John Funston is a Visiting Fellow in the Department of Political and Social Change, College of Asia and the Pacific, ANU. He was previously Associate Director (2002-2004) and Executive Director (2005-2007) of the National Thai Studies Centre, ANU. He has worked on Southeast Asian politics, particularly Malaysia and Thailand, for over four decades, including fourteen years in the region, at the National University of Malaysia (1972-1976), Brunei University (1986-1989), and the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore (1997-2001).