Description

With elections coming up on May 7, what does the future hold for Thailand? Amidst an anticipated global economic recession and geopolitical tensions worldwide, significant challenges await the incoming government.
 
Please join us at our Member Luncheon to hear our distinguished panelists discuss implications for policy, the economy, and beyond. Prof. Dr. Thitinan Pongsudhirak will begin the session by exploring the impacts on government policymaking, national development, and geopolitics. Our second speaker, Dr. Supavud Saicheua, will discuss opportunities and challenges for the economy and business sector. Following the opening presentations, our panelists will engage in discussion, moderated by Shawn Crispin of the Asia Times, including questions from the audience.
 
This event will also serve as the Annual General Meeting for the purposes of approving the 2022 President’s Report and 2022 Audited Financial Statements, along with the appointment of the 2023 Auditors. Voting will open on March 17 via online ballot and conclude at 1 pm on March 29, after which the results will be announced at the meeting.
 
This event is preceded by the New Member Orientation, which all members - old and new - are welcome to attend - please register separately for this event here.
 
About the Speakers
 
Thitinan Pongsudhirak is a Professor of International Relations at Chulalongkorn University’s faculty of political science and a Senior Fellow at its Institute of Security and International Studies in Bangkok, as well as a Senior Advisor for BowerGroupAsia. He earned his degrees from the University of California and Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, and a Ph.D. from the London School of Economics where he won the UK’s best dissertation prize. Thitinan has held visiting positions at Johns Hopkins University, Stanford University, the University of Victoria in New Zealand, and Yangon University, and serves on editorial boards of academic journals, including the Journal of Democracy. He has authored articles, books, book chapters, and over 1,000 opinion articles in local and international media. His work mainly focuses on Thai politics from a comparative perspective and geopolitics/geoeconomics of the Indo-Pacific. In 2015, he was awarded a prize for excellence in opinion writing by the Society of Publishers in Asia. 
 
Supavud Saicheua is currently an advisor to Kiatnakin Phatra Financial Group following his retirement as Managing Director and Head of Research at Phatra Securities Plc. Over his 25 years with Phatra, Supavud and his team lived through many tumultuous economic events including being on ground zero during Thailand’s financial crisis in 1997. Prior to his work at Phatra, Supavud worked at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs where he was posted to Washington D.C. as the Thai Embassy’s Economic Officer during 1986-90. In his varied positions at Thailand’s Ministry of Foreign affairs during 1978-1994, Supavud participated in bilateral and multilateral talks including the Uruguay Round of Multilateral Trade Negotiations. Supavud earned his Ph.D. from the University of Hawaii at Manoa in 1984.
 
Shawn Crispin is Southeast Asia's editor at Asia Times. He has worked as a journalist and editor based in Thailand for the past 20 years, serving previously as Bangkok bureau chief for the Far Eastern Economic Review and Asian Wall Street Journal and contributing editor to The Diplomat. Mr. Crispin has also served as Senior Southeast Asia Representative to the Committee to Protect Journalists, a New York-based press freedom advocacy organization. Mr. Crispin received a master's degree in Southeast Asian Studies and International Economics from the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies in Washington DC.