Professor Chris Alden
Professor of International Relations, Director of LSE IDEAS
Professor Chris Alden teaches International Relations at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) where he is Deputy Head of the Department (PhD and Research). He is also Director of . He is a Research Associate with South African Institute of International Affairs (SAIIA).
He is author/co-author of numerous books, including Apartheid’s Last Stand – the Rise and Fall of the South African Security State (Palgrave 1996), Mozambique and the Construction of the New African State (Palgrave 2003), South Africa’s Post-Apartheid Foreign Policy (Adelphi Paper IISS 2003), China in Africa (Zed 2007), Land, Liberation and Compromise in Southern Africa (Palgrave/Macmillan 2009) The South and World Politics (Palgrave 2010), Foreign Policy Analysis – New Approaches 2nd edition (Routledge 2017), China and Latin America - Development, Agency and Geopolitics (Bloomsbury 2023) and co-editor of China and Mozambique: from Comrades to Capitalist (Johannesburg: Jacana 2014), China Returns to Africa (Hurst 2008), China and Africa – Building Peace and Security Cooperation on the Continent (Palgrave 2017), New Directions in Africa-China Studies (Routledge 2019) as well as having written numerous articles in internationally recognised journals.
Professor Alden has held fellowships at Cambridge University, Institute of Social Science, University of Tokyo; Ritsumeikan University, Kyoto; Ecole Normale Superieure (Cachan), Paris; CERI, Paris; and University of Pretoria.
Ambassador Bilahari Kausikan
Former Ambassador-at-Large, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Singapore
Bilahari Kausikan is a Singaporean academic and retired diplomat. He was Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the former ambassador to the UN and Russia. Bilahari was Chairman of the Middle East Institute at the National University of Singapore. Bilahari Kausikan joined the civil service in 1981. He was appointed as Singapore’s ambassador to the newly formed Russian Federation in 1994, and subsequently as ambassador to the United Nations (1995 – 1998). Bilahari was appointed Second Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 2001, and promoted to Permanent Secretary in 2010. After a 37-year career in Singapore’s foreign relations, Bilahari is known to speak his mind about the issues confronting the country and the wider region. He believes the civil service has become too accommodative and argues that ‘when you are polite, nothing gets done.’ He has called for Singapore to be more muscular in its own delicate diplomatic relations, saying that true neutrality means ‘knowing your own interests, taking positions based on your own interests and not allowing others to define your interests for you by default’. Furthermore, he warns of the danger of passivity in relation to the current US-China split, saying there is no ‘sweet spot’ to keep both the Chinese and Americans ‘happy’. Bilahari studied political science at the University of Singapore before receiving a scholarship to embark on a PhD in international relations at Columbia University. However, he decided against an academic career and returned to Singapore to join the Foreign Ministry. He is the author of Singapore is Not an Island: Views on Singapore Foreign Policy (2017).
Tan Sri Dr Munir Majid
Honorary and Visiting Senior Fellow at LSE
Tan Sri Dr Munir Majid's work is focused on Asean (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) regional politics and economy. As chairman of CARI Asean Research and Advocacy and of Asean Business Advisory Council Malaysia (from 2014 to 2023), he has been at the forefront of thought and practical business leadership for more effective regional integration. He was the founding chairman of the Malaysian Securities Commission and, over the past 50 years, has served in both the public and private sectors, and worked in academia, as a journalist, in banking, as regulator and corporate leader.
Dr Rohan Mukherjee
Assistant Professor, Deputy Director of LSE IDEAS
Dr Mukherjee’s research focuses on rising powers and how they navigate the power and status hierarchies of international order. His book, Ascending Order: Rising Powers and the Politics of Status in International Institutions (Cambridge University Press) received the 2024 T.V. Paul Best Book in Global International Relations Award from the International Studies Association (ISA), the 2023 Hedley Bull Prize from the European Consortium for Political Research (ECPR) and the 2023 Hague Journal of Diplomacy Book Award. His regional focus is on the Asia-Pacific, particularly how major powers such as India, China, the United States, and Japan, and smaller states in South and Southeast Asia, manage the regional effects of global transitions.
His research has been published in journals such as International Affairs, Global Studies Quarterly, Contemporary Politics, Survival, Global Governance, Asian Security and International Relations of the Asia-Pacific, as well as in edited volumes from academic presses such as Oxford, Cambridge, Stanford, University of North Carolina, and Brookings. He has also co-edited a policy-focused volume, published by Oxford University Press, that brought together top scholars and analysts across generations from Japan and India to chart the future course of bilateral relations.
Prior to LSE, he was Assistant Professor of Political Science at Yale-NUS College in Singapore. He received his PhD from the Department of Politics at Princeton University. He holds an MPA in International Development from Princeton University’s School of Public and International Affairs, and a BA in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics from the University of Oxford. He is a Nonresident Scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, D.C., and a Nonresident Fellow at the National Bureau of Asian Research in Washington, D.C.
Dr Thitinan Pongsudhirak
Director, Institute of Security and International Studies (ISIS), Chulalongkorn University, Thailand
Dr Thitinan Pongsudhirak is Director of the Institute of Security and International Studies (ISIS) and Associate Professor of International Political Economy at the Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University. He has authored a host of articles, books and book chapters on Thailand’s politics, political economy, foreign policy, and media as well as ASEAN and East Asian security and economic cooperation. He is frequently quoted and his op-eds have regularly appeared in international and local media, including a column in The Bangkok Post and The Straits Times. Dr Thitinan has worked for The BBC World Service, The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU), and Independent Economic Analysis (IDEA) as well as consulting projects related to Thailand’s macro-economy and politics. He received his BA from the University of California at Santa Barbara, MA from the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, and PhD from the London School of Economics where his work on the political economy of the 1997 Thai economic crisis was awarded the United Kingdom’s Lord Bryce Prize for Best Dissertation in Comparative and International Politics. Dr Thitinan was a visiting professor at Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies in spring 2011 and a visiting scholar at Stanford University’s Humanities Centre and Centre on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law in spring 2010, a Salzburg Global Seminar faculty member in June 2009, and Visiting Research Fellow at ISEAS in Singapore in 2005, having lectured at many local and overseas universities. He currently serves on the editorial boards of Contemporary Southeast Asia, South East Asia Research, Asian Politics & Policy, and Journal of Current Southeast Asian Affairs, and was a visiting professor at Yangon University’s International Center of Excellence from March-April 2014
Tengku Zafrul Azi
Datuk Seri Utama Tengku Zafrul bin Tengku Abdul Aziz
Minister of Investment, Trade & Industry, Malaysia
Tengku Zafrul Aziz is Malaysia’s Minister of Investment, Trade & Industry until December 2025, responsible for growing the country’s manufacturing industry and trade, as well as attracting investments into the country. Since his appointment in December 2022, he has consistently pledged to make Malaysia more pro-business, pro-investment and pro-trade.
Tengku Zafrul was previously Malaysia’s Minister of Finance from March 2020 – October 2022. He led the curation and implementation of eight stimulus and aid packages, the four-phased National Recovery Plan (NRP) to exit the pandemic safely, as well as three national budgets (2021, 2022 and 2023). Post-pandemic, Malaysia achieved a GDP of 8.7% in 2022, the highest among ASEAN countries, and the nation’s highest in 22 years, largely due to the targeted aid measures and NRP. These strategic measures are detailed in his book published by MPH in 2022, entitled Weathering the Economic Storm: A Journey through the Uncharted Waters of COVID-19.
Prior to his ministerial appointments, Tengku Zafrul was in the banking and financial sector for over 22 years, specializing in investment banking, sustainable finance, change management and regional policy execution. He was the Group CEO and Executive Director of CIMB Group Holdings Berhad, a leading ASEAN universal bank and a global leader in Islamic finance, with presence in 13 countries. He had also served as the President Commissioner of PT Bank CIMB Niaga in Indonesia. Earlier years saw him helm senior positions at Maybank Investment Bank Berhad, Maybank Kim Eng Holdings, Citigroup Malaysia, Kenanga Holdings Berhad, Avenue Securities and Tune Money.