Seen and heard this week

In an opinion piece in The Business Times on 30 November, Associate Professor Marleen Dieleman from NUS Business School wrote about the criticality of recognising privilege, particularly for those in positions of influence, and how that awareness could be used to improve systems and behaviour. Privilege could become a force for greater diversity on company boards, she wrote, sharing that research on Singapore-listed enterprises had demonstrated that such companies were up to five times more profitable than those with homogenous boards.

Emeritus Professor Duane Gubler from Duke-NUS Medical School’s Emerging Infectious Diseases Programme spoke on the Zika virus — its impact, association with microcephaly and future implications — in a Channel NewsAsia piece on 30 November. Prof Gubler expects the virus will continue to spread and called for mosquito controlling efforts to be maintained on the island in order to mitigate the threat of an epidemic.

Mr Justin Lee, Research Fellow at the Institute of Policy Studies (IPS) at NUS shared in The Straits Times on 2 December the genesis of Disabled Peoples’ International, the only global organisation promoting full participation of disabled people in society. He discussed several key initiatives for building an inclusive society and said that IPS was piloting a Disability Network to facilitate sharing between disability organisations and policymakers. He also highlighted the need for interdisciplinary research that includes views from the disabled.

Read more about the NUS community in the news.