Research

The three interconnected foci for research in Public Policy and Global Affairs (PPGA) are Global Asia and Asian Regionalism, China studies, and Public Policy in Science and Technology

PPGA has launched major research projects in the following areas:

  • regional governance and Asian regionalism
  • policy innovation study in Asia;
  • public administration and public consultation in Asia; and
  • rise of China and its consequent global and regional impact - this research area aims to study the impact and implications of a rising China on Asia and/or Asian regionalism, as well as on global politics (e.g. the potential reform of institutions such as the United Nations, International Monetary Fund, and the World Bank).

At the same time, PPGA faculty conduct research on other policy issues, such as the role of religion in the public sphere, the relationship between identity and violence, Covid-19 management policies of different countries, critical questions in Political Theory, urban governance, inter alia.

On-Going Research


Walid Jumblatt Abdullah:

  • Muslim Activism in Singapore

Felicity HH Chan:

  • HAB-itat (sense of home and belonging in the age of global mobility)
  • Urban Imprints of Immigration in Singapore: the socio-spatial impacts of international schools on locales (SUG)
  • Inter-cultural Learning and Urban Planning in Diverse Places

Chung-An Chen:

  • Preparing public affairs (PA) students for future public service (Tier 1)
  • Does PFP compromise job satisfaction and public service motivation?

Meng-Hsuan Chou:

  • 'European Transoceanic Encounters and Exchanges' (ETEE) (the Jean Monnet Network Grant, European Commission)
  • Unraveling Interdependence: Global Scholarship in Practice (the Fung Global Network Fund, Princeton University)

Azusa Katagiri:

  • The Strategic Sequencing of Signals in Crisis Bargaining: Computational Approach to Foreign Relations 
    Documents (Tier 1)
  • Political and Diplomatic Communication in Interstate Conflicts: A Computational Approach to Historical
    Documents (SUG)

Soojin Kim

  • Exploring the Determinants of Better Financial Performance in the Public Sector: In Pursuit of New Evidence (SUG)
  • The Quality of Government and Varieties of Governance. Social Science Korea (SSK) Research Grant of the
  • National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF-2018S1A3A2075609)
  • Towards Financially Effective Service Delivery: International Evidence on Public-Private Partnerships (HASS
  • Incentive Scheme for the Development of Competitive Research Grant)
  • Preparing Public Affairs (PA) Students for Future Public Service: Examining a Long-Term Change of Students’
  • Public Service Perceptions, Values, and Propensity in Singapore and the World (Tier 1)

Kei Koga:

  • Security Policy under Strategic Uncertainty: Behavior of Secondary Powers in the age of the East Asian Power Shifts
  • Managing Great Power Politics: ASEAN, Institutional Strategy, and South China Sea
  • Institutional Transformation of Regional Security Institutions
  • Tactical Hedging and Strategic Alignments

Christopher Holman:

  • Democracy and Comparative Political Theory: Imaginative Encounters in the History of Political Thought (Tier 1)

Liu Hong:

  • Transnational Knowledge Transfer and Dynamic Governance in the Global South (Tier-2)
  • SG200: Heritage, Identity, Progress (NTU Strategic initiative Grant)

Dylan M.H. Loh

  • Diplomacy at the margins: How non-state actors sustain, contest and supplant international diplomacy
  • Stranger Things: Technologies, Liminalities and Novelties in International Politics

Sabrina Luk:

  • Sustainability of healthcare financing and the importance of healthy ageing: The case study of Singapore

Wang Jue:

  • A comparative study of innovation system (Shenzhen S&T Innovation Commission)
  • Transformations of Career Development in Academia (TUM Global Incentive Fund. 2018-2019)

 

2022:

 

2021:​

 

2020:

 

2019:

 

2018:

2021 - April 2022:

Hong Liu, The Political Economy of Transnational Governance: China and Southeast Asia in the 21 st Century. London and New York: Routledge, 2022. Pp. 227.

Hong Liu, Tan Kong Yam, and Lim Guanie, eds., The Political Economy of Regionalism, Trade, and Infrastructure:  Southeast Asia and the Belt and Road Initiative in a New Era. Singapore: World Scientific Publishing, 2022. Pp. 344.

Ban Guorui [Gregor Benton] and Liu Hong, Dear China: Emigrant Letters and Remittances, 1820-1980. Shanghai: Eastern Publishing Centre, 2022. Pp. 324. [Chinese version of the book of the same title published by the University of California Press in 2018].

Joseph Liow, Hong Liu, and Gong Xue, eds.,  Research Handbook on the Belt and Road Initiative. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar Publishing, 2021. Pp. 438.

Akita Shigeru, Hong Liu, and Shiro Momoki, eds., Changing Dynamics and Mechanisms of Maritime Asia in Comparative Perspectives. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2021. Pp. 258.

Abdullah, Walid Jumblatt (2021). Islam in a Secular State: Muslim Activism in Singapore. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press. 

Singh, Bilveer, Abdullah, Walid Jumblatt, & Tan, Felix (2021). Unmasking Singapore’s 2020 General Elections: Covid-19 and the Evolving Political Landscape. Singapore: World Scientific.

 

2020:

Sabrina Luk (2020) Ageing, Long-term Care Insurance and Healthcare Finance in Asia, Abingdon, Oxon; New York, NY: Routledge.

Soojin Kim and Kai Xiang Kwa. (2020). Exploring Public-Private Partnerships in Singapore: The Success-Failure Continuum. Abingdon: UK; New York, NY: Routledge [The Routledge Book Series – Focus on Public Governance in Asia].

Gregor Benton, Huimei Zhang, Hong Liu, eds. (2020). Chinese Migrants Write Home: A Dual-Language Anthology of Twentieth-Century Family Letters, Singapore: World Scientific

 

2019:

Ting-Yan Wang and Hong Liu, eds. (2019). An Emerging Asian Model of Governance and Transnational Knowledge Transfer, London: Routledge.

 

2018:

B. Guy Peters, Giliberto Capano, Michael Howlett, Ishani Mukherjee, Meng-Hsuan Chou, and Pauline Ravinet. (2018)  Designing for Policy Effectiveness: Defining and Understanding a Concept. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.​

Nilay Saiya. (2018)  Weapon of Peace: How Religious Liberty Combats Terrorism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Christopher Holman. (2018).  Machiavelli and the Politics of Democratic Innovation Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

Long Denggao and Liu Hong, eds. (2018) Shangmai yu Shangdao: Guoji Huashang Yanjiu Wenji [Commercial Networks and Business Behaviours: Studies in Global Chinese Entrepreneurship], Zhejiang University Press.

Gregor Benton and Liu Hong. (2018). Dear China: Emigrant Letters and Remittances, 1820-1980. University of California Press.

Gregor Benton, Liu Hong, and Huimei Zhang, eds. (2018). The Qiaopi Trade and Transnational Networks in the Chinese Diaspora. Routledge.

 

2017 and earlier:


Koga, Kei (2017). Reinventing Regional Security Institutions: Power Shifts, Ideas and Institutional Change in Asia and Africa. London; New York: Routledge. 

Luk, Sabrina CY (2016). Financing Healthcare in China: Towards Universal Health Insurance. London; New York: Routledge. 

Luk, Sabrina CY, & Preston, Peter W. (2016). The Logic of Chinese Politics: Core, Peripheries and Peaceful Rising. Cheltenham; Northampton: Edward Elgar. 

Holman, Christopher (2013). Politics as Radical Creation: Herbert Mercuse and Hannah Arendt on Political Performativity. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

 

Book chapters

Hong Liu, Kong Yam Tan, and Lim  Guanie, “In Pursuit of Regionalism, Trade, and Infrastructure: Southeast Asia, China, and the Belt and Road Initiative in a New Era,” in idem, eds., The Political Economy of Regionalism, Trade, and Infrastructure:  Southeast Asia and the Belt and Road Initiative in a New Era (Singapore: World Scientific Publishing, 2022), pp. xxvii-xlvi.

Hong Liu, “Beyond Strategic Hedging: Mahathir’s China Policy and the Changing Political Economy in Malaysia, 2018-2020,” in Felix Heiduk, ed., Asian Geopolitics and the US-China Rivalry (London:  Routledge, 2021),  pp. 159-176.

Joseph Liow, Hong Liu, and Gong Xue, “Introduction,” in idem, eds., Research Handbook on the Belt and Road Initiative (Cheltenham: Edward Elgar, 2021), pp. xx-xxii.

Joseph Liow, Hong Liu, and Gong Xue, “Conclusion: BRI, Covid-19, and the Future,” in idem, eds., Research Handbook on the Belt and Road Initiative (Cheltenham: Edward Elgar, 2021), pp. 439-448.

Guanie Lim and Hong Liu, “Soaring Garuda Meets Rising Dragon: The Political Economy of the Belt and Road Initiative in Indonesia,” in Joseph Liow, Hong Liu, and Gong Xue, eds., Research Handbook on the Belt and Road Initiative (Cheltenham: Edward Elgar,  2021), pp. 123-137.

Akita Shigeru, Hong Liu, Shiro Momoki, “Introduction,” in idem, eds., Changing Dynamics and Mechanisms of Maritime Asia in Comparative Perspectives (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2021), pp. 1-14.

Hong Liu, “Modern China’s Imagining of the  Nanyang and the Construction of Transnational Asia,” in  Akita Shigeru, Hong Liu, and Shiro Momoki, eds.,  Changing Dynamics and Mechanisms of Maritime Asia in Comparative Perspectives (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2021), pp. 165-194.