Dr. Paul D. Hutchcroft, author of Booty Capitalism: The Politics of Banking in the Philippines (1998), will deliver a public lecture, Money Politics: Patronage, Clientelism, and Electoral Dynamics in Southeast Asia, on Friday, 5 September 2014, 2:30 p.m. to 5:00 pm, at the Seminar Room, Hall of Wisdom, GT-Toyota Asian Cultural Center, Asian Center University of the Philippines Diliman.

Dr. Hutchcroft will examine the term and practice of “money politics” in Southeast Asia, where it is “a vague but derisive label for political practices deemed unsavoury and in need of reform.” These include “large sums of patronage—particularistic benefits, including cash, goods, appointments, or other rewards,” which are “distributed via clientelist and other political networks,” and “affect the quality and character of governance, democratic structures, and national integration.”

To shed light on these practices, Dr. Hutchcroft will discuss the “character, causes, and implications of patronage in Indonesia, the Philippines, Malaysia, and Thailand,” but will provide special emphasis on the Philippine midterm elections held last 13 May 2013. The lecture also serves as an overview of a “major collaborative research project” on Southeast Asian money politics.

A scholar of comparative and Southeast Asian politics, Paul D. Hutchcroft, Ph.D. is Lead Governance Specialist with the Australian Embassy in Manila. He is on leave from his position as Professor of Political and Social Change at the Australian National University (ANU). From 2009 to 2013, he was founding Director of the School of International, Political and Strategic Studies in the ANU’s College of Asia and the Pacific. Dr. Hutchcroft has written extensively on Philippine politics and political economy, and his work has appeared in various journals and different edited volumes published by Cambridge, Cornell, Harvard, and Johns Hopkins, among others.