Festschrift: Asia in three parts

Writing from Asia has three parts, containing 49 chapters consisting of articles he researched and wrote. The first part, ‘Politics and Personalities’, contains twenty articles that explore major geopolitical issues that confront the countries of Southeast Asia, such as climate change, energy resources, environmental degradation, political developments and population growth.

The second part, ‘Energy and Resources’, contains the meat of Symons’ researches. These are detailed, carefully documented and wide-ranging studies of developments and issues related to mining and energy resources. The highlight of his career was probably a report commissioned by the Lowy Institute, an independent think-tank based in Sydney, in preparation for a conference dealing with Asia-Pacific perspectives on nuclear energy and global governance in April 2008: ‘Nuclear Power in Southeast Asia: Implications for Australia and non-proliferation’.[2] The report makes the point, among others, that the general public in Southeast Asia and Australia already had little confidence in the safety of nuclear energy. This, of course, was prior to the Fukushima disaster.

The third part of the book, ‘Book Reviews’, showcases his multi-dimensional interests in the society and history of Southeast Asia. The book reviews are mainly essays that paraphrase and retell the messages of the authors in a way that reflects his focus on the public interest. The books covered in the reviews are varied: the story of Chin Peng, leader of the Communist rebellion in Malaya, explores the nationalist thinking behind his existential struggle;[3] in ‘The New Chinese Empire’, veteran China watcher Ross Terrill forecasts likely future political developments in China; ‘Target North Korea’ explicates the development of the paranoid psychology of the North Korean regime and discusses the possibility of ‘bringing them in from the cold’ to end the suffering of the unfortunate populace. His review of Elizabeth Economy’s ‘The River Runs Black’ details the efforts of the Chinese to address their pressing need to prevent further environmental degradation. He also reviews Anthony Reid’s ‘An Indonesian Frontier’ by retelling the long history that preceded the Acehnese rebellion. He reminds us of the significance of the first great meeting of newly independent Asian and African states in 1955 in Bandung, explained by the late Jamie Mackie in ‘Bandung 1995’ as one of the first and most significant steps towards the emergence of a new multi-polar world that developed later as the sharp polarities of the Cold War disintegrated. He also reviews John Monfries’ ‘Different Societies, Shared Future’, clarifying that it is the cultural differences between the two societies that are the root cause of the continuous see-sawing that is a notable feature of the relationship between Indonesia and Australia, which needs ‘ballast’ in the form of more institutional and ‘people to people’ links. Another article introduces us to the charm of the unique architecture of the Khmer modernist movement that flourished under Prince Sihanouk, which was characterised by diversity, subtlety and innovation, but is now being lost through demolition and unregulated development as more money flows into Cambodia (‘Building Cambodia’ by Helen Ross and Darryl Collins). These are a few of the offerings in the last section of the book, which—unlike the earlier more dispassionate sections—is imbued with humanitarian and aesthetic values, and this enhances the other chapters for the reader by displaying the underpinning basis of Symon’s world-view.

The paperback volume presents well, appears well-edited and includes an index, although on closer examination one finds quite a number of mangled sentences, incorrect page references, and so on, which betray its hasty compilation. For students and scholars, the value of this collection is faceted, like the structure of the book. For those interested in the region, not just in terms of mining and energy resources, it provides an extremely well-informed and broad, yet deep, introduction to enhance their understandings in many disciplines such as economics, engineering, environmental studies, history, politics and public policy. For students and professionals in mining and energy resources it should be required reading, one would think.

[1] In 2000, he wrote a popular series of articles about STOVIA (the Vocational School of Medicine for Indigenous Doctors), an institution of the Dutch Colonial Government that produced many thinkers of the revolutionary generation in Indonesia, for the Jakarta Post.

[2] The report is also available on the Lowy Institute’s website.

[3] Published as ‘Fact and Fiction on Chin Peng’ by Andrew Symon, IIAS Newsletter #33, March 2003.