Mrs. Anjali Jalichandra has been working with Honda, a Japanese leading automotive manufacturer, for twenty years in both the Asia & Oceania regional headquarter function and currently in domestic function at Honda Automobile (Thailand) Co., Ltd.. Her current position is the Government Affairs Department Manager. Her main responsibility is to liase with government policy makers and leaders about the automotive industry outlook and policies related to foreign investors.
With respect to her interests in the rule of law, she personally would like to learn more about how to solve inequality in Thai society and particularly to understand how the marginalized and the vulnerable can access more opportunities. For almost 10 years, she has been at the helm of a major CSR initiative known as “KhaoHom Boon” project in my hometown Buriram province where she helped design a business model to make farmers in the area self-sufficient and able to make a steady income by growing organic rice. To achieve that, she spearheaded marketing campaigns, fundraised for the procurement of safe fertilizers, and collaborated with the abbot at the temple to make sure the momentum of the campaign had a lasting impact on the community. Together, they achieved considerable success as the farmers are able to enjoy their earnings while making a healthy living, free of the need to rely on toxic pesticides. However, at a later stage, they encountered a major challenge as their farmers became attracted by the promise of higher prices for the sugar cane crop, seeing it as an opportunity for them to earn higher income, despite exposing themselves to a more toxic environment.
Mr.Buntoon Srethasirote is currently working at the Good Governance for Social Development and the Environment Institute (GSEI), a non-profit organization, as the Executive Director and a researcher. GSEI is specialized in conducting policy research on environment and natural resources, multilateral environmental agreements (Convention on Biological Diversity and Convention on Climate Change), and sustainable development. Meanwhile, he is involved in policy making processes as members of various mechanisms at the national level such as the National Committee on Sustainable Development, Sub-Committee to Formulate National Strategy and National Reform Framework, Sub-Committee to Formulate Development Strategy to Generate Environmental-Friendly Growth within the12th National Plan on Economic and Social Development. He is also the Chair of the Working Group to Formulate Economic, Social, and Legal Measures to Assist Sustainable Development.
At present, Thailand is working on the national plan to achieve the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and integrating it with the 20-year National Strategy. This effort is the opportunity to set the long-term direction of the country towards sustainable development and a stable democracy, as the rule of law is one of the key milestones for the success of SDGs. Therefore, he is keen to take part in the TIJ’s Workshop on the Rule of Law and Policy to learn about the rule of law, on the principles and the application it in public policy process. The knowledge from the workshop will be very valuable to his work in policy decision making on the development direction towards sustainable development
Captain Piyamin Thanutaksorn is currently working as Deputy Director of Foreign Liaison Division of the Naval Intelligence Department, Royal Thai Navy. He was graduated from the Armed Forces Academies Preparatory School and the Royal Thai Naval Academy. After competition, he worked onboard many ships with different responsibilities such as Weapon Engineering Officer, HTMS Thayanchon, Executive Officer of Coastal Patrol Craft (PGM) No. 14, Weapons officer of HTMS Songkhla, Navigator Officer of HTMS Rattanakosin, Commanding Officer of Coastal Patrol Craft (PGM) No. 19.
After that he was assigned to various duties on shore including Aide to First Frigate Squadron Commander, Company Commander of the Naval Cadet Regiment, the King’s Guard, Royal Thai Navy Academy, Aide to Deputy Chief of Joint Staff, Royal Thai Armed Forces, Aide to Commander-in-Chief of the Royal Thai Navy, Assistant Naval Attaché to the Royal Thai Embassy, Rome, Republic of Italy, Head of Attaché Section of the Naval intelligence Department before assuming the present position as Deputy Director of Foreign Liaison Division of the Naval Intelligence Department. Many years of his responsibilities at sea has given him extensive experience as sea navigator and maritime law enforcement authority. Captain Piyamin also had good opportunity to work in Italy as Assistant Naval Attaché, where he received invaluable experience that serves him well for external relations in military affairs under his current position as Deputy Director of Foreign Liaison Division.
Ms. Chamaree Suthiphongchai is currently a director of Risk Management Policy office of the Bank of Thailand. She has an extensive experience in financial institutions policy especially in the area of banking business, financial products, risk management, and risk supervision. In recent years, her role and interest were expanded to cover also governance and sustainable banking. Additionally, she was appointed as a Bank of Thailand’s representative to be a member of the Supervision and Implementation Group under Basel Committee of Banking Supervision, one of the most eminent international supervisory forum. The group is responsible for assessing standards implementation
across countries and contributes to the development of international standards on banking supervision. During her years at the Bank of Thailand, she was seconded to the Bank of International Settlement where she and her colleague conducted research and published an article on Credit Default Swaps. She graduated with a Bachelor’s degree and Master’s degree in Economics and was awarded with a scholarship from the Bank of Thailand to study at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology where she received her Master’s degree in Business Administration (Financial Engineering).
M.L. Dispanadda Diskul or Duke is a Deputy Chief Executive Officer of the Mae Fah Luang Foundation under Royal Patronage based in Thailand. Since 2007, Duke was in charge of the foundations rural development programs inside and outside of Thailand. He leads the foundation’s two core teams, the Centre for Social Entrepreneurship (CSE) and the Knowledge and Learning Centre (KLC), in improving livelihood of people in rural communities and training interested organization on hands-on and practical approaches to Sustainable Development including Alternative Development. In 2014, he was given
additional responsibility to run the Doi Tung Development Project, the foundation’s social enterprise based in Chiang Rai Province, North of Thailand. Duke received Master’s Degree in Business Administration from Sasin Graduate Institute of Business Administration of Chulalongkorn University, Thailand in 2005 and a Bachelor Degree in economics from Brandeis University, Massachusetts, USA in 1997. He is a member of the Schwab Foundation’s Social Entrepreneur (2009), the World Economic Forum’s Young Global Leader (2013) and Asia 21 Young Leader (2013).
Mr. Fermin Mabulo’s career started in the Armed Forces as a young Officer specializing on counter terrorist operations. Being imbued with youthful idealism, He could not help but question the ills in our society especially the corruption in my beloved institution, the Armed Forces. Wanting to change things for the better, he helped organize a movement of young officers espousing reforms in the military. As they dig further, they realized that corruption is not only rampant in the Military but so much more in other institutions of our society.
Young and inexperienced that they were, their only option was to employ drastic means outside the bounds of the law to achieve their goals. One thing led to another and he found myself languishing in detention. He was jailed for three months as a result of his involvement in the Magdalo adventure. After my release from detention, he went on self exile in the United Kingdom where he worked as Security Manager of a food manufacturing company. In 2007, he came home to his beloved Philippines. He ran and won as Mayor in his hometown San Fernando, Camarines Sur. In 2010, he ran and lost his bid for Congressman. Then he got appointed as Provincial Administrator of the Province of Cam Sur until March 2016. In May 2016, he was elected again as Mayor of San Fernando. As a leader and policy maker in his current position the upcoming TIJ Workshop is a match made in heaven for him.
Born in Scotland and educated there, he came to Hong Kong in 1997 following the handover of Hong Kong to China which was previously under British Rule. Currently, he is a Senior Portfolio Manager at Allianz Global Investors, focusing on the management of equity investments within Asia Pacific. His current position exposes him to a variety of different people from different parts of Asia, leaders of industries, industrial consultants, and market research in all aspect of the economy. What is more important is the need to understand all the facts, whether social, economic and philosophical to make decisions for the future.
He is interested in joining TIJ Workshop to discuss the state of the criminal justice system and the potential reform, the good governance and the current attitudes of society. He hopes to get a better understanding from the legal profession and to share his views from the investment world on society and attitudes towards the law. What he is also interested is to learn how the law will change as society moves from democracy to Ochlocracy, where society is run by demagogues who has a lack of respect for the law.
Dr. Jullamon has been working with Thailand Court of Justice for over 10 years. For the past 4 years, he has been attached to Bankruptcy Division of the Supreme Court of Thailand where he drafts and reviews court decisions and orders for justices in the areas of bankruptcy and business reorganization. Dr. Jullamon received his LLB (First Class Honors) from Chulalongkorn University in 2002 and two LLM degrees from New York University in 2004 and the University of Chicago in 2005 with the scholarships of the Thai government. Then he went on to study for the Doctor of the Science of Law degree (J.S.D.) at University of Illinois and graduated in 2012 with the scholarship of the Court of Justice. Dr. Jullamon has written extensively in the areas of consumer, business, and international bankruptcy as well as foreign court and case managements both in English and Thai languages.
Ms. Kanokwan Meksophawannagul is currently a director of the Financial Institutions Strategy Department, Bank of Thailand. She is responsible for overseeing development and implementation of financial sector master plans, financial liberalization policies that are related to the banking sector, and financial sector analysis. Joining the Bank of Thailand since 1995, Ms Kanokwan has various experiences related to banking policies and supervision, including issuing prudential regulations, onsite examination and offsite surveillance of commercial banks, overseeing financial system stability, editing the Bank of Thailand’s Supervision Report and Financial Stability Report, as well as performing a secretariat function of the Executives Meeting of East Asia Pacific Central Banks’s Working Group on Banking Supervision. Ms. Kanokwan received the Bank of Thailand’s Scholarship to study in the United States, where she received a bachelor degree in economics from Princeton University and a master degree in economics from University of Wisconsin (Madison). She also received the United Kingdom Government’s Scholarship for a master degree in economics and finance from University of Warwick.
Ms. Khin Aye Aye Maw is serving as a Deputy Director of the Office of the SECM. Her work experience lasts for 24 years. Her first career started as a Staff Officer at Internal Revenue Department (IRD) under the Ministry of Planning and Finance from 1992 to 2012 and was promoted as an Assistant Director from 2012-2013. She was then transferred to the Central Bank of Myanmar (CBM) as an Assistant Director from 2013 to 2015. Now she has been working for Securities and Exchange Commission of Myanmar as Deputy Director since 2015. Myanmar introduced the market economic system in late 1980s by
the Military Government. Economic reform measures were conducted ranging from fiscal sector reforms, financial sector reforms, State Economic Enterprises reforms, Agricultural reforms, to Border Area reforms. Moreover, policies to foster private sector promotion have continuously been carried out since then. Myanmar is in its transition and has been continuously carrying out both political and economic reforms with new versions by the newly elected government in 2015. However, as per the 2015 Corruption Perceptions Index of Transparency International (TI) report, there is the serious level of public sector corruption in Myanmar. “Rule of law” is also still a big issue in our country. Good governance is also necessary in both public and private sectors. Therefore, she is very much interested in the Topic of Workshop and also would like to gain the concepts and practices of the developed world by having opportunity of attending the Workshop.
Mr. Sato believes his knowledge and experiences has prepared me for TIJ Workshop for Emerging Leaders on the Rule of Law. He served as a senior advisor on international judicial cooperation at Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) from 2006 to 2015. He designed, monitored and implemented multi-year comprehensive rule of law programs in Asian and African countries. In every country he endeavored to grasp actual situations through field surveys and utilized the results of those surveys for policy dialogue, project designs and implementations. Also, he worked for the government of Vietnam as a Hanoi-based rule of law advisor from 2004 to 2006.
He has a wealth experience in providing advice on policies for judicial reform, and designing, managing, monitoring and evaluating democracy, human rights and governance programs. He is keen to be involved in rule of law promotion in Southeast Asian countries based on his experiences in JICA. Your rigorous Workshop will be a precious opportunity to exchange practical knowledge and lessons learned in the field of Rule of Law promotion. In addition, development and improvement of international cooperation activities in the justice sector were cores of my tasks over ten years. He is planning to summarize JICA’s lessons learned in Rule of Law cooperation in an academic paper for further improvement of international cooperation in this area.
Mr. Natapanu Nopakun is a Thai diplomat with 21 years of experience in bilateral, multilateral and management experience. Based on his past experiences, he has worked on issues concerning all regions of the world and on global health, and regional security, among others. He was an official interpreter, speechwriter, and note-taker for three Prime Ministers of Thailand and was assigned to be a liaison for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs at the Government House from year 2008 to 2011.
Mrs. Nattanun Asawalertsak. She is a Permanent Law Councillor (Krisdika legal Counsel, advisory level) at the Office of the Council of State of Thailand. Her duties involve the duty of considering draft legislation, giving legal opinions and I am responsible for the work of the Foreign Law Bureau of the Office whose tasks involve foreign law and foreign legal affairs. Although she does not have a direct role in the making of State policy, she is responsible for considering draft legislation and giving legal opinions which plays a significant part in shaping and forming the legal policies of Thailand.
She was pleased to find out that the Thailand Institute of Justice (TIJ) has organized a Workshop on the Rule of Law in policy making process with a team of specialist from the Institute for Global Law and Policy at Harvard Law School. She thinks that it would be a great opportunity to exchange views and experiences between both Thai and international participants on policy making, as well as an opportunity to learn from the experiences and views of the specialists on the definition of, and the different dimensions of the Rule of Law and its’ relevance in policy making. She truly believes that this would be of great benefit to the making of State policy to suit legal, social, economic and other aspects and to make policies practical, equitable and socially accepted.
Pol.Maj. Peabprom Mekhiyanont is currently working as Police Inspector at Criminal Investigation and Interrogation Institute of Royal Thai Police. She has extensive experiences in various legal practices and implementing of the project in areas of justice and security sector reform both at national and international levels. Recently, she had completed her tour of duty as United Nations Police in Haiti and as Police Advisor in South Sudan after two years of service for United Nations Peacekeeping Operations.
Furthermore, she had worked for UNICEF as consultancy to review and revise of documents which contributed to improve the curriculum and materials for Royal Thai Police. She also had previous experience conducted a research on the Review of “National Action Plan and National Human Right Plan of Action”. She obtained master degree of laws in International Crime and Justice from United Nations Interregional Crime and Justice Research Institute and successfully passed the defensed thesis on “The Challenges in Peacekeeping Operations to Promote the Rule of Law through the Community Policing”.
Dr. Phiset Sa-ardyen is currently the Director of the Office of External Relations and Policy Coordination at the Thailand Institute of Justice (TIJ), responsible for coordinating all key activities to strengthen TIJ’s portfolio as an international research institute in the field of crime prevention and criminal justice. Prior to joining TIJ, he was the Director for Legal Affairs, and prior to that, the Director for International Affairs at the Ministry of Justice, Thailand.
Dr. Phiset holds a Ph.D. in Chemistry from New York University and an LL.B from Sukhothai Thammathirath University.
Mr. Phua Chao Rong is a pracademic. He is currently a Head Research Trainer in Ministry of Defence training Captains and Majors in research work to support policymaking. He is expected to assume Deputy Director of Centre for Livable Cities, Ministry of National Development in early 2017. He is also a civil society leader as President of Association for Public Affairs running the SG100 envisioning and policy recommendations process in youth sector.
As an academic, he is Lee Kong Chian scholar and final year PhD candidate at Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy and Fulbright US-ASEAN fellow focusing on US-China-Singapore foreign policy. While schooled in International Relations at LSE, he did a PhD in Public Policy to work on my gaps and also because good public policies can start small. He has always find lawyers fascinating: their clarity of thought, precision in writing, impact of delivery. Strong lawyers tend to make strong politicians; converse might not be true. While he is now schooled in policy, law remains my gap. To him, a solid understanding of law, economics, policy sciences and international context is vital to serve the public better. Professionally, TIJ Workshop is useful to his new job by upskilling him to better analyse ‘livable cities’ from a ‘rule of law and policy’ angle. In the 1990s, good governance and global governance discourse, ‘rule of law’ as a key institution has always been mentioned. Singapore is one proponent. How exactly it works in a ‘livable city’, how to adapt its success in other cities with varying political models are key questions I seek answers.
Dr. Primyadar Duangrat is a highly regarded corporate and securities lawyer in Thailand, who is constantly ranked as top lawyer within her field of practice by leading international legal publications and organizations. Dr. Primyadar focuses her legal practice at Baker & McKenzie on areas of capital markets and mergers and acquisitions. She has been appointed as legal counsel for many Initial Public Offerings (IPO), involving both domestic and international offerings. She has also represented various Thai private companies and listed companies in its domestic and overseas (M&A), including prominent deals which usually involves an acquisition of foreign large companies. Aside from her corporate and capital market law practice, Dr. Primyadar regularly lectures at the Chulalongkorn University’s Faculty of Law and delivers seminars on various topics of law. She continues to be recognized in the corporate sector for her work on corporate good governance, a particular area of interest to her since her time at Oxford University where she completed her Doctorate degree (with distinction) with her thesis on the topic of Family-Based Governance in Thailand. Also at Oxford, she was awarded a Master of Studies (with distinction). Prior to that, Dr. Primyadar graduated from Harvard University with a Master of Laws, and a Bachelor of Laws, with honors, from Chulalongkorn University.
After graduating from the L.S.E with a BSc in Economics, Mr. Prinn Panitchpakdi began his career in the corporate finance department of ABN Amro in London. He was appointed Vice Chairman of the Asean-UK Business Forum. Returning to Thailand in 2005, he joined Deutsche Bank Tisco as VP. CLSA Securities appointed him as head of sales in 2007. In 2008 he moved to HK for regional equity coverage and in March 2012 has been appointed as their Thailand Country Head. He is on the Board of Directors of ASCO and is also a MD of the Four Seasons Restaurant Group, the largest Chinese restaurant chains in the world. He is also a Governor on the Board of Governors of the Stock Exchange of Thailand (SET).
Mr.Rathapol Bhakdibhumi is the President & CEO of General Electronic Commerce Services (GEC), a company he co-founded as a joint venture with General Electric Information Services (GEIS), a subsidiary of General Electric USA (GE later divested GEIS to a Venture Capital company), his main responsibilities are to recommend the company’s business strategy to the Board of Directors, oversee employees by coaching talents and drive necessary changes.
Another of his key responsibilities is to lead the management team in developing a corporate strategy by initiating new business models and overseeing the management policies. He is also serving as a Chairman of a subsidiary of GEC, DX-Innovation Co., Ltd., the owner of e-Market place for carriers and shippers to meet online, actively advising overall company’s business development. He also serves as a member of the Board of Directors at State-Owned Enterprises, namely Thai Airway International (Public) Company Limited, Thailand Post Office Communications Authority of Thailand and CAT Telecom Public Company Limited.
Mr. Ronnapong Kamnuanthip is a Managing Director of Universal Music (Thailand) Ltd., managing music business ranging from physical products, digital, licensing, artist management, sponsorship, and endorsement. He is also elected Chairman of Thai Entertainment Content Association (TECA). Based on his extensive experiences in media and digital industry, he believes that IP protection is crucial for the industry as it ensures that creative works are well-protected so that content creators can be reasonably benefited from their works.
Santanee graduated LL.B with first class honors from Chulalongkorn University and was admitted to the Thai Bar with the highest scores of the 1995 class. Consequently she received the Royal Thai Government scholarship to study master degrees at University of Wisconsin-Madison and University of Pennsylvania. Upon returning to Thailand, she has served as a public prosecutor since 2001. Further to criminal litigation, her expertise lies in international cooperation in criminal matters and issues related to transnational organized crime. Santanee is professionally active in various international law forums. She was a member of the task force for organizing the 11th UN Congress on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice hosted by Thailand. In 2005, she was on secondment to UNODC as a regional expert for Terrorism Prevention Branch in which her responsibility was to promote the ratification and implementation of relevant international conventions and protocols against terrorism covering Asia and the Pacific region. She acted as a chair person in an informal consultation on femicide at the 23rd Commission on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice and played a key role in representing Thailand during the negotiation of the Draft UN Model Strategies and Practical Measures on the Elimination of Violence against Children. Besides her prosecutor profession, she has taught in many leading law schools in Thailand.
Associate Professor Shenkuo Wu currently works at Beijing Normal University College for Criminal Law Science and Law School. Consultant of China’s Supreme Court. PhD in Law, Postdoc and Research Associate of University of Verona (Italy๗. Contract Researcher of University of Turin (Italy). Member of International Association of Penal Law (AIDP). Member of International Institute of Higher Studies in Criminal Sciences (ISISC). Main research fields: Chinese Criminal Law, Economic Criminal law & Criminal Information Law (Cybercrime), Comparative Criminal Law & International Criminal Law (EU Criminal Law).
An avid advocate for women’s rights and gender justice, Dr. Sita Sumrit has worked on women empowerment for more than ten years with international organisations, NGOs and academic institutions. Her areas of work include women’s access to justice, gender and sustainable development, women political leadership and elimination of violence against women and girls. She is currently a Chief of Women and Children Empowerment Programme at the Thailand Institute of Justice (TIJ). Prior to TIJ, she was a regional research advisor for Oxfam Asia Regional Office, a gender officer, supporting Gender Equality Law, at the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (UN FAO) in Vietnam and consultant to various development projects in Asia. She represented Thailand at the US-ASEAN Women Leadership Forum in 2016 and was awarded the Human Development Academic Fellowship for Asia and the Pacific on Women Empowerment from UNDP in 2008. Sita received her PhD and Mphil from University of Cambridge and an MSc from the London School of Economics and Political Science.
Mrs. Sittasri Nakasiri is now a Director of Risk Management Department at the Securities and exchange of Thailand (SEC). She has worked for 19 years and will soon be in charge of Strategy and Planning Department in 2017. Based on her extensive experiences, she has found that limitation of laws and regulations are the main obstacle in developing the market as well as the country.
Over 20 years of experience in Energy Industry in Thailand, Mr.Somkiat Masunthasuwun has excellent understanding of gas and power generation business. He also has broad experience in both complex technical and commercial aspects as well as overall project development process, from project feasibility study phase to financial closure phase.
Dr. Soraphol Tulayasathien is an expert in macroeconomics, public finance, and financial risk management. He received his Ph.D. and M.A. in economics from the University of Michigan; M.S. in engineering from Stanford University; B.S. in engineering and B.S. in finance from the University of Pennsylvania; and LL.B. from Sukhothai Thammathirat Open University. He also received Chartered Financial Analyst and Financial Risk Manager certificates from USA.
Dr. Soraphol has an extensive experience in public, private, and academic sectors. He was a treasury strategist at Siam Commercial Bank and a director of the Agriculture Futures Exchange of Thailand. He was selected to enrol in the Public Sector Executive Development Program at the Prime Minister’s Office before joining the Thai government as an FTA negotiator at the Ministry of Commerce.
Dr. Soraphol is currently the Senior Expert at the Fiscal Policy Office, Ministry of Finance and an advisor at the National Credit Bureau. He also teaches part-time at Thammasat University and NIDA Business School. In addition to various researches and newspaper articles, Dr. Soraphol contributed to a textbook on public economics, wrote a pocket book on tax, and translated a book on behavioural economics.
Currently, Prof. Dr. Suchatvee Suwansawat is the President of King Mongkut’s Institute of Technology Ladkrabang (KMITL), one of the most renowned science and technology universities in Thailand and also served as the President of Engineering Institute of Thailand under H.M. King’s Patronage (EIT), the largest and most respected engineering association in the nation. Since, she believes that any “future leader” needs to have an extensive depth and breadth of experience on “the Rule of Law and Policy” to tackle and, perhaps, solve their country’s and the world’s problems. These problems are becoming more serious with the passage of time. This is why he is very interested to join the TIJ Workshop. He always encourages students and young engineers to contribute to the development of Thailand. What he learns from the workshop, will definitely help him to improve my leadership. Besides, he will be passed down the experience to the younger generation as he strongly believes that his duty is not only “to build good scientists and engineers” who can make differences but also “to create good leaders to change the world.”
Ms. Sukanya Vesvarut attained LL.M.s from University of Manchester with Merit in 2005 and London School of Economics in 2006 both fully funded by Thai government. She has been a public prosecutor for 9 years, involving in the extradition and mutual legal assistance cases, bilateral and multilateral meetings and development of international standard and norms in the field of crime prevention and criminal justice. She was assigned to handle several informal consultations for the revised draft of the Model Strategies and Practical Measures on the Elimination of Violence against Children in the Field of Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice as chair. Her insight into this intentional standard and norms allows her to set trends in the prosecutor’s role in Chiang Mai to better to protect the rights of children witness and victims of crimes to be more in line with domestic legislation and international standard. She currently works in Chiang Mai as public prosecutors handling wide range of criminal cases in Chiang Mai Provincial Court.
Ms. Sumathi Chandrashekaran has nearly 10 years progressive experience in law and public policy, having worked on issues relating to legislative, policy and judicial reform across diverse sectoral domains. Her areas of work and experience have included intellectual property, financial regulation, and judicial sector reform. She is particularly interested in areas of legislative and regulatory reform. Public policy making in India is gradually becoming more evidence- and data-based, and she expects this is true even of jurisdictions such as Thailand.
She finds herself in a unique space as a professional with some capabilities in both qualitative and quantitative research, with a solid background in substantial subjects such as law as well as public policy. Her present research focus is on judicial reform, which she believes is an area of concern shared with many developing countries worldwide. She views this workshop as an opportunity to learn about the work being done in the region and beyond, on the judiciary as an institution; to understand the challenges that come with data-oriented projects, particularly from the perspective of developing nations like India and Thailand; and to explore the policy reform opportunities to address relevant concerns.
Ms. Suntariya Muanpawong is a Chief Judge in the Research Justice Division of the Supreme Court of Thailand. After finishing her Master of Law from Thammasat University and Barrister at Law, she obtained Master and Doctorate Degree in Public Law from Muenster University, Germany. She practiced shortly as a lawyer and was a teacher in a South-East Asian refugee camp. Suntariya spent five years as a legal officer in the Harbor Department, then became a judge at the Court of Justice.
She was the first supervisor of the Judicial Research Institute, where she played a significant role in developing the accountability and responsiveness of the judiciary. Suntariya has joined various human rights programs held by international institutions. She has conducted research projects on court reform, child’s rights protection, gender justice, prisoners’ rights and environmental jurisprudence. As the Chief Judge of the Juvenile and Family Courts, she created some innovative programs to work with the communities. To develop the women’s human rights, Suntariya has worked with prominent scholars and women study institutions. She has also participated in Asian and ASEAN forums on judicial specialization in environmental law. She has been consistently engaged in the justice reform movement in the Thai society. Her main current concern is to democratize the justice system. Her last research paper proposed the people-oriented justice reform model.
At present, Dr. Supamas Trivisvavet is the President of a construction company,CH. Karnchang Public Company Limited, developing basic infrastructure in Thailand and most projects originate from government policies. She personally believes that policy guides the development path of a country and it takes a good policy to put a country on the right path with a desirable goal as the destination.
As a development economist by training, Dr. Suphannada Lowhachai has always been interested in development policy, particularly poverty- and inequality reduction. With the aim of being able to make an effective development policy, she had pursued a PhD in Economics with a thesis on Provincial Disparities and Poverty in Thailand. After graduation, she has been assigned to the Social Database and Indicator Development Office of the NESDB. The office is responsible for producing data as well as formulating policies relating to poverty and inequality of Thailand. Her job assignments include drafting of inequality-reduction strategy under 12th National Economic and Social Development Plan, writing a MDG8 chapter in the 2015 Thailand MDGs Report and developing the National Transfer Accounts data—a crucial tool for analyzing economic effects of ageing society. She has also had an opportunity to be part of the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) process for Thailand. This has broadened her perspective on mechanisms that can be effective in poverty- and inequality reduction. The UPR has made her realize that legislative mechanism can be a powerful instrument in driving government actions. She is therefore certain that the TIJ Workshop will best enhance her understanding of the rule of law and how to use it for driving effective poverty- and inequality-reduction policies. Hopefully, this will ultimately lead to a true sustainable development of Thailand in the future.
Supinya Klangnarong is the only female and youngest commissioner of the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC) that was selected by the senate in September 2011. In addition she is a Thai media rights advocate and the former of vice-chair of the Campaign for Popular Media Reform (CPMR). She previously served as secretary-general of the CPMR from 2003-2008 and was co-founder and coordinator for Thai Netizen Network (TNN), an Internet rights group and also a university lecturer as media reform from 2008-2011. A graduate of Chulalongkorn University, she holds a BA from the Faculty of Communication Arts, a MA from the Faculty of Journalism and Mass Communication at Thammasat University and a MA in Communication Policy and Regulations from the University of Westminster. Supinya received the Communication for Social Change Award (CSC) from school of Journalism and Communication, the University of Queensland, Australia and other awards in Thailand. She has been selected as Ashoka Fellow in 2004 and Eisenhower Fellowships in 2007.
Taya Kitiyakra, M.D. is a doctor, working in a teaching hospital, Ramathibodi hospital, Mahidol university. His job includes clinical duties, teaching students and other doctors and also medical research. He has been involved in some anticorruption activities for the last few years and would like to learn more about reforming the Criminal Justice system and good governance. He thinks one of the major problems with corruption that people (and anticorruption organizations) do not talk about in Thailand is the criminal justice system and the police. At the moment, there is a clause in the constitution that mandates police reform, so the issue might become more open. He thinks the problem with police systems is quite widespread in many countries, from looking at the TI surveys and from books like the Locust effect, and Thieves of state. In many aspects of politics, there is an international measure to compare countries, whether it’s the Corruption Perception Index, the Freedom House measure of free speech, the Human trafficking report or Human rights score card, etc.
Mr. Teeradetch Tungsubutra is a 48-year old SOE’s (State-owned Enterprise’s) employee. He has been with the organization for 7 years and currently is holding a position at the Executive Vice President level (has been for 4 years). Prior to this employment, he has been with a few large private firms outside Thailand – and had held positions in all the continents, working in both developed and developing (or underdeveloped) countries. From his experience – moving from one place to another- he could notice the difference among the citizen’s adherences to/ or willingness to comply with the policies issued by the authorities of these countries. He personally thinks that this (the aforementioned difference) is the key factor attributing to the differences in their national economic/social development. As a senior executive of one of the largest SOEs (PTT Public Company Limited), he could be in a position to contribute to the society through policies; whether as a law-abiding citizen of as an influencer to the issuance of a policy, particularly an energy-related one.
Mr. Thanh Nguyen is one of public opinion influencers in Viet Nam, and he supports the three pillars that he believes Viet Nam needs for a sustainable future: rule of law, market economy, and civil society development. To realize his contribution to the reforms of the country, he founded Vietnam Institute for Economic and Policy Research (VEPR) in 2008, working intensively and actively on the current fundamental issues of Viet Nam. He joined the Economic Advisory Group of the Prime Minister’s term of 2011-2016 with his perspectives on reforming the State-Owned Enterprise Sector and enhancing the international integration of the country. He actively addresses and debates current economic and social issues on various forums including the national TV channels, policy forums and publications. He founded Vietnam Scholar Network in 2014, joined Eisenhower Fellows in 2015, and has been member of different networks in Viet Nam. He supported different young groups (many of them are my former students) to encourage the civil society development.
Ms. Theerada Suphaphong is Thailand Country Representative of the Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue (HD), Geneva-based organization working on conflict prevention and resolution in areas around the world. Theerada graduated from the University of Oregon in 1996 and subsequently worked as an academic staff in the Thai Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs during 2001- 2005. She continued her studies in International Development Studies at Chulalongkorn University in Thailand and worked on project-based activities ranging from policy research to social advocacy during 2006 – 2008. Theerada has started working with HD since 2009 to manage projects that use of dialogue as the tool for conflict resolution in Southern Thailand and the national reconciliation. She facilitates dialogue at various levels and engages with political actors, policy makers, victim groups, and civil society to build common ground on how to prevent violence. Currently, Theerada is undertaking a research to develop index to assess the impact of the National Economic and Social Development Plan, in line with the UN SDGs indicators.
Dr.Thorn Pitidol is currently a lecturer at the Faculty of Economics, Thammasat University. Thorn graduated from the University of Oxford, UK, receiving MPhil in Development Studies and DPhil in Social Policy. His research focus is at the intersection between economics and politics, with the issues of interests ranging from community development, inequality, and welfare systems in Thailand. Thorn’s PhD work and his subsequent academic publications focus on applying multi-disciplinary approaches to understand Thailand’s development and political issues.
His doctoral thesis “The Limits of Community Participation” combines knowledge from economics, politics, and anthropology to examine and evaluate Thailand’s experiences in promoting community participation as the answer to development problems. His recent publications “Democratic Discourses in Thailand’s Civil Society” (Journal of Contemporary Asia, 400(3)) and “The Rise of the Thai Upper-Middle Class and its Turn against Democracy” (Forthcoming publication of ISEAS, Singapore) represent similar attempts in understanding other aspects of Thailand. He is currently pursuing research to understand the dynamics of wealth and inequality in Thailand since World War II. In addition to academic works, Thorn is also working as a country-based consultant for the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU), regularly providing analysis and insights on Thailand’s current state of economy and politics.
For the last 18 years, Mr. Tomonori Tani has worked in international capital markets as a financial analyst and portfolio manager at global investment firms, Fidelity Investments and Capital Group Companies. Throughout his career, he has extensively discussed public and macroeconomic policy making with policymakers, central banks and private corporations across many developing countries for the common goal of sustainable economic development. As an observant of a series of financial crises in Japan, Southeast Asia, Latin America and developed world of 2008, he tremendously learned the importance of governing code, law and order and sound economic management to achieve sustainable economic development and improve the standard of living. He is very keen to learn from the prominent experts and emerging leaders on the rule of law and policy, so that we all can work to change the world better.
Strengthening the rule of law and improving access to justice have been central to Ms. Tze-Wei NG’s work for over a decade, and therefore seeing Goal 16 included in the post-MDG UN Development Agenda is very encouraging. In her current role, she mostly works with legal actors (lawyers, law students, legal NGOs etc.) and focuses on improving the legal processes (civil and criminal procedures, courts, legal aid system etc.). She is interested in this TIJ Workshop because she wants to learn more about how rule of law can be integrated in policy-making across policy areas, and also to meet peers with similar interests and passion from across the region. Moreover, many pressing justice issues today require a cross-border solution, e.g. anti-trafficking and pollution. Mutual understanding and collaboration are key to solving these challenges.