Carissa currently serves as a program and research associate at the Stratbase Institute, where she conducts policy research and analyzes sectoral trends in defense and security.

Carissa has held key roles in institutions focused on governance, diplomacy and social development. As a project officer for a non-profit organization, she led flagship campaigns on women’s health and empowerment in collaboration with foreign embassies. During her internship focused on the public sector, she facilitated strategic planning workshops and supported the alignment of governance frameworks with national government agencies.

Carissa earned a bachelor’s degree in diplomacy and international relations specializing in East and Southeast Asian studies from Ateneo de Manila University, graduating cum laude.

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Ms. Declaro specializes in research and policy analysis in the areas of defense and security, enterprise technology, cybersecurity and critical infrastructure. She currently serves as a senior program and research associate at the Stratbase Institute, where she develops policy papers, prepares briefing materials and coordinates multistakeholder engagements involving the government, private sector and civil society. Ms. Declaro earned a Bachelor of Arts in international studies from De La Salle University-Manila, where she majored in European studies and minored in sports health. Graduating summa cum laude, she is also a member of the Rizal Honors Society.

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Dr. TING-HUI LIN teaches Law of the Sea and South China Sea issues in the Department of Maritime Police, Central Police University. He is also a commisioner of Taiwan Ocean Affairs Council. He served in the Taiwanese National Security Council and operated think tank, Taiwan Brain Trust and Prospect Foundation as the Vice President of those institutions. He got master degree in National Chengchi University and PhD. in National Taiwan University. Dr. LIN’s research areas are South China Sea, East China Sea, Pacific Islands, International Law and Law of the Sea.

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Marites Dañguilan Vitug, a leading Filipino investigative journalist and author, is editor-at-large for Rappler. She was editor of Newsbreak magazine, a trailblazer in Philippine investigative journalism. She has written nine books, the latest of which is Unrequited Love: Duterte’s Embrace of China co-written with Camille Elemia. Before that, she wrote Rock Solid: How the Philippines Won its Maritime Case against China. It won the National Book Award and was translated into Vietnamese. Marites has a degree in A.B. Broadcast Communication from the University of the Philippines and a diploma in world politics from the London School of Economics. She was a Nieman fellow at Harvard University and a recipient of fellowships from the University of San Diego in California—the Pacific Leadership Fellow; the Rockefeller Foundation Writing Fellowship in Bellagio Center, Lago di Como, Italy; the International House in Tokyo—the Asia Leadership Fellow Program; the Australian National University, University of Kyoto and the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies in Tokyo.

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Mr. William Yang is the Senior Northeast Asia Analyst at International Crisis Group, where he focuses on tracking and analysing China’s foreign and security policies, relations between China and Taiwan, and how China’s activities around the world influence and shape geopolitical dynamics around the world. Prior to joining Crisis Group, Yang worked for twelve years as a correspondent covering China, Taiwan and the rest of East Asia for multiple foreign media outlets. His coverage focused on major political and social issues in China, relations between China and Taiwan, and how China’s growing global impact shapes dynamics in East Asia and other parts of the world. He regularly appears on television and radio programs to talk about issues related to China, Taiwan and the Indo-Pacific region.

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Dr. Titus C. Chen earned his Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of California, Irvine, in 2008. He specializes in International Relations Theory, international human rights, Indo-Pacific regional security, and Chinese foreign and security policy. He currently serves as a Research Fellow and Deputy Director at the Institute of International Relations and a Professor at the International College of Innovation, National Chengchi University, Taipei, Taiwan. He is also the Executive Director of CSCAP Taiwan and the Executive Editor of the journal Issues & Studies. Dr. Chen’s academic contributions include the critically acclaimed book, The Making of A Neo-Propaganda State: China’s Social Media under Xi Jinping, published by Brill in 2022, which examines the profound implications of Xi Jinping’s social media policies. Currently, Dr. Chen is at the forefront of innovative research, utilizing Big Data and AI tools to analyze China’s security policy in territorial disputes. His work combines theoretical depth with cutting-edge methodologies, offering critical insights into the evolving dynamics of Indo-Pacific order and China’s role in it. Dr. Chen’s research continues to shape understanding of contemporary international relations in the 21st century.

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Chong Ja Ian is an associate professor of political science at the National University of Singapore, where he teaches and conducts research in international politics and security. Chong is a non-resident scholar at Carnegie China, Carnegie’s East Asia-based research center on contemporary China, where he examines U.S.-China dynamics in Southeast Asia and the broader Asia-Pacific. He received his PhD from Princeton University in 2008. His research covers the intersection of international and domestic politics, with a focus on the externalities of major power competition, nationalism, regional order, security, contentious politics, coercive diplomacy, and state formation.
He was a 2019-20 Harvard-Yenching Visiting Scholar, 2013 Taiwan Fellow, 2012-13 East-West Center Asia Fellow, and a 2008-9 Princeton-Harvard China and the World Fellow. Chong’s current research examines how non-leading state behavior collectively intensifies major power rivalries. He has concurrent projects investigating how states react to sanctions on third parties by trade partners, and the characteristics of foreign influence operations.
Chong is the author of External Intervention and the Politics of State Formation: China, Indonesia, Thailand, 1893-1952 (Cambridge, 2012), and a recipient of the 2013 International Security Studies Section Book Award from the International Studies Association. He has published in the China Quarterly, European Journal of International Relations, International Security, Security Studies, and Pacific Affairs, among other outlets.

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Jane CHAN is a Senior Fellow and Coordinator of the Maritime Security Programme at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS) in Nanyang Technological University (NTU), Singapore. Her main research interests include maritime security issues in Southeast Asia, law and order at sea, regional maritime cooperation and confidence-building measures, and regional boundary delimitation and territorial disputes. She is an affiliated faculty at the Singapore Arm Forces (SAF)-NTU Academy (SNA).

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Dr Rahman Yaacob is a Research Fellow at the Southeast Asia Program, Lowy Institute. He is also a Non-Resident Fellow at the Korea Institute for Maritime Strategy (KIMS). His research focuses on Southeast Asian defence policy and relations with major powers.

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Professor Anne-Marie Brady FRSNZ is a specialist on the Chinese Communist Party (domestic politics and foreign policy), polar politics, Pacific politics, and New Zealand foreign policy. She is founding and executive editor of The Polar Journal (Taylor and Francis Publishers). She has published ten books and over fifty sole-authored scholarly papers. She has written more than 60 opeds on her research for newspapers such as the New York Times, The Guardian, The Australian, Sydney Morning Herald, The Financial Times, The Diplomat. In addition to her duties at the University of Canterbury, Professor Brady holds a number of honorary roles. She was a Global Fellow at the Woodrow Wilson Centre in Washington DC from 2014 to 2025. In 2014 she was appointed to a two-year term on the World Economic Forum’s Global Action Council on the Arctic. She is an advisor to the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China (IPAC).

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