Asia & the Pacific Policy Studies最新文献

Popular political attitudes surveys have been conducted globally for several decades, but the Pacific region remains an exception. This paper presents the findings of the first Pacific Attitudes Survey (PAS), conducted in Samoa from December 2020-January 2021. Drawing on a nationally representative sample of Samoans of voting-age (n = 1319) the PAS gauges the attitudes of ordinary Samoans to their democracy, levels of popular trust in institutions, attitudes towards the role of government, and to women's participation in politics. Findings reveal high levels of support for democracy and trust in democratic institutions. At the same time, popular political attitudes highlight a distinct model of Samoan democracy, in which respect for modern democratic norms is tempered and entwined with deeper traditions of Samoan community and identity.

The valuation effects on international investment position induced by the exchange rate volatility are not uniform or easily manageable in small and vulnerable economies when compared with larger developing or developed countries. To investigate the underlying dynamics, we developed a foreign currency exposure index over the period 2006–2019. The positive reading of the index suggests that though Fiji has a high net negative international investment position (90% of its GDP), it does not pose any serious risk. To ascertain determinants of Fijiʼs exposure index, we applied fully modified ordinary least square and autoregressive distributed lag bounds test. We have compared both estimates for consistency. Our findings suggest that the underlying determinants of Fijiʼs currency exposure are foreign debt, trade openness and exchange rate. This article bridges the gap in the literature on currency exposure risks in small island developing states and is the first study of its kind for the Pacific region.

Skilled workers in poor countries earn wages a fraction of that of their counterparts in rich nations. Here, we estimate the opportunities for wage arbitrage from emigration of workers from the Pacific Islands into Australia and New Zealand. Our calculations, based on wages earned by graduate accountants, computer science graduates and cooks with Certificate III qualifications, reveal wage premiums of a factor of up to 10 from emigration. Likewise, the cost of training to Australian standards within the Pacific Islands is as little as a third of that in Australia meaning that the total factor of economic arbitrage is 30.

In 2018–19 some 12,000 people from the Pacific and Timor-Leste came to Australia with its Seasonal Worker Programme (SWP), part of a worldwide trend towards labour mobility. The ways in which Timorese workers use money earned individually within the SWP are shaped by broadly collectivist frameworks for understanding wealth and work embedded in their home communities. Drawing on fieldwork in Timor-Leste and the literature on livelihood seeking and governance there, this article shows how for most Timorese in the SWP the impact of international work is mediated by local custom.

As malaria cases continue to decline in Asia, an integrated service delivery approach is ever more urgent to ensure that no malaria and fever cases are missed, and that malaria health workers continue contributing to broader infectious disease control efforts. However, despite its perceived merit, translating integrated surveillance into practice poses several systemic challenges. This article aims to identify what is hindering improved processes for integrating diagnostic and surveillance services for febrile illnesses. Data from peer-reviewed and grey literature were reviewed using a systems approach based on the World Health Organisation health systems building blocks to fully understand the connections between different elements and system implications of integration. We include snippets from Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Malaysia and Nepal, highlighting expanded diagnostic integration best practices. This review provides a foundation for ‘integration roadmaps’ that can be adapted to different contexts and guide national stakeholders on the operational and political steps for a successful integration model. Such a model can support malaria elimination efforts and serve as a public health tool in the context of disease surveillance and regional health security.

This article introduces a dataset on ministerial tenure in Papua New Guinea (PNG). The dataset, which spans from 1972 to 2017 and covers 15 governments and 321 ministers, is used to study ministerial duration and stability. To do this, two measures of ministerial duration and two stability indicators have been developed. These measures show that ministerial instability is high in PNG but it has not become worse over time. They also show, however, that instability has varied considerably between governments. Drawing on PNGʼs political history, this article provides a discussion of this variation by examining the circumstances of particular governments.

Meeting global and national malaria elimination targets requires identifying challenges as early as possible so that strategies can be modified to stay on track. This qualitative study of stakeholders who have a major influence on malaria programs across the Southeast Asian region, including those at a state level in India and at a national level in Cambodia, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam, shows that most believe Plasmodium falciparum malaria elimination targets are attainable, but are less optimistic for meeting Plasmodium vivax targets. Across these countries, stakeholders reported large variations in access to malaria diagnosis and treatment; the effectiveness of strategies for reaching migrants and hard-to-serve populations; and securing sufficient numbers of skilled workers for both diagnosis and compliance with artemisinin-combination treatments and the need to optimise use of insecticides. Additionally, there was optimism about coordinated surveillance and response, but this was counterbalanced with a sense that national and regional collaboration opportunities have been missed. Climate change impacts were seen as a potential threat by all stakeholders in this study and in need of further research.

This purpose of this article is to demonstrate (1) how growing seaweed in the central Philippines is affected by multifaceted local dynamics and (2) how it is also dependent on the complementary livelihood strategies of in situ and ex situ diversification. This article explores the livelihood trajectories of 45 households that were all engaged in growing seaweed in 2015. Surveys and semi-structured interviews were conducted with households and key informants in two municipalities. Results reveal a process of livelihood divergence. While in one municipality growing seaweed has become a relative success, virtually all households in the other municipality have had to stop growing seaweed, returned to fishing, and remained poor. The reasons for this divergence can be found in the spheres of environmental challenges, value chain governance dynamics, and local coastal governance. Three implications are put forward that could improve the inclusiveness of coastal development in the Philippines and beyond.

Since the early 2000s, the Chinese Government has undertaken a series of recentralisation efforts. In social policy areas, such efforts are targeted at greater equalisation and inclusiveness. These developments raise a critical question: has recentralisation improved equality? This study explores this question through the lens of primary care infrastructure development, an essential aspect of healthcare reforms that has received limited attention in the academic literature. Based on an analysis of health yearbooks (2004–2016), other government documents and fieldwork interviews, we find that, despite recentralisation efforts, the financing for primary care infrastructure development has remained highly decentralised. Provincial governments act as important intermediaries, reflected by their discretionary power in managing central targets and fundraising behaviour to leverage available resources for outcomes that align with local priorities. Despite an overall capacity increase in primary care infrastructure, significant inequality has remained, which contradicts the central governmentʼs intent to improve equality through recentralisation.

Initiated in 2017 and formally established in 2020, the Multilateral Cooperation Center for Development Finance (MCDF) is the latest addition to the development finance landscape in Asia. This article provides an in-depth analysis of MCDFʼs potential to offer additionality in development finance and its political legitimacy by comparing it to 18 development finance and capacity-building organisations. The article finds that while the MCDF contributes to closing the substantial infrastructure financing gap in Asia, it risks overlapping with existing initiatives to such a degree that it may become an inefficient use of resources while lacking legitimacy as a multilateral organisation due to its unclear relationship with Chinaʼs Belt and Road Initiative. From this outset, and given the climate mandates of its multilateral development bank members, this article finds that if the MCDF focuses specifically on green and climate finance, it could carve out an area where it can become a much-needed new platform for project development and coordination.