DIJ-ARI Asian Infrastructures Research Partnership
Steering Group Coordinator
Research Foci
In July 2022, ARI established a “Research Partnership on Asian Infrastructures” with The Deutsches Institut für Japanstudien (DIJ) which is one of the institutes of the Max Weber Foundation (MWS). The Partnership is interested in infrastructures in a broad sense, including (but not only) knowledge networks, health infrastructures, migration infrastructures, port and other transport infrastructures, digital and financial infrastructure networks and nodes and China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). The Research Partnership capitalizes on and replaced the Max Weber Foundation Research Group on Borders, Mobility and New Infrastructures established in the NUS Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences in June 2017. At ARI, coordination of the Research Partnership is overseen by Professors James D Sidaway and Tim Bunnell and at the DIJ by Professor Franz Waldenberger.
Research Activities
In August 2023, two of the Singapore-based members of the partnership, together with other colleagues, co-organized a panel on “Explanation, critique and critics of geoeconomics” at the Annual International Conference of the RGS-IBG in London. The proceedings will be published a special section of Environment and Planning A: Economy and Space.
In February 2024, the partnership participated in a two-day event on Asia’s Carbon Territories: Infrastructure, Environment, and Society from the Age of Imperialism to the Climate Crisis held at ARI and the Singapore Art Museum.
In May 2024, the partnership participated in a two-day event on The Johor-Singapore Causeway: Celebrating and Conceptualising its Centenary held at ARI.
In October 2024, the partnership organized a workshop at ARI on “The Indo-Pacific: In What Sense a Region?” to examine the (geo)political construct of the Indo-Pacific concept from historical, transregional and multidisciplinary perspectives. Moderated by Han Cheng (ARI), the panel included David M Malitz (DIJ), Priya Chacko (Adelaide), Yang Yang (NUS), and Fathun Karib (ARI). An edited transcript from the workshop will appear in Dialogues in Human Geography as a Conversations Forum.
Further events linked to the partnership, include a workshop on (De)Carbonizing Asia: Histories and Futures of Energy, Space, and Infrastructure in November 2024 the second Global Financial Geography Conference (on the Geopolitics and Geoeconomics of Finance) in February 2025.
Current Members
Professor James D SIDAWAY, Steering Group Coordinator of ARI-DIJ Asian Infrastructures, Department of Geography, NUS
Professor Franz WALDENBERGER, Steering Group Coordinator of ARI-DIJ Asian Infrastructures and Director, DIJ
Professor Tim BUNNELL, Steering Group Member, Department of Geography, NUS & Director, ARI
Dr David M MALITZ, Senior Research Fellow, DIJ
Dr Dolf-Alexander NEUHAUS, Senior Research Fellow, DIJ
Dr Giulia DAL MASO, PI (CHINGREEN), Ca' Foscari University of Venice and Visiting Research Fellow, ARI
Dr Han CHENG, Max Weber Foundation Research Fellow, ARI
Dr Max Jakob FÖLSTER, Visiting Senior Research Fellow, ARI
Dr Stefan HUEBNER (HÜBNER), Senior Research Fellow, ARI
Dr Fathun KARIB, Postdoctoral Fellow, ARI