PoliticsDev in Southeast Asi

3 Credits · Level: Graduate, Undergraduate

Southeast Asia has been acclaimed as one of the most dynamic and rapidly growing regional economies in the Asia-Pacific. However, there is limited consensus with regard to the region’s governance record. This unit places the region’s socio-political and economic experiences within a broader historical and comparative context. Such an approach allows us to better appreciate the variegated patterns of development, governance, political and policy reform. Themes include the role of the state in facilitating economic development, the relationship between democracy and development, the salience of ethnic tensions, the significance of performance-based legitimacy, the role of elections in facilitating regime legitimacy, dynamics of authoritarian resilience and political backsliding, policy contestations, nexus between political business (networks) and corruption, forces associated with political Islam and the reconfiguration of the secular state, efficacy of the regional grouping ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) and impact of the economic 'rise’ of China within the context of the geo-political shifts in larger international community.