[…] week I posted about the Sino-Thai “tree of friendship” planted by Thailand’s Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn in the Yunnanese border town of Jie […]
Thank you. Please upload to youtube any video of your protest. Public is not allowed to protest in Singapore so it will be good for Singaporeans inside and outside the country to see that even Mr Lee can be protested against.
Khun Somsak: I am not so sure that the reasons for the prominence of the issue of a boycott are obvious. It seems that people have different reasons, or combinations of reasons, to argue for a boycott: support of the military government (there will probably have been an election before the conference); the conference organizers using foreign academics as tools for unprecedented royalist propaganda (this remains an assumption; this issue is about unethical academic behavior); censorship in face of crucial questions concerning the current and future political order of Thailand (what you refer to as the combination of coup and monarchy). Finally, most Thai and foreign academics are probably not at all “concerned.”
P.S.: I also don’t think that Handley’s book has anything much to do with it.
It’s partly my fault for not making myself clear enough. I don’t have a literary prowess to carry people away to the game of language. Can’t stand why human beings bother to publish books or write miles of words while we can sum up our thought in half A4 page. So, no need to aplogise, really.
Regarding the incoming Thai Studies Conference, I maintain my point. I don’t think any of us who’ve never been on the receiving end have the rights to speak the language of ‘freedom’, ‘liberty’, or ‘reason’. Four years ago I met a family whose three generations of men are rubber planters– what does this imply about this coup or history of Thailand’s coups?
It’s all about keeping people at the same place.
How this social reality (yes, reality* not theory or that elusive term academics called empiricism) relates to the boycott/attendance of the conference, you intelligent people decide for youself. But I pledge people who are defending ‘academic freedom’ to shut up. It absruds to hear people ‘who had it so good’ keep on voicing their concern wheras all that victims can do is to get by.
China and Singapore are the life support systems for the regime in Yangon.
If the United States really valued change in Burma they would have used their relationships with China and Singapore to affect a change long ago.
The real issue is that the United States does not value Burma-Myanmar relations and uses Burma as a human rights show, essentially the only real value that Burma-Myanmar has for American policy makers.
Over the last twenty years Chinese economic interests have become so entrenched in Upper Burma (Kachin and Shan States) that China now probably has more of a sovereign interest in Burma, not just an economic one.
The building of a oil pipeline would merely solidify this sovereign interest. For instance, if in the future some political instability threatened that pipeline, China would have a justification for military intervention. This is essentially what happened to politically insulated Afghanistan in 1979. Add to that Singapore pushing from the south and you have obvious extrapolations for the future.
How many times have I been lectured on the horrible fate of Burma by people who have no absolutely idea of the place besides a long list of disconnected human rights abuses and have no idea of the context which allows these abuses to persist.
End economic sanctions against Burma now.
End Burma’s isolation now.
Reconnect Burma with the world now.
End China and Singapore’s monopoly of influence over Burma now.
“And this is a remarkable feat as after all we’re just a tiny red dot, looking from the map.”
Not so remarkable. It’s not so amazing that small Special Economic Zones like Shenzhen or Singapore, and in the future in the Iskandar Development Region across the straits in Johore, can develop more quickly. They are not saddled with the burden of a huge slow moving rural periphery like Thailand is.
The only time that Singapore has come on my radar in recent years is when I heard about the latest act of exploitation it pulled on its neighbors.
My Burmese merchant marine friends told me the stories of how their friends who had dared to defend their rights as workers were shuttled to an airport lounge when they arrived in Singapore and flown back to Burma with the help of the Singaporean government. Their fate after this, who knows.
Than Shwe flies his grandson everyday to Singapore everyday to study, I hear. Than Shwe and other elites received the medical treatment and other services they can’t consume in Burma cordoned off and isolated from the world so they can collect their economic rents. Singapore serves as a conduit for elite capital flight from Burma also, I hear.
Business relations between Singaporean elites and Thaksin business interests are known to the world now.
The solution is pretty clear, it seems. Create a little Singapore in your own country, so you can capture the economic rents for yourself that Singapore has captured. Malaysia is following in this direction, others will too eventually.
Re: Khun david w. writes :
“I am struck as is Srithanonchai – why is the issue of censorship and self-censorship in scholarship and its presentation at scholarly venues so intense now as to lead to calls for a boycott? I can only presume it has much to do with the release of Handley’s book….”
No, not quite. First of all this is the first coup in 15 years! There’s been no talk of boycott because there’s no coup for 15 years. Secondly, This is not only the first coup in 15 years but the first in 30 years that the monarchy is being suspected of direct involvement. Also, the degree to which a gathering like this is being used to promote the monarchy (while its involvement with a coup is concurrently suspected) is NOT something that happened previously – as far as I can remember. After all, His Majesty wasn’t 80 years old every time a conference was held, he was not proposing a ‘theory of Sufficient Economy’ and an intense campaign to celebrate/endorse both didn’t happen everytime a conference was held.
In short, I don’t think yours and khun srithanonchai’s question is relevant.
P.S. I’m still not arguing one way or another about the boycott proposal itself (as I said, still too scared!) Just trying to explain the obvious: why there should be such proposal now.
As long there is a dictatorial China, every effort to get Burma on the road to democracy is a mere farce.
This is not to say that India or Korea give big efforts to urge Burma on human rights and democracy, but at least they give better role models.
Being a Singaporean, I take a middle stand in my country’s politics. Not that I’ll be detained if I even say anything (Trust me you won’t be thrown in prison just by badmouthing the country. Doesn’t work that way.)
To the rest of the world, it might be a country of no freedom of speech, strict laws, etc but seriously if not for all these ‘restrictions’ I don’t think it would have become such a nice little city that you can live in without worrying much about the economy or crime rates.
As a ‘brainwashed’ singaporean, I do not at all feel restricted living in Singapore. In fact, I always enjoy meeting up with friends at coffee joints, etc and talk about the ‘silly’ politics our government has yet again invented. (And I don’t think we’ve been thrown into jail yet) To us (or rather me and my friends), if those restrictions help to create a strong nation then we’ll accept it. Yes, we may bitch about them and maybe sulk over it for a few days, weeks, or even years but we’ll soon get over it and appreciate what it has helped us to become.
So what if our former prime minister may not be the most popular man in the world but the truth is he has helped shape our nation to be what it is today. And this is a remarkable feat as after all we’re just a tiny red dot, looking from the map.
A quick note on the protest. It begins at 10:30am at University House. All staff, students and concerned members of the community are more than welcome.
Thanks for the support Andrew. Hope to see you all there.
Ben
SINGAPORE: Singapore aims to grow its education sector to about 5 percent of its GDP (gross domestic product) by 2015, up from the current 3.8 percent.
Minister of State for Trade and Industry S Iswaran said the objective is to develop the city-state into a ‘global schoolhouse’ with a mix of international students.
Frankly, I’d misunderstood you. I thought you were deriding the countries in your list as “unfree” and holding up the USA in contrast : The bastion of “liberty”. People reflexively and defensively “defending” the USA from critics within often “ask”… “Yeah, well, if you hate the US so much why don’t you go live in… ?” And then run of a list of countries such as yours. So rather than get into a shouting match with someone I took for a brawler, I dismissed you out of hand. I should not have done that in any case and It appears that I was well off base in my sterotypical characterization of you to boot. I apologize.
“Singapore might not be the most liberal nation in the world, but it is still one of the more liberal nations in Southeast Asia. If the Faculty administration wants to disqualify Lee’s contributions in economy/government-building because of his human rights record now, it will also have to do so for every other statesman in Southeast Asia.”
Yes, but why not give Lee an Honorary Degree in Economics then. This would make much more sense and something I would personally would have no issue with – of course I am willing to accept arguments over how much Lee was *really* responsible for Singapore’s economic success.
I don’t think Lee’s human rights records would, or even should, play such an important role in an Honorary Degree in Economics, but an Honorary Degree in Law, it is just beyond the pale to give it to Lee. Lee’s success has not been in the legal field, even though he is a trained lawyer, but in economics or even management.
Chris Fry: Thatcher was an Oxford graduate. If Lee was an ANU Graduate, I would have even less concern if given in the right field.
[…] Stephen Dobbs of University of Western Australia writes “The laws of Singapore under Lee and his successors (really no true successor while he lives on forever in the background) have been used as a very blunt instrument to bludgeon any and all political opposition, academic independence, freedom of the press and citizenry generally who are deemed to have stepped out of line.” [link] […]
Well, LKY-bashing is easy enough, and many have done just that here. But hey, what about criticisms of ANU for handing this honour to him? Most recently, the hanging of the Viet-Aussie drug-mule in S’pore probably summed up Aust/S’pores’ ‘love-hate’ relationship on the ideological front. So who/what is ANU pandering to, and why? I’m not surprised that in the near future, ANU will be announcing an off-site campus in S’pore to cash in on the foreign-degree market here.
I am struck as is Srithanonchai – why is the issue of censorship and self-censorship in scholarship and its presentation at scholarly venues so intense now as to lead to calls for a boycott? I can only presume it has much to do with the release of Handley’s book and the way it has energized critics of the monarchy to be more public in their criticisms. So I have two questions:
1) To what degree has the issue of censorship ever been raised regarding previous Thai Studies Conferences, wherever they took place; particularly regarding the issue of the monarchy?
2) Are there other examples of censorship know to readers that parallel the example raised by “Thaiedup” in the first post of this thread.
Firstly, yes, Singapore is what it is today not only because of LKY but his entire cabinate but it also boils down to the man in charge, so I don’t see whats wrong with crediting the leader. The thing about all big western democracies is that they feel that democracy is the only way to economic & social success. This may not be the case look at China today, it has opened up significantly but it is still predominantly communist. Today the moment Shanghai sneezes the entire world catches a cold. Lee is not perfect he did make a few blunders during his term in office such as the suzhou project, but these are nothing compared to what he has helped singapore achieve. As they say one man’s meat could be another man’s poison. How a country is governed depends very much on the economical and social climate of that country. We shouldn’t force a type of government onto another country just because it was “proven” to be successful. Singapore is one such case Singapore is a small country without natural resources, without anything in fact. If it were to plunge into a fully democratic government upon independence, there would be so much debating that nothing gets done. Mauritius is one such example, they became independent right about the same time as Singapore 1968 but their GDP per capita is currently 1/2 that of Singapore. Yes it could swing either way, had Singapore gotten somone like Suharto the future would be very bleak. I guess Singapore was lucky to get LKY.
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Sino-Thai “tree of friendship” at the border
[…] week I posted about the Sino-Thai “tree of friendship” planted by Thailand’s Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn in the Yunnanese border town of Jie […]
“Frankly very disturbing”
Thank you. Please upload to youtube any video of your protest. Public is not allowed to protest in Singapore so it will be good for Singaporeans inside and outside the country to see that even Mr Lee can be protested against.
Thai studies boycott? An update
Khun Somsak: I am not so sure that the reasons for the prominence of the issue of a boycott are obvious. It seems that people have different reasons, or combinations of reasons, to argue for a boycott: support of the military government (there will probably have been an election before the conference); the conference organizers using foreign academics as tools for unprecedented royalist propaganda (this remains an assumption; this issue is about unethical academic behavior); censorship in face of crucial questions concerning the current and future political order of Thailand (what you refer to as the combination of coup and monarchy). Finally, most Thai and foreign academics are probably not at all “concerned.”
P.S.: I also don’t think that Handley’s book has anything much to do with it.
Thai studies boycott? An update
John Francis Lee:
It’s partly my fault for not making myself clear enough. I don’t have a literary prowess to carry people away to the game of language. Can’t stand why human beings bother to publish books or write miles of words while we can sum up our thought in half A4 page. So, no need to aplogise, really.
Regarding the incoming Thai Studies Conference, I maintain my point. I don’t think any of us who’ve never been on the receiving end have the rights to speak the language of ‘freedom’, ‘liberty’, or ‘reason’. Four years ago I met a family whose three generations of men are rubber planters– what does this imply about this coup or history of Thailand’s coups?
It’s all about keeping people at the same place.
How this social reality (yes, reality* not theory or that elusive term academics called empiricism) relates to the boycott/attendance of the conference, you intelligent people decide for youself. But I pledge people who are defending ‘academic freedom’ to shut up. It absruds to hear people ‘who had it so good’ keep on voicing their concern wheras all that victims can do is to get by.
Have enough of this.
The Economist on Burma’s pipeline possibilities
China and Singapore are the life support systems for the regime in Yangon.
If the United States really valued change in Burma they would have used their relationships with China and Singapore to affect a change long ago.
The real issue is that the United States does not value Burma-Myanmar relations and uses Burma as a human rights show, essentially the only real value that Burma-Myanmar has for American policy makers.
Over the last twenty years Chinese economic interests have become so entrenched in Upper Burma (Kachin and Shan States) that China now probably has more of a sovereign interest in Burma, not just an economic one.
The building of a oil pipeline would merely solidify this sovereign interest. For instance, if in the future some political instability threatened that pipeline, China would have a justification for military intervention. This is essentially what happened to politically insulated Afghanistan in 1979. Add to that Singapore pushing from the south and you have obvious extrapolations for the future.
How many times have I been lectured on the horrible fate of Burma by people who have no absolutely idea of the place besides a long list of disconnected human rights abuses and have no idea of the context which allows these abuses to persist.
End economic sanctions against Burma now.
End Burma’s isolation now.
Reconnect Burma with the world now.
End China and Singapore’s monopoly of influence over Burma now.
ANU College of Law condemns Lee’s degree
“And this is a remarkable feat as after all we’re just a tiny red dot, looking from the map.”
Not so remarkable. It’s not so amazing that small Special Economic Zones like Shenzhen or Singapore, and in the future in the Iskandar Development Region across the straits in Johore, can develop more quickly. They are not saddled with the burden of a huge slow moving rural periphery like Thailand is.
The only time that Singapore has come on my radar in recent years is when I heard about the latest act of exploitation it pulled on its neighbors.
My Burmese merchant marine friends told me the stories of how their friends who had dared to defend their rights as workers were shuttled to an airport lounge when they arrived in Singapore and flown back to Burma with the help of the Singaporean government. Their fate after this, who knows.
Than Shwe flies his grandson everyday to Singapore everyday to study, I hear. Than Shwe and other elites received the medical treatment and other services they can’t consume in Burma cordoned off and isolated from the world so they can collect their economic rents. Singapore serves as a conduit for elite capital flight from Burma also, I hear.
Business relations between Singaporean elites and Thaksin business interests are known to the world now.
The solution is pretty clear, it seems. Create a little Singapore in your own country, so you can capture the economic rents for yourself that Singapore has captured. Malaysia is following in this direction, others will too eventually.
Thai studies boycott? An update
Re: Khun david w. writes :
“I am struck as is Srithanonchai – why is the issue of censorship and self-censorship in scholarship and its presentation at scholarly venues so intense now as to lead to calls for a boycott? I can only presume it has much to do with the release of Handley’s book….”
No, not quite. First of all this is the first coup in 15 years! There’s been no talk of boycott because there’s no coup for 15 years. Secondly, This is not only the first coup in 15 years but the first in 30 years that the monarchy is being suspected of direct involvement. Also, the degree to which a gathering like this is being used to promote the monarchy (while its involvement with a coup is concurrently suspected) is NOT something that happened previously – as far as I can remember. After all, His Majesty wasn’t 80 years old every time a conference was held, he was not proposing a ‘theory of Sufficient Economy’ and an intense campaign to celebrate/endorse both didn’t happen everytime a conference was held.
In short, I don’t think yours and khun srithanonchai’s question is relevant.
P.S. I’m still not arguing one way or another about the boycott proposal itself (as I said, still too scared!) Just trying to explain the obvious: why there should be such proposal now.
The Economist on Burma’s pipeline possibilities
As long there is a dictatorial China, every effort to get Burma on the road to democracy is a mere farce.
This is not to say that India or Korea give big efforts to urge Burma on human rights and democracy, but at least they give better role models.
ANU College of Law condemns Lee’s degree
Being a Singaporean, I take a middle stand in my country’s politics. Not that I’ll be detained if I even say anything (Trust me you won’t be thrown in prison just by badmouthing the country. Doesn’t work that way.)
To the rest of the world, it might be a country of no freedom of speech, strict laws, etc but seriously if not for all these ‘restrictions’ I don’t think it would have become such a nice little city that you can live in without worrying much about the economy or crime rates.
As a ‘brainwashed’ singaporean, I do not at all feel restricted living in Singapore. In fact, I always enjoy meeting up with friends at coffee joints, etc and talk about the ‘silly’ politics our government has yet again invented. (And I don’t think we’ve been thrown into jail yet) To us (or rather me and my friends), if those restrictions help to create a strong nation then we’ll accept it. Yes, we may bitch about them and maybe sulk over it for a few days, weeks, or even years but we’ll soon get over it and appreciate what it has helped us to become.
So what if our former prime minister may not be the most popular man in the world but the truth is he has helped shape our nation to be what it is today. And this is a remarkable feat as after all we’re just a tiny red dot, looking from the map.
ANU College of Law condemns Lee’s degree
A quick note on the protest. It begins at 10:30am at University House. All staff, students and concerned members of the community are more than welcome.
Thanks for the support Andrew. Hope to see you all there.
Ben
ANU College of Law condemns Lee’s degree
What about an Honorary Degree in City Planning?
ANU honours Lee Kuan Yew. Why?
blueheeler :
S’pore aims to grow education sector to 5% of GDP by 2015
Similar quote in People’s Daily Online
Thai studies boycott? An update
sawarin :
Frankly, I’d misunderstood you. I thought you were deriding the countries in your list as “unfree” and holding up the USA in contrast : The bastion of “liberty”. People reflexively and defensively “defending” the USA from critics within often “ask”… “Yeah, well, if you hate the US so much why don’t you go live in… ?” And then run of a list of countries such as yours. So rather than get into a shouting match with someone I took for a brawler, I dismissed you out of hand. I should not have done that in any case and It appears that I was well off base in my sterotypical characterization of you to boot. I apologize.
ANU College of Law condemns Lee’s degree
“Singapore might not be the most liberal nation in the world, but it is still one of the more liberal nations in Southeast Asia. If the Faculty administration wants to disqualify Lee’s contributions in economy/government-building because of his human rights record now, it will also have to do so for every other statesman in Southeast Asia.”
Yes, but why not give Lee an Honorary Degree in Economics then. This would make much more sense and something I would personally would have no issue with – of course I am willing to accept arguments over how much Lee was *really* responsible for Singapore’s economic success.
I don’t think Lee’s human rights records would, or even should, play such an important role in an Honorary Degree in Economics, but an Honorary Degree in Law, it is just beyond the pale to give it to Lee. Lee’s success has not been in the legal field, even though he is a trained lawyer, but in economics or even management.
Chris Fry: Thatcher was an Oxford graduate. If Lee was an ANU Graduate, I would have even less concern if given in the right field.
“Frankly very disturbing”
[…] Stephen Dobbs of University of Western Australia writes “The laws of Singapore under Lee and his successors (really no true successor while he lives on forever in the background) have been used as a very blunt instrument to bludgeon any and all political opposition, academic independence, freedom of the press and citizenry generally who are deemed to have stepped out of line.” [link] […]
“Frankly very disturbing”
kin mun = brown?
ANU honours Lee Kuan Yew. Why?
Well, LKY-bashing is easy enough, and many have done just that here. But hey, what about criticisms of ANU for handing this honour to him? Most recently, the hanging of the Viet-Aussie drug-mule in S’pore probably summed up Aust/S’pores’ ‘love-hate’ relationship on the ideological front. So who/what is ANU pandering to, and why? I’m not surprised that in the near future, ANU will be announcing an off-site campus in S’pore to cash in on the foreign-degree market here.
Thai studies boycott? An update
I am struck as is Srithanonchai – why is the issue of censorship and self-censorship in scholarship and its presentation at scholarly venues so intense now as to lead to calls for a boycott? I can only presume it has much to do with the release of Handley’s book and the way it has energized critics of the monarchy to be more public in their criticisms. So I have two questions:
1) To what degree has the issue of censorship ever been raised regarding previous Thai Studies Conferences, wherever they took place; particularly regarding the issue of the monarchy?
2) Are there other examples of censorship know to readers that parallel the example raised by “Thaiedup” in the first post of this thread.
Blood and marriage in Cambodia
[…] Blood and marriage in Cambodia (New Mandala) Posted by Erik Filed in cambodian news […]
ANU honours Lee Kuan Yew. Why?
Pig,
Firstly, yes, Singapore is what it is today not only because of LKY but his entire cabinate but it also boils down to the man in charge, so I don’t see whats wrong with crediting the leader. The thing about all big western democracies is that they feel that democracy is the only way to economic & social success. This may not be the case look at China today, it has opened up significantly but it is still predominantly communist. Today the moment Shanghai sneezes the entire world catches a cold. Lee is not perfect he did make a few blunders during his term in office such as the suzhou project, but these are nothing compared to what he has helped singapore achieve. As they say one man’s meat could be another man’s poison. How a country is governed depends very much on the economical and social climate of that country. We shouldn’t force a type of government onto another country just because it was “proven” to be successful. Singapore is one such case Singapore is a small country without natural resources, without anything in fact. If it were to plunge into a fully democratic government upon independence, there would be so much debating that nothing gets done. Mauritius is one such example, they became independent right about the same time as Singapore 1968 but their GDP per capita is currently 1/2 that of Singapore. Yes it could swing either way, had Singapore gotten somone like Suharto the future would be very bleak. I guess Singapore was lucky to get LKY.