iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

For its 210th anniversary my secondary school had me give a speech to alumni and students. Calling Headmaster "Headmaster" makes everything Harry Potter-y.

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

Everyday now I walk into Lee Kuan Yew School buildings on the Bukit Timah Campus that look exactly like these buildings everyday I walked into for secondary school. English colonial architecture FTW

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

Build cooperation worth joining. Stop waiting for the Great Powers to show up. 32-country median 61% back tackling global problems even without the US or China. G-minus is in the data. Great Powers optional. Cooperation essential. www.rockefellerfoundation.org/reports/seek...

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

International order makes trade possible. But what if the reverse causality also operates? Trade builds order—not by forcing countries to agree, but by making cooperation inadvertent and ordinary. www.thefreedomfrequency.org/p/trade-buil...

thefreedomfrequency.org

Trade Builds Order

A trading system does not just move value across borders. It makes international cooperation ordinary.

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 06/09/2026

Montek Ahluwalia's inspiring professional arc, wonderfully written up by Prakash Loungani, surfaces a story that is the best of East-West economic policymaking in Asia. www.imf.org/en/publicati...

imf.org

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 05/09/2026

In geoeconomics when confronting shocks that are not natural events but bear bad-actor intentionality, we need to respond using unconventional mixed strategies and without provoking unnecessary hostility. Call this economic diplomacy.

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

In geoeconomics you can ask, How can a Great Power get further ahead. Or you can instead ask, How can the rest of us respond better to the Great Power's actions. Quah, Danny. 2026. "A Cooperative Advantage", IMF Finance and Development (Sep) pp. 24-27 www.imf.org/en/publicati...

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

Christoph Trebesch provides an intricate modern version of Kindleberger's Hegemonic Benefit. Hegemonic presence benefits those allied with it, through information or other frictions www.thefreedomfrequency.org/p/globalizat... In the model, bad-actor hegemons run the mechanism in reverse.

thefreedomfrequency.org

Globalization without a US Hegemon

An unstable international order makes globalization more costly, less predictable, and harder to manage.

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 22/08/2026

When the world was globalizing under rules-based multilateralism, individual states adopted straightforward strategies: be a price-taker; follow norms. Now that rules-based order is under attack, everyone proclaims instead geoeconomics.

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 16/08/2026

In academic seminars, the behaviour of each generation of scholars is based on what that generation, as PhD candidates, observed of the previous generation. This is a surefire way of locking in either good codes of conduct or bad. Be that as it may: canvas.nus.edu.sg/courses/9819...

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 11/08/2026

Talking International Security with my old friends Heng Chee, Tim Besley, and Jomo, and new ones made on the panel. youtu.be/-OTHof4Q3Y8 Tue 28 July 2026. Singapore

youtu.be

International Security in a Fractured Global Economy: The Middle East Crisis and Beyond Plenary

YouTube video by Economic Growth Centre / Singapore Economic Review

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 08/08/2026

In Economics research and teaching, policy evaluation and micro-intervention empower the student: "Fix poverty, do this." By contrast, more macro challenges don't provide that surface area quite as easily. Here's my attempt to change that impression. canvas.nus.edu.sg/courses/98197

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 07/08/2026

News can have all the same stresspoints as anywhere on Earth but hearing it in calm BBC tones while enjoying a tandoori chicken wrap is unexpectedly calming.

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 01/08/2026

Debates about international order usually ask the same question: who will lead next? The US? China? A concert of major powers? All these entrust order to power. The task is to stop asking who will rule and instead start designing an international system in which states choose to remain.

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 26/07/2026

Tue 28 Jul in Singapore I, Tim Besley, and other friends at SERC 2026: 1130h-1250h Panel: International Security in a Fractured Global Economy editorialexpress.com/conference/s... 1550h-1710h Papers: Political Economy editorialexpress.com/conference/s... www.DannyQuah.com/Storage/1776...

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 25/07/2026

We all conjecture how tectonic forces are changing work and markets. Here's a day-to-day, where as economists we produce papers and compete in a crowded market for ideas. One datapoint with implications for how we work, but what's your own experience? x.com/DannyQuah/st...

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 23/07/2026

When across the capital cities of Asia I get to talk to academics about economics and world and regional order, it's often these guys

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 19/07/2026

While the course materials are gradually migrating to NUS Canvas, here's a brief outline of what I will be teaching in PP5182 Economic Diplomacy in an Age of Strategic Interdependence (updates at www.DannyQuah.com/Storage/PP51... ).

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 13/07/2026

When rules collapse, small states should not go it alone. But neither should they meekly scurry off to look for the protection of this Great Power or that. www.channelnewsasia.com/commentary/w... ari.nus.edu.sg/app-essay-da...

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 11/07/2026

Kai-Fu and I met up in Tower Block 10. So, of course we talked AI and Great Powers, small states and leadership in economic diplomacy, geopolitical shocks and AI agility: if we can't get back rules-based multilateralism our world needs to be OK being multilateral-enough in coalitions of the willing

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 10/07/2026

When you learn that Yeap Chor Ee started out as a street urchin in Southeast Asia but then Oei Tiong Ham valued Yeap's work ethic enough to begin their sugar trade partnership, you re-assess your life choices. Still, grateful for food and colours that take you back to when life was simpler.

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 01/07/2026

Today's reality of intelligence, agility, and networks means we need to retire the naive linear thinking that only major powers determine systemic outcomes. Today, incentives matter more than power. I argue here one consequence of this: Small states are our best bet for peace. cna.asia/446gtcs

cna.asia

Commentary: Small states are the best bet for keeping world at peace

Economic interdependence was once expected to guarantee peace. It now fuels resentment, says economics professor Danny Quah from the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy.

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 26/06/2026

Here's how. First, get a G-minus group of nations. That's just any group where great-power presence is optional. www.bfm.my/content/podc...

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 22/06/2026

When we say the international economic system is disrupted by geopolitical shocks, the emphasis should be on these shocks differing from natural-event shocks like crop failures or tsunamis. Geopolitical shocks come bearing intentionality. substack.com/@dannyquah/n...

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 06/06/2026

When you run into Nobel Laureate fellow journalist, fellow Princeton alumni, fellow ASEAN in the airport lounge, of course you go Asian and take the wefie.

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 06/06/2026

Our CN-US table, just for fun: substack.com/@dannyquah/n...

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 04/06/2026

Even as each time we all step into a river no longer the same, Wright's Bar remains.

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 01/06/2026

What about Asia might help it navigate the international economics of strategic interdependence? Quah, Danny. 2026. "Asia's Evolving Development Landscape: The International Economics of Strategic Interdependence" (June) www.dannyquah.com/working-pape... Working paper, so comments welcomed

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 30/05/2026

Small states are traditionally viewed as norm-takers, just as in economics, consumers and firms are price-takers. However, while in economics there is a theorem that price-taking leads to systemic efficiency, the study of world order admits no analogous proposition. substack.com/@dannyquah/n...

substack.com

Danny Quah (@dannyquah)

The world just needs to be multilateral-enough Small states are traditionally viewed as norm-takers in the international system, the same way that in economics, consumers and firms are price-takers...

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 24/05/2026

Is US dollar-dominance in the International Monetary System a red herring? How Is Changing A USD-dominant IMS Harder Than Changing World Order? substack.com/profile/1378... www.dannyquah.com/Storage/2026...

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 14/05/2026

We're Princeton alumni. So of course we spent the whole evening discussing distribution requirements and how they become constraints that do not bind, and that the Honor Code no longer is. Also, service to nation and the world.

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

Asia is more than China and India, and its future might be shaped not by its giants but by its smaller states. When Great Powers practise economic statecraft, they bend the world to their geopolitical will. What goes instead into the smaller state's playbook? nus.syd1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_...

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 29/04/2026

World order is metastatizing. The wealth of nations is shifting. I was in conversation in Delhi with Vijay Vaitheeswaran on disorder, the futility of power, and how the new global order might look. Who rolled up to ask questions: Gen Z's making macroeconomics great again.

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

Very early draft, but it's got a title page and a technical appendix (and carefully-crafted LaTeX drawings), and it's been presented to serious scholars, so... Quah, D. 2026. "The Rest of Us: Incentives, not Power, in Rebuilding World Order", LKYSPP (Apr). www.dannyquah.com/Storage/1776...

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 23/04/2026

Wed 29 Apr in Delhi I'm discussing shifts in the global economy with Vijay Vaitheeswaran, The Economist's Global energy and climate innovation editor. events.economistenterprise.com/resilient-fu...

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 19/04/2026

Four decades of the Seoul Forum for International Affairs, and somehow this year a paper on multilateralism namechecks The Last of Us. I'm speaking alongside Victor Cha and Christina Davis, but it's Chatham House Rule. So all I can say is the fungal metaphor for multilateral collapse is underused.

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 07/04/2026

Today if you are not American and cheering on the US administration's foreign policy actions, you are cheering on the actions of an administration that is ever less recognised by the American people. substack.com/@dannyquah/n...

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 31/03/2026

Even as a young assistant professor, Obstfeld seemed to get to make a paper presentation at every macroeconomics conference .. which is good, as every time we read him, our thinking course-corrected. WEAI International Conference, Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok www.weai.org/events/18th-...

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 28/03/2026

Boao Forum this year centered on the theme of a shared future and new models of cooperation. I am a big fan of new models of cooperation. Also, whatever happened to the traditional Chinese gift offerings of smartphones, tablets, and powerbanks? substack.com/@dannyquah/n...

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 26/03/2026

PM Lawrence Wong at Boao Forum for Asia: flexible plurilateralism with pathfinder initiatives, with groupings open and inclusive, will complement not replace traditional multilateralism. Importance of greater regional cooperation and integration. Continued growth of groupings such as CPTPP and DEPA.

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 19/03/2026

Andrew Rozanov and I recalled the Santiago Principles - guidelines which the US insisted on so that potential adversaries with large pools of capital invested based only on economic risk-return calculation, not political motivation. Yeah, we had a good laugh at that one. Then we discussed war.

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 18/03/2026

I'm not mad about self-proclaimed middle powers, but not very much should hinge on who exactly takes leadership. Any sensible incentive-compatible coalition is good. "A Constructive Path to Sustainable Trade Reform", Brookings-Rockefeller 17 Rooms Flagship (Mar) www.brookings.edu/articles/a-c...

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 15/03/2026

Sims was someone from a time when giants walked the earth. Macroeconomics has now lost yet another of those giants. substack.com/profile/1378...

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 14/03/2026

When in one afternoon you can have an Ipoh lunch, relive examination fear (even if it's been decades), and go behind the scenes of this most formative separation.

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 13/03/2026

They've done the sums. The threat from an established nuclear power that has broken international law invading a smaller sovereign state is not as bad as one the US keeps saying will go nuclear any day now and that keeps badmouthing a smaller sovereign state www.nytimes.com/2026/03/12/u...

nytimes.com

Trump Removes Sanctions on Russia to Help Oil Flow Amid Iran Conflict

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 10/03/2026

We sit back and marvel at the geopolitical disruptions major powers wreak. We hardly ever ask who is most incentivised to carry out economic statecraft against them. substack.com/@dannyquah/n...

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 03/03/2026

Thu 05 Mar 2026 Bangkok, IMF Asia in 2050 Conference I will be speaking on this panel alongside these distinguished thinkers on the Future of Growth in Asia Depending, I might go all in on rules-based order. www.imf.org/en/news/semi...

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 27/02/2026

AI inversion. I asked my local LLM to introspect and join up what I'd been thinking the last four years open.substack.com/pub/dannyqua...

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 22/02/2026

We're dealing with a powerful nation whose ultimate objectives remain unclear and unarticulated. Instead of resolving that, many have chosen instead to respond to the strongest signal that they do see, that of a mercurial political leader. substack.com/@dannyquah/n...

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Danny Quah @dannyquah.bsky.social · 20/02/2026

It's called economic statecraft

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