Today Trends

Authors: Shweta Saini and Siraj Hussain, ICRIER As the COVID-19 pandemic unfolds, the ability to reach citizens digitally has become more critical than ever before. In India, the government is harnessing its Aadhaar platform to deliver several social and welfare services. Indian lives and livelihoods are suffering inconsolable losses because of the COVID-19 pandemic . While most Indians have suffered a financial setback, many are also suffering socioeconomically, psychologically and generationally. The Indian economy shrank by 7.3 per cent in 2020–21. The unemployment rate increased from 7.46 per cent in August 2019 to 10.4 per cent in April 2020. It later increased to 11.55 per cent in August 2020 and has since moderated to 8.32 per cent in August 2021. According to a 2021 Azim Premji University report , half of India’s workforce employed in the formal sector was pushed into the informal sector between 2019 and 2020. The poorest 20 per cent of households lost their entire incom

Author: Nyi Nyi Kyaw, Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities The Myanmar military junta seems to be here to stay after extending its emergency rule until at least until August 2023 . But what does it plan to do in the next two years? On 1 August, the chief of the Myanmar military (the Tatmadaw), Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, has endowed himself as chair of the State Administration Council and Prime Minister of the caretaker government he formed. Min Aung Hlaing possesses executive, legislative and judiciary powers under the one-year emergency rule, which was declared when the Tatmadaw took power on 1 February. He laid out an electoral and legislative agenda at the 14th meeting of the State Administration Council on 23 August in Naypyidaw. Min Aung Hlaing’s words are orders and his orders are implemented. So what he says at State Administration Council meetings is telling for the future. Until late July, Min Aung Hlaing’s immediate targets were protesters, the National U

Author: Kim Leng Yeah, Sunway University Malaysia’s push into digital banking is gathering pace. The central bank’s decision to issue up to five digital bank licences in the first quarter of 2022 generated considerable interest . With the country’s existing banks already deploying digital delivery channels and financial technology as a competitive tool, the advent of new digital banks will further enliven the post-COVID-19 banking landscape. The central bank’s digital banking thrust is a natural progression of the financial sector’s continuous innovation and growth which has supported the country’s economic development. Following the banking system’s recapitalisation and bad loans carve-out during the 1998 Asian financial crisis, Malaysia’s financial institutions, structure and governance were improved significantly. Guided by the Financial Sector Master Plan 2001–2010 , the strengthened banking system enabled the economy to withstand the turbulence of the global financial crisis

Author: Arzan Tarapore, Stanford University Nuclear-powered submarines for Australia was the most eye-catching part of the announcement of ‘ AUKUS ’, the new trilateral security initiative joining Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States. The eight new boats would greatly extend the range, endurance and firepower of Australia’s submarine fleet . They would break the taboo against nuclear power in Australia. And they show that the United States and the United Kingdom are committed to strategic competition in the Indo-Pacific . But while AUKUS shows a seriousness about naval power, it shows an even greater seriousness about alliances. The trilateral initiative seeks to expand an existing alliance structure — the Five Eyes intelligence alliance — into the field of leading-edge defence technology and industry. AUKUS goes much deeper than submarines — but it cannot do everything. The Biden administration promised to prioritise strategic competition with China, and to reinv

Author: Loro Horta, Dili While analysts give substantial attention to China’s expanding fleet of modern fighter jets, such as the J-20 and J-15, they are much less enamoured with its growing strategic airlift and logistical capacity. Although modern stealth fighters might be ‘sexier’ than transport or mid-air refuelling platforms, China’s progress in this area is rapidly expanding its strategic footprint. No air force — no matter how modern its fighters or how good its pilots — can prevail without good logistics. The People’s Liberation Army Air Force’s (PLAAF) generals understand this well. Over the past decade China has invested significant resources in improving and expanding its mid-air refuelling and strategic airlift capabilities. For most of its existence since it was founded in 1949, the PLAAF’s role was limited to defending mainland China’s airspace and nearby areas. Chinese MiG-15s and MiG-17s fought against US fighters in Korea and the Taiwan Strait in the early 1950s,

Author: Aristyo Rizka Darmawan, University of Indonesia The waters of the Indo-Pacific are heating up, with Beijing’s increasing activities in Southeast Asia pushing the United States and its allies into a flurry of political machinations to shore up their positions. Caught in the middle of these economic and security challenges, ASEAN countries need to formulate a coherent strategy that goes beyond norm-setting to actual implementation. Recent visits to Southeast Asian countries by senior US officials include Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman’s visit to Jakarta, Bangkok and Phnom Penh in late May 2021 and the visit by Secretary of Defence Lloyd Austin to Singapore, Manila and Hanoi in early August. This was followed by Indonesian Minister for Foreign Affairs Retno Marsudi travelling to Washington to meet Secretary of State Antony Blinken among others. These meetings highlight the importance of the US–Indonesia strategic partnership for a secure and prosperous Indo-Pacifi

Author: Nick Bisley, La Trobe University The contours of US Asia policy under the Biden administration have become clearer through the recent high-profile visits to the region by Vice President Kamala Harris, Secretary of Defence Lloyd Austin and Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman. While the tone is different from the bombast of the Trump presidency, these reveal much more continuity than change in Washington’s approach. The approach taken by the Biden administration was most clearly articulated in two speeches given in Singapore — Secretary Austin’s Fullerton Lecture in late July 2021 and Vice President Harris’s remarks to the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy in late August. Above all else they sought to reiterate that the United States retains its long-term commitment to the region. The United States has been the dominant military power in Asia since the 1940s and these speeches confirm it intends on maintaining its geopolitical primacy. But neither squarely addressed

Author: Lawrence Repeta, Seattle In the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, while governments in many countries issued mandatory lockdown orders backed by penalties for non-compliance, Japan’s did not. In March 2020, the Diet amended the infectious disease control law to add COVID-19 to the diseases covered but did not provide penalties for non-compliance with government requests to limit activities. International news organisations reported that Japan’s Constitution ‘would need to be amended to impose and enforce a lockdown’. The suggestion that effective action required constitutional change was no surprise. The Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) has been calling for change to the democratic Constitution since it was founded in 1955. One key proposal is the creation of an ‘emergency powers’ provision. But while the pandemic is a crisis that calls for emergency action, an effective response does not require constitutional change. Article 41 of Japan’s Constitution makes the Diet ‘the

Author: Editorial Board, ANU In mid-September China ticked over quite the milestone: one billion of its citizens — about 70 per cent of the population — had then been fully vaccinated against the COVID-19 virus . That puts China close to the top of the league table in global vaccination, ahead of Japan, South Korea and Australia, as well the early vaccination champions, the United Kingdom and United States. But China isn’t yet ready to put the pandemic behind it, as Nick Thomas explains in our lead article this week . Indeed, by embracing a more hawkish approach towards the virus than even the Asian norm, ‘China has locked itself away from most of the world with no sign yet of a strategy to live with what experts agree will be a globally endemic disease. Chinese authorities ruthlessly extinguished community transmission with lockdowns in the first wave of infections in early 2020, with China being one of the first countries to return to normal civil and economic life just as the c

Author: Nicholas Thomas, CityU What is normal in a post-pandemic world? How can the idea of a return to a normal state of affairs be articulated and realised by a state? The answers to these questions depends what country you are talking about. At present China equates a return to normal with zero COVID-19 cases, where China is safe from imported cases of the virus and where its population is protected from local transmissions. To achieve this, China has locked itself away from most of the world and put its population through an extensive campaign of vaccinations. According to China’s National Health Commission, by the first week of September Chinese authorities had administered over two billion doses of the three Chinese vaccines currently available. Although it is unclear how many people have received both doses, it is an impressive effort. But this does not mean that China has successfully returned to normal. The efficacy of local vaccines is the biggest hurdle the government fa

Author: Pravda Parakkal, Dataminr On 18 July, Taliban leader Hibatullah Akhundzada said the group seeks strong diplomatic, economic and political relations with all countries including the United States. The Taliban soon revealed it had opened several channels of communication with foreign countries. China is among the first in the region to embrace — albeit cautiously — the new political reality shaping Afghanistan. For Beijing, the Taliban takeover presents opportunities as well as threats. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi met with a top-level Taliban delegation in Tianjin on 28 July. He labelled the Taliban ‘a pivotal military and political force’ and urged them to make a clean break with all militant organisations including the East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM). In a phone call with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken — made shortly after Beijing confirmed its Kabul embassy is operating safely under Taliban rule — Wang even appealed for the international community to eng