Our Library

Analyses, Perspectives and Opinions

RLS Southeast Asia regularly publishes political analyses and working papers on current and relevant topics from the Mekong Region. Together with our partners, we shed light on different opinions and introduce perspectives on pressing social and ecological questions and challenges. The publications are categorized according to topics and countries and can be selected using the links below.

 Social Justice, Social-ecological transformation

The concept of the “imperial mode of living” points toward the norms of production, distribution and consumption built into the political, economic and cultural structures of everyday life for the populations of the Global North.

 Social Justice, Social-ecological transformation, Vietnam

Smallholder farmers in Huong Lam commune, Ha Tinh province, Viet Nam were surveyed to identify what ecosystems they depend on, what climate change impacts they face, and what Ecosystem-based adaptation (EbA) measures that are appropriate for the area.

 Germany, Social Justice

Our goal in this text is not to make any assessments about virology or epidemiology. There are more than enough of those at the moment and we do not claim to be specialists in those fields. Like many others, we are trying to get our bearings in the whirlwind of information, and we invest our trust in the Robert Koch Institute more than in the cooked-up opinions of loudmouth know-it-alls. We are not of the opinion that the German federal and state governments are actors who have simply been waiting to impose authoritarian measures.

 Germany, Social Justice

Loren Balhorn sat down with Friedrich Burschel, the Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung’s in-house expert on far-right extremism and a long-time observer of how the German state deals with neo-Nazis, to get a better understanding of how far-right violence in modern Germany has grown in recent years and what, if anything, can be done about it.

 Germany, Social Justice, Social-ecological transformation

Do you want socialism and the future? How can we still talk about socialism in these dystopian times? And how to fall silent upon this? Capitalism is devouring our future—while the crises of our time are literally heating up, it appears that their resolution is all the more absent.

 Political Analysis, Social Justice, Social-ecological transformation

The world is in disarray: social divisions, inequality, economic crisis, the climate catastrophe and the rise of a new authoritarianism all challenge the very foundations of civilization. Saying that capitalism offers no answers is not enough. We need effective alternatives, alternative experiments, more democracy, and socialist discussions. But there is another truth that is particularly evident amidst the Covid-19 pandemic: the challenges of a global world cannot be solved at the national level alone.

 Political Analysis, Social Justice

In Europe today, more people than ever before are convinced that climate
change is a pressing political issue. This is not a win by default. People
anxious about ecological catastrophe are vulnerable to racist, xenophobic
and even fascist methods of addressing the climate crisis, especially as far
right and populist actors are occupying more and more positions of power
across Europe, emboldening racist violence in the streets.

 Social Justice, Social-ecological transformation

A just transition process evolves in changing the economy and production, as well as relations of productions towards a green economy that reduces carbon emissions and guarantees environmental sustainability and at the same time protects and develops jobs for the people. The transformation process aims to shift for a sustainable production.

 Social Justice

Poppy S. Winanti and Nanang Indra Kurniawan, researchers at the Universitas Gadjah Mada in Indonesia, argue how the extractive sector - characterized by the exploitation of natural resources - unleashed a number of serious problems for the local population: many extractive regions are plagued by conflicts, there is little direct positive impact on the local economy, and finally, extractive industries are non-renewable. To resist the increasing exploitation of natural resources, post-extractivism emerged as an economic and political strategy.

 Social Justice, Social Justice, Social-ecological transformation

According to a UN report from last week’s Wednesday, the world struggles to protect children from the impact of climate change. Vietnamnews.vn reports that a commission of child and adolescent health experts have declared that the next generation won’t get enough protection from the impacts of carbon emissions, not even within one single country. Adequate measures, to protect children from destruction of nature and processed foods, are not taken either. Helen Clark, a co-chair of the commission has revealed: “But even of greater concern, every child worldwide faces existential threats from climate change and commercial pressures.”