JAPANESE TELEVISION: ADVERTISING, CULTURE, AND MEDIA PRACTICES

This brief overview examines Japan’s enduring relationship with the small screen and television broadcasting, a surprisingly faithful relationship in a time of upheavals in media consumption. Television connects all 126 million inhabitants, informing, persuading, relaxing, befriending, and providing topics for discussion and ways of contextualising events, brands, people and world-views. It is now virtually impossible to escape the worlds of the screens in any way in Japan, meaning it is also impossible to escape the manufactured content on these screens. The driving force behind this promulgation of screens is at its most basic level a self-promotion, a need to perpetuate consumerism and brandism, to ensure that screens continue to be bought and continue to integrate into everyday life, providing a direct conduit between products and consumers. These products range from the television screens themselves, everyday consumer goods, through to opinions and worldviews, selections and slices of life for consumption by audiences eager to absorb and consume and connect.

LIVING IN UNCERTAINTY - PROSPERITY AND THE ANXIETIES OF NGO MIDDLE-CLASS WOMEN IN THE CONTEXT OF MARKETISATION AND PRIVATISATION IN VIETNAM

Studies of the new middle-class often write about the anxieties of falling behind with its members acquiring their middle-class status from uncertain and unpredictable market values. This type of anxiety is typical for members of the white-collar middle-class who often deal with pressures to maintain a conspicuous consumption level to remain in the middle strata. I argue that some of the anxieties associated with wealth experienced by the new middle class in Vietnam are also the result of a mode of governmentality that is used by the state to boost individual self-reliance and economic efficiency with the appeal of public contributions. Governmentality, in Foucault’s proposition, consists of technologies that allow the state to govern individuals from a distance with the vision of correct conduct. This mode of governance is done in Vietnam through the idea of “moral conduct”, by which the state guides the autonomous economic activities of individuals with the moral appeal of public contributions. This paper looks at the performance and experiences of Vietnamese female NGO professionals in the process of marketisation and privatisation in Vietnam. I show that their economic and professional performances demonstrate the morality of domestic responsibilities and public contributions, resembling the symbol of the virtuous woman in Vietnam’s Confucian and socialist tradition, a symbol which continues to be applauded by the state. The findings in this paper are drawn from my PhD research project at the University of Leeds, with data collected from a six-month fieldwork study conducted in Hanoi between 2016 and 2017.

LEGAL STATUS OF THE MYANMAR MIGRANT WORKERS IN THAILAND: THE EXPERIENCE OF WORKERS FROM MON AND KAREN STATES IN THAILAND

Myanmar’s unfavorable business environment leads to difficulties for its citizens, especially in rural regions, to find a job with a stable income. To fulfill basic needs for their families, many people from Myanmar cross the border to find a job in the rapidly modernizing neighboring country of Thailand where the salary for unskilled laborers is higher than that of white-collar workers in Myanmar. Thailand hosts the largest number of Myanmar migrant workers. Because of the unfamiliarity of the migration process and, the time and efforts it takes, most of them enter into Thailand illegally and work without proper documents. Even those who cross the border and work legally sometimes end up as illegal workers due to various circumstances, including because they are not able to move between jobs without the employer’s consent. As a result, a large percentage of these workers in Thailand cannot enjoy most of the rights provided for under Thai Laws and under International Human Rights Law. The purpose of this research is to identify ways for the Myanmar migrant workers in Thailand to be able to fully enjoy the rights to which they are entitled. By first providing a thorough review of the existing laws and regulations relating to migrant workers domestically and internationally and then analyzing the current situation of Myanmar migrant workers in Thailand through interviews, this study aims to explore what can be done by the Myanmar government to reduce and eventually eliminate irregular migration to Thailand and to ensure that those working in the country are in a regular situation. The study also points out the importance of informing migrants about the existing process to migrate regularly to Thailand.

THE JAPANESE COAST GUARD’S OPERATIONALIZED HEDGING STRATEGY IN THE EAST CHINA SEA

Qualitative evidence from nearly two dozen sources are used to explain how and why an energized, retooled, and restructured Japanese Coast Guard can serve as the primary enabler of an updated Japanese maritime security policy. This study examines the efforts associated with improving Japan’s maritime security in the East China Sea against the pressure points of an assertive Chinese naval apparatus, as well as the country’s enduring security partnership with the U.S. This research showcases both how, and more importantly, why, a specific Japanese Coast Guard-related policy and operational capability can be effective when developed and cultivated from a tailored hedging strategy. This study finds Japan’s best bet for long-term stability and absolute security gain lies in operationalizing a varied hedging strategy through a capable and resourced coast guard.

SPECIAL ECONOMIC ZONES, THE BELT AND ROAD INITIATIVE AND THE FUTURE DEVELOPMENT OF KACHIN STATE

Kachin individuals and organizations operate within a dense and complex web of domestic and cross-border links that integrate them into a series of network relationships with communities around them. Problems with governance, lack of ability in terms of nation-building and the prevalence of high-risk economic activities have been some of the factors that have constrained economic growth for the State, which represents a similar situation for other spatially outlying people of Myanmar such as the Naga and the Chin. Some limited attempts have been made to create coherent economic organizations so as to help to promote peaceful governance of the land and the needed replacement of opium growing offers an opportunity for cash crop production and exporting that has been successfully exploited elsewhere. However, limitations to the labour force and to resource management capability mean that endogenous economic development is a very limited prospect. An available alternative to internal development is to be the recipient of externally imposed developmental initiatives. Notable among these initiatives is an industrial park or a special economic zone to be built by Chinese capital, such as the proposed Kanpiketi border park. Such an initiative would take its place alongside existing and proposed Chinese projects in Kyaukphyu, Yangon and elsewhere, which have achieved mixed levels of success. Is it possible that such projects, as part of China’s Belt and Road Initiative outreach program, could offer meaningful and sustainable improvement to the standard of living of people in Kachin State? If so, what would be the impact of a new mode of economic activity on existing patterns of Kachin ways of life? This paper uses a case study approach rooted in management science to investigate the possibilities of these initiatives with a view to understanding the potential of such changes.