• SUVANNABHUMI
• /
• v.8 no.1
• /
• pp.77-94
• /
• 2016

The paper examined Southeast Asia as a whole and focused on similarities among countries composing what is now known as the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). In order to determine these similarities, the analysis focused on the fact that during World War II the whole of Southeast Asia was occupied by one political power: Japan. The policies the Japanese implemented in the region were to a degree very similar in terms of pressures and tensions that occurred in the different countries. The paper argues that these pressures and the responses of the various peoples of Southeast Asia instilled a nucleus of common identity in Southeast Asia as a whole. Basically, the policies that the Japanese implemented all over Southeast Asia were the following: the setting up regional administrations; the extraction of resources and emphasis on local self-sufficiency; the implementation of cultural Japanization; and local indigenization policies. The Southeast Asian responses that crystalized this joint Southeast Asian identity may be described as: accommodating and resisting the Japanese; commemorating portraying; and collectively remembering the era. The process of action and reaction between Japan and Southeast Asia was formative of this joint Southeast Asian identity.

• The Southeast Asian review
• /
• v.21 no.2
• /
• pp.1-41
• /
• 2011

Southeast Asia developed maritime trade from the early period due to the suitable physical and cultural conditions. The land consists of peninsular and archipelago, and located at the junction of the two monsoons in South China Sea and India Ocean. The people inherit cultural openness to receive outer influences positively. When Portuguese came to Southeast Asia in 16th century, the region had already enjoyed certain level of commercial development and sociocultural dynamics through the long time experience of interactions with outer world. The Portuguese contact to Southeast Asia was more of participation and assimilation than of conquest and rule experienced in South America. It was due to the higher level of spiritual and material civilization existed in Southeast Asia. Portuguese brought several new elements into Southeast Asia such as colonization and new weapons, Cartaz system and commercial monopoly, and Catholic mission and Casado policy. These new elements, however, did not impact much on the existing Maritime trade that played an important role to change the sociocultural structure of Southeast Asia. Even though Portuguese contact itself did not make significant differences in Southeast Asia, it was meaningful in a sense that it opened a path and left a model case for the more powerful Europeans who came soon after her.

• The Southeast Asian review
• /
• v.21 no.2
• /
• pp.77-123
• /
• 2011

Recently, Southeast Asian people, its food, natural sceneries and so on have been increasingly exposed to Korean people through mass media and multi-cultural events. At the same time, Koreans can frequently encounter Southeast Asians in their everyday lives. Thus, specific images and discourses of Southeast Asia has been established in our society, which creates a new social trend called 'Southeast Asia phenomena'. In short, 'Southeast Asia phenomena' means a totality of Korean people's experience of Southeast Asian and their perception on the region. On the one hand, 'Southeast Asia phenomena' is a result of inflow of Southeast Asians and their culture into Korea. On the other hand, it is also a consequence of Korean people's understanding of Southeast Asia from their trip to Southeast Asia or from their interactions with Southeast Asian people. This article aims to analyze the origin and diffusion of 'Southeast Asian Phenomena' in Korea in the context of Southeast Asia focusing on 4 topics, that is, migrant workers, overseas investments, retirement migration, study-abroad categorized as human movement. This article is also about a country-by-country comparative analysis both at the macro level and the micro level. At the macro level, overseas investments and trade, human exchanges, positive perception to Koreans which considered to be the structural causes become a strong mechanism playing a important bridge role between Korea and Southeast Asia. So these create the high probability of the emergence of 'Southeast Asian Phenomena' At the micro level which is more direct causes of 'Southeast Asian Phenomena', the economic cause is the most important common cause for 4 Southeast Asian Phenomena. Additionally, Korean wave is also remarkable common cause creating 'Southeast Asian Phenomena' even it is not the origin in the context of Southeast Asia. The diffusion of 'Southeast Asian Phenomena' is different by the topics and the elements contributing to create the favorable situation for the diffusion are not only overseas investments and trade, human exchanges at the macro level but also policy elements at the micro level. The relative differences of the causes of 'Southeast Asian Phenomena' in the country-by-country analysis are found. Regarding overseas investments in Vietnam and Cambodia, the economic degree of freedom in Cambodia is higher than in Vietnam. Even Korean Wave has had the longer history in Vietnam, but the favorable perspectives on Korean Wave are stronger in Cambodia. For migrant workers from Vietnam and Indonesia, the economic causes in Vietnam are more significant than in Indonesia. The impact of Korean Wave is stronger in Vietnam than in Indonesia. In case of study-abroad, the social-cultural elements and policy elements are more diverse in Malaysia than in Korea. For the Korean retirees who immigrate to the Philippines and Malaysia, the economic causes in the Philippines is more significant in Malaysia.

• SUVANNABHUMI
• /
• v.12 no.2
• /
• pp.19-52
• /
• 2020

Southeast Asianists have a perennial tendency to question the reality of the region in which they are specialized. Yet while scholars have doubted, Southeast Asians at large have become increasingly sure that Southeast Asia does exist, and increasingly inclined to identify with it. This article summarizes a range of evidence to that effect, from opinion poll research and from the history of ASEAN and other pan-Southeast Asian institutions, and uses it to construct a critique of the relativistic view that Southeast Asia is a fluid and ill-defined concept. Southeast Asians today tend to see Southeast Asia as a cultural as well as a geographical and institutional unit. The nature of the perceived cultural unity remains unclear, and further research is called for in this area. There are reasons to think, however, that it reflects real inheritances from a shared past, as well as shared aspirations for the future.

• SUVANNABHUMI
• /
• v.12 no.2
• /
• pp.81-118
• /
• 2020

Despite its centrality at a pivotal crossroads of both land and sea of East-West trade, communications and travel, the region now known as Southeast Asia provides very few scholarly works situating or featuring it in an international context. Because of this paucity, there is immense scope for exploration. But prior to further explorations, justification is needed to establish that Southeast Asia, as a region, is a subject of interest, relevance, and significance in a global context. Southeast Asia was home to several empires whose reach transcended the region and beyond. Southeast Asia in, and as part of international history as an area of study is therefore justifiable. Moreover, other factors come into play, viz. geography, resources, migration, diffusion of ideas and beliefs from without and accommodation from within, shared experience of imperialism and colonialism, decolonization, and the Cold War, and the collective fate under the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), that further bolster its rationalization as a component of international history. Explorations, on the other hand, examine issues and obstacles that contribute to the paucity of works on Southeast Asia in international history. Furthermore, in contextualizing Southeast Asia in international history, there might appear challenges that need to be identified, confronted, and resolved.

• The Southeast Asian review
• /
• v.22 no.2
• /
• pp.43-93
• /
• 2012

This paper examines the performances of economics for Southeast Asian studies and finds the relationship between economics and Southeast Asian studies in Korea. Based on this we try to find the direction and the way how economics contributes to Southeast Asian studies. First of all, we look into several journals on area studies, such as Review of Southeast Asia, and find out that economics researches on Southeast Asia are much fewer than expected. This shows that Korean economists are not much interested in the issue of Southeast Asia and reflects the academic differences as discipline in economics and interdisciplinary Southeast Asian studies. However, we could find the common area that economics and Southeast Asian studies can share. Also, we suggest some points that economics contributes to development of Southeast Asian studies toward a independent academic discipline. It includes the theory and methodology of international, and development economics. The rapid development of information and communication technology and the economic integration by globalization needs new and modified economic theory and methodology for research on Southeast Asia. Adopting the objective and statistical methodology of economics could level up Southeast Asian studies as social science. Also, Southeast Asian studies need to recruit more actively economics research topics and methodology. Economics could attribute to the development of Korean Southeast Asian studies.

• The Journal of Asian Finance, Economics and Business
• /
• v.6 no.2
• /
• pp.55-62
• /
• 2019

China has become the second largest economy since 2010. China's economy is supported by the rapid growth of its automobile industry. The rapid growth of the automobile and tire industry will increase the natural rubber (NR) demand as its primary raw materials. Although as a significant producer, China cannot fulfill the consumption by its domestic production. Thus China relies heavily on import from Southeast Asia countries as the primary producers of natural rubber in the world. China and Southeast Asia are dependent on their economy in terms of the availability of natural rubber as raw materials. But the economic slowdown in China since 2008 is expected to affect the international trading between China and Southeast Asia countries. This research aims to analyze the determinants of NR export from Southeast Asia to China using panel data analysis. The results show NR price, exchange rate, and China's economic slowdown significantly affect NR export to China, while Southeast Asian NR production has no significant effect. China as the main importer of NR from Southeast Asia has a big role in growing NR export in Southeast Asia. If China's economy doesn't improve soon, it will affect the economy in Southeast Asia.

• The Southeast Asian review
• /
• v.21 no.2
• /
• pp.217-261
• /
• 2011

This study is an attempt to construct a basic framework of analysis about China's political and economic influence on Southeast Asia through traditional Sinocentrism, anti-colonial nationalism, Cold War socialism and post-Cold War capitalism. As to the historical status of Southeast Asia vis-a-vis external forces such as India, China and the West, the colonial discourse tends to put excessive emphasis upon its dependence, and the posy-colonial discourse upon its autonomy. However, this study elucidates the political and economic interactions between China and Southeast Asia in a dynamic perspective, focusing on their reciprocal interactions beyond the essentially static dichotomy of autonomy and dependence. Chinese influence on Southeast asia can be divided into active and reactive one, with the former referring to direct and intended consequences and the latter to indirect and unintended consequences. In the historical process of active and reactive influence, both China and Southeast Asia were fundamentally proactive actors. Thus, the autonomy or dependence of Southeast Asia is just a question of relative one, with its actual extent and degree varying with specific spatial and temporal conditions.

• The Southeast Asian review
• /
• v.20 no.3
• /
• pp.1-40
• /
• 2010

China and Southeast Asia share intimate relationships based on close spatial, temporal and human conditions. Thus, Southeast Asian studies in China boast of a long lineage of 'traditional', 'embryonic', 'closed' and 'opened' Southeast Asian studies. In the modern period the 'embryonic Southeast Asian studies,' professing conservative nationalism based on traditional Sino-centric perspectives, accumulated elementary knowledges on the history of Sino-Southeast Asian relations and Chinese communities in Southeast Asia. On the other hand, 'closed Southeast Asian studies' standing for radical Communism suffered from chronic stagnation. After the Reform and Opening, 'opened Southeast Asian studies' recorded impressive progress in the restoration and development of Southeast Asian studies. Nevertheless, 'opened Southeast Asian studies' are faced with some serious problems such as biased perspectives, traditional methods, and national subjects. Most of all, it is urgent to overcome Sino-centric perspectives on Southeast Asia. Despite the opening of Southeast Asian studies to the diverse methods of modern social sciences, descriptive studies prevail over analytical ones. Regardless of the diversification of subjects, national questions such as the overseas Chinese and cross-border nationalities are prone to excessive nationalism.

• SUVANNABHUMI
• /
• v.10 no.2
• /
• pp.57-85
• /
• 2018

The debates continue on the conceptualization of Southeast Asia and the ways in which those of us who are concerned to attempt scholarly interventions in the region define, conceive, understand and engage with it. But, in an important sense, the region has now been defined for us by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), and whatever academic researchers might wish to impose on Southeast Asia in regard to their priorities and interests, it may make little difference. Given the politically-derived, nation-state definition of Southeast Asia, are all our problems of regional definition resolved? In some respects, they have been. ASEAN has constructed and institutionalized a regional organization and an associated regional culture. But in certain fields of research we still require academic flexibility. We cannot always be confined by an ASEAN-derived regional definition. The paper will explore other configurations of 'region' and its sub-divisions and propose, that in the spirit of academic freedom, we can continue to generate imaginative depictions of Southeast Asia and its constituents both within and beyond the region.