DESPERATELY SEEKING EAST ASIA AMIDST THE POPULARITY OF SOUTH KOREAN POP CULTURE IN ASIA

This study questions the term ‘East Asia’ by investigating its usage in South Korean mass media and academic discourse about the Korean Wave and by reframing the Korean Wave as a source of new definitions of the cultural geography of East Asia and East Asian sensibilities instead of its current designations as either an empty signifier or a profitable market. Reframing the Korean Wave as a set of seminal iterations of East Asian pop culture includes its multiplicity and historicity, which enables the delineation of the cultural geography of East Asia as neither a unilateral nor fixed topography but rather something that is constantly re-imagined via pan-Asian pop cultures, materialized through actual encounters, and re-invented through shared historic pasts and modernizing desires. Examining East Asian pop culture also helps to illuminate current structures of feeling in East Asia (‘East Asian sensibilities’). The study concludes with suggestions for future collaborative works and theoretical endeavors, which are imperative for the establishment of East Asian pop culture as an object of analysis.     

Managing Secrecy and Disclosure of Domestic Violence in Affluent Communities

Although it is widely acknowledged that domestic violence (DV) can happen to anyone, there is scant research on affluent women's DV experiences. Using grounded theory, the present study examined how affluent mothers managed secrecy and disclosure of DV in the context of their community. Data consisted of interviews with 10 mothers and 17 service providers from one affluent community. The process of managing secrecy and disclosure of DV was nonlinear, ongoing, and strongly influenced by community culture and familial status. Mothers' secrecy and disclosure decisions (i.e., how and when mothers disclosed) and experiences (i.e., the type of responses they received upon disclosure) varied depending on whether they bought in or opted out of the culture of affluence during marriage. The resulting grounded theory has implications for future research on DV in affluent families and the broader literature on secrecy and DV disclosure.     

Women’s political pathways in Southeast Asia

While Southeast Asian women’s socioeconomic status and formal political rights have improved significantly in recent decades, women remain under-represented in the region’s political institutions, especially at local levels of governance. Although interest in Southeast Asian women’s political representation has increased in recent years, our understanding of women’s experiences in their pursuit of elected office remains limited. Through a critical reading of the literature on women and politics and an examination of experiences in Southeast Asia, this article highlights gaps between normative theories and elite-biased empirical studies of women’s political advancement and the conditions, processes and outcomes observed across several Southeast Asian countries. Drawing on original ethnographic research in Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam, this article identifies three major pathways by which women in Southeast Asia have sought election and re-election to political office. In so doing, the article highlights the significance of understanding women’s varied experiences and suggests an agenda for further research.     

Privileged migrants and their sense of belonging: Insider or outsider?

Asia is gaining prominence as a destination for millions of migrants, totaling to about one-third of total international migrants. The privileged migrants (highly skilled and affluent) make up a large part of this group. They remain a fertile ground for scholarly examination owing to the fact that extremely scarce research attention has been paid to this group. Within this context, this paper focuses on the sense of belonging of this migrant group in the host countries. We argue that professional hierarchy; socioeconomic and sociocultural factors contribute to the privileged migrants’ positionality as an insider or outsider in the host country. In this research, four Southeast Asian countries (Singapore, Malaysia, Brunei, and Thailand) are selected. Via multiplex communication (WhatsApp, email, and phone calls), a total of 27 interviews were conducted. Findings suggest that most of the privileged migrants position themselves as an outsider for multifaceted factors.     

Gambling motivations and superstitious beliefs: a cross-cultural study with casino customers

The expansion of legalized commercial gaming in Macau has motivated stakeholders to explore opportunities in other Asian countries. However, there is a lack of research focusing on casino customers in these markets. Thus, the purpose of this study is to explore gambling superstitious beliefs and motivations of those visiting a casino in South Korea, and how these factors are different across four ethnic groups. The researchers surveyed 323 casino customers in the lounge area on the casino floor, including Americans, Chinese, Japanese, and Koreans living abroad. This study found American gamblers could be characterized as more superstitious than Japanese gamblers, while the Chinese and American gamblers exhibited many similarities regarding the pattern of superstitious beliefs that they were most likely to endorse. The findings also suggest the culture and the area around the casino might be more important to Chinese, while novelty to Japanese and winning money to Korean gamblers are seen as most important. This study contributes to gambling literature by examining gamblers’ beliefs and motives in a different setting with more diverse populations than those in previous studies. The findings of this study will help casino operators properly develop and adjust strategies to thrive in the Asian marketplace.     

The future of small farms in Asia

Farms throughout Asia are predominantly small. By nature, small farms use labour‐intensive production methods. The question arises as to the viability of small farms in the face of the rapidly increasing wage rate in most Asian countries. There is also indication that the production efficiency of small farms has declined relative to large farms in many Asian economies, indicating the increasing disadvantage of small farms in Asia. Therefore, this study argues that unless new policy measures are taken to expand farm size, Asia as a whole is likely to lose comparative advantage in agriculture and become an importer of food grains in the future.     

Why Is There So Little Migrant Settlement in East Asia?1

Unlike states in Europe, East Asia settles very few migrants and has not developed a European‐style multicultural society. We seek to explain this variation using comparative analysis of two of the most advanced states in East Asia, South Korea and Japan, with several states in Europe. Focusing on family reunification – almost always the precursor to migrant settlement – we examine the effects of several independent variables, including supranational institutions, independent courts, interest groups, political culture, and the perceptions of migrants. We conclude that both Korea and Japan have less migrant settlement because of the lack of regional institutions pushing for family reunification rights, an elite political culture that still maintains the assumptions and repertoires of a “developmental state,” where rights may be sacrificed for economic growth and order, and migrant perceptions of greater immigration control in Asia.     

RESEARCHING INTERNATIONAL LABOR MIGRATION IN ASIA

This article focuses on research on international labor migration in Asia, a region marked by intense migration in the last four decades. The review covers migration research undertaken from the post-1970s to the present. The growing significance of international migration in the region has stimulated the production of evidence-based knowledge on Asian migration in Asia. This is indicated by the growing literature on migration-related questions, the development of research centers focused on migration, and the development of research networks in the region. Although migration research is thriving, future efforts should aim toward theory building and establishing the links between internal and international migration.     

Alternative Regionalism from Below: Democratizing ASEAN's Migration Governance

Most literature on migration governance has addressed the global level, and it has done so primarily from a state‐centric and top‐down perspective, with little regard to the role of civil society organizations in shaping its direction. Moreover, in an institutional sense, except for the EU, the regional level has only received scant attention, which is surprising given the significance of intra‐regional migration flows elsewhere. The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) is a case in point. Although there are few direct channels of engagement for civil society, the vibrant migrant rights community in Asia has been capitalizing on, and creating, opportunities at multiple levels including the regional. Our argument is that this creative use of channels of engagement in combined form at multiple levels can have democratizing potential.     

Koreans in Central Asia – a different Korean nation

The main objective of this study was to illustrate the cultural changes that have taken place among Korean ethnic groups living in the Central Asian states of the former Soviet Union. Previous research on Korean minorities has demonstrated the impact of state intervention on the formation of ethnic identity. Despite a wide range of regional differences, those living in Korea in the nineteenth century belonged to one ethnic group. Once they left the northern part of the country for Russia, they began to adopt Russian culture relatively quickly. Following their deportation to Central Asia in the 1930s, they then experienced a largely Soviet model of inclusion into mainstream society. However, since the 1980s, when confronted with ‘original’ Korean culture, they now consider themselves to be dissimilar to other Korean groups. The differences are already so substantial that Koreans themselves now talk about belonging to different nations.     

Contributing Factors in Trafficking from South Asia

This pioneering research in the field of human trafficking from South Asia is an important study as the subject population has not been studied in social work literature. Victims of trafficking who were working as exotic dancers in South Asian bars in the United States were studied qualitatively. The method of recruiting, transporting, putting to work, and maintaining victims within the trafficking system is explored through interaction and observation revealing victims' personal accounts. Data analysis was conducted using NVivo and experts' analysis. The study results support a dynamic theoretical framework in which social exchanges and choice of migration networks increase South Asian women's vulnerability to trafficking.     

Measuring the Unmeasurable—A Study of Domestic Violence Risk Prediction and Management

ABSTRACT

The prevention of domestic violence (DV) have aroused serious concerns in Taiwan because of the disparity between the increasing amount of reported DV cases that doubled over the past decade and the scarcity of social workers. However, most common collaborations for DV prevention, between academic researchers and advocacy groups or governments outsourcing, often fail to produce effective prevention strategies. Hence, Data for Social Good Initiative (D4SG) worked with Taipei City Government to improve the efficiency of DV prevention and risk management on two levels—project collaboration level and data level. On the project collaboration level, we adopted a platform strategy and utilize public-private partnership (PPP) to connect and empower change agents across data silos from pilot runs to actual project execution. On the data level, we helped social workers differentiate the risk level of new cases by building a repeat victimization risk prediction model using random forest method with the 2015 data from Taipei City government’s DV database. The accuracy and F1-measure of our model were 96.3% and 62.8%. This projects’ PPP approach and quantification method successfully improved DV prevention process. These methodologies have also been applied to other work fields including firework prediction, emergency healthcare management as a paradigm.     

Aging in Asia: A cultural,socio-economical and historical perspective

Asia has about 60% of the world population and population aging is occurring more rapidly in Asia than in Western countries. The group aged 65 years and above will increase from 207 million in 2000 to 857 million in 2050, a staggering increase of 314%. The diversity in economic, demographic, religious, cultural and geo-political factors in Asia is unparalleled by any other continent, and is, in part, contributory to the rapid rise in population aging. By 2050, those under 15 years old will have shrunk from 30% in 2000 to 19%, while those aged 65 years and above will increase from 6% to 18%. In addition, the gender divide still persists with 100 elderly women to 70 elderly men. These projected demographic changes pose three major challenges: 1) how best to address the rising population of the group aged 65 years and above, 2) how to address the shrinking population of the young as well as the working adults, and 3) how to address the problems arising from the disproportionate increase in older women than men. From now to 2050, it will be expeditious for each country in Asia to look into ways of reversing the decline in total fertility rates (TFRs) and restore to replacement levels. If not, at least introduce measures to halt its free fall. Due to the complexity of factors that have influenced the fall in TFRs in Asia, it will be a daunting task to reverse this fall. There is no “single size fits all” solution to this complex problem. Research work in this short-term strategy in addressing the aging population is urgent. In the longer term, the East-West Centre have suggested four modalities, 1) establish policies and programmes that enhance traditional Asian systems of family support for the elderly; 2) introduce policy reform that encourages the elderly who are still capable of remaining in the work force; 3) create institutions and systems that support high levels of personal saving; and 4) formulate public programmes, including pension schemes and national healthcare systems. We need to work while there is time.     

Migrant Domestic Workers in Asia: Transnational Variations and Policy Concerns

The labour force of the migrant domestic workers (MDWs) has become one of the significant policy concerns in Asia. Most of the Asian countries are not following (or not to an equal extent) the Domestic Workers Convention 2011 (No. 189) which has been adopted by the International Labour Organization (ILO). The objective of this article is to show the transnational variations and policy concerns of the MDWs in Asia. Based on content analysis, the authors found that there are considerable transnational variations of the MDWs in terms of their age and nature of work, legal identity, working hours, and remuneration across Asian countries. These variations have serious policy concerns in a number of areas such as lack of available data of the MDWs, working conditions, exploitations, and gender issues. The findings of the article would be an important guideline for adopting new legislation and labour policy for the MDWs in Asia.     

Representations of Central Asian Ethnicities in British Literature c. 1830-1914

This article evaluates representations of Central Asian ethnicities in British literature between 1830 and 1914. It commences by evaluating the ways in which representations of Central Asia were influenced by the Mongol campaigns in Europe of the thirteenth century and proceeds to examine the ways in which these changed during the debate over the 'Central Asian Question' in the second half of the nineteenth century. It argues that the way in which different ethnicities were depicted was contingent upon a number of factors. The first was the extent to which they were deemed to conform to 'Tartar features' (the greater the perceived resemblance, the more unfavourable the assessment). The second was geopolitical factors (the extent to which they were perceived as allies or enemies in the Anglo-Russian rivalry in Central Asia between 1830 and 1914). The third was social Darwinism, most notably the notion of 'degeneracy' articulated by proponents of eugenics.     

Researching an-'other' minority ethnic community: Reflections of a black female researcher on the intersections of race,gender and other power positions on the research process

There is a dearth of discussion on the methodological dilemmas faced by minority ethnic researchers who research minority ethnic communities of which they are not a part. The paper explores the political and ethical issues involved in a black woman researching South Asian women's lives, analysing the research process, and focusing on issues of choice of research group, access and placing. This paper represents a reflexive account of the research relationships developed in longitudinal qualitative doctoral research between a black (of African descent) postgraduate student and sample of 19 South Asian female student teachers in England and draws on literature of women interviewing women and ethnic or 'race' matched research. The methods employed were documentary analysis, observing meetings, a focus group, two student questionnaires, one-to-one interviews with staff and group and one-to-one interviews with South Asian female student teachers. It is argued that whilst social characteristics such as gender, language, religion and culture are important in determining notions of commonality and difference, a shared experience of racism between the researched and the researcher may affect the research relationship most significantly.     

Indigeneity in Asia: an emerging but contested concept

This introduction presents background information about some of the ways that the concept of indigenous peoples is emerging but is also being contested in Asia. Indeed, many governments in Asia accept that there are indigenous peoples in the world, but claim that the concept does not apply to them due to a relative lack of European settler colonization in the continent. This is why many governments of Asia signed onto the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) in 2007, but with the understanding that UNDRIP does not apply to them. This has become known as ‘the salt-water theory’ or the ‘Asian controversy’. This special issue includes five articles that variously consider the ways that the concept of indigeneity is being deployed in various parts of Asia, including Cambodia, Myanmar, and Nepal, and also transnationally between Thailand, Myanmar, China and Laos; and between Cambodia, Vietnam and the United States.     

Academic “Centres,” Epistemic Differences and Brain Circulation

This article investigates the factors that shape how migrant academics engage with fellow scholars within their countries of origin. We focus specifically on the mobility of Asian‐born faculty between Singapore, a fast‐developing education hub in Southeast Asia, and their “home” countries within the region. Based on qualitative interviews with 45 migrant academics, this article argues that while education hubs like Singapore increase the possibility of brain circulation within Asia, epistemic differences between migrant academics and home country counterparts make it difficult to establish long‐term collaboration for research. Singapore institutions also look to the West in determining how research work is assessed for tenure and promotion, encouraging Singapore‐based academics to focus on networking with colleagues and peers based in the US and Europe rather than those based in origin countries. Such conditions undermine the positive impact of academic mobility between Singapore and surrounding countries within the region.