free ebooks review rapidshare, megaupload |
|
|
China: Economics Political and Social Issues Summary:By Jack M. Phillips, Logan J. Moore
China's economic, political and societal issues have become major points of interest to countries all over the globe. This book presents in-depth analysis of such issues as foreign policy, political reform, and overall economic developments. PREFACE China's economic, political and societal issues have become major points of interest to countries all over the globe. This new book presents in-depth analyses of issues such as foreign policy, political reform, and overall economic developments. Chapter 1 - The Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) has been universally acknowledged as the major regional economic cooperation organization for the liberalization and facilitation of trade and investment (TILF) in the Asia-Pacific region. However, APEC’s role as leader in the Asia-Pacific region is being challenged. In 2004, an emerging China entered into a landmark agreement with ASEAN, which is the 2004 ASEAN-China accord that portends to establish the world’s largest free trade area by the year 2010. As a result, the fate of APEC largely became intertwined with the fate of China. APEC was formed in 1989, and evolved from a regional economic consultative body, into an organization explicitly addressing political concerns in the region. APEC is the byproduct of evolving international political economy concerns, from the post-Cold War, post- East Asian financial crisis, to post-9/11 and global threats of mega-terrorism. APEC has suffered a crisis in lack of credibility since the East Asian financial crisis; many perceive that APEC failed to adequately respond to the crisis. However, APEC’s credibility has been more harmed by a perceived inability to accomplish the Bogor goals. In 1994, APEC member economies signed the Bogor Declaration, and developed economies pledged to eliminate trade and investment barriers by 2010, while developing economies pledged to eliminate trade and investment barriers by 2020. Some critiques link accomplishing the Bogor goals to APEC’s survival and relevancy in the new millennium. A critique of APEC based solely on the Bogor goals results in a denial of other equally important relevancies, serving as harbingers for survivability and continuing relevancy. In the new millennium, APEC’s survival and continuing relevancy will lie in its historical commitment to TILF. However, historical relevancies must also allow for adjustments reflecting new international political economy concerns, such as, global threats of megaterrorism, the 2004 ASEAN-China accord, termination of the WTO Multi-Fibre Agreement (MFA) of 1974, and what is being dubbed “JACIK,” a prospective free trade super mega zone, comprising ASEAN, China, Japan, India and the Republic of Korea. Moreover, survival for APEC in the new millennium means encompassing an explicit economic agenda, in conjunction with an explicit international relations (political) agenda. APEC will survive in the new millennium by incorporating the latter relevancies, which reflect both historical relevancies, and evolving relevancies from changing and dynamic international political economy environments. Chapter 2 –This chapter outlines the trade barriers in China. The U.S. goods trade deficit with China was $232.5 billion in 2006, an increase of $31 billion from $201.5 billion in 2005. U.S. goods exports in 2006 were $55.2 billion, up 31.7 percent from the previous year. Corresponding U.S. imports from China were $287.8 billion, up 18.2 percent. China is currently the 4th largest export market for U.S. goods. U.S. exports of private commercial services (i.e., excluding military and government) to China were $9.1 billion in 2005 (latest data available), and U.S. imports were $6.5 billion. Sales of services in China by majority U.S.-owned affiliates were $5.1 billion in 2004 (latest data available), while sales of services in the United States by majority China-owned firms were not available in 2004 ($321 million in 2002 is latest data available). Chapter 3 - Asia presents one of the most vibrant economic environments in the world. China and India have emerged as the leaders in the Asian region due to their rapid growth and market size. Consequently, equity markets in both China and India have significantly developed following liberalization in the early 1990s. The rapid growth of these economies coupled with the development of their financial markets has attracted significant portfolio investment from U.S. investors. For example, U.S. equity portfolio flows have increased from 0.63 billion to 7.14 billion in China and from 0.5 to 11 billion in India between 1994 and 2005. This research examines the dynamic nature of the relationship between U.S. portfolio equity flows and equity returns in China and India. To understand the linkages between equity flows, market returns, and other variables we dissect our empirical findings as follows: first, the authors examine the correlations between stock market returns and portfolio flows; second, they decompose flows into expected and unexpected components to analyze how returns are influenced by different flow components; and third, they explore the dynamic relationships among flows, returns, and related variables. The authors’ findings show that flows are ‘pulled’ into China and India by returns greater than U.S. market returns. Additionally, they find that the Indian equity index is influenced by U.S. investment activity and dividend yields, whereas the Chinese equity index is statistically unaffected by foreign investor behavior and fundamental determinates of value. This supports the ideas espoused in the popular press that the Chinese government still plays a major role in determining equity prices. A unique finding of this research is that the variance of the flow sequence in both China and India is better explained by shock to fundamentals vs. shocks to returns. This indicates that large American investors are making portfolio allocation decisions not simply on the basis of simple ‘return chasing’, but are at least partially informed about the markets of China and India. The authors anticipate that the strong relationship between equity flows and fundamentals should strengthen in the future as information asymmetries decline and U.S. investors continue to develop more sophisticated methods of assessing underlying value in these markets. Chapter 4 - Oriental cultures differ from white, Christian cultures in the structure by which the family is organized and the way children are brought up. The formal representation of the Oedipus complex in Confucian Chinese society shows a distinct difference from that of white, Christian, Western societies. The classic oedipal situation as described by Freud seldom, if ever, exists in pre-modern Chinese literary works, but variant forms do appear even in classical Chinese literature. In this chapter, the author attempts to explore to what extent the Oedipus complex as the "fate of all of us" is true of other cultures. The author inquires, however, not by conducting a case study of social data collected in a non-Western culture, but by analyzing textual data contained in a literary masterpiece in an approach adopted by Freud when he formulated his initial idea of the Oedipus complex. The literary text is China’s greatest classical novel, the Hongloumeng, authored by Cao Xueqin, which has two complete English translations: A Dream of Red Mansions and The Story of the Stone. This masterpiece offers an encyclopedic representation of traditional Chinese family life and narrates deeply hidden oedipal themes. Although their formal structure is very different from the triadic structure of the classical Freudian concept, it still falls within what Ernest Jones calls "the nuclear family complex." The author’s case study will be conducted in relation to various debates on the Oedipus complex in the West. Chapter 5 - The purpose of this chapter is to present a framework for understanding Chinese business culture and negotiating style. The author has had opportunities to discuss this topic with a large number of foreign executives. Many of them said they loved to negotiate and work with the Chinese. They perceived Chinese businesspeople as sincere business “gentlemen” who worked at a high level of mutual trust and respect. However, many others gave a diametrically different picture; they hated to negotiate with the Chinese and they were fed up with the tricky Chinese style of negotiating. In their eyes, the Chinese are “immoral” businesspeople who can “cheat”, “lie”, or just do whatever is necessary to knock you off balance at the negotiation table. The author was struck by this contradictory image and was very much a part of this Chinese phenomenon some years ago when negotiating (as a Chinese negotiator) with foreign businesspeople: the Chinese negotiator is a both sincere and deceptive negotiator. This chapter aims to decode the paradox of Chinese negotiating style. The author starts by discussing the philosophical foundation of Chinese culture. Next, he presents will present a model of Chinese business culture. The chapter will conclude with managerial implications about how to do business effectively in China. A case study of Chinese negotiation behavior will be presented in the Appendix. Chapter 6 - The modern concept of child abuse as a public health concern originates from Western societies. The various forms of child maltreatment have been extensively studied in the past 40 years. However, studies of child abuse among Chinese communities are extremely limited. The purpose of this study is to examine the clinical characteristics of child physical abuse seen in a regional hospital that provides acute and ambulatory care to one-sixth of the childhood population in Hong Kong. Children admitted into the hospital from January 1998 to June 2004 for management of suspected physical abuse were included. They were examined by one of the designated paediatricians, Medical Coordinators on Child Abuse, and were managed according to a hospital protocol and a set of inter-professional procedures. The management included medical and health evaluation, injury documentation, nursing observations, and a social enquiry into the family background and functioning, and the child’s academic and behavioural problems at school. Seven hundred and twenty children had been evaluated for suspected physical abuse during the study period. An increasing annual incidence was seen and the number of cases had been rising by an average of 20% per year. Boys (392, 54%) outnumbered girls (328, 46%). The mean and median ages were both 8.8 years. A sharp rise in the number of cases was seen after the age of 6 years, the time when children started their primary school education. The male predominance was also evident only during the pre-primary and primary education ages. The highest number of cases was seen during May and June each year, the time when most students were preparing for their year-end examination. 568 (79%) cases were eventually substantiated as child abuse. The more severe injuries included intracranial bleeding (n=7), fractures (n=17), poisoning (n=16), burns (n=12), and soft tissue lacerations (n=41). Two children died, one from shaken baby syndrome and the other from carbon monoxide poisoning. Family dysfunction, including dependency on social security (48%), parental conflicts (30%) and single-parenthood (29%), was prevalent. Genuine behavioural problems (14%) and problems in studying (12%) of the child concerned were less frequently seen. Hence, the pattern of physical abuse and vulnerabilities in families revealed in this study are comparable to those of the Western culture. The bias in the age and gender of the battered children may reflect the traditional and higher expectation on the male offspring to excel academically, and the culturally fostered practice of corporal punishment under such circumstances. Chapter 7 - With two questionnaires named Money Ethics Scale (MES) and Propensity to Engage in Unethical Behavior Scale (PEUBS), which are designed by the authors, this study investigates randomly 204 managerial staffs and 395 university students, to analyze their money profiles, and the relation between money profiles and unethical activity. The results show that Achieving Money Worshiper and Careless Money Admirer have more possibility to involve unethical activity than Apathetic Money Handler and Money Repeller when they are faced with work stress, but Apathetic Money Handler and Money Repeller have more possibility to involve unethical activity than Achieving Money Worshiper when they are faced with unethical organizational context; university students have more possibility to involve unethical activity than managerial staffs when they are faced with work stress, conformity and organizational context. Chapter 8 - Contrary to the expectations of many outside observers at the beginning of the 1990’s the political system of the People's Republic of China (PRC) experienced remarkably little transformation during the last decade of the twentieth century. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) weathered the aftermath of the bloody repression of the Tiananmen democracy movement of 1989 as well as the demise of other Communist Party dictatorships in Russia and Eastern Europe. Neither the transition of authority from the late Deng Xiaoping to Jiang Zemin nor the passing of the helm from the latter to Hu Jintao at the Sixteenth Party Congress convened in Beijing in November 2002 have ushered in large-scale elite in-fighting or a systemic succession crisis disabling the functioning of the political system. Against this backdrop of stability, it has been the more subtle changes to that system on which most authors have pinned their hopes for a political transformation. These include inter alia the building of the rule of law, a more independent role for people's congresses at different levels of the political hierarchy, changing state-society relations and new intellectual trends. However, one of the aspects receiving most attention in recent years has been ongoing political reform in the Chinese countryside. The very dearth of other eye-catching reforms in the political realm has made the adoption of direct elections at the basic-level of a Leninist Party-state seems even more spectacular. These elections pertain to villagers’ committees (VCs), the executive body at the rural grassroots-level which was instituted with the demise of collective farming and the people's commune system in the early 1980s. Only after a special law was passed in 1987 did these elections begin to resemble democratic procedures and during the 1990s the spread of these was still quite uneven. Yet, problems of implementation notwithstanding these elections have served as an impetus to pioneer elections for other positions of the Party and state apparatuses. All of these reforms, to be dealt with in more detail below, have raised the eyebrows of Western China-watchers. While it appears easy to explain the attention paid to grassroots political reforms in rural China, the extent of these changes and their impacts remain hard to gauge given the huge area and diverse nature of the Chinese countryside. In fact, Jonathan Unger aptly called rural politics in China "kaleidoscopic" because of the wide variations existing between different localities. Nevertheless, it is probably not too early to raise questions pertaining to the nature of these political transformations. Specifically, this article addresses the question which driving forces behind them can be identified. The author argues that political change at the grassroots-level in rural China has neither been a story of top-down reform, nor of bottom-up initiative, but rather a mixture of both and that during the process new actors which he terms bureaucratic entrepreneurs, policy advocates and policy entrepreneurs came to play significant roles. First, it will be necessary to sketch the economic transformations in rural China during the reform era to elaborate different reform patterns. The author then turns to the political reforms taking place in this new context and attempt to identify which pattern best serves to explain these. In doing so, he focuses on political reforms defined as a restructuring of formal political institutions. Accompanying changes in political attitudes and the political culture of rural China are addressed only where they are perceived as either driving forces or results of these institutional reforms. Chapter 9 - This chapter provides an overview of the Muslim separatist movement in China's northwestern Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region, China's attempts to stifle activities, which it considers terrorism, and implications for U.S. policy. Some analysts suggest that the U.S.-led campaign against terrorism may make it difficult to pressure the Chinese government on human rights and religious freedoms, particularly as they relate to Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang. China also has reportedly stepped up its suppression of Uighur Muslims following the attacks in the United States on September 11, 2001. A policy question for the United States is how to balance the anti-terrorist campaign with traditional concerns over human rights in China's western region, and how to react should Beijing use the threat of terrorism to abrogate rights of autonomy in Xinjiang as provided for in China's constitution. Chapter 10 - The technology market was built upon under the circumstance of the largescale reform on the system of economy as well as science and technology. The core of the reform was to improve the integration among Science and Technology with economic and social development, accelerate the application and dissemination of the S&T achievements as well as give full play to S&T as the primary productive force. In accordance with reforming on the whole system of science and technology, China also reformed the technology transfer system. The orientation was to discard the drawbacks of the former application and dissemination system on S&T system, to establish a market-guided technology transfer system and enhance the motivation and energy of technology development and transfer Please select one mirror to download
Guest should register an account Register
NEWER EBOOKS
OLDER EBOOKS
Sponsored LinksChina: Economics Political and Social Issues Keywordsequity reform abuse flows returns india technology policy culture rural unethical reforms activity elections investment complex authors portfolio oedipus complex political economy international political equity flows bogor goals asean china accord rapid growth equity index economic cooperation investment barriers international political economy asian financial crisisChina: Economics Political and Social Issues download copyrightThis site does not store China: Economics Political and Social Issues on its server. We only index and link to China: Economics Political and Social Issues provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete China: Economics Political and Social Issues if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately. |
|
Architecture
Audiobooks
Business
Cooking & Diets
Cultures & Languages
Database
Engineering Tech
Games
Graphic Design
Hardware
History
Internet
Magazine
Microsoft
Novel
Personality
Programming
Science
Security
Software
Study
Theology & Occultism
Web Development
(