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The strategic competition between India and China has turned deadly in the Himalayas, but the stakes may be higher elsewhere, in the Bay of Bengal. While India gradually fortifies its island outposts in the Bay, China is preparing for a long-term naval presence there. Both countries are scrambling to build security cooperation with littoral states, especially Bangladesh and Myanmar. This webinar will explore what makes the Bay of Bengal a particularly important sub-region of the Indo-Pacific. It will consider how China’s growing political and military influence poses security risks for India, and how India and its partners – including the United States and the Quad – can build resilience and deterrence in the Bay of Bengal.  

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Professor C Raja Mohan is the Director of the Institute of South Asian Studies at the National University of Singapore. Professor Mohan is one of India’s leading commentators on India’s foreign policy. He has been associated with a number of think tanks in New Delhi, including the Institute of Defence Studies and Analyses, the Centre for Policy Research and the Observer Research Foundation. He was also the founding director of Carnegie India.  He served on India’s National Security Advisory Board, and led the Indian Chapter of the Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs from 1999 to 2006. He writes a regular column for the Indian Express and was earlier the Strategic Affairs Editor for The Hindu newspaper. Professor Mohan has a Master’s degree in nuclear physics and a PhD in international relations. Among his recent books are Samudra Manthan: Sino-Indian Rivalry in the Indo-Pacific (2013) and Modi’s World: Expanding India’s Sphere of Influence (2015).

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Ms. Nilanthi Samaranayake directs the Strategy and Policy Analysis Program at CNA. She focuses on the study of US alliances and partnerships globally and led several studies on Indian Ocean security. Her work has examined U.S.-India naval cooperation, water resource competition in the Brahmaputra River, and Sri Lankan foreign policy. She also has conducted research on the navies of Bangladesh and Pakistan, the Maldives Coast Guard, security threats in the Bay of Bengal, and relations between smaller South Asian countries and China, India and the United States. Prior to joining CNA, Samaranayake held positions at the National Bureau of Asian Research and the Pew Research Center. Samaranayake holds an M.Sc. in International Relations from the London School of Economics and Political Science and a B.A. in International Studies from American University.

Moderator:

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Dr. Arzan Tarapore is the South Asia research scholar at the Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center at Stanford University, where he leads the newly-restarted South Asia research initiative. He is also a senior nonresident fellow at the National Bureau of Asian Research. His research focuses on Indian military strategy and contemporary Indo-Pacific security issues. He previously held research positions at the RAND Corporation, the Observer Research Foundation, and the East-West Center in Washington. Prior to his scholarly career, he served in the Australian Defence Department. Arzan holds a PhD in war studies from King’s College London.

This event is co-sponsored by: The Center for South Asia

This event is part of Shorenstein APARC's spring webinar series "The United States in the Biden Era: Views from Asia."

When this webinar is held, Joe Biden’s presidency will be exactly three months old. Enough time to allow for the evaluation of his administration, its policies, and his country by observers around the world, including in Southeast Asia. Ms. Ha will share and interpret the findings of the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute’s latest annual survey of elite Southeast Asian opinions regarding the United States and other nations, which she co-led and co-wrote up with ISEAS colleagues.  Professor Liow will will share some observations on regional views on the Biden administration thus far, focusing on its evolving approach to the region .  Regional impressions and judgments of America now and prior to Biden’s term will also be contrasted, alongside the changing reputations of other countries such as China and Japan.  Policy implications will be drawn as well, especially in light of the unfolding political crisis in Myanmar.

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Joseph’s research interests encompass Muslim politics and social movements in Southeast Asia and the geopolitics and geoeconomics of the Asia-Pacific region.

Joseph is the author, co-author, or editor of 14 books, has testified before the U.S. Congress, and has extensive teaching and consultancy experience. He sits on several editorial boards and governing boards of think tanks, and on the Social Science Research Council of Singapore.

The REDI task force invites you the next event in our Critical Conversations: Race in Global Affairs series: a panel discussing the troubling rise of anti-Asian racism.

About the Speakers:

Gi-Wook Shin is the director of the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center; the William J. Perry Professor of Contemporary Korea; the founding director of the Korea Program; a senior fellow of the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies; and a professor of sociology, all at Stanford University. As a historical-comparative and political sociologist, his research has concentrated on social movements, nationalism, development, and international relations.

Eujin Park is an incoming IDEAL Provostial Fellow at the Stanford Graduate School of Education. Currently, she is a Postdoctoral Research Associate at the University of Illinois at Chicago. She draws upon Critical Race Theory, Asian American Studies, and community-engaged research to examine how Asian American youth and families negotiate with race in and through educational institutions. She recently conducted an ethnographic investigation of community-based educational spaces in the Chicago-area Asian American community, which highlighted the role of community spaces in youths’ educational experiences and understandings of racializing discourses. In addition to publishing and presenting her work in multiple academic venues, Dr. Park draws upon her research in her work with Asian American youth in community-based organizations.

Min Zhou is Professor of Sociology and Asian American Studies, Walter and Shirley Wang Endowed Chair in US-China Relations and Communications, and Director of the Asia Pacific Center at the University of California, Los Angeles. Her main research areas are in migration & development, race and ethnicity, Chinese diaspora, and the sociology of Asia and Asian America, and she has published widely in these areas.  She is the co-author (with Lee) of the awarding winning book The Asian American Achievement Paradox (2015) and editor of Contemporary Chinese Diasporas (2017) and Forever Strangers? Contemporary Chinese Immigrants around the World (2021). She is the recipient of the 2017 Distinguished Career Award of the American Sociological Association (ASA) Section on International Migration and the 2020 Contribution to the Field Award of the ASA Section on Asia and Asian America. 

Gabrielle Hecht is the Frank Stanton Foundation Professor of Nuclear Security at CISAC, Senior Fellow at FSI, Professor of History, and REDI Task Force Chair. She is Vice-President/President-Elect of the Society for the History of Technology. Her current research explores radioactive residues, mine waste, air pollution, and the Anthropocene in Africa. Essays based on this research have appeared in Cultural Anthropology, Aeon, Somatosphere, the LA Review of Books, and e-fluxArchitecture. Hecht's graduate courses include colloquia on "Infrastructure and Power in the Global South," "Technopolitics," and "Materiality and Power." She teaches a community-engaged undergraduate research seminar on "Racial Justice in the Nuclear Age," in partnership with the Bayview Hunters Point Community Advocates (BVHPCA). She is currently working with BVHPCA and other partners to develop knowledge infrastructures to underpin community-driven public history that supports racial equity and environmental justice.

Co-sponsored with the Harvard Kennedy School

This event is part of the Asia Health Policy Program (AHPP) 2020-21 Colloquium series "Health, medicine, and longevity: Exploring public and private roles"

Speakers

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Lawrence H. Summers is President Emeritus of Harvard University. During the past two decades he has served in a series of senior policy positions, including Vice President of development economics and chief economist of the World Bank, Undersecretary of the Treasury for International Affairs, Director of the National Economic Council for the Obama Administration from 2009 to 2011, and Secretary of the Treasury of the United States, from 1999 to 2001. 

 

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Richard J. Zeckhauser is the Frank Ramsey Professor of Political Economy at the Harvard Kennedy School.  

 

 

 

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John D. Donahue is Faculty Chair for the Master’s in Public Policy program at the Harvard Kennedy School.

 

 

 

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Karen Eggleston is Senior Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and Director of the Asia Health Policy Program in the Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center at Stanford University.

 

 

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Yijia Jing is a Chang Jiang Scholar, Seaker Chan Chair Professor in Public Management, Dean of the Institute for Global Public Policy, and Professor of the School of International Relations and Public Affairs, Fudan University. He conducts research on privatization, governance, and collaborative service delivery. He is the founding editor-in-chief of the journal Global Public Policy and Governance.