🚨PANEL TALK🚨 Rising Authoritarianism and the Retreat of Aid: Confronting US Cuts and Techno-Colonialism in the Global Majority - SEA Focus

📍Panel discussion, FCCT Clubhouse and Facebook livestream (FCCT FB Page)

🕑 Friday, 9 May 2025, 2.00 pm to 3.30 pm

As USAID retreats from global development and humanitarian aid, authoritarian regimes are growing bolder — and Big Tech is stepping into the void.

This urgent panel explores how the Global Majority, especially Southeast Asia, is being reshaped by the double threat of:

⚠️ Transnational repression and shrinking civic space

⚠️ Techno-colonialism: where AI and Musk’s digital ‘solutions’ deepen inequality

In Thailand, the state has gone as far as deploying AI Police Cyborg 1.0—a robot powered by facial recognition and predictive surveillance tech, symbolizing a chilling future where authoritarian control is outsourced to machines. This is not progress — it's techno-oppression.

WHY THIS MATTERS

The abrupt scaling back of USAID’s commitments to development cooperation and humanitarian assistance marks a seismic shift in global governance, human rights, and equity. Across Southeast Asia, critical protections against transnational repression have been dangerously weakened—just as authoritarianism gains strength and civil society comes under growing attack.

At the same time, a new form of colonialism is emerging: techno-colonialism. With the retreat of traditional aid, governments and donors are turning to AI and digital technologies to fill the void—often at the expense of human rights, accountability, and local agency. From Elon Musk’s growing influence to the unchecked rise of Western tech giants, this shift threatens to deepen inequality, extract unconsented data, and marginalize already vulnerable communities.

This panel explores how USAID’s withdrawal and the rise of Big Tech are reshaping the aid and development landscape—posing existential risks to grassroots movements, Rohingya refugees, gender and sexual minorities, and Indigenous climate defenders. It also calls for urgent alternatives: decolonized funding, Asian philanthropy, and community-led models for resilience.

🎙️ Featuring powerful voices from the frontlines:

Emilie Palamy Pradichit, Founder and Executive Director, Manushya Foundation; International Human Rights Lawyer

Yasmin Ullah, Executive Director, Rohingya Maìyafuìnor Collaborative Network; Rohingya Woman Human Rights Defender

Michael L. Bąk, Advisor, Centre for AI Leadership, Singapore; and Co-Founder and Director of Policy Research, Sprint Public Interest, Thailand

🎤 Moderator: Debbie Stothard, Founder, ALTSEAN-Burma; longtime Advocate for Democracy and Human Rights in Southeast Asia

FREE ENTRY!

👉 Join us as we reclaim the narrative on development, challenge AI imperialism, and imagine decolonized, people-led alternatives.

The event is co-organized by Manushya Foundation, ALTSEAN-BURMA, Rohingya Maìyafuìnor Collaborative Network and the Centre for AI Leadership.