Peter Boettke & Bryan Cheang on Unveiling Liberalism in Southeast Asia

Peter Boettke sits down with Bryan Cheang, discussing unveiling liberalism in Southeast Asia. In this conversation, Bryan begins with discourse on the synthesis of different schools of thought in economic growth and development, stressing the importance of considering the relationship between cultural differences, classical liberalism, and economic development. He points out that in Asia, many countries adopted capitalist practices but remained authoritarian, challenging the notion that capitalism and freedom always go hand in hand. Bryan also argues for a broadening of methodological approaches in economics to include cultural and historical contexts of individuals.

Bryan Cheang is the Assistant Director of the Centre for the Study of Governance & Society. He received his PhD and MA in Political Economy from King’s College London and is a graduate of the National University of Singapore. He has authored three books including Economic Liberalism and the Developmental State: Hong Kong and Singapore’s Post-war Development (Palgrave Macmillan, 2023), Liberalism Unveiled: Forging A New Third Way In Singapore (coauthored with Donovan Choy, World Scientific, 2021) and Free Market Humanitarianism (Ally Press, 2019). Bryan is an alum of the Mercatus Adam Smith Fellowship.