[Video]Mobilizing for Elections: Patronage and Political Machines in Southeast Asia

Recorded March 15, 2023

Across Southeast Asia, as in many other regions of the world, politicians seek to win elections by distributing cash, goods, jobs, projects, and other material benefits to supporters. But they do so in ways that vary tremendously—both across and within countries. Please join Edward Aspinall of the Australian National University, Meredith Weiss of the University at Albany, SUNY, Allen Hicken of the University of Michigan, and Paul Hutchcroft of ANU, as they discuss their key findings from Mobilizing for Elections: Patronage and Political Machines in Southeast Asia (Cambridge University Press, 2022), which presents a new framework for analysing variation in patronage democracies.

Sspeakers:

Allen Hicken, Professor of Political Science at the University of Michigan where he is also an affiliate at the Center for Political Studies, the Center for Southeast Asian Studies, and the Weiser Center for Emerging Democracies. His work focuses on political institutions, political economy, and policy making with a special focus on Southeast Asia, where he focuses on Thailand and the Philippines, but has also work in Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Cambodia, and Timor Leste.

Paul D. Hutchcroft, a scholar of comparative and Southeast Asian politics who has written extensively on Philippine politics and political economy. He is professor of Political and Social Change in the Australian National University’s Coral Bell School of Asia Pacific Affairs. While on secondment from the ANU, 2013-2017, Hutchcroft served as Lead Governance Specialist with the Australian Embassy in Manila.

Meredith Weiss, Professor of Political Science in the Rockefeller College of Public Affairs & Policy at the University at Albany, SUNY. Her work addresses social mobilization, civil society, and collective identity; electoral politics and parties; institutional reform; and subnational governance in Southeast Asia, particularly Malaysia and Singapore.

Edward Aspinall, professor and head of the Department of Political and Social Change, Coral Bell School of Asia Pacific Affairs, Australian National University. He is a specialist in the politics of Southeast Asia, especially Indonesia. He has authored four books and has co-edited a further ten. His most recent research projects focus on clientelism and urban machine politics across Southeast Asia and village politics and political representation in Indonesia.