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By Ooi Kee Beng, Editorial, Penang Monthly, August 2017 As with all agreements, consensus and contracts, a Constitution is a hunt for a balance – and a dynamic one at that, between the expressing on one hand of lofty national aspirations and ambitions, and on the other of compromises meant to be more binding than … Continue reading
By OOI KEE BENG For The Edge, Forum July 24, 2017 In the time of Brexit and the tenure of Trump; with the triumph of Putin and the threat of Kim, instead of thinking about how Globalisation is being reversed, we should take a longer perspective and think about how the global battle in modern … Continue reading
By Ooi Kee Beng, Editorial, Penang Monthly, July 2017 It’s a complicated subject, this thing we call Economics. I don’t always know what it means. I remember once talking to Robert Kuok about it. His reply was (and I paraphrase from my vague memory of that conversation): “Economics is simply about living, isn’t it? As … Continue reading
By Ooi Kee Beng The Edge Malaysia Weekly (June 26-July 02, 2017). You know that you are living in the 21st century when you wake up in the morning and the first thing you do is reach across the bed — not to caress your spouse, but to embrace your smartphone. After all, it has … Continue reading
By Ooi Kee Beng The Edge Malaysia Weekly (May 2017) Humans are land animals. The history of humanity has been largely played out on land. The sea was something that rivers emptied into, and much of seafaring had hugged coastlines. Lakes were simply smaller seas. Access to fresh water, though, is vital to human life. … Continue reading
Review of “The ASEAN Miracle: A Catalyst for Peace” (Ridge Books, 2017) by Kishore Mahbubani and Jeffry Sng. In MEKONG REVIEW, May-July 2017, Volume 2, Number 3. By Ooi Kee Beng The Association of Southeast Asian Nations, founded on 8 August 1967, famously holds more than 1,000 meetings a year. Some say 1,400 would be … Continue reading
By Ooi Kee Beng, editorial in Penang Monthly, May 2017. IN LIEU OF a normal editorial, and in keeping with this month’s cover story being about Penang Hokkien, I am providing here in somewhat truncated form, the Introductory from “The Hokkien Vernacular” (edited by George Thompson Hare and published in Kuala Lumpur in 1904). I … Continue reading
By OOI KEE BENG For The Edge, Malaysia. 1 May 2017. Although one may forgive those who laugh off the Sustainable Development Goals developed by the United Nations in 2015 as a vain exercise to create Heaven on Earth, it is nevertheless vital for the credibility of goals that seek to change the direction of … Continue reading
By OOI KEE BENG, Editorial for Penang Monthly, April, 2017 A racist act is the conscious effort by one group identity to effectively reduce the social status and the security, the rights and the privileges, and the integrity and dignity of another group identity. The intended dynamic is two-fold, and lies firstly in the racist’s … Continue reading
By Ooi Kee Beng In The Compass, March 2017. Jeffrey Cheah Institute on Southeast Asia. With the world caught up in the reality show we call the Trump Presidency, it is important for those of us who are not Americans to retain some distance to the partisanship of their domestic politics. No doubt there is … Continue reading
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