Ending the Year With a Bang

Dear Fulcrum readers,

There will be a publishing break for Fulcrum between Christmas and the New Year. We will resume publication on 2 January 2026.

2025 is the fifth full year of Fulcrum’s operation since it was established in 2020. We are proud that we published a record 403 commentaries this year. For comparison, we published 302 Fulcrums in 2023 and 381 in 2024. In terms of website views, we hit 1.64 million, a steady increase from the 1.40 million registered in 2024. This is way higher than the 220,000 views registered in 2021, Fulcrum’s first full year of operation.

We have had a frenetic year, covering the Trump administration’s reciprocal tariffs, the dispute between Thailand and Cambodia, and the slew of ASEAN meetings and summits held throughout the year. In addition, we discussed the persistent topics that affect Southeast Asia such as climate change, the emergence of AI technologies, the impact of Islam and other religions, and domestic politics in countries like Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand.

Malaysia, Singapore, the Philippines, the US, and Indonesia constituted Fulcrum’s top five countries in terms of viewership. It is par for the course that Singapore’s ASEAN neighbours have an interest in Fulcrum; we are encouraged that readers from the US were in the top five.

We are thankful for many things, including the host of colleagues who raised nary a protest when called upon to review drafts and who constantly submit their commentaries and provide feedback on how Fulcrum can be improved. We are also grateful to colleagues who continue to produce and publish other content on Fulcrum, including our podcasts, Long Reads (adaptations of ISEAS’ signature Perspective series) and the ASEANFocus Plus commentaries published by the ASEAN Studies Centre.

Most of all, we are thankful for our readers who have constantly complimented us on our work. We want to thank the external writers who constantly offer their work to be published in Fulcrum. Many diplomats, civil servants, scholars, and corporate folk have incorporated Fulcrum as part of their regular reading regimen. We would not be where we are today without them.

During the break, we will — as per tradition — republish the top 10 commentaries which drew the most views in 2025. We have one more thing to be thankful for: that some of these commentaries were written by our younger research colleagues.

The team at Fulcrum wishes all Fulcrum readers a blessed and restful Christmas and New Year!

The Editors and the Fulcrum team

Eugene, Hae Won, Hwee Leng, Hwok Aun, Isabelle, Julia, Lydia, Poh Onn, Prema, Sue-Ann and William