Institute of Advanced Studies
Asia-Pacific Universities in the New Era
by Dr Antonette Palma-Angeles, Associate Professor, Philosophy Department, Ateneo de Manila, Philippines
East and Southeast Asian universities are intensifying Asian-focused internationalization efforts. Japan, S. Korea and Taiwan in particular are investing substantial amounts of public money to send postgraduate students to its Asian neighbours and to recruit the best and the brightest science and technology students from the region, with the hopes that these students will replace in the future, their aging workforce. Additionally, with the launching of the ASEAN charter in December 2008, in Jakarta, Indonesia, ASEAN countries are seriously promoting socio-cultural cooperation through bilateral student mobility among their members and the plus 3 countries (Japan, China, S. Korea).
The lecture explored how internationalization efforts among universities in the region will bring a new kind of regionalism in 21st century. It is one that will no longer be driven by the traditional integrators (i.e. businessmen many of whom knew nothing about Asia before they had to work in the region). Asian universities, by introducing a new awareness and appreciation among their students of the identity of the countries in the region, are forming new integrators who know Asia, chose to work in Asia and are proud to be Asian.
The lecture also discussed challenges to current internationalization programs and proposes research topics and changes in student mobility efforts so universities and academics can better promote appreciation and understanding of the region.
About Antonette Palma-Angeles
Antonette Palma-Angeles is Associate Professor at the Philosophy Department of the Ateneo de Manila, a Jesuit university in the Philippines. She obtained her Ph.D. from the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven (KUL) in Belgium with a dissertation on Hans-Georg Gadamer’s philosophical hermeneutics. She served as Chair of the Philosophy Department (1991-1997) and then as Academic Vice President (1998-2009) of the Ateneo. As Academic Vice President, she was responsible for research and the University’s international networks and academic partnerships. She is currently Director of the Ateneo’s Jose B Fernandez Jr. Center for Ethics.
Dr Palma-Angeles facilitates ethics workshops for business people, local government executives and health practitioners and provides consulting services on corporate governance and business ethics to Philippine corporations. She is also on a number of boards and Ethics Committees in Asia. Her current research interests are corruption and religion in Thailand and the Philippines and business ethics in the Philippines.
This lecture was part of the Anteneo de Manila University visit to Australia co-sponsored by IAS and The Thesis Eleven Centre for Cultural Sociology at La Trobe University.
Thursday, 30 July 2009
