India and Indonesia, the juggernaut democracies of South and Southeast Asia, both ended 2024 with new governments that hold new ambitions. How will this pan out in the year to come?

We talked about this with Dewi Fortuna Anwar, one of Indonesia’s foremost foreign policy experts; and Garima Mohan, Senior Fellow in the Indo-Pacific Program at the German Marshall Fund. The conversation is moderated by James Crabtree, 2024 TOY Senior Fellow at Asia Society Switzerland, and was recorded at the third edition of our STATE OF ASIA conference, held last November in Zurich.

More information on the conference, the speakers, plus videos and summaries, available here.

GUESTS ON THIS EPISODE

Dewi Fortuna Anwar is an Academician of the Social Science Commission of the Indonesian Academy of Sciences (AIPI), a Research Professor at the Research Center for Politics, National Research and Innovation Agency (BRIN), Chairman of the Board of Directors of The Habibie Center (THC) and Co-Founder of the Foreign Policy Community of Indonesia (FPCI). From 2001-2010, Dewi Fortuna Anwar was Deputy for Social Sciences and Humanities, Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI). From 2010-2017, she served as a Deputy Secretary to the Vice President of the Republic of Indonesia. She was a Distinguished Visiting Professor at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), NTU, Singapore in 2017/2018, and a Distinguished Visiting Professor at SAIS, Johns Hopkins University in 2007. She has written widely on Indonesias foreign policy, and ASEAN regional political and security issues.

Dewi Fortuna Anwar sits and has sat in a number of national and international advisory boards i.a. Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue (HD) since 2019, Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) from 2010-2020, and the UN Secretary General Advisory Board on Disarmament Matters from 2008-2012. She obtained her PhD from Monash University, Melbourne, while her M.A. and B.A. (Hons) were from SOAS, University of London.

Garima Mohan is a Senior Fellow in the Indo-Pacific program, where she leads the work on India and heads the India Trilateral Forum. Her research focuses on Europe-India ties, EU foreign policy in Asia, and security in the Indo-Pacific. Prior to joining GMF, she was the acting team leader and coordinator for the EU's Asia-Pacific Research and Advice Network (APRAN), which supports EU policymakers on issues concerning the Asia-Pacific. She also led the Global Orders program at the Global Public Policy Institute in Berlin. Mohan holds a PhD from the Freie Universität Berlin and received her master's degree from the London School of Economics. She was a non-resident fellow at Carnegie India, an Asian Forum for Global Governance Fellow, and a 2017 Raisina Young Fellow. She has published widely on Indian foreign and security policy, EU-Asia relations, Germany-India ties, and maritime security in the Indo-Pacific, and is a frequent commentator for European and Indian media.

James Crabtree is a geopolitical analyst and author, with extensive experience living and working in Asia. He was the 2024 TOY Senior Fellow at Asia Society Switzerland and Asia Society Policy Institute. James' book The Billionaire Raj: A Journey Through India’s New Gilded Age, was named an Amazon book of the year and short-listed as FT / McKinsey business book of the year. He is a distinguished visiting fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations. He was previously the Singapore-based Executive Director of the International Institute of Strategic Studies in Asia, where he led the organisation of the Shangri-La Dialogue security summit, the region's most important annual meeting of defence leaders. He was also an Associate Professor in Practice at the Lee Kuan Yew School, Asia's leading school of public policy. James spent ten years as a journalist and foreign correspondent, notably for the Financial Times, where he was both Mumbai Bureau Chief and Comment Editor. He is currently a columnist for Foreign Policy, and writes for publications ranging from the Financial Times to the New York Times.

STATE OF ASIA podcast

Season 8, Episode 4 – published January 28, 2025

Host / Editor: Remko Tanis, Programs and Editorial Manager, Asia Society Switzerland

Find previous and future episodes here, on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or search for 'State of Asia' in any other podcast app. We're also on YouTube.