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STATE OF ASIA 2022

A Conference on the World's Most Dynamic Region

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All event pictures by André Hengst

And just like that, the first edition of our STATE OF ASIA Conference is history.
Speakers from across Asia, Europe and the U.S. and 120 hand-selected guests joined us at the beautiful Swiss Re Center for Global Dialogue to discuss the key developments in Asia.
Thank you to everyone who joined us!

In case you couldn't attend in person this time: videos of all sessions are available below and on Youtube. And the latest episode of our STATE OF ASIA podcast features C. Raja Mohan’s eloquent assessment of where the region stands from the State of Asia Address on the night before.

We're already looking forward to next year where we'll be opening our doors again to talk about the most dynamic region of the world with you once more.
 


State of Asia Adress

With C. Raja Mohan  


Opening Remarks

With Sergio P. Ermotti


Session 1: The State of Asia

With Leni Robredo, Tomohiko Taniguchi, C. Raja Mohan  


Session 2: The Rise of Sovereign Asia?

With James Crabtree, Tomohiko Taniguchi, C. Raja Mohan
Moderated by Nico Luchsinger 


Session 3: The State of Technology

With John Lee and Shotaro Tani  
Moderated by Nico Luchsinger 


Session 4: The State of Asian Economies

With Kristine Braden and John Zhu
Moderated by Mark Dittli


Session 5: The State of Democracy

Keynote by Leni Robredo 
With responses from Tomohiko Taniguchi and C. Raja Mohan


Session 6: The State of China

Virtual keynote by Kevin Rudd        
With responses by both Agatha Kratz and Markus Herrmann 


Session 7: What the State of Asia Means for Us

With Agatha Kratz, Markus Herrmann, 
Moderated by Nicola Forster  


Gen A Input – Korean Digital Comics

With Kimberly Schlegel, 2022 Fellow of the Gen A Young Leaders Program at Asia Society Switzerland


Gen A Input – Of Rules, Power and Order

With Boas Lieberherr, 2022 Fellow of the Gen A Young Leaders Program at Asia Society Switzerland


Gen A Input – Mapping the Rights of Sexual Minorities Across Asia

With Loïc Jent, 2022 Fellow of the Gen A Young Leaders Program at Asia Society Switzerland


 

Leni Robredo

Leni Robredo
14th Vice President of the Philippines
Leni Robredo was the 14th Vice President of the Philippines, serving as such from 2016 to 2022. During her term, she reinvented the Office of the Vice President from a purely ceremonial one into an advocacy centered office, instituting poverty alleviation programs all over the country, focusing on programs on education, health, nutrition and food security, rural development, women empowerment and housing and resettlement.

She was able to do this by focusing on the value of collaboration,  private-public partnerships and capacity building of the different stakeholders. The kind of leadership she has long believed in – ethical, empowering, efficient and inclusive – was further highlighted during the pandemic when the Office of the Vice President, under her helm, was in the forefront of Covid Response Operations.
Before her term as Vice President, she was a Member of the House of Representatives. Before she joined politics, she was a human rights lawyer, serving the basic sectors – farmers, fisherfolk, laborers, informal settlers, indigenous peoples, women and children. For almost a decade, she was part of an alternative law group called Sentro ng Alternatibong Lingap Panligal. After her term as Vice President, she set up Angat Pinas, Inc., a non government organization which will focus on education, health, community engagement, disaster response and rehabilitation. This NGO aims to become the biggest network of volunteers in the entire country.

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raja mohan

C. Raja Mohan
Senior Fellow, Asia Society Policy Institute, New Delhi
C. Raja Mohan is a Senior Fellow with the Asia Society Policy Institute in New Delhi — a division of the Asia Society India Centre, Mumbai.

He is a Visiting Research Professor at the Institute of South Asian Studies (ISAS), National University of Singapore, and was previously the Director of ISAS. Mohan was the founding director of Carnegie India in Delhi, the sixth international center of Carnegie Endowment for Peace. He was associated with several Indian think tanks, including the Institute of Defense Studies and Analyses, the Observer Research Foundation, and the Center for Policy Research in New Delhi. Mohan was a Professor of South Asian Studies at the Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, and the Rajaratnam School of International Studies, Singapore. He served on India’s National Security Advisory Board. He was the Henry A. Kissinger Chair in Foreign Policy and International Relations at the Kluge Center, US Library of Congress, Washington DC, during 2009-10. Mohan convened the India chapter of Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs, during 1995-2005. He has published widely on India’s foreign and security policies, Asian geopolitics, and the global governance of advanced technologies. In his most recent, he co-authored the Adelphi Book, The New Asian Geopolitics: Military Power and Regional Order published by the International Institute of Strategic Studies, London in 2021. He is a columnist for Foreign Policy and the Indian Express. 

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tomohiko

Tomohiko Taniguchi
National Security Professor, Keio University Graduate School of System Design and Management
Tomohiko Taniguchi worked with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe as his primary foreign policy speech writer throughout the period in which Mr. Abe was in office, 2006-2007, and 2013-2020.

He terminated his service as Special Advisor to Prime Minister Abe's Cabinet on 16 September, the same day Mr. Abe stepped down as Premier. Bachelor of Law from the University of Tokyo, he spent 20 years in journalism before joining Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 2005 as Deputy Press Secretary. Taniguchi spent the next 3 years addressing members of the foreign press corps, while writing speeches for Foreign Minister Asō Tarō as well as for then Prime Minister Abe. 

While in journalism he was a Fulbright visiting fellow at Woodrow Wilson School, Princeton University, 1991-92, spent three years in London, 1997-2000, during which Foreign Press Association in London elected him President, the first from "the east of Suez," and spent sabbaticals at Shanghai Institute for International Studies, 2002-03, and at Brookings Institution, Washington, D.C., 2004-05. Between 2008 and 2012 he was an Executive Advisor at JR-Central. Taniguchi has published books on Mr. Abe, modern history, and international affairs. 

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sergio ermotti

Sergio P. Ermotti
Swiss Re Chairman of the Board of Directors (non-executive, independent)
Sergio P. Ermotti was elected to the Board of Directors of Swiss Re Ltd in 2020 and has been Chairman of the Board of Directors since April 2021. He chairs the Governance and Nomination Committee.

Sergio P. Ermotti was Group Chief Executive Officer of UBS Group from September 2011 to October 2020, having joined the Group Executive Board in April 2011. Prior to this, he was at UniCredit Group, serving as Head of the Markets & Investment Banking Division as of December 2005, and, from 2007 to 2010, as Group Deputy Chief Executive Officer responsible for Corporate and Investment Banking and Private Banking. Between 1987 and 2004, he held various positions at Merrill Lynch & Co. in the areas of equity derivatives and capital markets. He became Co-Head of Global Equity Markets and a member of the Executive Management Committee for Global Markets & Investment Banking in 2001.

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john zhu

John Zhu
Swiss Re Chief Economist Asia
John Zhu joined the Swiss Re Institute as Chief Economist Asia in December 2021. He is based in Hong Kong. 

 

Before joining Swiss Re, John was the Senior Global Economist at Haitong International Securities. He has worked on both the buy-side and sell-side in London and Hong Kong with HSBC, Legal & General and Pimco.  John was also previously a central banker with the Hong Kong Monetary Authority, which included a secondment as a Visiting Economist at the Bank for International Settlements. John read economics at the University of Cambridge and completed a Masters at the London School of Economics in 2007, after which he worked as a financial journalist during the Global Financial Crisis.

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Kristine Braden

Kristine Braden
Managing Director, Head of Europe, CEO, Citigroup Global Markets AG
Kristine Braden serves as Citi’s Europe Cluster Head leading the firm’s businesses across 42 countries.

She is also the CEO of Citigroup Global Markets Europe AG(CGME), Citi’s European investment firm based in Frankfurt. She is Vice Chair of the Supervisory Board of Bank Handlowy, Citi’s Polish bank, and serves as a Director of the Swiss-American Chamber Commerce Board. Kristine has enjoyed a 24 year career with Citi, working across the US, EMEA, Asia and Latin America. From 2018 to 2020, she was Chief of Staff to CEO Mike Corbat, having served as Citi Country Officer and Corporate and Investment Banking Head for Switzerland, Monaco and Liechtenstein for three years prior. She was based in London in 2012 as Europe Head of Citi’s Global Subsidiaries Group after spending 14 years in Asia. Kristine started her career as a Global Emerging Market Management Associate with postings in the Dominican Republic, Hong Kong, the Philippines and Egypt.

Kristine is a keen advocate of advancing women’s diversity and is listed among the ‘Top 100 Most Influential Women in European Finance' by Financial News in 2021. She currently serves as the Families Matter Affinity Co-Lead at Citi.

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James Crabtree
Executive Director, IISS–Asia
James Crabtree leads the growing IISS research team in Singapore focused on the Asia-Pacific and contributes to IISS publications.

He also plays a leading role in organising the annual IISS Shangri-La Dialogue and the IISS Fullerton Forum: The Shangri-La Sherpa Meeting, as well as the IISS Fullerton Lecture series. Prior to joining the IISS, James was a Singapore-based author and journalist, and an Associate Professor of Practice at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy. His best-selling 2018 book, The Billionaire Raj: A Journey Through India’s New Gilded Age was shortlisted for the FT / McKinsey book of the year. Prior to academia, he worked for the Financial Times, most recently as Mumbai bureau chief, and has written for a wide range of global publications. He also worked as a senior policy adviser in the UK Prime Minister’s Strategy Unit under Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. James was educated at Harvard and the London School of Economics. His fields of expertise contain - but are not limited to - the following topics: Politics, international relations and security, Southeast Asia and the Asia-Pacific region, India’s economy, politics, foreign and security policy, Geo-economics, trade and economic development.

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John Lee

John Lee
Director, East West Futures
John Lee is also a researcher at the Leiden Asia Center, a consultant for the International Institute for Strategic Studies and Co-lead on the EU China Semiconductor Observatory.

John’s research focuses on China and digital technology, in particular China’s cyberspace governance regime, the semiconductor industry and future telecommunications networks. Previously he was a senior analyst at the Mercator Institute for China Studies and worked at the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and Department of Defence. He tweets @J_B_C16.

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Shotaro Tani

Shotaro Tani
Reporter for the Financial Times, on secondment from Nikkei
Shotaro Tani is a reporter for the Financial Times, on secondment from Nikkei, Japan's leading business daily. He started his career as an editor for Nikkei in 2011, and moved to the economics department to cover the central bank and the financial markets. 

He was most recently the Indonesia correspondent for Nikkei Asia, Nikkei's English publication, based in Jakarta from April 2018 until April 2022, and covered all things Indonesia, from corporate news, startups to politics and macro economy.

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Markus Herrmann 2022

Markus Herrmann
Co-Founder and Managing Director China Macro Group (CMG)
Markus Herrmann, a Swiss-Chinese, is an experienced advisor to European corporate and public sector clients on the Chinese market and an expert in China’s economic, trade and S&T policies, political cooperation and government affairs strategies.

Prior to China Macro Group, he worked as Government Affairs Director with Bayer MaterialScience in China and as Management Consultant with Boston Consulting Group in its Shanghai, Hong Kong and Zurich offices. He is a Strategic Advisor Europe to Caixin Global and engages in several board and advisory board roles including CEIBS Zurich, SCCC, UZH AOI, Swiss Forum on Foreign Policy and Stein am Rhein Symposium. Markus holds a B.A. and M.A. in Law from the Universities of Geneva and Bern as well as CAS degrees from ETHZ in public policy and from the University of Zurich in applied ethics.

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Agatha Kratz
Director at Rhodium Group
Agatha Kratz heads Rhodium’s China corporate advisory team, as well as Rhodium’s research on European Union-China relations and China’s economic statecraft. 

She contributes to Rhodium's work on China’s global investment, industrial policy and technology aspirations. Agatha is also a non-resident Adjunct Fellow of the Reconnecting Asia Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies under the Simon Chair in Political Economy. She holds a Ph.D. from King’s College London, on China’s railway diplomacy. Her previous positions include Associate Policy Fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations and Editor-in-Chief of its quarterly journal China Analysis, Assistant Editor for Gavekal-Dragonomics’ China Economic Quarterly, and Junior Fellow at Asia Centre in Paris.

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bruno macaes

Bruno Maçaes
Author, former Minister of European Affairs of Portugal
Bruno Maçaes has represented his country in Brussels during the eurozone crisis, the first Ukraine war and Brexit.

He has published four books since 2018, mostly focused on geopolitics, China, Russia, and technology. Bruno has a doctorate in political science from Harvard and has recently held fellowships at Renmin University in China and the Hudson Institute. Since 2020, he is a fellow at the Wilfried Martens Centre in Brussels, and since 2022 a member of the European Council on Foreign Relations. His latest book, Geopolitics for the End Time, was published in September 2021. He specialises in technology policy, the European Union, and Chinese and Russian foreign policy.

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kevin small

Kevin Rudd
Asia Society President, former Prime Minister of Australia
Kevin Rudd is President and CEO of the Asia Society, and inaugural President of the Asia Society Policy Institute. He served as 26th Prime Minister of Australia (2007 to 2010, 2013) and as Foreign Minister (2010 to 2012).

He is Chair of the Board of the International Peace Institute in New York, and Chair of Sanitation and Water for All – a global partnership of government and non-governmental organizations dedicated to the implementation of Sustainable Development Goal 6. He is a Distinguished Fellow at Chatham House and the Paulson Institute, and a Distinguished Statesman with the Center for Strategic and International Studies. He is also a member of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Organization’s Group of Eminent Persons.

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Nicola Forster (Moderator)
Asia Society Switzerland Board Member, President of Swiss Society for the Public Good 
Nicola Forster is a civic entrepreneur and President of the Swiss Society for the Public Good. He co-founded the foreign policy think tank foraus, the public sector innovation lab staatslabor, the Global Shapers Bern (World Economic Forum) as well as the Global Diplomacy Lab (German Foreign Office).

Furthermore, he is the (Co-)President of the Science et Cité Foundation, the Green Liberals in the Canton of Zurich and a member of the Swiss Commission for UNESCO. As a partner at crstl.io, he has in recent years initiated and moderated innovation and participation processes w various foreign ministries, foundations and international organizations. For his achievements, he was named an Ashoka Fellow and listed among the "Top 99 under 33 Foreign Policy Leaders". Nicola holds an MLaw from the University of Zurich, Montpellier and Lausanne. 

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Mark Dittli

Mark Dittli (Moderator)
Financial Journalist and Founding Partner of The Market
Mark Dittli is editor-in-chief of the Swiss online magazine Republik. From 2000 until 2017 he worked as editor of the Finanz und Wirtschaft, the last six years as editor-in-chief and from 2003 until 2008 as correspondent in New York. 

From late 2017, he was writing for the online magazine Republik for a good year. Mark studied business administration in Winterthur and holds the CFA degree as a certified financial analyst. His journalistic specialties are global macroeconomic issues, economic history and Swiss equities.

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SOA x Gen A 2022

Gen A Inputs: The Fellows 

In our mission to foster Asia Competence, Asia Society Switzerland is committed to empowering young voices in the dialogue with Asia. We offer the Gen A (short for Generation Asia) program to young professionals and advanced students in Switzerland. This year, some of the most outstanding final projects and interventions of the 2022 class of the Gen A Young Leaders Program are presented at the STATE OF ASIA Conference:

  • Kimberly Schlegel, "Korean Digital Comics"
  • Boas Lieberherr, "Of Rules, Power and Order"
  • Loïc Jent, "Mapping the Rights of Sexual Minorities Across Asia"
  • Manuela Coldesina & Thibault Maillard, "Golden Shadows – Voices of Two Exiled Artists" (Off-stage project)
  • Lea Hasenzahl & Tim Hofer, "Highlighting China's Techno Scene  – An Exposé" (Off-stage project)

More info and full list of the current fellows can be found here.

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