’s party triumphed in 2015, in the first free national elections since 1990, Myanmar was expected to turn a corner. Building on five years of progress under a civilian government installed by the military, Suu Kyi’s government, which took power the next year, would pave the way toward democratic consolidation and attract foreign investment while taking steps to reduce deep poverty and inequality. With the goodwill she enjoyed, Suu Kyi would even possibly end some of Myanmar’s long-running civil wars. The Barack Obama administration, and many in Congress, believed that Myanmar was clearly on the right track and also was an example of successful diplomacy by the United States and other countries, which had pressured the country’s generals with years of sanctions but then slowly eased pressure as real political change emerged. In reality, as Thant Myint-U acknowledges in his new book exploring Myanmar’s current crisis and its roots, the country was closer to a failed state when Suu Kyi took over than many outsiders would have imagined—and it veers even closer to a failed state today. Its infrastructure was destroyed, the central government faced ongoing insurgencies, the education system was in tatters, the military remained the dominant institution in society, and the history of Myanmar royal rule, British colonial rule, and junta rule had left the population extremely divided along ethnic and religious lines. These divisions would be exacerbated by social media, which flourished in Myanmar with few constraints, spreading dangerous conspiracies and fomenting hate against the Rohingya and other minorities. Thant Myint-U, a former UN diplomat and advisor to Myanmar president Thein Sein, Suu Kyi’s predecessor as civilian leader, (Suu Kyi is not technically president but she clearly is Myanmar’s civilian leader) has become one of the ablest chroniclers of modern-day Myanmar and its multiple deep economic, religious, and ethnic fault lines. (He also, notably, has worked to preserve some of Yangon’s most important architectural legacies.) As a prominent advisor to Thein Sein and other military reformers who shepherded the country between 2011 and 2016, a period when most Western states ended their isolation of the country, he had a first-hand view of Myanmar’s challenges, and how they could have been addressed. In some cases, as he notes, because he was a prominent member of Myanmar society (his grandfather was former UN secretary general U Thant) and had enjoyed ties to both military reformists and the NLD, he served as an interlocutor between Myanmar leaders and top foreign leaders, including Barack Obama, during his time advising Thein Sein. Thant Myint-U looks deeper into Myanmar’s history, beyond 2011, however, to explain why the country that seemed so hopeful really was always going to be tough to transform. His book is elegant and concise, cramming in Myanmar’s older and modern history, background on the country’s racial and ethnic divisions, stories of the run-up to the 2011-2015 reform period, his personal experiences, and his assessment of Myanmar’s long, complicated history with free market economic models. Although detailed, it could appeal not only to Myanmar experts and policymakers but also to a general audience of people simply interested in what happened to the country and its icon. Thant Myint-U traces Myanmar’s history—from its ancient kingdoms to its period of British colonial rule to its early years of independence. He pays special attention to the deep and lasting divisions that the legacy of colonization left on the country. Among other efforts to divide Myanmar, the British brought with them thousands of Indian migrants from British-administered India, with whom they filled the ranks of colonial administration in the country, much to the detriment of Burmese civil service, education, and the development of Myanmar’s aspiring middle class. These divisive policies left indelible scars on society, casting a long shadow after independence, on government capacity (only a small minority of Myanmar citizens benefited from both the higher education and administrative training of their colonial rulers) and on the collective memory of many Myanmar citizens. A sour ethnic nationalism curdled among the majority Burmans, and during decades of military rule the Myanmar government forcibly ejected hundreds of thousands of ethnic Indians and launched multiple scorched earth operations against the Muslim Rohingya. This sour nationalism would have effects on many other minorities as well. When Myanmar achieved national independence in 1948, the country’s numerous ethnic and religious divisions quickly posed a problem for the first Prime Minister U Nu. Civil war erupted across the country within the first year of Burmese independence. Ultimately, the army would wrest political control in 1958 with promises of a “caretaker government” that soon gave way to decades of brutal military rule, with the army faced off against communist and ethnic insurgencies. By the time the country began to shift away from military rule to civilian rule in the 2010s, it already had vast internal divides, a ruined economy, a legacy of vicious racial conflicts, and the ongoing effects of authoritarian rule. Thant Myint-U, like many other scholars, argues that, given the deep, possibly unbridgeable divisions left by Myanmar’s history, in the modern era outsiders have seen the country in too binary a focus: A people oppressed by a ruthless military dictatorship. Furthermore, he argues, there has been little effort outside Myanmar to understand the complexities of Myanmar’s authoritarian history or its myriad ethnic conflicts. This myopia, he believes, has limited the international community’s ability to respond to many of Myanmar’s modern-day crises, like the ongoing battles between the military and ethnic armies. But by mostly focusing on structural causes and the legacy of history, Thant Myint-U gives the impression that these factors are unchanging determinants of Myanmar’s present and future—that the country was ruined, potentially doomed. And this type of essentialism also allows the author to avoid placing responsibility for Myanmar’s problems on individual policymakers—both military and civilian. Thant Myint-U does discuss some of the pivotal players in Myanmar’s political transformation in the years leading up to and immediately after 2010-2011, but his discussion focuses on a quite narrow cast of actors, including the NGO leader Nay Win Maung of Myanmar Egress, Aung Min and Soe Thane (two former generals Thant labels as “reformers”), and Aung San Suu Kyi. The book accords Nay Win Maung, Aung Min, and Soe Thane central roles in Myanmar’s moment of political reform. Nay Win Maung was a controversial figure in the country’s budding civil society movement between the years of 2006, when he founded Myanmar Egress, and early 2012, when he died of a heart attack. His NGO was frequently accused of sacrificing the principle of providing independent advice to the numerous advantages of working with the former junta as a self-described “third force.” Aung Min and Soe Thane were respectively minister of railways and minister of industry in the former administration of President Thein Sein, himself a former general and prime minister under the military junta of Senior General Than Shwe. Yet Thant Myint U’s account mostly ignores the contributions of countless other individuals to the reform process and glosses over the murky pasts of some of the key figures discussed. By only hearing the perspectives of these few elites, a casual reader may infer from the retelling of the reform years that Myanmar lacks a diverse and talented pool of grassroots civil society actors, and that the reform process did not stem from a broader societal push. This narrative also verges on whitewashing the records of former generals such as Aung Min, Soe Thane (formerly commander in chief of the navy), and Thein Sein, who worked within a junta that regularly violated its peoples’ human rights, for instance by employing forced labor, enlisting child combatants, and using rape as a weapon of war. Thant’s account also doesn’t tell the reader much about where or why Aung San Suu Kyi and the current ruling party, the NLD, may have failed to achieve greater political liberalization, progress toward peace with ethnic armies, and any solution to the human rights crisis in Rakhine State. In the end, Thant Myint-U lays the blame for Myanmar’s stalled democratization and continued polarization on (unnamed) opportunistic actors playing on the fears of foreign influence amidst rapid change and “a failure of the imagination” to challenge Myanmar’s insular nationalism. The book leaves the reader with little hope. He also hints at a future in which the NLD and military’s shared vision of ethnic nationalism and managed market reforms may lead the two former adversaries to a brokered political trajectory that allows each side to benefit: the military would maintain its traditional prestige as guardian of national unity, and Suu Kyi and the NLD would be able to actually implement policies, on issues ranging from economic reform to even potentially some modest military reforms, without the military negating the NLD’s decision-making. But given the military’s and the NLD’s record so far—both sides’ unwillingness to compromise and also the NLD’s failures to develop coherent policies on almost every issue—this brokered transition is hard to imagine. Yet if Myanmar is to escape its past divisions and overcome the constraints of its colonial legacy, its leaders will have to find a way to enshrine pluralism and tolerance in the national imagination. Thant Myint-U suggests that overcoming economic and social inequalities will be essential to that transformation. But he advances few tangible policy visions for a more equitable society. With the NLD unable to stimulate foreign direct investment and kickstart economic growth, such challenges may be insurmountable for decades to come. However, Thant Myint-U makes a compelling case for the urgent need for creative thinking—creative thinking that could result in new and effective policy responses to the multiple crises unfolding in Myanmar. In so doing—and by rooting his new book deeply in Myanmar's historical context—he offers a valuable contribution, and one accessible to a broad array of readers.

In recent months, the Myanmar government has begun pushing for some of the over one million Rohingya living in Bangladesh to return to Myanmar’s Rakhine State. As I noted in a blog post for CFR.org earlier this month, Naypyidaw recently launched a plan to facilitate Rohingya repatriation that was actually the second proposed plan, after an earlier one last November failed. The Bangladesh government has supported Naypyidaw’s proposed repatriation of Rohingya, although so far no Rohingya have taken up the offer to return to Rakhine State. Yet lost in much of the coverage of the Rohingya’s grim fate as refugees in Bangladesh, and the growing tensions between the Rohingya and citizens of Bangladesh, is that the situation in Rakhine State itself remains dire. So dire, in fact that another genocide of Rohingya is certainly possible, two years after earlier crimes against humanity decimated Rohingya in western Myanmar. For more on the situation in Rakhine State, see my new World Politics Review article.

Over the past decade, democracy has regressed in much of Asia, though there are notable exceptions including Malaysia and Taiwan. Southeast Asia has witnessed a reversal in Thailand, weakening institutions and norms in Bangladesh, India, and the Philippines, backsliding in Cambodia and even to some extent Indonesia, and sustained authoritarian rule in Laos and Vietnam, among other examples. Most notably, despite decades of predictions that China would, as it grew wealthier and more modern, undergo the type of political liberalization that had occurred in South Korea and Taiwan, China actually, in many ways, is more politically repressive today than it was in the early period of its reform era. The space in China today for political discussion has shrunk, even mildly reformist voices within the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) have been ostracized or essentially purged, the internet and social media are far more controlled than they were in China even five years ago, and the government is rolling out some of the most Big Brotheresque surveillance technology of any state on earth. In his concise but well-argued new book, Mark Thompson, head of the Department of Asian and International Studies and director of the Southeast Asia Research Center at the City University of Hong Kong, notes that China could clearly challenge the notion that modernism must necessarily, eventually, lead to political liberalization. China could indeed further modernize without democratizing. Thompson places China’s four-decade trajectory in the context of authoritarian modernization in East Asia (and to some extent other areas like Europe), where many states, at least initially, modernized their economies and societies without real political reform. He examines the links between China’s strategies and those of Singapore, the clearest model for what China has achieved—albeit one that can only explain so much about China’s development—and he cogently assesses how the Communist Party stays in power, and well could stay in power for many decades to come, diverging from the paths of other Asian modernizers, and even from Singapore. My full review of Thompson’s timely new book can be read in the Kyoto Review of Southeast Asia.

Earlier this month, the Myanmar government embarked upon a new plan to begin repatriating Rohingya who had fled Rakhine State after waves of brutal violence there. It was the second time Naypyidaw tried to begin the repatriation process—the first attempt was in November—and this time the Myanmar government reportedly had approved some three thousand Rohingya to return, with the backing of Bangladesh for this action. None apparently voluntarily took up the offer, instead fleeing back to the camps in Bangladesh or hiding out. That Rohingya would not want to return to Myanmar is hardly surprising. It has been only two years since the deadliest wave of violence against them in Rakhine State. Rakhine State, where most Rohingya in Myanmar live, remains a violent and unstable place. In recent months, violence in Rakhine State has been rising again, as the army battles the ethnic Rakhine Arakan Army. The military has resorted to its usual scorched earth tactics in response, and the UN’s human rights office has accused the Tatmadaw of launching attacks against civilians in this fighting. Amnesty International has further issued a report claiming that the Myanmar military is committing new atrocities in Rakhine State, against both ethnic Rakhine and Rohingya—including extrajudicial executions. Meanwhile, the Myanmar government, while telling Rohingya that they can come back safely, has not exactly created a safe, trustworthy environment for their return. The ongoing violence in Rakhine State certainly does not indicate a strong prospect for safe return. Senior Myanmar government leaders continue to demonize the Rohingya and also refer to those still in Myanmar as illegals. A report released this week by Fortify Rights, a human rights and investigative group closely monitoring the situation for Rohingya, found that Myanmar authorities have continued to force Rohingya still living in Myanmar to accept National Verification Cards, which basically mark them as foreigners and preclude their getting citizenship rights. And the Myanmar and Bangladesh authorities did not appear to consult with Rohingya who were put on a list for repatriation, or prepare anywhere for them to restore their lives in Myanmar. The UN fact-finding mission found that the Myanmar government has simply leveled portions of northern Rakhine State where Rohingya had lived. Naypyidaw has done little to rebuild to prepare for a return, or offer infrastructure or social services of any kind in northern Rakhine State. Instead, Myanmar companies are developing tracts of land formerly occupied by Rohingya. A UN fact-finding report released in early August found that the Tatmadaw’s “crony companies” are funding projects in Rakhine State now designed to reengineer the province’s ethnic makeup and “erase evidence of Rohingya belonging to Myanmar.” Instead, the more than one million Rohingya in Bangladesh may try to stay in Bangladesh indefinitely, a scenario that is becoming increasingly plausible—though as Bertil Lintner notes, the Bangladesh government desperately does not want them to remain. Already, the camp on the Myanmar-Bangladesh border is the largest refugee camp in the world, overflowing with people, crowded, and highly vulnerable to disease and human trafficking. As Lintner notes, Bangladeshi citizens are growing increasingly resentful of the refugees and worried that they might take locals’ jobs, the camp’s massive size is causing environmental damage, and there are real fears that, the longer so many Rohingya stay as refugees in desperate conditions in Bangladesh, they could become targets for radicalization by extremist groups. Yet given the abysmal prospects for Rohingya if they returned to Myanmar, he is probably correct to note that the Rohingya are “there to stay” in Bangladesh, at least for a long time. If this is the reality, what can Bangladesh, and other governments and aid agencies do about it? For one, while continuing to prepare for the (remote) possibility that Rohingya would be safely repatriated to Myanmar, the UN and other third party actors could push harder for a third country settlement solution for at least some Rohingya. There is at least some precedent for this option—Bhutanese refugees in Nepal have almost all been resettled in third countries—although it will obviously be difficult in the current global environment of large refugee flows and leaders increasingly opposed to taking in refugees. Still, there are third countries, in the region and globally, where more Rohingya resettlement might be possible in at least modest numbers, including Malaysia, Indonesia, and Canada. Yet the likelihood is that the Rohingya are going to remain in Bangladesh, and both the Bangladesh government and outside actors need to prepare for that possibility.

Earlier this month, Nuon Chea, the former number two in the Khmer Rouge’s genocidal 1975–1979 regime, died in a hospital in Phnom Penh. He was ninety-three years old.  Nuon Chea had served under Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot, and was seen as one of the major planners for the Khmer Rouge’s rapid, brutal overhaul of Cambodian society, which included emptying Phnom Penh of citizens, murdering a sizable portion of the population, and torturing and killing some 14,000 people at an infamous prison called Tuol Sleng. Nuon Chea, who until his death portrayed himself as a Cambodian hero, also was one of the few former Khmer Rouge leaders who actually ever faced trial. And yet despite securing convictions against Nuon Chea and Khieu Samphan, the Khmer Rouge’s head of state, and legally declaring that the Khmer Rouge committed genocide, the tribunal has been mostly a bust. For more on the failures of the Khmer Rouge tribunal, see my new World Politics Review article.