ALSA 2025 meeting

In an era striving for greater understanding and equity, the global stage is witnessing a disconcerting surge: the rise of anti-Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) movements in the United States. These movements, far from being disorganised, employ sophisticated legal and political strategies to dismantle frameworks designed to foster inclusivity. Fueled by conservative ideologies, they rebrand DEI efforts as divisive or antithetical to meritocracy, potentially emboldened by shifts in political power.

This paper explores the international implications of these anti-DEI strategies, specifically how the legal and political approaches seen in the US under the Trump 2.0 administration might influence emerging DEI initiatives in select Asian legal systems, and the resulting impact on achieving substantive justice in the region.

This research employs Dixon and Landau's abusive constitutional borrowing framework, analyzing how liberal constitutional concepts are twisted for illiberal ends. Using a doctrinal approach, the paper interprets legal sources to understand principles, their evolution, application, and impact. The aim is to create a new framework for comprehending how liberal arguments are used against DEI, guiding the creation of legal and policy counter-strategies to safeguard justice and inclusion in Asia.

The anti-DEI movement in the US employs legal and political strategies that fuel transnational trends. This could manifests in Asia through abusive borrowing via ideological diffusion, policy mimicry, and economic or geopolitical spillover.

This paper examines how anti-DEI manifestations in Asian jurisdictions, like Indonesia, use concepts such as religious harmony against minorities, public order against LGBTQ+ individuals, and meritocracy against gender equality. Similar trends in other Asian jurisdictions reveal diverse vulnerabilities. The transnational anti-DEI movement threatens DEI progress in Asia by eroding minority protections, undermining substantive equality, and challenging critical legal thought. Thus, addressing external anti-DEI movement is vital for protecting DEI in the region.