Authors

Momo Sakudo is the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Networks Officer with the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada. She holds a Master of Public Policy from the School of Public Affairs at Sciences Po Paris and a dual Bachelor of Arts from the University of British Columbia and Sciences Po Paris. As a Japanese national living in Canada, Momo is interested in exploring Asia's growing role in the international community.

Dr. Ari Van Assche is a Professor at the Department of International Business, and
Co-Director, International Institute for Economic Diplomacy, at HEC Montréal.

Dr. Deborah Elms is Head of Trade Policy at the Hinrich Foundation in Singapore. Prior to joining the Foundation, she was the Executive Director and Founder of the Asian Trade Centre (ATC). She was also President of the Asia Business Trade Association (ABTA) and the Board Director of the Asian Trade Centre Foundation (ATCF).

Dr. Elms serves on the board of the Trade and Investment Negotiation Adviser (TINA) at the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia Pacific (UNESCAP). She was on the International Advisory Council for APCO (2021-2023) and was a member of the International Technical Advisory Committee of the Global Trade Professionals Alliance and Chair of the Working Group on Trade Policy and Law. She was also a member of the World Economic Forum’s Trade and Investment Council for 2018-2020.

Dan Ciuriak is Director and Principal, Ciuriak Consulting Inc. (Ottawa), which provides analytical and policy analysis services related to international trade, finance, industrial policy, and economic development. He also holds fellowships with the Centre for International Governance Innovation (Waterloo), where his research interests are focussed on the nexus between innovation and trade, and quantifying the economic impact of the digital transformation, and with the C.D. Howe Institute (Toronto), where he focuses on Canadian trade policy issues. 

An APF Canada Distinguished Fellow, he has published widely as author and editor, including numerous studies on Canada’s trade relations in the Asia Pacific, and comments frequently in the media.

Pitman B. Potter is Professor Emeritus in Law, University of British Columbia; Distinguished Fellow, Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada; and, a Member of the Order of Canada.

Robert Williams is a Kitchener, Ontario-based journalist and feature writer for the Waterloo Region Record. As part of The Record’s investigations unit, he has worked on long-term projects on Conestoga College’s international student enrolment, Ontario’s public education achievement outcomes, and the Government of Ontario’s COVID-19 pandemic response. 

Robert is a winner of the Goff Penny Award and Atlantic Journalism Award for feature writing, and his work has appeared in publications across Canada, including the Toronto Star, iPolitics, and the Telegraph-Journal.

Dr. Sanjay Ruparelia is an Associate Professor of Politics and the inaugural Jarislowsky Democracy Chair at Toronto Metropolitan University. He is the author of Divided We Govern: Coalition Politics in Modern India, editor of The Indian Ideology, and co-editor of Understanding India’s New Political Economy: A Great Transformation? 

Sanjay serves as co-chair of Participedia, an international network that studies democratic innovations, and co-hosts On the Frontlines of Democracy, a monthly podcast and lecture series with TMU School of Journalism and the Toronto Public Library, respectively. He regularly contributes essays and commentary to prominent media outlets in Canada and abroad.

His current research analyzes democratic backsliding, the contentious transformations of India and China over the last decade, and the evolution of rights, welfare, and constitutionalism in the global South.

Woojoo Hong is a Research Scholar at the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada, funded by the Korea Foundation’s Global Challengers Program. Woojoo holds a master’s in international studies, focusing on International Development and Cooperation, from Korea University.

Hugh Stephens has more than 35 years of government and business experience in the Asia Pacific region. He is currently Vice-Chair of the Canadian Committee on Pacific Economic Cooperation (CANCPEC), Executive Fellow at the School of Public Policy at the University of Calgary, Principal of TransPacific Connections, and a Distinguished Fellow with the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada. In addition, he teaches in the MBA program at Royal Roads University as an Associate Faculty member.

Before returning to Canada in December 2009, Hugh was Senior Vice President (Public Policy) for Asia Pacific for Time Warner for almost a decade, located at the company’s regional headquarters in Hong Kong.