On April 4, 2024, the Young Urbanists of Southeast Asia (YUSEA) brought together a panel of urban practitioners and academics for an eye-opening session entitled “Urban Experimentation in Southeast Asia: Novel Solutions to Emerging Challenges”. The event was organised by Yale-NUS College in partnership with YUSEA, and held in a hybrid format, via Zoom, and in-person at Yale-NUS College in Singapore. The distinguished panel included Larry Yeung, Executive Director at Participate in Design, a non-profit design organisation in Singapore, Pim Chuaylua, Founding Software Engineer at Muvmi, a ridesharing start-up based in Bangkok, Priza Marendraputra, Postdoctoral Fellow at the Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore, and Shawn Tan, Deputy Director of Research, Centre for Liveable Cities Singapore. The panel was moderated by Joshua Vargas, Co-Founder and Co-President of YUSEA.
The event kicked off with an opening keynote address that introduced Southeast Asia’s rapid development. It highlighted how the new generation can innovate creative solutions to tackle existing urban challenges, setting the stage for the main thrust of the ensuing panel discussion. The panelists addressed trends and challenges that Southeast Asia will face in the next 5 to 10 years, emphasising the region’s growth and innovation, such as in the case of technological advancements to tackle transportation issues like congestion.
A key point of the discussion was the growing youth population in Southeast Asia and their crucial role in enhancing the region’s development. While growth and innovation present significant opportunities, the panelists argued for rethinking the traditional role of Southeast Asian governments in shaping urban spaces and systems. Many Southeast Asian countries have complex political and governmental structures that lack participation from diverse stakeholders. Instead, the panelists agreed that change that comes from the community through a bottom-up approach can be meaningful. Even as governments continue to be important stakeholders in urban planning, they should emphasise multi-stakeholder collaboration to draw on collective wisdom, and support startup initiatives to encourage greater citizen participation. To this end, the speakers raised a diversity of examples in Singapore, Indonesia and Thailand of community-led approaches to addressing urban issues that have successfully turned policy constraints into opportunities for innovation.
The panel discussion was followed by a fruitful Q&A session with the audience, featuring questions on topics such as the role of indigenous voices in decision-making, and how to ensure that underserved communities are also included. On this front, the panelists emphasised the need to intentionally avoid echochambers and be conscious of one’s internal biases and blindspots. When asked “What can youth bring to the table?”, the panelists offered a range of thought-provoking responses. They highlighted the power of youths to question existing practices and push boundaries creatively such as via social media, and reiterated the value of even a seemingly small impact in one’s own community. All in all, the panelists expressed their hope for the younger generation to become catalysts for change and encouraged the youth attendees to boldly advocate for the urban futures they would like to see.
YUSEA would like to express our deepest gratitude to everyone who supported us in making our first event a success. First and foremost, we would like to thank Yale-NUS College for organising this event in partnership with us and for the seamless collaboration. We also sincerely appreciate the time and candor graciously offered by our panelists Larry Yeung, Pim Chuaylua, Priza Marendraputra, and Shawn Tan. YUSEA will continue hosting events that bring together Southeast Asia’s urban practitioners, academics and youth to discuss pertinent issues in Southeast Asian urbanism. We look forward to seeing you at future events!
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