Hew briefed National Press Foundation fellows in July 2023: Politics Slow ASEAN’s Economic Agreements. 

Denis Hew is currently Senior Research Fellow at the Centre on Asia and Globalisation (CAG) at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy (LKYSPP), National University of Singapore. Prior to taking up this position, he was Director of the APEC Policy Support Unit (PSU) from 2011 to 2022. PSU is the research arm of the APEC, which is a regional grouping that promotes trade and investment liberalisation and facilitation in the Asia-Pacific region. In this position, he led a team of skilled professionals that provided high-quality evidence-based research and technical support to APEC Senior Officials, Committees and Working Groups.

Hew also spent two years in the Asian Development Bank (ADB) in its Southeast Asia department, where he managed technical assistance programs on regional cooperation and integration. From 2001 to 2008, Hew was Senior Fellow and Regional Economic Studies Coordinator at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies (ISEAS) Singapore, which is one of the region’s oldest and most established research institutes. During his time at ISEAS Singapore, Hew was also the Managing Editor of the ASEAN Economic Bulletin, an academic journal that focuses on policy-relevant economic issues in Southeast Asia.

Hew is a financial economist by training and holds a Bachelor’s (Hons) in Economics from the University of Warwick, United Kingdom and a Master’s and Ph.D. in Finance from the University of Manchester, United Kingdom. He has published extensively on policy issues related to economic integration in ASEAN and the Asia-Pacific region.