My name is Phil Robertson, and I am the Deputy Director of the Asia Division of Human Rights Watch. I want to thank Lia and SEA Junction, and the Raoul Wallenberg Institute, for organizing this film festival, and inviting me to speak.
Thailand has experienced conflict in its Deep South over recent decades. The Deep South includes the provinces of Yala, Pattani, and Narathiwat, as well as four districts of Songkhla province. Muslims make up 76% of the region, with Buddhists comprising around 23%, and Christians and other religious groups making up smaller percentages of the population.…
As a reader of the book “Who Cares? Covid-19 Social Protection Response in Southeast Asia”, I would like to share some reviews that spark my insights about the situation of the pandemic regionally.
COVID-19 has proven to be much more than a health crisis: it has rattled the global order and highlighted the precarious architecture of unbalanced social, political, economic, and environmental systems.
The impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic in Thailand, like in the rest of the world, have transcended public health. The country’s containment measures and strict border control in 2020 limited the toll on human life, but its economy was among the worst affected in Southeast Asia, contracting 6.1 percent for the year after growing 2.4 percent in 2019 (ADB 2022)
After weeks of unconfirmed rumors and government denials, President Joko Widodo, popularly known as Jokowi, officially announced on March 2, 2020, the arrival of COVID-19 in Indonesia.
วิกฤตโควิด-19 อาจมิได้เป็นเพียงแค่ปัญหาสุขภาพ แต่ยังครอบคลุมปัญหาเชิงโครงสร้าง และกระทบสู่ปัญหาอื่นๆ ที่ยังคงฝังรากลึกจนทวีความรุนแรงเป็นวงกว้าง สร้างผลกระทบที่รุนแรงต่อกลุ่มเปราะบางและคนชายขอบ
เมื่อพูดถึงการบริจาคเพื่อการกุศลแล้ว คนไทยนับว่าไม่แพ้ใคร ส่วนหนึ่งอาจเป็นเพราะจารีตของ “การให้” ที่ฝังรากลึกอยู่ในพุทธศาสนาแบบเถรวาท
In this commentary, Ben Harkins expresses his view on how the Book “Who Cares?” highlights the existing structural inequality of Southeast Asia societies, and how the coverage of the social protections in the region is defined by ‘deservedness’ rather than ‘universality’. Leaving the marginalized groups and the informal sector workers become the most painful victims of the crisis, as always.
For months, predictions have been made of the possible change-making results of the general election held in Thailand on May 14.
