Author: Mary Ditton, UNE

Migrants have escaped intra-national conflict within Burma by seeking refuge in Thailand for over 30 years.

But recent development projects in eastern Burma have further displaced segments of Burma’s ethnic population, with approximately 150,000 refugees now dispersed throughout nine refugee camps in Thailand. Read more…

Author: Gavin Jones, ANU

Thailand went through its fertility transition more quickly than almost any other country, with the average number of children born to the average woman declining from about six to two in little more than two decades, between about 1970 and 1990.

Fertility rates have since gone still lower, now standing at around 30 per cent below replacement level (the level that would lead to long-run population stability). This does not mean that Thailand’s population has stopped increasing. Read more…

Author: Vikas Kumar, Bangalore

In the aftermath of the Arab Spring, commentators on East Asia Forum have highlighted the moderate character of Southeast Asian Islam.

Bahrawi argues that contested interpretations of Islam are democratising Islam in Southeast Asia — but similar contests seem to be ineffective in countries like Pakistan. And van Bruinessen argues that large, resilient Islamic organisations are stabilising Indonesian democracy — but comparable organisations are failing to play such a role in other Islamic countries. So are local factors playing a bigger role in Southeast Asia than is usually suspected?  Read more…