The Diplomat | Author
David Hutt
David Hutt has been Southeast Asia columnist at The Diplomat since 2016, writing weekly about Southeast Asian politics.
David Hutt has been Southeast Asia columnist at The Diplomat since 2016, writing weekly about Southeast Asian politics. He was formerly based in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. He also writes for Foreign Policy, Asia Times, Nikkei Asian Review, South China Morning Post, and other international publications. He was previously a reporter at Southeast Asia Globe magazine and the editor of Focus Asean magazine. He was president of the Overseas Press Club of Cambodia between 2018 and 2019, and is a visiting fellow at Future Forum, a Phnom Penh-based think tank. He can be followed on Twitter @davidhuttjourno
April 16, 2021
Cambodia Risks Being Left Behind by Workplace Automation
By David Hutt
The Cambodian government has done little to prepare its population for an epochal economic shift.
April 02, 2021
Should UN Intervention in Myanmar Be Off the Table?
By David Hutt
The situation in Myanmar is worsening and the international community, although with good intentions, is standing, slack-jawed, watching events pass it by.
March 26, 2021
Laos’ Austerity Fantasies Reveal the Communist Party’s Weaknesses
By David Hutt
Ballooning external debt and growing fiscal deficits augur political storm clouds for the ruling LPRP.
March 19, 2021
Domestic Violence Scandal Highlights Cambodian Government’s Hypocrisy
By David Hutt
A treatment of the self-claimed businessman Duong Chhay reveals once again that in Hun Sen's Cambodia, there is one set of rules for the powerful and another for everyone else.
March 01, 2021
The World Faces a Choice Between Bad and Worse in Myanmar
By David Hutt
Jakarta's call for dialogue would legitimize the Myanmar junta, but is the most realistic option for resolving the country's crisis.
February 23, 2021
Why Communist Anti-Corruption Campaigns Never Work
By David Hutt
Ongoing anti-graft campaigns in Vietnam and Laos focus on officials' moral conduct without addressing the political structures that incentivize corruption.
February 18, 2021
Cambodia’s Ball-and-Chain of Corruption and Inequality
By David Hutt
COVID-19 offered the Cambodian government an opportunity to curb the worst excesses of corruption. Instead, things went in the other direction.
January 22, 2021
Post-Pandemic Southeast Asia Faces a Crisis of Authoritarianism
By David Hutt
History tells us that people rebel not when things are worst, but when hopes of improvements are disappointed.
January 18, 2021
In Laos, Reform Hopes Peter Out Into Business as Usual
By David Hutt
The Lao communist party's newly selected General Secretary Thongloun Sisoulith once promised change. Now he sits atop a closed and sclerotic system.
January 08, 2021
Can We Trust the Cambodia Microfinance Association?
By David Hutt
The CMA is an awkward amalgam of industry lobby group and regulatory watchdog.
December 21, 2020
How Much Should We Worry About Laos’ Debt?
By David Hutt
Laos has several options for dealing with its debt crisis, and none of them are palatable.
December 14, 2020
Cambodia’s COVID-19 Vaccine Boondoggle
By David Hutt
The tycoon-funded vaccine drive demonstrates the durability of the patronage state that Hun Sen has built since the 1980s. It also reveals its weaknesses.
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