This article investigates how the Chinese Expeditionary Force joined the Burma Campaign and retreated to India in 1942, and how the Chinese, American, and British authorities negotiated to determine the destiny of Chinese forces in India. This article argues that the choice of Ramgarh, a small town in northeast India, as the site of a training centre for the Chinese Expeditionary Force sheds light on a decades-long programme of colonial internment-camp building in British India, and illuminates the difficult relationship between Chinese and British authorities during World War II. In doing so, it also argues that the historiography of China's War of Resistance requires Southeast and South Asian perspectives.

The year 2019 marked the 40th anniversary of the outbreak of the Sino-Vietnamese War in 1979. Making use of published and unpublished Chinese, Vietnamese, and English sources, this article traces the tensions between official and popular memories of the Sino-Vietnamese War of 1979 in China and Vietnam, respectively. We argue that these tensions existed because the development of the official Chinese and Vietnamese memories of the war largely mirrored each other. Between 1991 and roughly 2006, when bilateral relations between the countries improved, both Beijing and Hanoi claimed victory for their side while simultaneously downplaying the bloodshed, tragedy, and loss experienced during the war. However, they have reacted to the rise of popular memories since the early 2000s in very different ways. While Beijing walks a thin line between accommodating appeals for greater recognition of the sacrifices made by ordinary soldiers without provoking social discontent with the political system, Hanoi has been more successful in mobilising Vietnamese popular memory of the war to strike a measured nationalistic response to China. How China and Vietnam remember and downplay the Sino-Vietnamese War points to the bigger picture of the sensitivity of bilateral relations to historical memory in Asia. In particular, historical memory shapes how a country perceives external threats and opportunities, while historical memory is created, suppressed, and re-created as international relations evolve.

In Malaysia, a Muslim-majority country in Southeast Asia, a dynamic market for Muslim fashion has evolved over the past decade, especially concerning the abaya, a female Muslim dress. Malay Malaysian designers, producers and consumers focus on this garment because it represents a style of female Islamic clothing that is perceived as ‘authentic’. The abaya originates from the Arabian Peninsula and is generally worn by Arabic Muslim women with a syariah-compliant design that is commonly simple, loose and opaque. Embedded into the broader marketising processes of a halal industry in Malaysia, Malay women started to adopt this material object and transformed it into a distinct expression of Malaysian Muslim style. The original abaya that follows Islamic rules became a colourful and decorated dress. This transformative process is not only an expression of variation in fashion and style but profoundly transcends powerful social, placial and spatial orders within the Muslim world. The Malaysian fashion market for abayas is embedded in wider dynamics of sacred landscaping in which the Arabian Peninsula is considered to be the ‘centre of Islam’ while Malaysia is positioned and positions itself at the margins. However, Malay Malaysian social actors have shifted this constellation towards a Malaysia that has pushed itself to the forefront of a commercialising Islam through the development of the related Muslim fashion market, among other things. Thus, within a Muslim world order, transregional connections lead to an entangled web of meaning-making regarding power structures, Islamic principles and social practices.

Studies on tourism and pilgrimage show that spatial mobility, including transregional travel, mostly confirms and strengthens tourists’ and pilgrims’ social identities and symbolic boundaries between Self and Other. However, in guided religious package tours from Indonesia to Israel and Palestine, experiences with spatial boundaries do affect the Muslim and Christian pilgrims, adding more nuances to socio-cultural boundary-making. This complex making and breaching of boundaries relates to inner-Indonesian religious dynamics. Among both Muslim and Christian Indonesians, references to the Middle East express not only transregional solidarity but also multifarious orientations in inter and intra-religious relations within Indonesia. Among Indonesian Muslims, some orthodox Muslims’ orientations towards the Middle East as the birthplace of Islam are contested but also combined with indigenous Islamic traditions. Similar to these intra-Muslim frictions, members of Indonesia's Christian minority experience fissures in the expressions of local and global Christian identities. This article analyses how symbolic, social, and spatial boundaries are maintained and breached in transregional tourism from Indonesia to the Middle East.

Remittances from the Vietnamese diaspora have played an important role in Vietnam's post-Cold War economic development, providing important inputs to a range of household spending areas, from education to health care. In the case of Vietnam, however, remittances are also caught up with memories and traumas of war, betrayal, separation, and exodus. This article traces that history and illustrates how Vietnam's particular post-war refugee and remittance situations and channels illuminate networks and exacerbate inherent contradictions and comparisons in the mobile flows of finance, people, and goods across borders. Examining genealogies of remittance reception and management offers insight and intervention into analytical assumptions of the distancing and mediating functions inherent to classic conceptions of money, as well as the reciprocity and recognition perceptions mapped onto gift economies.

Conventionally perceived as a geographical and civilisational periphery of the Muslim world, Indonesia has recently pursued an Islam-based diplomatic narrative that aims to promote itself as a model democratic Muslim-majority country, upholding religious pluralism and tolerance. This paper analyses the educational dimension of this Islamic soft power policy, which has been overlooked by the academic literature. It argues that the extroversion of Indonesian Islamic education—defined as the switch from an inward-looking perspective to a strategy of exporting this sector beyond Indonesia's borders, while upholding the narrative of its national distinctiveness—aims at fostering the authoritativeness of Indonesian Islam, enhancing the nation's standing within the Muslim world and, more broadly, bolstering the image of Indonesian Islam as inherently moderate and pluralist, which serves both domestic and foreign policy purposes. At the same time, extroversion seeks to legitimise local Islamic practices that have become increasingly challenged by external and, in particular, Wahhabi influences. By mapping out historical trajectories and current developments of the Indonesian Islamic educational sphere, we argue that future research on Indonesia's position within and relationship to the Muslim world—and particularly the country's Islamic soft power strategy—must consider Islamic educational institutes and their intellectual milieux as distinct actors in global religious and political competition.

Myanmar was under a military government for almost six decades, during which time the state maintained an ‘authoritarian public sphere’ that limited independent civil society, mass media and the population's access to information. In 2010, Myanmar held flawed elections that installed a semi-civilian government and established a hybrid governance regime, within which civil, political and media freedoms expanded while the military's influence remained significant. In this paper, we examine ‘hybrid governance at work’ in the ‘hybrid public sphere’, that holds in tension elements of an authoritarian and democratic public sphere. The boundaries of these spheres are demarcated through legal means, including the 2008 military-created Constitution, associated judicial and administrative state structures and the actions of civil society and community movements toward political, military and bureaucratic elite actors. We develop our analysis first through an assessment of Myanmar's political transition at the national level and, then, in an empirical case of subnational politics in Dawei City regarding the planning of the electricity supply. We suggest that the hybrid public sphere enables discourses—associated with authoritarian popularist politics in Myanmar—that build legitimacy amongst the majority while limiting the circulation of critical discourses of marginalized groups and others challenging government policies. We conclude that for substantive democracy to deepen in Myanmar, civil society and media must actively reinforce the opportunity to produce and circulate critical discourse while also facilitating inclusive debates and consolidating legislated civil, political and media freedoms. On 1 February 2021, shortly after this article was finalized, a military coup d’état detained elected leaders and contracted the post-2010 hybrid public sphere, including constraining access to information via control of the internet and mass media and severely limiting civil and political rights.

The relationship of the bourgeoisie and democratisation has been inconsistent across the history of democracy. This work offers an alternative explanation taking the example of the Thai middle class, which had promoted democracy, turned against it. From the democratic transition of 1973 until the present day, the Thai middle class has played contradictory roles in the democratisation of the country. This work investigates the effects of democratic institution-building after regime change and the efforts to consolidate democracy in the middle class. This work proposes two major observations. The first is the failure of the middle class to establish themselves in democratic institutions and processes in either the legislature/executive, political parties, local government or structured interest groups. They have learned of the uncertainty of free elections and how the elected executives have benefitted other classes but not them. The second regards the missing prerequisite of democracy. Insufficient understanding of majority rules and two-turnover elections, caused the middle class who were disappointed with the outcome of democratic regimes and systems to easily turn away from democracy.

Hosting a sports mega-event strengthens connectivity with the world and provides opportunities to establish or increase networks and to build soft power. These events operate as hubs for the global flow of capital, people, knowledge and technology, and they perform important rituals and symbolic functions. In particular, they become coveted opportunities to enrich the soft power portfolio of governments or individual leaders. Despite its regional character, the Asian Games have developed into such a mega-event. In 2018 – only for the second time in the history of the Asian Games – Indonesia staged the event in Jakarta and Palembang. This paper scrutinises the ways in which Indonesia used or failed to use the Asian Games as a platform to increase the country's soft power and reputation and to strengthen intra-Asian connectivity. Three aspects serve as examples to assess Indonesia's soft power initiatives: (1) the “spirit of 1962”, (2) the host country's emergence on the Asian stage and (3) Indonesia's cooperation with other countries and intra-Asia connections in the context of the sports event. Examining the prominence of domestic politics reveals shortcomings and untapped potential. The analysis shows that the inward-looking foreign policy approach of the Jokowi administration limited the initiatives to increase Indonesian soft power and to establish and address Asian themes and debates; consequently, this approach downgraded the sports event to a tool to generate political capital for domestic affairs.

Beginning in the early 1960s—and especially by the end of the decade—a large number of the ethnic Hmong people in Thailand aligned themselves with the Communist Party of Thailand (CPT). By the 1970s, most of the CPT's “liberated areas” were located in remote, mountainous areas populated by Hmong people. In this paper, I situate Hmong involvement in CPT through the literature related to the multi-ethnic connections being made through the organisation of armed groups and argue that Hmong involvement with the CPT was transnational, transcultural and gender-relations-transforming. The first Hmong Thai to join the CPT was recruited in neighbouring Laos. Other Hmong in Thailand heard about the CPT through radio broadcasts from Laos in Hmong language. Furthermore, many of the early CPT recruits travelled from their homes in Thailand for political and military instruction at a basic training centre called A-30, which was located somewhere in northern Laos near the border with China. There, most Hmong CPT recruits learned to speak, read and write central Thai language. Hmong CPT also started to meaningfully interact with other Thais, including those from northeastern and southern Thailand and Chinese Thais from Bangkok. Later, those deemed to have particular potential were sent to study in China or in Vietnam for specific military training. Some Hmong sent their children to study with the CPT; others went on their own. The Hmong also interacted with people from other communist movements in Southeast Asia.

The concept of al-wala’ wa-l-bara’ (loyalty and disavowal) has become the ideology of modern Salafism; it is used to justify unfriendly relationships with non-Muslims. This concept is usually implemented by reserving love only for fellow Muslims and showing insularity towards non-Muslims. What is the ideological concept that guides some Muslims in their relationship with groups that are considered heretics? This article intends to scrutinize the theological matrix used by vigilante groups in their anti-heresy campaign or attacks on the Ahmadiyya. It also aims to determine why some people believe that persecuting the Ahmadiyya is a theologically justifiable idea. What theological and ideological reasons can be used to justify attacks against the Ahmadiyya community? How do they cope with the conflict between divine law and human/state law? This article argues that instead of feeling guilty, the perpetrators of faith-based violence often feel they have just fulfilled a good religious duty. Committing violence against religious groups deemed heretics is believed to be more than al-amr bi al-màrūf wa al-nahy `an al-munkar (“commanding right and forbidding wrong”)—it is a jihad. Violence is seen not as an illegal act, but as a “virtue” or an effort to save them from the punishment of God in Hell. In justifying the breaching of state law, the idea of a hierarchy in the law is constructed, i.e. state/human law is hierarchically lower than divine law, so attacking the Ahmadiyya is seen as a transgression of human law for the sake of upholding the divine view.

There is a northern Thai story that tells how the naga—a mythical serpent—came and destroyed the town known as Yonok (c. thirteenth century) after its ruler became immoral. Despite this divine retribution, the people of the town chose to rebuild it. Many archaeological sites indicate resettlement during this early historical period. Although many temple sites were constructed in accordance with the Buddhist cosmology, the building patterns vary from location to location and illustrate what this paper calls ‘nonconventional patterns,’ distinct from Theravada Buddhist concepts. These nonconventional patterns of temples seem to have been widely practiced in many early historical settlements, e.g., Yonok (what is now Wiang Nong Lom). Many local written documents and practices today reflect the influence of the naga myth on building construction. This paper will demonstrate that local communities in the Chiang Saen basin not only believe in the naga myth but have also applied the myth as a tool to interact with the surrounding landscapes. The myth is seen as a crucial, communicated element used by the local people to modify and construct physical landscapes, meaning Theravada Buddhist cosmology alone cannot explain the nonconventional patterns. As such, comprehending the role of the naga myth enables us to understand how local people, past and present, have perceived the myth as a source of knowledge to convey their communal spaces within larger cosmological concepts in order to maintain local customs and legitimise their social space.

Members of the Kerinci ethnic group area migrated to and settled in Malaysia centuries before the nation-state era arrived on the Malay Peninsula. Their migration continues in the present, and they face a range of problems, such as ongoing changes in the nation-state in the Malay Peninsula, migration policies, available types of occupations and aspects of their social-economic and cultural context. This paper focuses on the lives of members of ethnic groups from the regency of Kerinci, Sumatra, who have been living as migrants in Malaysia for more than three generations. It explores the ethnic identification of Kerinci migrants in Malaysia and investigates how they have preserved their legacy and protected the land that was inherited from their ancestors. This paper argues that the migration of some Kerinci to Malaysia entails a preservation of cultural differences and reunification of some families, as well as the continuation of certain family inheritances.

This article examines the meaning of Vietnam's removal of the Khmer Rouge in January 1979—an event that recently became a point of contention between the Prime Minister of Cambodia Hun Sen and Prime Minister of Singapore Lee Hsien Loong. Since 1980, Vietnam's removal of the Khmer Rouge has been adopted as Liberation Day by the Cambodian ruling political party. The article discusses three topics: (1) the Vietnamese presence in Cambodia during the 1980s and the resulting civil war, (2) three major changes in the Liberation Day narratives, and (3) reflections on Hun Sen and Lee's recent debate. It demonstrates that Hun Sen and Lee's contention reflects on how the legacy of Vietnam's removal of the Khmer Rouge has continued to be very important and sensitive in Cambodia and within the ASEAN Community today. It also examines China's successful approach to strengthening its relationship with Cambodia after more than a decade of the political confrontation and hatred during the 1980s.