Fridae

The big political event of the coming year is the American presidential election, due November 2008. The current President, George Bush is constitutionally barred from seeking reelection and is anyway deeply unpopular. Unusually even compared to past elections, the field is wide open, with a good chance that the next president will come from the Democratic Party.

While none of the three leading Democratic contenders - Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and John Edwards (above, left to right)- have openly come out to support gay marriage, it's fair to expect that neither will they resist moves by any state towards it. Marriage in the US is governed by state legislation, not federal legislation.

Among Republican candidates, Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee are angling for the conservative evangelical vote. The former is a Mormon, the latter a Southern Baptist minister.

Yet another victory by a candidate embraced by the religious rightwing (after Bush's victories in 2000 and 2004) will solidify the hold they have over US politics, and boost the confidence of anti-gay groups. A new Republican president will have another four or eight years to stack the US Supreme Court with conservative-leaning judges.

Since US policies, even domestic ones, have a disproportionate influence on how the world perceives social trends, the outcome of the 2008 US presidential election will resonate globally.

Speaking of court cases, California's Supreme Court is likely to deliver its decision in 2008 in an important judicial challenge. In April 2005, San Francisco Superior Court Judge Richard Kramer had ruled that denying marriage to same-sex couples unconstitutionally discriminated on the basis of sex and violated the fundamental right to marry. In October 2006, an appeal court reversed that decision, holding that there was no violation of the equal protection, due process, privacy or free expression guarantees of the California constitution. Subsequently a petition for review was filed in the California Supreme Court. It was granted and that's where things stand today.

Although California is but one of the 50 states of the US, it has a population of 40 million and an economy that would rank among the world's top 10 if it were an independent country. Furthermore, California has manifold social, cultural and trade linkages with Asia: Lots of people from this part of the world travel there to study, work and holiday, lots of businesses from the state are involved with Asian economies, not to mention the huge output from its entertainment industry.

Given these linkages, the legalisation of gay marriage in California will reverberate strongly in Asian societies - if that's the way its supreme court rules.

Another case wending its way through the courts is the challenge mounted by Naz Foundation and other groups to Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code. It was launched in 2001 on the basis that this law unfairly hindered its HIV prevention work among gay communities.

In September 2004, the Delhi High Court dismissed the petition on the ground that that the Naz Foundation had no cause of action since no prosecution under Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code against it was pending,

The Naz Foundation then filed a Special Leave Petition before the Supreme Court of India challenging the High Court's order. In February 2006, the Supreme Court set aside the order and remanded the case back to the Delhi High Court for a decision on the merits of the case.

The Indian Supreme Court's move was consistent with a direction it has taken since the early 1980s when it adopted a more expansive view of judiciary's role. Before that, the traditional paradigm applied where only the person whose interest was prejudiced could move the court. After that, courts more readily undertook the process of judicial review, with a liberalisation of the concept of locus standi. The result made the judiciary more responsive to disadvantaged sections of society and issues of public interest.

However, the wheels of justice in India grind slowly. It is not certain that the case will reach its conclusion in 2008. Whenever it does, and should Section 377 be struck down, it will have repercussions across all countries, such as Singapore, Sri Lanka and Malaysia, whose laws share common antecedents with India. And that is in addition to being of very direct consequence to one billion people in that country itself.

Across East Asia, homosexual relations are not criminal offences, but social homophobia can still be strong. Progress must involve attitudinal change in society at large. This necessarily means a slow evolution of views beyond the news headlines, but there are a number of factors that can help the process along.

One is the freedom of the media, including the Internet, to discuss gay-related topics. Another is the freedom of gay groups in various countries to organise. But underlying these is the question of whether the middle classes in various countries have the critical mass to begin addressing issues other than those of bare survival.

Self-expression and social recognition are handmaidens of economic growth. This is true both at micro and macro levels. For example, sons and daughters with homosexual leanings will find it much harder to realise themselves without education. Personal happiness may be elusive if they have no economic livelihood independent of the family.

Education, job opportunities, the freedom to network and travel are the building blocks of gay consciousness, and therefore of social progress, and these are enabled by economic growth.

Hence, to what extent 2008 brings steady economic growth, and to what extent it distributes that growth to various strata of society have to be understood in order to grasp the prospects for gay equality.

Fortunately, most developing countries in East Asia have generally enjoyed good growth in recent years. China is a star example, but so is Vietnam and Cambodia with GDP growth in the high single digits. For 2007, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, the Philippines, Malaysia and Indonesia can expect to see growth in the four to six percent range.

Right now, the main worry is whether the US economy will in 2008 tip into recession as a result of its sub prime mortgage mess. If it does, many Asian countries can expect to be affected to some degree, relying as they do on US consumer demand for their continued economic health.

Fortunately, however, even the most pessimistic observers do not believe this will impact the long-term prospects of the region. Short of political upheaval, the middle class will grow and with it, the space for sexual minorities.

Alex Au has been a gay activist for over 10 years and is the co-founder of gay advocacy group People Like Us. He is also the author of the well-known Yawning Bread web site.