Measuring changes in women's empowerment and its relationship to intimate partner violence

This article uses survey data to examine changes over time in the relationship between women’s empowerment and intimate partner violence (IPV) in six Bangladeshi villages. Prior analyses using a limited set of empowerment indicators available in both 2002 and 2014 suggested a persistent positive association between empowerment and IPV. The article’s analysis, using an updated set of measures derived from extensive qualitative studies, suggests that empowerment may be shifting from a risk factor for IPV to a protective factor. The article discusses the methodological limitations posed by the shifting manifestations of empowerment and its social meanings within and across settings.     

South Korean views on Japan's constitutional reform under the Abe government

In this Special Section, this article reviews South Korean views on Japan's ‘peace’ Constitution and the Abe government's attempts at constitutional reform. It identifies three different understandings among South Korean academics on why Japan is escalating attempts to revise the Constitution under the Abe government. An in-depth analysis demonstrates that all three perspectives pay specific attention to Japan's constitutional reform in relation to security policy changes. However, they differ in assessing the impact of Japan's constitutional reform on South Korea as well as how South Korea should deal with such a change. A minority opinion considers Japan's ‘remilitarisation’ through constitutional revision as conducive to South Korean security interests by increasing deterrence against North Korea, whereas the dominant opinion is that any attempt to revise the Constitution could be in and of itself a potential threat to South Korea's security due to a lack of trust attributed to unresolved historical conflicts between Korea and Japan. However, all three approaches pay hardly any attention to the positive role of Japan's peace Constitution while Japan's peace Constitution might provide a regional peace model in Northeast Asia.     

The autocratic mandate: elections,legitimacy and regime stability in Singapore

This paper explains how authoritarian regimes employ flawed elections to obtain both short-term legitimacy and long-term stability. In conjunction with the use of co-optation and repression, it argues that ruling parties hold de jure competitive elections to claim what is termed autonomous legitimation. This denotes the feigning of conformity to the established rules of the constitution and the shared beliefs of citizens. Regardless of overall turnout and support, ruling parties exploit the normative and symbolic value of elections in order to establish moral grounds for compliance within a dominant-subordinate relationship. In support of this argument, the case of Singapore's People's Action Party (PAP) is analysed in historical and contemporary terms. Since 1959, the PAP has used precisely timed elections to extract one or more mandate types from citizens and, by extension, claim legitimacy. In particular, it has sort a mandate based on its response to an event, execution of a policy and/or collection of a reward. In the long run, autocratic stability has been achieved through a process of reciprocal reinforcement, which has combined autonomous legitimation with targeted co-optation and low intensity coercion. The paper concludes by addressing the generalisability of this finding for other authoritarian regimes in Southeast Asia.     

From ambiguity to contestation: discourse(s) of non-traditional security in the ASEAN community

‘Non-traditional security’ (NTS) is prominently featured in the agenda of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and other ASEAN-led institutions in the Asia-Pacific. ‘NTS’ brings together a series transnational and non-military security threats that are considered common among regional states, urgent for them to attend to, and non-sensitive all at the same time. This a priori makes it a self-evident focus of attempts to bring regional security cooperation ‘to a higher plane’. However, this paper reveals that the uncontroversial character of NTS is overestimated, by shedding light on the co-existence of divergent – and potentially contradictory – interpretations of its meaning and implications in ASEAN and the wider region. In a context where ASEAN's relevance to the pursuit of regional security is increasingly being measured against its (in)ability to provide a coherent approach to security challenges that affect the region, the contested nature of NTS has important implications for the grouping's resilience in the twenty-first century.     

Changing arenas for agricultural climate change adaptation in Vietnam

Great changes are underway in how climate and agricultural risks are managed in Vietnam. Uncertainties are emerging regarding the role of the state in managing these risks and what this implies for assumptions regarding hoped-for climate change transformations. Local government control is waning in relation to the expanding roles of the private sector and the growing autonomy of farmers themselves. This article presents cases that illustrate the ways that farmers, private investors, and local authorities are responding to climate risk within roles relating to the other risks involving markets, food security, and pressures on common property resources.     

Developing urban space: the changing role of NGOs in Bangladesh

Rapid urbanisation has been an emerging issue in recent decades, particularly for developing countries such as Bangladesh. As one of world’s largest international NGOs, BRAC, based in Bangladesh, is transiting towards a more integrated approach for alleviating urban poverty. This article presents BRAC’s current journey for eradicating urban poverty and outlines the characteristics of urban poverty, key issues faced by the urban poor, and learning that BRAC has accumulated through its urban interventions. Introducing the concept of “coproduction”, the article identifies BRAC’s priorities to eradicate urban poverty within the context of an overall urban strategy.     

NGO networks in Central Asia and global civil society: potentials and limitations

Based on research carried out by INTRAC (International NGO Training & Research Centre) in 2006–2007 in four countries of Central Asia for Oxfam–Novib, the article investigates NGO networks and their international links in the context of current theory on civil society and global civil society. Three case studies of NGOs working in service delivery, community development and free media are examined to show the diversity of aims and the potential and challenges of networking in the region. Civil society advocacy at national and international levels is analysed with a fourth case study on the campaign conducted in Kyrgyzstan against joining the World Bank's Highly Indebted Poor Countries programme. This example shows a more radical, alternative mode of civil society activism. The article emphasizes the importance of national- and regional-level networking and poses the question of whether NGOs in Central Asia can shift from their current positions on the periphery of global movements and debates.     

多重三边关系影响下的中亚地区

作者通过总结和分析中亚的态势,提出在中亚存在的多重三边关系.首先,作为中亚区域的核心三角关系:例如在上海合作组织框架下的中亚国家、俄罗斯、中国三边关系; 其次,跨欧亚区域的三边关系,包括俄罗斯、欧洲、中亚国家,其中包含俄罗斯、中国、印度等国家; 第三,全球层面的三边关系,例如:俄罗斯、美国、中国的关系,俄罗斯、欧洲、美国的关系.从长远来看,中亚地区内部的多元化以及外部的多样化共同深刻地影响这个区域的发展.作为中亚外部环境的基本形式,三边关系应以尊重国家基本安全利益为目标,并考虑在不可避免的合作与竞争的外部行为过程中采用共同的价值标准.     

二战后东南亚华侨华人认同的变化

二战后,迫于国际国内大背景的压力,东南亚大多数华侨不得不自身调整,开始了自身身份认同的激烈变化。这主要体现在民族(当地)认同、文化认同与族群认同等方面。其中,民族(当地)认同是二战后东南亚华侨华人认同的最根本变化。