Singaporean philosopher, former diplomat and academic Professor Kishore Mahbubani has warned the world is entering a global “Asian new order” and he has called on researchers in the Asia-Pacific region to shed Western dominance of the social sciences.

Speaking as a keynote at the Symposium on Social Science 2020 in Indonesia this week, Dr Mahbubani, author of the recent book Has China Won? The Chinese challenge to American Primacy, told more than 200 participants on the webinar that Asian “mental maps” needed to change to address the new reality.

“The world has changed fundamentally – we must understand that,” he said. “But our problem is that the mental maps that we have to understand this new world, our mental maps given to us by our 19th century, 20th century [social scientists] – mostly Western – cannot guide us in the 21st century.”

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This was because the current century would be far different from the two previous centuries, said Dr Mahbubani, a member of the Asia Research Institute.

“What I have tried to do in my writing is to provide a glimpse of what the 21st century will be like.

“And I have also tried to explain why this is relevant to those studying social science.”

As well as his books, Professor Mahbubani has published extensively in leading journals and newspapers overseas such as Foreign Affairs, the National Interest, The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal.

New trends, new challenges
His wide-ranging speech explored new trends in the world, new challenges and new solutions.

“A shift of power to Asia [is taking place] and the 21st century will be the Century of Asia. We need to be very clear about that. There is absolutely no doubt,” he said.

This was not surprising, he said, because for 18 centuries of the past 2000 years, the world had been dominated by two Asia economies – China and India.

“It is only in the last 200 years that Europe and North America have taken over. So the last 200 years of Western dominance of world history has been an aberration,” he said.

“All aberrations come to a natural end. So it is only natural to see the return of Asia.”

The covid-19 coronavirus pandemic was hastening the world change, partly because the most competent countries in dealing with the global crisis had been in East Asia, he said, echoing what he told BBC Hardtalk’s Zeinab Badawi recently.

He said then that the number of deaths per million in East Asia was less than 10 compared to Europe and the US where it was in the hundreds.

‘Top three out of four in Asia’
“Even today, in terms of purchasing power as a measurement, if you look at the top four economies: number one is China, number two is the United States of America, number three is India, and number four is Japan.

“So three out of the top four economies are already Asian.”

Professor Mahbubani also told the live video symposium participants, hosted by the Centre for Southeast Asian Social Studies at the Universitas Gadjah Mada in Yogyakarta, that Indonesia would be a “big beneficiary” of this global change.

And in market terms it was much harder.

“Indonesia in 2017 was the 16th largest economy in the world. By 2030 it will become the ninth largest economy, and by 2050 it will be the fourth largest – bigger than Japan.

“That is amazing.”

These were the big changes coming, but the world was still outdated with mind maps being set in the 19th and 20th centuries.

‘Dangerous’ to rely on West
“It is dangerous for us to depend on Western social science to understand the Asian century,” he said.

Professor Mahbubani was critical of the double standards in the United States over corruption when it was illegal for American businessmen to bribe foreign legislators while it remained legal for businessmen to influence lawmakers at home, especially over the privatised health system.

He said he believed that the US had lost its moral compass and its current failure under President Donald Trump to stem the coronavirus pandemic and to deal constructively with China and other countries was a warning to the world.

The country was no longer a democracy, it was a plutocracy.

Climate change was an event greater issue than covid facing the globe.

Professor Mahbubani said the world needed a strong US to balance China.

The stimulating two-day webinar had speakers and research papers from all over Asia, but also included foreign presenters such as Australia’s Dr Daniel McCarthy of the University of Melbourne on “another face of power” and New Zealand’s Professor David Robie of Auckland University Technology on climate change and covid-19 – “redefining the relations between humankind and the environment”.

Selected papers will be published in a book to follow the publication from the first Social Science Symposium in 2018.

The Pacific Media Centre was a partner of Indonesia’s Centre for Southeast Asian Social Studies for this symposium.

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A pair of Indonesian Islamic universities are pushing female students to ditch niqab face veils – with one threatening expulsion for non-compliance – as concerns grow over rising fundamentalism in the world’s largest Muslim-majority nation, reports Rappler Indonesia.

Sunan Kalijaga State Islamic University said it had issued the edict this week to more than three dozen niqab-wearing students, who will be expelled from school if they refuse.

Although niqabs are common in ultra-conservative Saudi Arabia and some other Gulf states, they are rare in secular Indonesia, where around 90 percent of its 260 million people have traditionally followed a moderate form of Islam.

For many Indonesians, the niqab – a full veil with a small slit for the eyes – is an unwelcome Arab export and some associate it with radical Islam, which the country has wrestled with for years, reported Rappler.

“We are a state university… we’ve been told to spread moderate Islam,” the school’s chancellor Yudian Wahyudi told a press briefing this week.

The school, based in Indonesia’s cultural capital Yogyakarta, has some 10,000 students.

Another Yogyakarta-based institution, Ahmad Dahlan University, has also introduced a new prohibition on the niqab out of fears it might stir up religious radicalism, which has seen a resurgence on many of the nation’s university campuses.

No penalty
There would be no penalty for those who refused, it added.

“But during exams, they cannot wear it because officials have to match the photos on their exam ID with them, which is hard if one is wearing the niqab,” said university chancellor Kasiyarno, who like many Indonesians goes by one name.

Indonesia’s reputation as a bastion of progressiveness and religious tolerance has recently been tested by a government push to outlaw gay and pre-marital sex, Rappler reported.

The conservative lurch comes as once-fringe Islamic political parties move into the mainstream.

The niqab has been at the centre of a heated global debate over religious freedom and women’s rights, with France the first European country to ban it in public spaces.

Backers of the schools’ new rules said wearing a niqab is not a religious obligation.

“Education should be about dialogue – open and progressive – and if you wear a niqab it interferes in that dialogue and the teaching-learning process,” said Zuhairi Misrawi, head of the Jakarta-based Muslim Moderate Society.

But others saw the anti-niqab appeal as trampling on individual rights.

It’s “a matter of personal preference and the university has to respect that”, said Fadlun Amin, a spokesman for the local chapter of the Forum Ukhuwah Islamiyah, part of top clerical body the Indonesian Ulema Council.

Several Indonesian universities have issued niqab bans in the past.

Last year, a private Islamic high school in Java was reprimanded by local officials after images went viral online that showed a classroom of sitting female students wearing niqab, violating a national regulation on acceptable school uniforms.

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Indonesia’s National Commission for Human Rights (Komnas HAM) has demanded that state-owned airport operator PT Angkasa Pura I consider human rights aspects while working on the construction of a new airport in Kulonprogo, Yogyakarta.

The project should be free from human rights breaches, in particular when it comes to land ownership, the organisation said.

“Please, do not steal the citizen’s lands in the name of infrastructure development,” said Komnas HAM commissioner Choirul Anam.

READ MORE: Students reject new Yogyakarta airport, condemn forced evictions

Choirul added that he had received reports from local activists claiming that people of Glagah village were being forced by the company and police to give up their land.

Thirty of some 2700 families living on the disputed land reportedly insist on staying in their homes. Choirul suggested the company engage in dialogue with the people to find a solution.

“This is not only about land ownership; the eviction also threatens the people’s culture and social wellbeing,” he said, noting that violence could create even more problems.

Meanwhile, PT Angkasa Pura, through the manager of the New Yogyakarta International Airport (NYIA) construction project, Sudjiastono, claimed it had done everything in line with the law on land procurement for public utilities construction.

According to the regulation, he added, the company was allowed to forcibly evict people who refused to give up their land in return for compensation through the court.

“We’ve respected the people’s rights by giving them compensation, more than they deserve to get,” he said.

Bambang Muryanto is Yogyakarta correspondent of The Jakarta Post.

Protesters and students from Indonesia’s Alliance against the Kulon Progo Airport have again demonstrated in front of the PT Angkasa Pura (API) offices in the Central Java city of Yogyakarta.

The action was marred by scuffles between protesters and security personnel and the blockading of the road in front of API.

The demonstration began at the weekend. The protesters took turns in giving speeches opposing the construction of the New Yogyakarta International Airport (NYIA) in Kulon Progo regency.

Although the demonstration initially proceeded without incident, it was suddenly marred by a scuffle between the protesters and API Yogyakarta security personnel.

As a result, the front gate to the API office was damaged.

The demonstrators then blockaded a length of the road in the direction of Solo-Yogya. Not surprisingly, there was a long traffic jam on the length of road alongside the Adisutjipto International Airport which is located not far from the demonstration.

The demonstrators were still blockading the road and giving speeches in the middle of the street when Detik News published this story.

The blockade is located on the length of road in front of the PT API office on Jl. Raya Solo Km 9. As a result the flow of traffic from the east towards Yogyakarta city was brought to a standstill.

Security personnel from AP I, the police and the TNI (Indonesian military) could be seen guarding the rally.

“We are protesting in solidarity with the residents of Temon sub-district, Kulon Progo, who are being impacted on by the airport project. Reject the NYIA project and stop the forced eviction of Kulon Progo residents”, said action coordinator. (sip/sip)

Translated by James Balowski for the Indoleft News Service. The original title of the article was “Demo Tolak Bandara Kulon Progo, Mahasiswa Orasi dan Blokir Jalan”.

There was an unusual sight during the 1438th Eid (Eid al-Fitr) prayers at the Wonosari Square in the Gunungkidul regency of Indonesia’s Yogyakarta province, Central Java, last Sunday. The congregation dispersed in the middle of a sermon by mosque preacher Ikhsan Nuriansyah Bajuri.

Right from the start of the sermon, Ikhsan took up the blasphemy case involving former Jakarta governor Basuki Tjahaja Purnama or Ahok. The congregation, who had been sitting and listening to the sermon, stood up in unison, folded up their prayer mats and left the grounds.

Wonosari City Islamic Holiday Committee (PHPI) chairperson Iskanto confirmed what happened.

According to Iskanto, the sermon was considered too vulgar, contained too many accusations against other parties and made an issue of the Ahok blasphemy case.

“The issues raised may have been factual but for general consumption it was inappropriate”, he said.

Regret expressed
Iskanto expressed his regret over the incident saying a preacher should be able to gauge what is appropriate to be conveyed before a congregation. He hopes that in the future sermons will contain things that are refreshing and cheerful.

Right from the start of the sermon, Ikhsan immediately took up the blasphemy case that ensnared Ahok.

“Ahok is a blasphemer,” he said in front of the thousand or so strong congregation.

He then said that a blasphemer should not be defended or helped, let along assisted by the state, including the police. He said he fully supported the [two-year] sentence against Ahok and hoped that it would create a deterrent effect so that no one else will commit blasphemy.

In the end, the traditional Ikrar Halal Bihalal exchange of greetings and forgiveness that had been prepared following Idul Fitri prayers was only attended by a few people because most had already left.

Translated by James Balowski for the Indoleft News Service. The original title of the report was “Khatib Singgung Kasus Penodaan Agama, Jemaah Salat Ied Bubar“.

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The Bell 5073 chopper, carrying five people, crashed into a house in Taman Martani village in the Kalasan subdistrict around 3 pm local time.

The helicopter was heading to Adi Sucipto International Airport in Yogyakarta from Adi Sumarmo Airport in Solo, Central Java.

The helicopter crew members were Captain Titus Benediktus Sinaga, Second Lieutenant Angga Juang, Master Sergeant Rohmad, Second Sergeant Sirait and Lance Corporal Sukoco.

The victims were receiving treatment at Bhayangkara Police Hospital in Yogyakarta, the report said.