Memoirs of a Mediator
Review of “Blood and Silk: Power and Conflict in Modern Southeast Asia” by Humphrey Hawksley published in August 2017 in “Asian Affairs” Humphrey Hawksley on …
Financial Times review of “Blood and Silk” – 8th July 2017
Southeast Asia enters the danger zone Inequality and toxic identity politics haunt Michael Vatikiotis’s portrait of a region often celebrated for its dynamism By Victor …
Blood and Silk: Power and Conflict in Modern Southeast Asia
A powerful examination of the conflicts in Southeast Asia that risk destabilising its remarkable development. Thought-provoking and eye-opening, BLOOD AND SILK is an accessible, personal …
Digging up the Past
Former Dutch rulers launch an inquiry into the violence that gave birth to Indonesia In a world where liberal notions of truth and justice seem …
Trump
Triumph of Trump: such an easy headline. But one for some that recalls the arrogant populists who heralded the fascist order in Europe in the …
Appropriate my Ass!
“I write fiction to escape the bonds of cultural constraint, and use fictional characters and situations to bore more deeply into the cultures I …
Hard Power Prevails in Southeast Asia
So far, 2016 has been a terrible year for advocates of democracy and human rights in Southeast Asia. The military has tightened its grip on …
The World Gone Mad
Many baby boomers like me probably feel the same way: the world wasn’t quite the way it is now back in the 1980s when we …
Thoughts on Brexit
When I arrived in London as a migrant from the United States in 1966, racial prejudice and inequality was prevalent even in the school playground …
The Malaysia That Could Be
Shortly after I arrived in Kuala Lumpur in 1991 as newly-appointed bureau chief for the Far Eastern Economic Review I was introduced to a Malaysian …