Editorial

Our contemporary world is currently experiencing the global economic crisis and people from different socio-economic backgrounds suffer from various kinds of social and economic consequences. In coping with the 1997/1998 Asian financial crisis, most governments in the region hurriedly expanded their social protection projects with substantial help from international organizations for helping those people suffering most from the catastrophe without having fundamental social policy paradigm shifts in East Asia. Despite the growing needs for social protection after the Asian financial crisis in 1997, most of the Asian governments have not drastically changed their approaches in handling the increasingly complex social welfare issues. Thus, it is not surprising to see many people still suffering from economic hardship, especially in the midst of food price crisis before the current global economic crisis broke out in October 2008.