Search results

This case discusses Bank Islam Brunei Darussalam’s (BIBD) social responsibility initiative. Social marketers are committed to people’s health and well-being; they are not profit-oriented and are seeking a larger market share than commercial marketers. One such example is “Community for Brunei” the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiative by BIBD. It is an online marketplace designed to help small businesses, highlighting different social and philanthropic causes that are important to Bruneians’ nurturing identity. BIBD assists the country’s small, medium, and micro entrepreneurs to actively and competitively expand their businesses through the Brunei community. It aims to help ease and transform the marketplace for struggling entrepreneurs during the pandemic. The Brunei Community Platform uses technology to bring communities together and provide an online ecosystem with integrated digital payment gateways as part of their efforts to encourage a digital society driven by a cashless economy. Other than a digital marketplace, the Community for Brunei has evolved into a social charitable platform conducting charity drives in collaboration with other non-government organizations as well as a donation platform enabling the community to donate and give back to the nation in difficult times such as the COVID-19 pandemic. As part of BIBD’s overall commitment to maintain the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, events related to Community for Brunei also guards urban areas to ensure its safety, resilience and sustainability. BIBD’s CSR projects also promotes sustainability in consumption and clean production patterns, and takes urgent action by responding to climate change and its impact. The key takeaways of BIBD’s digital platform Community for Brunei is not only to accept but to fully embrace digitization of today’s businesses to not only continue thriving in this very restricted and scarcely resourced environment but to also open up opportunities to enter their goods and services into the global market. It has also become a community-driven and socially responsible platform providing a place for the society to give back to the community.

In Brunei Darussalam the implementation of a technical infrastructure to improve access to the digital world and various e‐government initiatives are empowering the country through an informed community and an efficient government. A number of ICT‐related projects have been planned and implemented under the Brunei Economic Development Council and e‐government initiatives. Digital libraries and the digital transformation of heritage information have been identified as the most viable areas to be developed in an effort to strengthen the information basis of the community. This paper describes the plans for one important project, the Virtual Library System of Brunei (VILIS Brunei), and outlines the economic sustainability issues being considered.

The objective of this paper is to assess the degree to which Islamic banks in Brunei Darussalam use risk management practices (RMPs) and techniques in dealing with different types of risk.

The researcher developed a questionnaire which covers six aspects in the first part: understanding risk and risk management, risk assessment and analysis (RAA), risk identification (RI), risk monitoring, credit risk analysis and RMPs. The second part consists of two questions based on an ordinal scale dealing with two topics: methods of RI and risk facing the sample banks.

This study found that that the three most important types of risk that the Islamic banks in Brunei Darussalam facing are foreign‐exchange risk, followed by credit risk and then operating risk. It also found that the Islamic banks are somewhat reasonably efficient in managing risk where RI and RAA are the most influencing variables in RMPs.

The paper's findings are limited to the RMPs of Islamic banks in Brunei Darussalam.

The paper explores the RMPs of the Islamic banks in Brunei Darussalam. The results can be used as a valuable feed back for improvement of RMPs in the Islamic banks in Brunei and will be of value to those people who are interested in the Islamic banking system.

This paper analyses the leadership approach and practices of the Brunei Government, in response hitherto to the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic.

A review of the available resources and existing literature on COVID-19 and crisis management in Brunei is conducted, consequently drawing lessons on effective measures of Brunei experience in combating the COVID-19 pandemic.

The main key lessons of Brunei's success factors in tackling the COVID-19 outbreak are the “Whole of Government Approach” and “Whole of Nation Approach”. It is to be noted that the approach would not be successful without the approval and full support of the monarch himself and, more importantly, the public's cooperation. Engaging in constant updates with the government's willingness to have themselves be led by recognised experts has gained public trust, which leads to the success of containing COVID-19, which resulted Brunei not needing to opt for a lockdown, which in turn did not lead Brunei to succumb to the second wave of COVID-19.

Brunei experiences in containing novel coronavirus will help international scholars, especially in Muslim countries, to understand the lessons and develop a robust pandemic leadership model.

The lessons and strategies used by Brunei can be used as an exemplary approach to prepare for any future uncertainties by other countries.

The literature on pandemic leadership during COVID-19 in Brunei is scarce. This study might be considered as the first attempt to exhibit strong crisis leadership capacity in Brunei which resulted in the success of containing COVID-19.

Focuses on Brunei, briefly describing its geographic, demographic, economic, political, and cultural background. Highlights the ease of doing business in Brunei, particularly for US companies. States, however, that there are certain aspects of doing business in Brunei that bear thinking about, such as the use of local labour when there is little motivation for people to work because they are so well cared for by the state. Points out that, consequently, the most motivating factor in working is to feel part of an extended family organization, which is difficult if the headquarters are on a different continent. Suggests joint ventures as a way round this. Identifies how the notion of excellence differs between the US and Brunei, highlighting also shared characteristics of the two countries’ management styles. Criticizes Brunei’s complacency, which has resulted in a lack of productivity through people, and infers that the workforce needs to be better motivated if managers are to achieve competitive advantage for their businesses. Another attempt to impose “west is best” economies that are actually doing very well on their own.

Isu diskriminasi antara kaum telah tular di media sosial berikutan isu pemberian vaksin secara jumpa terus yang mula dibukakan di Pusat Vaksinasi Stadium Tertutup pada hari Jumaat, 24 September 2021. Jumlah orang ramai yang ingin mengambil vaksin telah melebihi jangkaan sehingga menyebabkan keadaan menjadi tidak terkawal dan berlakunya pelanggaran Prosedur Pengendalian Standard (SOP). Kajian ini dijalankan untuk membincangkan isu diskriminasi kaum yang berlaku semasa gelombang kedua pandemik COVID-19. Penelitian menggunakan metode kualitatif secara deskriptif. Data yang diperolehi daripada komen-komen dalam halaman Brunei Dot Com, dan Facebook ini seterusnya dianalisis menggunakan model tiga dimensi Fairclough (1992). Hasil kajian mendapati kesemua komen telah menunjukkan sikap diskriminasi dalam kalangan masyarakat Brunei secara sedar ataupun tidak. Isu diskriminasi ini bukan sahaja dapat dilihat dari sudut representasi linguistik, tetapi juga penghasilan dan pewahanaan wacana berkaitan pada halaman Brunei Dot Com, dan Facebook. Kajian ini juga menunjukkan bahawa wacana bukan saja mampu dibentuk masyarakat tetapi juga membentuknya.

The issue of racial discrimination concerning the commencement of walk-in vaccination at the Indoor Stadium Vaccination Centre on Friday, 24 September 2021 was widely addressed in the social media. Chaos ensued as an influx of people attended the centre and violated the Standard Operating Procedure (SOP). This paper examines the issue of racial discrimination during the second wave of COVID-19 pandemic in Brunei. As a qualitative-descriptive study, data obtained from Brunei Dot Com, and Facebook page, were analysed using Fairclough's (1992) three-dimensional approach. Findings have shown presence of discriminatory attitudes among the local community displayed as deliberately or unintentionally. This is manifested in its linguistic representations, discourse production and consumption in the selected Brunei Dot Com and Facebook pages. This study indicates that a discourse is not only capable of shaping but is also shaped by the community.

Historians of technology have for the past decade begun to recognize the important role that technology plays in nation-building. From the development of the steam locomotive in Britain in the early 19th century that was integral to the Industrial Revolution to America’s emphasis on its technological progressiveness in its national narratives in the 20th century, studies have shown that the history of technology is necessarily the history of nations as well. While the majority of previous research focuses primarily on Western nations (and unsurprisingly so, considering that a greater proportion of technological advancements have happened in these countries in the recent past centuries), less have studied how other countries have dealt with the rise of modern technologies in the development and maintenance of their national identity. This paper seeks to expand the critical scope by examining Brunei’s stance on technology in the 1960s – just after the 1959 Constitution was established declaring the nation an independent, sovereign Sultanate – a time when Brunei was still in the early stages of defining its own identity. I propose that Brunei used modern technologies in order to further solidify its Muslim identity as a response to modernization and globalization, which is distinct to many previously-studied countries that focus more on boosting their military and/or industrial prowess. Brunei’s approach, then, notably counters oft-perceived contradictions between religion and technology. This study will focus on Brunei’s first film, Gema Dari Menara (1968), which was tellingly commissioned by the Religious Affairs Department, and will examine the portrayal of modern technologies that seek to break the binary between religion and modernity to show an image of Islam that is compatible with a developing Brunei.

This paper argues that the film Gema Dari Menara produced in 1968 reflects Brunei’s attempt towards constructing a Brunei Malayness as a national identity. During the early twentieth century, the colonial powers particularly in the Peninsula, tried to help establish a sense of unity among the Malays. Although it was not clear whether this was entirely successful, it is possible that the presence of colonial powers had some influence towards fuelling Malays to be more proactive in their own identity construction. After the British began to leave Brunei, the nation-state can be perceived to have intensified its efforts in creating a national identity as a way to unify its people, including the preservation and reconstruction of its Malayness. A close analysis of the characters in the film will reveal portrayals of ideals of Malayness and how Islamic values penetrate Malayness in the Bruneian context. The main character Azman is arguably the epitome of ideal Malayness, as his behaviour, his way of thinking as well as the way he dresses complement what Brunei aspires to for its people, whereas his younger siblings’ partying and wild behaviour are a cautionary tale. These findings will hopefully provide insights for further studies on the impact of the British administration on the Brunei Malay culture or identity formation in Brunei as a postcolonial state.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the government of Brunei’s anti-corruption programme.

A range of sources are used including online materials from Brunei government websites, reports of international organisations, press articles, conference papers, a thesis case study, journal articles, a book, chapters in books, and interviews with an officer working with the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) of Brunei.

The paper considers the factors that contribute to government corruption, and the measures to combat it. These include various laws to combat corruption and the work of the ACB in enforcing these laws and in undertaking major initiatives of prevention and education. The effectiveness of these measures are assessed and a number of recommendations are made of direct and indirect measures improve the programme to combat corruption. The paper points to the moderately favourable rankings and ratings that Brunei has earned in combating corruption, which is well above neighbouring countries where corruption is still widespread, but noticeably below the rankings and ratings of the least corrupt countries. However, it argues that further progress to combat corruption may be difficult, as a result of the lack accountability and limited transparency, which are essential features of Brunei’s system of government based on absolute monarchy. Also hindering further progress is the inbuilt protection of the privileges of the Malay community within the country, which protects their role in the civil service and the business sector.

The paper is the first scholarly examination of the anti-corruption programme in Brunei.