In this guest post, Dr Napong Tao Rugkhapan (Faculty of Architecture, Chulalongkorn University), Dr Tan Wenn Er (Department of Geography, National University of Singapore), and Dr Priza Marendraputra (Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore) introduce their Project “Tensions in policy learning: grounding learning practices in urban Southeast Asia” funded by a Seminar Series Awards grant, on the politics and tensions of urban policy learning in Southeast Asia. A sequence of events will run from late 2025 through 2026. Stay tuned for opportunities to engage.
In city halls across Southeast Asia, “learning from abroad” has become standard practice. Cue the now-ubiquitous “creative districts,” “smart cities,” and “green urbanism” playbooks – global templates imported off the shelf and quickly rebadged as prestige projects, often more aligned with elite imaginaries than everyday local needs. In Southeast Asia, where urban development is closely tied to national agendas and elite visions, such templates do particular political work: foreign ideas are introduced not only to address technical challenges but also to reinforce or reshape national images and political narratives.
These dynamics are not new: historically, Southeast Asia’s port cities were e
mbedded in colonial trade networks, and urban elites often aligned with foreign powers and values. Today, this legacy is palpable in the cultural mimicry and aesthetic preferences that shape development projects. The interplay between national interests and local development creates a complex vortex of policy mobility, where cities become arenas for experimentation, redevelopment, and the contested reimagining of global concepts.
We situate this Seminar Series within the broader literature on policy mobilities (McCann, 2011), urban modelling, worlding, and inter-referencing (Roy & Ong, 2011; Bunnell, 2015), as well as Asian urbanisms (Shin, 2021; Hogan et al., 2012). We build on burgeoning work theorising from alternative geographical sites, treating Southeast Asia as a site of learning and knowledge production rather than merely a recipient of ideas.
Contemporary policy mobility efforts are marked by tensions. Understanding how these tensions manifest in practice requires examining how different Southeast Asian cities adapt foreign frameworks to local socio-political conditions. Through comparative case studies, the Seminar Series invites participants to assess how cities balance global best practices with domestic pressures, cultural factors, and institutional constraints. Policy transfer outcomes hinge on a delicate process of negotiation, one that ultimately shapes how “learning from abroad” is realised and resisted across the region.
“Tension” is our analytic in three registers: theoretical, methodological, and practical. Theoretically, we probe the frictions inherent in “theorising from elsewhere,” asking how we can engage Global North references while keeping them under erasure – and whether we can move beyond the Global North as the default point of departure. Methodologically, we aim to extend recent advances in studying how ideas travel and translate. Practically, we attend to the messy implementation of policy learning, inflected by national politics and local sentiment on the ground.
Programme
- In November 2025, we will launch the Seminar Series with a hybrid seminar and circulate a call for papers for a proposed special issue on “Tensions in policy learning.”
- The first in-person, in-progress workshop will be hosted by the Indonesian International Islamic University (Depok, Indonesia) in June 2026. Over three days, invited participants will present work-in-progress and collaborate with early-career researchers in a day-long, skills-based workshop, culminating in a public roundtable.
- The second and final workshop will be hosted by Chulalongkorn University (Bangkok, Thailand) in December 2026. Over four days, invited participants will present final papers, lead an ECR training workshop, and take part in a site visit.
The Seminar Series is made possible by the generous support of the Urban Studies Foundation. We welcome urbanists, researchers, students, and practitioners interested in policy mobilities, comparative urbanism, and Asian urbanisms. Further details – including the webinar link, call for papers, and workshop logistics – will be announced in due course via the Urban Studies Foundation website and our institutional channels.