From President Biden dropping out, a failed assassination attempt on former President Trump, and Kamala Harris’s surge to stardom, calling these past few months in U.S. politics a whirlwind is quite the understatement.

As entertaining as it may be to watch from afar, the outcome of this election will have significant consequences for Asia and the rest of the world, especially with the two candidates charting divergent paths on critical issues like global security, trade, and climate change.

Come join us at Asia Society Japan for a rare opportunity to hear from experts from Melbourne, Delhi, Hong Kong, and Japan as we explore how Asian countries perceive the U.S. role in Asia and what the election will mean for the region’s security and prosperity.

Event and Registration Details

September 11, 2024, 6:00 – 7:00 p.m. (JST)

• This event will be conducted online, and registration is required.
• Online participation is open to the public and free.

Speaker Bios

Lydia Khalil, Program Director of the Transnational Challenges Program, the Lowy Institute, Australia

Lydia Khalil is Director of the Transnational Challenges Program at the Lowy Institute in Sydney Australia. She manages the Digital Threats to Democracy Project. Lydia has spent her career focusing on the intersection between governance, technology and security. She has a broad range of policy, research and private sector experience and has a professional background in international relations, national security and strategic intelligence analysis.

Lydia has held previous appointments as an international affairs fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York, the Australian Strategic Policy Institute and Macquarie University. She has previously served as an adviser with the US Department of Defense and as a senior policy and intelligence adviser to the Boston Police Department and the New York Police Department. Lydia is a frequent media commentator and has published widely in both popular and academic publications on her areas of expertise. She holds a BA in International Relations from Boston College and a master’s in international security from Georgetown University. She is the author of the book Rise of the Extreme Right: The New Global Extremism and the Threat to Democracy (Penguin, 2022).

Hiroyuki Akita, Commentator, Nikkei Inc., Japan

Hiroyuki Akita is a Commentator of Nikkei. He regularly writes commentaries and columns, analysis mainly on foreign & international security affairs. He joined Nikkei in 1987 and worked at Political News Dept (1998-2002) where he covered Japanese foreign & security policies, domestic politics. He was Senior & Editorial Staff Writer (2009-2017), and he also worked at “Leader Writing Team,” of the Financial Times in London (Oct-Dec, 2017).

He was Beijing Correspondent (1994-1998) and Washington Chief Correspondent (2002-2006). In Beijing, he reported major news events such as death of Deng Xiaoping, Hong Kong handover to China. In Washington D.C., he covered White House, Pentagon, and the State Department during the Bush administration.

He graduated from Jiyu Gakuen College in 1987 and Boston University (M.A.). From 2006 to 2007, he was an associate of US-Japan Program at Harvard University, where he conducted a research on US-China-Japan relations. He published two books in Japanese: “Anryu (Power Game of US-China-Japan)”(2008), “Ranryu (Strategic Competition of US-Japan and China)”(2016).

Debra Mao, Journalist, Hong Kong

Debra Mao is a former news editor who served as Taiwan bureau chief and broadcast presenter at Bloomberg News. As a business journalist, she regularly interviewed heads of state, corporate leaders, and market regulators. In 2019, Mao founded a media tech startup and pursued other entrepreneurial interests. She currently consults for multinational clients on media and communications topics, and hosted a technology-and-society themed podcast funded by China’s Alibaba Group. Mao is a San Francisco native and earned her BA in sociology from Harvard University.

Harsh Vardhan Shringla, Former Foreign Secretary, India

Harsh Vardhan Shringla was India’s Foreign Secretary from 2020-2022. He has also served as India's Ambassador to the United States, Bangladesh and Thailand and as the Chief Coordinator for India’s G20 Presidency in 2022-23. He joined the Indian Foreign Service in 1984 and spent 38 years in the service.

He has served in a variety of positions including France (as part of India's Mission to UNESCO and the embassy, respectively), the Permanent Mission of India to the United Nations in New York City, Vietnam (as consul-general in Ho Chi Minh City and at the embassy in Hanoi), Israel, and South Africa (as consul-general in Durban). Ambassador Shringla contributes regularly to opinion in India on domestic and international developments of interest . He pursued a course in conflict prevention at Columbia University and addressed prominent universities, including the Stanford School of Business, the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard and the University of North Carolina, Chapelle Hill.

As President of the Darjeeling Welfare Society, a non governmental organisation, he is also committed to working for the welfare of the underprivilege in remote communities, and on environmental, climate change and other  issues in north eastern India.