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New Mandala

@newmandala.bsky.social

743 followers 37 following 103 posts

A forum for anecdote, analysis and new perspectives on Southeast Asia since 2006. Want to contribute? See: www.newmandala.org/contributing-to-…

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New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 9h

NEW via Academia.sg: Former teacher Luke Lu's research examines the elite Raffles Institution as a microcosm of modern Singapore, using linguistic ethnography to hear how its high achievers talk about aspiration, state scholarships, and where they stand in Singapore and among their peers.

A microcosm of meritocracy and mobility at an elite Singapore school - New Mandala

Reflections on Raffles Institution

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New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

NEW 🇸🇬 Sold-out Teochew screenings of "Dear You" in Singapore revealed a deep attachment to Chinese dialects that decades of state policy have pushed out of everyday life. Revised rules for dialect media respect that sentiment, while also keeping faith with Lee Kuan Yew's Speak Mandarin Campaign.

Watch Teochew, but Speak Mandarin - New Mandala

“Dear You” strikes a chord in Singapore

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

NEW 🇸🇬 Sold-out Teochew screenings of "Dear You" in Singapore revealed a deep attachment to Chinese dialects that decades of state policy have pushed out of everyday life. Revised rules for dialect media respect that sentiment, while also keeping faith with Lee Kuan Yew's Speak Mandarin Campaign.

Watch Teochew, but Speak Mandarin - New Mandala

“Dear You” strikes a chord in Singapore

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

NEW 🇵🇭 A recent public debate offered hints that the BARMM’s electoral system design may be having its intended effect in encouraging inter-party competition based on policy promises rather than personalities. But whether this can survive the realities of post-election governing is another question.

Bangsamoro is finally voting. What is it voting for? - New Mandala

A first test of a party-based electoral system

Reposted by New Mandala

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

NEW 🇮🇩🇲🇾🇸🇬 Engku Puteri Raja Hamidah and Khatijah Sidek exercised political authority across a Malay world divided by colonialism. Their lives show how such figures fit awkwardly into national histories written from the perspectives of the postcolonial states that followed.

Herstory between borders - New Mandala

Two women and the blind spots of national history in the Malay world

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

NEW 🇮🇩🇲🇾🇸🇬 Engku Puteri Raja Hamidah and Khatijah Sidek exercised political authority across a Malay world divided by colonialism. Their lives show how such figures fit awkwardly into national histories written from the perspectives of the postcolonial states that followed.

Herstory between borders - New Mandala

Two women and the blind spots of national history in the Malay world

Reposted by New Mandala

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 10/08/2026

NEW 🇮🇩 Travelling through rural Java and Sulawesi, Jeff Neilson finds Prabowo Subianto’s signature "Red and White" village cooperatives program struggling to justify its own existence in the eyes of the communities it’s supposed to support.

“Murni top-down”: a look at Prabowo’s village cooperatives - New Mandala

The unravelling of community-driven development

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 10/08/2026

NEW 🇮🇩 Travelling through rural Java and Sulawesi, Jeff Neilson finds Prabowo Subianto’s signature "Red and White" village cooperatives program struggling to justify its own existence in the eyes of the communities it’s supposed to support.

“Murni top-down”: a look at Prabowo’s village cooperatives - New Mandala

The unravelling of community-driven development

Reposted by New Mandala

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 03/08/2026

NEW 🇲🇾 Meredith Weiss reviews Ngu Ik Tien's new history of ethnic Chinese politics in Sarawak, highlighting how its focus on the co-evolution of natural resource industries and social institutions under colonialism help us understand the shape of the state's politics up to the present day.

Timber, tycoons and the making of Sarawak politics - New Mandala

A review of a compelling new political history

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 03/08/2026

NEW 🇲🇾 Meredith Weiss reviews Ngu Ik Tien's new history of ethnic Chinese politics in Sarawak, highlighting how its focus on the co-evolution of natural resource industries and social institutions under colonialism help us understand the shape of the state's politics up to the present day.

Timber, tycoons and the making of Sarawak politics - New Mandala

A review of a compelling new political history

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 03/08/2026

NEW 🇦🇺🇮🇩 As Australia counts the cost of a generation of neglect of Asian studies, ACICIS endures. Yet its prominence as a rare survivor of the 1990s "Asia literacy" project only highlights the deterioration of Asian language learning and Asian studies in Australian education since, writes Liam Prince

ACICIS from the Cold War to New Colombo Plan - New Mandala

Reflecting on 30 years of the program

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 03/08/2026

NEW 🇦🇺🇮🇩 Australia's 'Asia-literate' ambitions span 50+ years of reports, plans and funding bursts—yet study of Indonesia and Indonesian language has declined since the early 2000s. Kirrilee Hughes traces this history to show what makes ACICIS's in-country model a distinctive, enduring intervention.

ACICIS' place in Australia’s Asia literacy - New Mandala

A rare institutional legacy of Keating-era Asian studies

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 21/07/2026

NEW 🇻🇳 After 51 years in print, Vietnam's Người Lao động newspaper has closed—a casualty of state media recentralisation and the party-state's determination to assert political control as it pursues a new phase of private sector-led growth.

The end of an era for Vietnamese labour journalism - New Mandala

On the demise of Người Lao động

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 16/07/2026

NEW 🇮🇩 "Balancing the interests of a domestic constituency against the ideologies of foreign partners is the challenge the moderate Islam project has consistently failed to meet."

The backlash against NU’s religious diplomacy - New Mandala

The organisation’s ties with neocons and illiberals abroad angers the grassroots

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New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 22/06/2026

NEW 🇹🇭 We are pleased to share a Thai translation of Pasit Wongngamdee's recent essay on the not-so-successful propaganda efforts being mounted under the Thailand's ROTC program.

ณ จุดปะทะทางอุดมการณ์: การปลูกฝังและการต่อต้านในหลักสูตรรักษาดินแดน - New Mandala

นี่คือการแปลบทความที่ตีพิมพ์เป็นภาษาอังกฤษดั้งเดิม

Reposted by New Mandala

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 22/06/2026

NEW 🇹🇭 The incumbent’s lead in polling for Bangkok's gubernatorial election reflects a shift towards a local politics of relatively non-ideological managerialism, but there is still the chance of a protest vote against conservative ascendancy at the national level.

Bangkok’s election puts policy competence over ideological cleavages - New Mandala

Chadchart represents the gradual detachment of city politics from national divides

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 22/06/2026

NEW 🇹🇭 The incumbent’s lead in polling for Bangkok's gubernatorial election reflects a shift towards a local politics of relatively non-ideological managerialism, but there is still the chance of a protest vote against conservative ascendancy at the national level.

Bangkok’s election puts policy competence over ideological cleavages - New Mandala

Chadchart represents the gradual detachment of city politics from national divides

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 22/06/2026

NEW 🇹🇭 We are pleased to share a Thai translation of Pasit Wongngamdee's recent essay on the not-so-successful propaganda efforts being mounted under the Thailand's ROTC program.

ณ จุดปะทะทางอุดมการณ์: การปลูกฝังและการต่อต้านในหลักสูตรรักษาดินแดน - New Mandala

นี่คือการแปลบทความที่ตีพิมพ์เป็นภาษาอังกฤษดั้งเดิม

Reposted by New Mandala

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 16/06/2026

20 years ago today New Mandala published for the first time. Here, the site's current and former editors reflect on what it has achieved, and offer their thanks to those who have had a hand in bringing it to this very special milestone.

20 years of New Mandala - New Mandala

Editors 2006–2026 reflect on the site's importance

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 16/06/2026

20 years ago today New Mandala published for the first time. Here, the site's current and former editors reflect on what it has achieved, and offer their thanks to those who have had a hand in bringing it to this very special milestone.

20 years of New Mandala - New Mandala

Editors 2006–2026 reflect on the site's importance

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 15/06/2026

NEW 🇰🇭🇹🇭 Thailand tried to use economic leverage against Cambodia during the 2025 border conflict, but it didn't have its intended impacts. The episode provides a case study in the limits of "geoeconomics" in Southeast Asia.

Cambodia–Thailand economic conflict and the limits of geoeconomics in Southeast Asia - New Mandala

The decline of dependency

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New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 10/06/2026

NEW 🇸🇬 via AcademiaSG: By trying to protect Lee Kuan Yew from critical scrutiny, a new exhibition on Singapore's fraught path to independence offers a comforting story instead of an educational one where power, fear race, ambition, and moral compromise led to Singapore's exit from Malaysia.

Singapore’s Albatross File Exhibition is bad history that diminishes Lee Kuan Yew - New Mandala

Comfort trumps scrutiny

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 10/06/2026

NEW 🇸🇬 via AcademiaSG: By trying to protect Lee Kuan Yew from critical scrutiny, a new exhibition on Singapore's fraught path to independence offers a comforting story instead of an educational one where power, fear race, ambition, and moral compromise led to Singapore's exit from Malaysia.

Singapore’s Albatross File Exhibition is bad history that diminishes Lee Kuan Yew - New Mandala

Comfort trumps scrutiny

Reposted by New Mandala

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 09/06/2026

NEW 🇹🇭 Interviews with students and educators show how the conservative indoctrination effort that has become an increasingly key part of Thailand's ROTC program is undermined from within by apathy and quiet defiance.

At the coalface of military indoctrination: the Thai ROTC - New Mandala

Propaganda versus apathy, defiance

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 09/06/2026

NEW 🇹🇭 Interviews with students and educators show how the conservative indoctrination effort that has become an increasingly key part of Thailand's ROTC program is undermined from within by apathy and quiet defiance.

At the coalface of military indoctrination: the Thai ROTC - New Mandala

Propaganda versus apathy, defiance

Reposted by New Mandala

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 20/05/2026

NEW 🇮🇩 The trial of Nadiem Makarim shows how Indonesia's broadly worded anti-corruption laws are facilitating arbitrary prosecutions by increasingly politicised law enforcement agencies, write Simon Butt and Tim Lindsey.

The Nadiem trial and Indonesia’s “rubber” anti-corruption laws - New Mandala

Loose definitions aid questionable prosecutions

Reposted by New Mandala

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 20/05/2026

NEW 🇹🇱 24 years since Timor-Leste's independence, the legacies of the resistance against Indonesian occupation in some ways pose challenges for the women’s movement, in the form of a a patriarchal political scene, donor dependency, and deep intergenerational divides.

The Timorese women’s movement continues the struggle - New Mandala

Confronting patriarchs, donors, and generational divides

Reposted by New Mandala

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 13/05/2026

NEW 🇮🇩 Teuku Reza Fadeli's doctoral research examined how colonial-era Southeast Asians navigated commercial spaces crafted to convey Western superiority. Consumer markets emerge as "places where people learn, perform, contest, and sometimes refuse the terms on which modern life is offered to them."

Buying, boycotting, and the politics of modernity - New Mandala

Nationalism and consumer culture in colonial Southeast Asia

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 20/05/2026

NEW 🇮🇩 The trial of Nadiem Makarim shows how Indonesia's broadly worded anti-corruption laws are facilitating arbitrary prosecutions by increasingly politicised law enforcement agencies, write Simon Butt and Tim Lindsey.

The Nadiem trial and Indonesia’s “rubber” anti-corruption laws - New Mandala

Loose definitions aid questionable prosecutions

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 20/05/2026

NEW 🇹🇱 24 years since Timor-Leste's independence, the legacies of the resistance against Indonesian occupation in some ways pose challenges for the women’s movement, in the form of a a patriarchal political scene, donor dependency, and deep intergenerational divides.

The Timorese women’s movement continues the struggle - New Mandala

Confronting patriarchs, donors, and generational divides

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 13/05/2026

NEW 🇮🇩 Teuku Reza Fadeli's doctoral research examined how colonial-era Southeast Asians navigated commercial spaces crafted to convey Western superiority. Consumer markets emerge as "places where people learn, perform, contest, and sometimes refuse the terms on which modern life is offered to them."

Buying, boycotting, and the politics of modernity - New Mandala

Nationalism and consumer culture in colonial Southeast Asia

Reposted by New Mandala

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

NEW: Through contemporary artworks and a chance encounter in the Singapore Art Museum, Lukas Fort reflects on how Singapore’s commitment to renewal shapes its cityscape, its visions of youth and ageing, and everyday engagements with technology. www.newmandala.org/city-of-rene...

City of renewal - New Mandala

Notes from the temporary Singapore Art Museum

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New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

OBITUARY: "Vince Rafael exemplified the onset of a long overdue shift in the intellectual centre of gravity in Southeast Asian Studies to new generations of scholars hailing from the region...his work was distinctive in its close attention to identity, ideology, and experience."

Vicente L. Rafael (1956–2026) in memoriam - New Mandala

John Sidel honours his contributions to the study of Southeast Asia

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

NEW: Through contemporary artworks and a chance encounter in the Singapore Art Museum, Lukas Fort reflects on how Singapore’s commitment to renewal shapes its cityscape, its visions of youth and ageing, and everyday engagements with technology. www.newmandala.org/city-of-rene...

City of renewal - New Mandala

Notes from the temporary Singapore Art Museum

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 24/04/2026

OBITUARY: "Vince Rafael exemplified the onset of a long overdue shift in the intellectual centre of gravity in Southeast Asian Studies to new generations of scholars hailing from the region...his work was distinctive in its close attention to identity, ideology, and experience."

Vicente L. Rafael (1956–2026) in memoriam - New Mandala

John Sidel honours his contributions to the study of Southeast Asia

Reposted by New Mandala

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 23/04/2026

NEW 🇲🇲 Long before today's post-coup economic crisis examples of Myanmar's rich artistic heritage were already being looted, copied and sold to foreign buyers. Today's market in fake antiquities, gemstones and paintings is simply the latest chapter in a tradition of creative deception.

Buyer beware: fakes, forgeries and fraudsters in Myanmar - New Mandala

A thriving market in counterfeit art and gems

Reposted by New Mandala

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 23/04/2026

NEW 🇮🇩 The Netherlands has returned a Qur'an taken from the house of Acehnese resistance leader Cut Nyak Dhien in 1896—but to Jakarta, not Aceh, and under her husband Teuku Umar’s name. The gendered absence built into colonial record-keeping lives on in the efforts to return colonial loot.

Returned, but not home: Teuku Umar’s Qur’an - New Mandala

On the unfinished business of restitution

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 23/04/2026

NEW 🇮🇩 The Netherlands has returned a Qur'an taken from the house of Acehnese resistance leader Cut Nyak Dhien in 1896—but to Jakarta, not Aceh, and under her husband Teuku Umar’s name. The gendered absence built into colonial record-keeping lives on in the efforts to return colonial loot.

Returned, but not home: Teuku Umar’s Qur’an - New Mandala

On the unfinished business of restitution

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 23/04/2026

NEW 🇲🇲 Long before today's post-coup economic crisis examples of Myanmar's rich artistic heritage were already being looted, copied and sold to foreign buyers. Today's market in fake antiquities, gemstones and paintings is simply the latest chapter in a tradition of creative deception.

Buyer beware: fakes, forgeries and fraudsters in Myanmar - New Mandala

A thriving market in counterfeit art and gems

Reposted by New Mandala

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 09/04/2026

NEW 🇮🇩 President Prabowo's drive to reassert state control addresses a genuine postcolonial grievance—but with a strategy that destroys the broader institutional conditions for the prosperity it claims to pursue, argues Rayhan Prabu Kusumo.

Indonesia's new state capitalism shrinks its future - New Mandala

Statism isn't synonymous with developmentalism

Reposted by New Mandala

Ward Berenschot @wardb.bsky.social · 09/04/2026

Nice article on Indonesia’s increasingly state-controlled economic ‘development’ under Prabowo.

Reposted by New Mandala

Peter van Tuijl @vantuijlpeter.bsky.social · 09/04/2026

This is an excellent summary of a sad development: how the Prabowo government is undermining Indonesia’s economic future

Reposted by New Mandala

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 15/03/2026

NEW 🇹🇭 Thailand's February 2026 election was a disaster for reformist politics in Thailand, and Jirapreeya Saeboo argues that the People's Party's ideological and strategic shortcomings have to share in the blame.

A reckoning for Thailand’s liberals - New Mandala

How the People’s Party failed its own cause

Reposted by New Mandala

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 15/03/2026

NEW 🇲🇲 The socialist economy envisioned by the military regime that ruled from 1962 to 1988 existed only in propaganda. The real economy, meanwhile, ran on Johnnie Walker, jeans, and officials’ willingness to look the other way.

Officially unofficial: the black market in Ne Win’s Burma - New Mandala

At the peak of the socialist era, the market found a way

Reposted by New Mandala

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 19/03/2026

NEW 🇵🇭 Rodrigo Duterte can no longer perform the strongman persona that generated his appeal, yet the political loyalty towards him has only intensified. John Lee Candelaria argues that the moral economy of "utang na loob"—"debt[s] of honour"—sustains the populist bond between Duterte and supporters.

Moral economy and the Dutertes’ political durability - New Mandala

Rethinking the emotional foundations of populism

Reposted by New Mandala

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 22/03/2026

NEW 🇮🇩 Indonesia’s new ‘war on waste’ revives familiar community mobilisation strategies focused on downstream remediation while leaving the structural causes of pollution largely untouched, writes Lukas Fort.

Indonesia’s war on waste - New Mandala

Shifting blame to society and away from industry

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 09/04/2026

NEW 🇮🇩 President Prabowo's drive to reassert state control addresses a genuine postcolonial grievance—but with a strategy that destroys the broader institutional conditions for the prosperity it claims to pursue, argues Rayhan Prabu Kusumo.

Indonesia's new state capitalism shrinks its future - New Mandala

Statism isn't synonymous with developmentalism

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 22/03/2026

NEW 🇮🇩 Indonesia’s new ‘war on waste’ revives familiar community mobilisation strategies focused on downstream remediation while leaving the structural causes of pollution largely untouched, writes Lukas Fort.

Indonesia’s war on waste - New Mandala

Shifting blame to society and away from industry

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 19/03/2026

NEW 🇵🇭 Rodrigo Duterte can no longer perform the strongman persona that generated his appeal, yet the political loyalty towards him has only intensified. John Lee Candelaria argues that the moral economy of "utang na loob"—"debt[s] of honour"—sustains the populist bond between Duterte and supporters.

Moral economy and the Dutertes’ political durability - New Mandala

Rethinking the emotional foundations of populism

New Mandala @newmandala.bsky.social · 15/03/2026

NEW 🇲🇲 The socialist economy envisioned by the military regime that ruled from 1962 to 1988 existed only in propaganda. The real economy, meanwhile, ran on Johnnie Walker, jeans, and officials’ willingness to look the other way.

Officially unofficial: the black market in Ne Win’s Burma - New Mandala

At the peak of the socialist era, the market found a way