Asia in the Old and New Cold Wars

This collection of essays marks the 30th anniversary of the historic Cold War’s formal conclusion in 1991. It enriches Cold War studies—a field dominated by Political Science, International Relations, and History—with insights from Sociology, Anthropology, Cultural Studies, and Film and Media Studies. Through critical analysis of films, television shows, novels, newspaper and magazine articles, tourist souvenir shops, art exhibits, museums, and other commemorative sites that engage with the themes of conflict, violence, trauma, displacement, marginalization, ecology, and identity, the book provides rich and diverse perspectives on the complex relationship between the historic Cold War and its legacies on the one hand and, on the other, their impact on Asia, its plural histories and peoples, and their shifting ideological beliefs, narratives of identity, and lived experiences. 

Today, we often speak of an “Asian century” and witness intensifying concerns over a “New Cold War”. A United States in decline and a China on the rise create conditions for a new superpower rivalry, with a trade and tech war already being fought between the two competitors. As grand narratives and strategies of the Cold War jostle to make sense of high-level geopolitical events, this book descends to the level of lived experience, zooming in on ordinary and marginalized peoples, whose lives and livelihoods have been affected over the decades by the Cold War and its legacies.

Kenneth Paul Tan is a tenured Professor of Politics, Film, and Cultural Studies at Hong Kong Baptist University (HKBU), which hired him under its Talent100 initiative. His recent books include Movies to Save Our World: Imagining Poverty, Inequality and Environmental Destruction in the 21st Century (Penguin, 2022), Singapore's First Year of COVID-19: Public Health, Immigration, the Neoliberal State, and Authoritarian Populism (Palgrave Macmillan, 2022), Singapore: Identity, Brand, Power (Cambridge University Press, 2018), and Governing Global-City Singapore: Legacies and Futures After Lee Kuan Yew (Routledge, 2017).