New Mandala

In this podcast we revisit Radio UNTAC. The podcast presents the work by the UN-established radio station in Phnom Penh and their role in informing millions of Cambodians en route to casting their ballot in the much-anticipated 1993 election to create a new internationally recognised government.

The Boundary of Our Rights, Radio UNTAC August 1993. សិទ្ធិមានត្រឹមណា by New Mandala

In this podcast episode (in Khmer), we dive deep into archives of the United Nations Transitional Authority in Cambodia and its UNTAC Radio with selected key events on the promises and the challenges from the signing of the Paris Peace Agreement on October 23, 1991 to the UNTAC supervised general election in May 1993 and beyond. The episode reflects on the challenges of disarming four well-equipped conflicting military factions, combatting ethnic hate speech and responding to violence against ethnic Vietnamese, the return of Cambodian refugees, the pre-election inflammatory political rhetoric, and failed attempts at secession by CPP officials after electoral defeats.

In this last episode of the second series of Philippines beyond clichés, Associate Professor Nicole Curato talks to sociologist Dr Mary Racelis to unpack the idea that major cities like Manila should be decongested by moving the urban poor out and moving highrise developments and private capital in. Who has the right to live in the city and what role can facilitated community organisation that engages all residents of the city play in determining the shape and life of a the city?

In the penultimate episode of our second series, Dr Nicole Curato of UC's Centre for Participatory Democracy and Global Governance takes a look at a topic very close to her heart, when she talks to Dr Teresa Melgar about participatory governance. While the practice attract cynicism in many quarters, Dr Melgar's comparative sociological research in Porto Alegre in Brazil and Naga in the Philippines has helped to understand how local democracy unfolds in post-authoritarian settings, and the role that  institutionalising participatory processes can play in this.

In this fourth episode from New Mandala's second series of podcasts looking at the Philippines beyond the clichès, Associate Professor Nicole Curato from University of Canberra's Centre for Deliberative Democracy and Global Governance sits down with Wataru Kusaka to discuss the widespread notion that populist voters are deluded. Wataru Kusaka's extensive ethnographical work with urban poor communities has helped him develop an empathetic and deep understanding of their motivations. From this experience, Kusaka emphasises the importance of recognising populist voters as concrete individuals, rather than abstract others, in the pursuit of truly deliberative democracy.

Ep3: Tambay by New Mandala

In this second episode of our second series of the Philippines beyond clichés, the topic of discussion is sexism. Is the Philippines a sexist society? Associate Professor Nicole Curato of the University of Canberra's Centre for Deliberative Democracy and Global Governance speaks with Dr Maria Tanyag,  a research fellow in the Coral Bell School of Asia Pacific Affairs, in order to unpack the complexities of this question. How can we "understand or disaggregate gender equality issues based on multiple overlapping issues of inequality based on class, religion, sexuality, ethnicity, and also geographic locations" and consider the potential of intersectionality across marginalised groups in Filipino society?

In this first episode in New Mandala's second podcast series Philippines beyond clichés, Associate Professor at Western Sydney University speaks to Nicole Curato from the University of Canberra about television entertainment and celebrity culture, revealing how this important field of study can tell us more about the perpetuation and performance of inequality, injustice and power dynamics in broader society.

Sumit K. Mandal, "Becoming Arab: Creole Histories and Modern Identity in the Malay World" by New Mandala

Reposting the February episode of the New Books in Southeast Asian Studies channel: In her book Sovereign Women in a Muslim Kingdom: The Sultanahs of Aceh, 1641-1699 (Cornell University Press, 2018), Sher Banu Khan provides a rare and empirically rich view of queenship in early modern maritime Southeast Asia. Four women ruled the Muslim realm of Aceh in succession during the second half of the seventeenth century. Their reign – with the acquiescence of the religious elite in the kingdom – was remarkable in a society where women were not seen as natural rulers, and where in more recent history, public leadership by women was discouraged. Writing against extant historiography that depicts this era as a period of decline, Khan argues instead that the queens of Aceh enabled diplomatic and trading networks to prosper and asserted Acehnese sovereignty in encounters with European powers. In our conversation, we discuss the challenges in multi-lingual archival work, how studying queens can help us to reframe the idea of decline, the gendering of authority and leadership as well as the place of female authority in the Muslim world. Sher Banu Khan is an associate professor of Malay Studies at the National University of Singapore. Faizah Zakaria is an Assistant Professor of History at Nanyang Technological University. She is completing her first monograph on dialectical relationships between landscape and religious conversions in maritime Southeast Asia. You can find her website here or on Twitter @laurelinarien

ANU's Prof Hall Hill interviews Thomas Lembong, chairman of Indonesia's Investment Coordination Board (BKPM). Recorded during the 2019 ANU Crawford Leadership Forum. Transcript available at www.newmandala.org/qa-thomas-lembong-on-indonesias-economy

New Mandala's Philippines editor Dr Nicole Curato speaks with Yves Aquino, a doctor and bioethicist who is completing his PhD in Department of Philosophy and the Research Centre for Agency, Values and Ethics, Macquarie University. They discuss the cliché that "in order to be beautiful in the Philippines, you have to look like Pia Wurtzbach".

New Mandala's Philippines editor Dr Nicole Durato speaks with ANU's Dr Hannah Bulloch about how her research on the island of Siquijor calls into question the cliché that Filipinos look to America for ideas about economic and social progress. Read Hannah Bulloch's "In Pursuit of Progress: Narratives of Development on a Philippine Island" (University of Hawai'i Press, 2017)https://www.uhpress.hawaii.edu/title/in-pursuit-of-progress-narratives-of-development-on-a-philippine-island/

"Whither academic freedom in Thailand? The criminal case against Dr Chayan and four others" Discussion recorded at the Australian National University, 23/8/2018. Speakers: Dr Craig Reynolds | Australian National University Dr Tyrell Haberkorn | University of Wisconsin-Madison Prof Anthony Connolly | Australian National University Chaired by: Dr Nick Cheesman | Australian National University This event was co-hosted by the Department of Political & Social Change, ANU College of Asia and the Pacific, and the Centre for International & Public Law, ANU College of Law. See also: Scholars at Risk—https://www.scholarsatrisk.org/

New Mandala's editor Liam Gammon talks to Assoc Prof Bridget Welsh about how the institutions Pakatan Harapan inherits from BN complicate reform efforts, and ANU's Dr Ross Tapsell talks to Prof Shamsul AB about the social and ideological constants that GE14 didn't change.

New Mandala's Philippines editor Dr Nicole Curato speaks with Dr Clarke Jones from the Australian National University (ANU) about what real-world effects the Philippines' "tough on crime" mentality has in the prison system. Clarke Jones is a criminologist based at the ANU's Research School of Psychology, specialising in ethnographic, longitudinal and participant observation research. As part of the Australian Intervention Support Hub, Dr Jones works closely with communities that are often marginalised, hard-to-access and at-risk. This includes terrorist offenders and prison gangs in the Philippines, as well as work with specific marginalised and vulnerable communities in Australia. He is the co-author along with Dr Raymund Narag of "Inmate Radicalisation and Recruitment in Prisons" (Routledge, 2018), which draws on their ethnographic research inside the Philippine prison system.

What's changed about how politics and policy are reported on after GE14? ANU's Dr Ross Tapsell talks with Boo Sy-Lyn (Twitter: @boosulyn) and Zurairi Abdul Rahman (Twitter: @zurairi , news editors and columnists at the Malay Mail. Podcast produced with the support of the Malaysia Institute at the ANU's College of Asia and the Pacific.

Part 1 of a new series of podcasts on post-GE14 Malaysia. New Mandala editor Liam Gammon talks to Prof Meredith Weiss about whether Malaysia is witnessing 'democratisation through elections', and ANU's Dr Ross Tapsell speaks with Dato' Ambiga Sreenevasan about how civil society can hold the new government to its promises of reform. This podcast is produced with the support of the Malaysia Institute at the Australian National University's College of Asia and the Pacific.

Our Philippines editor Dr Nicole Curato sits down with Assoc Prof Ronald Mendoza, Dean of the Ateneo School of Government, Ateneo de Manila University, to talk about the idea that political dynasties engender poverty in the Philippines. In the previous instalment in this series of podcasts, Nicole talked to Assoc Prof Jayeel Cornelio about what it means to label The Philippines as a 'Catholic Country': https://soundcloud.com/newmandala/the-philippines-beyond-cliches-catholicism-with-jayeel-cornelio