Held on the 11th of July 2011 at the Research Clusters, the one-day workshop welcomed speakers from Germany, Thailand and Indonesia, who presented papers pertaining to Indonesian foreign policy, national identity and ASEAN. The 25 participants who attended consisted of undergraduate and graduate students, research fellows from local research institutions such as NTU and ISEAS, as well as faculty members from FASS.
Professor Jürgen Rüland, the Lee Kong Chian NUS-Stanford Distinguished Fellow for 2010, initiated proceedings by introducing the conference topic and presented his preliminary research findings on Indonesian discourses on ASEAN. This was followed by a session on Indonesian Perceptions on ASEAN and the West in which Dr. Paruedee Nguitragool of the University of Freiburg (Germany) delivered a talk on the worldviews and perceptions of Indonesian International Relations lecturers. Mr. Guido Benny from Universiti Kebangsaan, Bangi (Malaysia) then provided some complementary insights with his presentation on Indonesian Attitudes towards ASEAN.
As for the other two sessions, they focused on, respectively, the stakeholders in Indonesia’s foreign policymaking process and whether Indonesia’s foreign economic policies were too neoliberal in nature. To shed light on the latter issue, Dr Alexander C. Chandra of the Trade Knowledge Network (Jakarta, Indonesia) presented his arguments on Indonesia’s trade liberalization policies while Mr Andi Widjajanto of Universitas Indonesia (Depok, Indonesia) tackled the former topic by explicating the impact and role of security issues as well as the Indonesian National Armed Forces (TNI).
Professor Rüland brought the workshop to a close with a lively discussion on framing a new foreign policy identity for Indonesia and there was even time for a brief stretching exercise led by one of the chairpersons! All in all, if indicators of a successful workshop include continuous note-taking by members of the audience, lively networking opportunities and exhausted, but satisfied looking participants, who enthusiastically brought discussions into meal and break times, then I confidently conclude that this short but dynamic workshop had been positively received.
By
Suen Johan
Research Assistant
Religion Research Cluster
FASS