Author: Peter Drysdale, Editor, East Asia Forum
In the latest episode in Pakistan’s unfolding political drama, Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani appeared before the Supreme Court on Thursday over the failure to prosecute corruption charges against his political patron, President Asif Ali Zardari, who came to power after the assassination of his wife, Benazir Bhutto.
This is no simple one-plot play about a contest over political corruption between the Supreme Court and the civilian government of Pakistan. Read more…
Author: Moeen Cheema, ANU
Pakistan experienced dramatic political crises in 2011, including the covert raid carried out by the US on 2 May, which killed Osama bin Laden, and the killing of two civilians by CIA contractor Raymond Davis.
It was in these circumstances that an American businessman of Pakistani origin, Mansoor Ijaz, wrote a ‘memorandum’ to the US military commander urging an intervention on behalf of Pakistan’s elected government, which seemed on the verge of being toppled by the country’s historically powerful military establishment. Read more…
Author: Rod Broadhurst, ANU
Few crime victim surveys have been conducted with Chinese populations, but a recently released study, Business and the Risk of Crime in China, analyses the results of the first large scale victimisation survey of 5,117 businesses in Hong Kong, Shanghai, Shenzhen and Xi’an.
This snapshot shows that the level of crime reported by Chinese businesses was lower than other emerging economies such as Brazil, Russia, Nigeria and India, and considerably lower than Western and Eastern Europe. Read more…
Author: John Hemmings, CSIS, Honolulu
At both the APEC and ASEAN summits, attempts were made to deal with the building impasse over the South China Sea issue.
Tensions over the region have grown steadily since 2009, after China, Vietnam and Malaysia submitted their respective claims under the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). China’s naval exercises in the region and apparent willingness to showcase its military capabilities in favour of its claims have also exacerbated these tensions. Read more…
Author: Xin Frank He, City University of Hong Kong
In authoritarian regimes like China, courts and their judges decide legal cases behind closed doors.
How they do so is rarely examined — but is critically important in comparative judicial studies. Read more…
Author: Roger Lee Huang, City University of Hong Kong
A new sense of optimism seems to be emerging in Myanmar (Burma). The nominally civilian government, formed as a result of last year’s election, has unveiled a series of reforms and offered an olive branch to opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
When the former prime minister turned president, Thein Sein, gave his inaugural speech in March, he addressed serious issues such as national reconciliation, good governance and economic reforms — hinting at a divergence from the practices of his State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) predecessor. Thein Sein’s words have also been matched by concrete actions in the last few months, signalling the possibility for real change. Read more…
Author: Sourabh Gupta, Samuels International
On 7 September 2011 in Dacca, the prime ministers of India and Bangladesh signed a landmark protocol to their 1974 Land Boundary Agreement, providing for final settlement of their long-pending boundary issues.
Given that instances of territorial dispute settlement in this sovereignty-conscious region have been few and far between, this exercise in statesmanship is both commendable and long overdue. Read more…
Author: Rajiv Kumar, FICCI
The Supreme Court of India seems to have created a crisis after imposing a large-scale ban on iron ore mining in the Bellary district of Karnataka.
Although the Supreme Court has subsequently allowed the public sector entity National Mineral Development Corporation to continue operations, its imposition of a ban on iron ore mining in Bellary remains an extreme step. Read more…
Author: Chun Peng, Oxford University
Accompanying China’s miraculous economic growth over the past decades have been its equally impressive urban regeneration and expansion.
This is characterised by the ever-modernising city landscape and a record-breaking rise in urbanisation rates from less than 20 per cent to over 40 per cent within 22 years. Read more…
Author: John Gillespie, Monash University
After the Asian Financial Crisis in 1997, most Asian states moved towards a regulatory model that gave judges a greater role in resolving contentious social issues such as land disputes.
This policy of judicialisation, submitting new social and economic problems to regulation by courts, faced considerable hurdles in transforming socialist Asia, particularly in China and Vietnam. Read more…
Author: Justine Zheng Ren, LSE
‘Mass incidents’, as civil unrest is officially called in China, have proved to be an inescapable social and political phenomenon.
After a long period of economic boom with little investment in institutional change, the current conflict resolution mechanisms are no longer capable of sustaining China’s changing social structure and political relationships. Read more…
Authors: Tim Lindsey, University of Melbourne, and Cate Sumner, Indonesia
Once routinely described as ‘Islam with a smiling face,’ the image of Indonesian Islam has been sullied in recent years by a noisy minority of radicals.
The toxic combination of the violent terrorism of Jemaah Islamiyah, vigilante gangs like the Islamic Defenders Front (Front Pembela Islam), inter-religious civil wars in eastern Indonesia, and local governments legislating conservative versions of sharia have all given the impression to some outsiders of an incipient takeover by what Indonesians call ‘hardliners’ (garis keras). Read more…
Author: Clark B. Lombardi, University of Washington
Islamic law is playing an increasing role in the Malaysian legal system. While many celebrate this trend, liberal Muslims inside and outside of Malaysia are concerned.
In particular, liberal Muslims are concerned about the recent application of strict Islamic law to women, Muslims who hold unorthodox beliefs, or religious minorities. Read more…
Author: Brent White, University of Arizona
If you want a sense of the outcome of rule-of-law reform efforts in Mongolia over the last two decades, spend a few hours driving in Ulaanbaatar.
Your immediate impression is likely to be one of chaos. Read more…
Author: Hualing Fu, HKU
Public interest lawyering (PIL) has developed quickly in China since its reception in the mid-1990s, and a small number of lawyers have used litigation as a key law reform strategy.
The popularity of PIL in China can be explained by the lack of alternative opportunities for citizens to assert their rights. Read more…
