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Zouping Revisited: Adaptive Governance in a Chinese County

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China has undergone dramatic change in its economic institutions in recent years, but surprisingly little change politically. Somehow, the political institutions seem capable of governing a vastly more complex market economy and a rapidly changing labor force. One possible explanation, examined in Zouping Revisited, is that within the old organizational molds there have been subtle but profound changes to the ways these governing bodies actually work. The authors take as a case study the local government of Zouping County and find that it has been able to evolve significantly through ad hoc bureaucratic adaptations and accommodations that drastically change the operation of government institutions.

Zouping has long served as a window into local-level Chinese politics, economy, and culture. In this volume, top scholars analyze the most important changes in the county over the last two decades. The picture that emerges is one of institutional agility and creativity as a new form of resilience within an authoritarian regime.

About the authors:

Jean C. Oi is William Haas Professor in Chinese Politics and a Senior Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies at Stanford University.

Steven Goldstein is Sophia Smith Professor Emeritus of Government at Smith College, Director of the Taiwan Studies Workshop, and Associate at the Fairbank Center at Harvard University.

This book is part of the Studies of the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center series with Stanford University Press.

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Jean C. Oi
Steven Goldstein
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SCPKU holds forum on China's urbanization challenges

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Mike Dong and Yann Zhang
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The Stanford Center at Peking University (SCPKU) on August 26 hosted a forum, “Challenges in the Process of China’s Urbanization,” which included the launch of a book of the same name and a panel discussion. 

The book explores the key institutional and governance challenges China will face in reaching its ambitious targets for sustainable, human-centered, and environmentally friendly urbanization as part of the next phase of the country’s National New Urbanization Plan (2014-20). Book authors Karen Eggleston, Director of the Asia Health Policy Program at Stanford’s Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (Shorenstein APARC) and Senior Fellow in Stanford’s Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI), Jean C. Oi, Stanford’s William Haas Professor in Chinese Politics, Founding Director of Shorenstein APARC’s China Program and SCPKU Director, and Wang Yiming, Vice President and Senior Research Fellow at the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), attended the launch and participated in the panel discussion.  In her welcoming remarks, Professor Oi briefly introduced the book, the result of a close, 5-year collaboration between Shorenstein APARC and the NDRC. In addition to qualitative data and fieldwork, the book covers comparative analyses among countries, such as the spatial distribution of urbanization in China, India and the United States.

Other panel speakers included Canfei He, Dean of Peking University’s College of Urban and Environmental Sciences, Yulong Shi, Director of NDRC’s Institute of Spatial Planning and Regional Economy, Yongzhi Hou, Director-General and Research Fellow of the Department of Development Strategy and Regional Economy at the Development Research Center of the State Council, and Sangay Penjor, Director of the Asian Development Bank’s Urban and Social Sectors Division, East Asia Department. 

During the panel discussion, Dr. Hou pointed out that the publication gave an accurate and objective description of China’s urbanization that could help deepen the understanding of problems in China’s urbanization efforts.

Wang Yiming summarized the book’s content in the context of the household registration system, land system, public service, housing system, finance, financial policy, and administration policy. He suggested that in past forty years, a large number of the rural population has moved to form enormous urban hubs in various cities in China. The Chinese government is targeting 100 million of the 260 million people who are residing in cities to complete their citizenization by 2020. Prof. Wang introduced current urbanization reform plans to close this gap, policies that relate to the household registration system, urban “zero threshold” access, and policies on public services such as education and health care, and intergenerational inheritance.

 

 

 

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The Third Annual Forum on China’s Primary Healthcare Reform and Community Medical Services

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The 2017 Forum will feature a luncheon keynote address on “Primary Care in the Netherlands: Lessons for China” by Jeroen N. Struijs, Senior Researcher in the Department of Quality of Care and Health Economics, National Institute of Public Health and the Environment, The Netherlands. Additional prominent speakers include Dr. Huncheol Bryant Kim, Cornell University, US, speaking on health policy in South Korea; Dr. Bei Lu, University of New South Wales, Australia, speaking on China’s efforts to integrate long-term care with primary care--Experiences of Qingdao’s Long-term Care Insurance program; Dr. Xiaoyun Liu, Peking University, on China’s primary care workforce; Dr. Jiayan Huang, Fudan University, on a model of integrated care from southern China; and Dr. Qiulin Chen, China Academy of Social Sciences, speaking on “Strengthening China’s primary care: A view from Inner Mongolia.” In addition, select policymakers and providers will introduce China's overall healthcare system reforms as well as discuss challenges to strengthening primary care in China.

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Stanford Center at Peking University

Jeroen N. Struijs Senior Researcher in the Department of Quality of Care and Health Economics, National Institute of Public Health and the Environment, The Netherlands
Huncheol Bryant Kim Cornell University, US
Bei Lu University of New South Wales, Australia
Xiaoyun Liu Peking University, China
Qiulin Chen China Academy of Social Sciences, China
Seminars

China’s Invisible Crisis: Cognitive Delays among Rural Toddlers and the Absence of Modern Parenting

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A growing body of evidence suggests that China’s schooling system, as it stands today, is unable to produce the high-skilled labor that will be needed if the nation is to avoid the middle-income trap. How does poor parenting and inadequate early childhood development attribute to this problem? Prof. Rozelle will discuss his research on cognitive delays among toddlers in rural China, and the national crisis that the country faces due to inadequate childhood development.  

 

Scott Rozelle holds the Helen Farnsworth Endowed Professorship at Stanford University and is Senior Fellow in the Food Security and Environment Program and the Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center, Freeman Spogli Institute (FSI) for International Studies. For the past 30 years, he has worked on the economics of poverty reduction. Currently, his work on poverty has its full focus on human capital, including issues of rural health, nutrition and education. Rozelle has been the chair of the International Advisory Board of the Center for Chinese Agricultural Policy, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) for the past 20 years. He is the co-director of the Rural Education Action Project (REAP). 

Registration: 

https://www.eventbank.cn/event/9642/

 

Stanford Center at Peking University

 

Scott Rozelle Senior Fellow Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies
Lectures

No Pain, No Gain: China Female Entrepreneurs and Their Stories

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About the Event

“No Pain, No Gain” is a periodic event that will highlight China-based entrepreneurs with roots at Stanford University. Entrepreneurs will discuss the challenges they faced and how they overcame them. Using the Graduate School of Business’ state-of-the-art distance learning technology, there will be audiences at Stanford and at the Stanford Center at Peking University (SCPKU).

The discussion will take the form of a structured conversation between the entrepreneur and a moderator, either a professor from the GSB or a subject matter expert selected for his or her familiarity with the entrepreneur and/or the sector.

This time, two young female entrepreneurs, Gu Ji MBA '12, Cordy Xie MBA '16, are invited to share their stories and what is the biggest challenges facing them when starting the new ventures. 

On the Stanford side the audience will consist of current Stanford students and GSB alumni with an interest in entrepreneurship in China. In Beijing the audience will consist of Stanford alumni and current students at Peking University and Tsinghua University. The event will be in English. Admission to this event is free of charge.

Registration

https://www.eventbank.cn/event/7474/

 

Panel Discussions

SCPKU faculty fellow focuses on consumer motivation

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Lili Li, Program Coordinator at SCPKU, spoke with Graduate School of Business Assistant Professor Szu-Chi Huang about her research and the contributions SCPKU made to her research in China.

Q: How did your interest in consumer behavior and motivation develop?

Szu-Chi Huang: After receiving my undergraduate degrees in Business and in Financial Law from National Taiwan University, I pursued a career in advertising. While I enjoyed early success in the advertising industry, I found many managerial decisions puzzling. There are many things we don't know about consumers, such as what motivates them to make a purchase, to pursue a goal, to make donations etc. Therefore, after a few years working in the industry, I decided to pursue a PhD degree and conduct research to answer my questions related to consumer behavior and motivation.

Q: Could you give us a brief introduction to your research on “motivation in different stages of goal pursuit”?

Szu-Chi Huang: Through various projects, my collaborators and I examine the changes in the determinants of consumer motivation in different stages of goal pursuit and their impact on consumers' behaviors. When people first begin to pursue a goal, they are less certain about how to approach the goal and whether they can even attain the goal; however, after they have made a significant amount of progress and are getting near the end point of the pursuit, these uncertainties are alleviated, and they focus more on reducing the remaining discrepancy to attain the goal in a timely manner. Because of this switch in people's concerns during the course of goal pursuit, people are in turn motivated by different types of feedback and interact differently as they move from early stages to later stages of the pursuit.

 

Q: How does understanding motivation change help the motivators and consumers?

Szu-Chi Huang: Our findings provide valuable insights for marketers and organizations that aim to motivate consumers. By choosing the appropriate goal structure for consumers, providing relevant feedback that answers their concerns at the moment, and implementing relevant social infrastructures, organizations can continue to motivate consumers as they advance across various stages of goal pursuit.

Q: In what field/areas do you anticipate seeing the most impact from your research?

Szu-Chi Huang: Our work has important implications for rewards programs and loyalty programs, pro-social events (donation drives, fundraising), and joint goal pursuit programs such as weight-loss programs and smoke-cessation programs.

Q: Describe your research and its connection to China?

Szu-Chi Huang: My research focuses on what motivates people to pursue their goals. I conducted field study in a Chinese dining hall to capture people's food consumption behaviors. I've also collected charity data from China. We found that what motivates people from different cultures may be different -- while Chinese people may be more motivated by temporal impact such as leaving a legacy, US donors are more motivated by scale-based impact. In addition, we suspect that they are motivated to eat different types of "healthy" food, as defined by culture; we are still analyzing the data for this part.

Q: Why did you decide to apply for an SCPKU Faculty Fellowship?

Szu-Chi Huang: I wanted to collect data in China, and also start building collaborative relationships with scholars in China.

Professor Huang's presentation at SCPKU (Photo courtesy of Lili Li)

Q: How valuable was SCPKU's team in supporting your fellowship at SCPKU?

Szu-Chi Huang: Extremely valuable - they provided a nice office equipped with great IT as well as research and staff supports. Also, I had the opportunity to interact with faculty from other departments for collaborations.

Q: What were your fellowship objectives and were they met?

Szu-Chi Huang: My fellowship objectives were to conduct research and collaborate with scholars in China -- they are all successfully realized. SCPKU helped me achieve my objectives by providing facilities and support, but also giving me the flexibility to visit other departments (e.g., the management school) and work with the scholars there as well as in other schools.

Q: What did you learn during your stay and what were the most interesting experiences you had?

Szu-Chi Huang: My stay was wonderful. Chinese scholars are extremely productive and have great connections with the industry for field data. Also, the business environment in China is very different from the US -- it has its own infrastructure and culture. I would encourage my students to visit China and observe these differences themselves. This experience also inspired me to start developing a course that could capture and communicate these important insights and differences.

Q: List at least THREE words that come to mind which best describe your experience at SCPKU.

Szu-Chi Huang: Unique, creative, productive.

Q: Any future plans in China?

Szu-Chi Huang: I'd like to visit again in summer as well as next year, to further cultivate the research relationships I've built during this trip.

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Advancing a Human-Centered Approach to Cities: A Conversation with the Stanford Human Cities Initiative

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By 2050, two out of three people will live in cities worldwide. The addition of 2.5 billion urban dwellers requires cities to accommodate the needs of a rapidly growing population. As Chinese and American cities confront environmental problems, housing costs, congestion, and widening social inequity, the Stanford Human Cities Initiative (HCI) works to address these urgent issues by advancing a human-centered approach to cities in order to benefit the environment, economy, and society at large.

 

The Stanford Human Cities Initiative is an interdisciplinary effort based out of the Program on Urban Studies. Recognizing that cities are complex, the HCI works to cultivate a 21st-century century mindset and tools to address urban challenges. Drawing from rigorous methods from engineering, architecture, planning, and design, its mission is to combine these approaches and enable cities to reach their full potential beyond the siloed approach of one discipline. The HCI works simultaneously at the global and local scales to ensure that these approaches are complementary, while prioritizing human relationships and social inclusion.

 

Join Deland Chan and Kevin Hsu, co-founders of the Stanford Human Cities Initiative, in a conversation about the future of cities. They will discuss the framing of the “human city” and the benefits of an interdisciplinary and multi-sector approach. Learn how you can get involved with the Initiative’s efforts to engage departments from within and outside Stanford, as well as partnerships with international NGOs, community-based organizations, and the private sector.

 

The talk will follow student presentations from the International Urbanization Seminar, a Human Cities course offered in long-term collaboration with Tsinghua University.

 

Learn more about Stanford Human Cities Initiative

http://www.humancities.org

 

FOR REGISTRATION: Email: sanjiu39@stanford.edu; Tel: 10-62744163

 

Stanford Center at Peking University

The Lee Jung Sen Building, Langrun Yuan, Peking University

(Please bring a photo ID and enter Peking University through the NE Gate)

 

Lectures

CHINA ARTS FORUM

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Stanford University’s Center for East Asian Studies presents “China Arts Forum” at the Stanford Center on July 2, 2016.  The event will explore contemporary arts development in China and feature three visual artists and one performing artist, all of them women. Each artist will introduce her creative process and unique approach to her art form. This will be followed by a panel discussion focusing on contemporary arts and society in China.  The renowned pipa player Zhao Cong will showcase her newly created works to conclude the event.

 

Widely recognized as a global economic juggernaut and nascent political power, China is on the cusp of becoming a major cultural power.  In the arts field over the past two decades, cities across China have built state-of-the art museums, opera houses, and concert halls to both foster and showcase their cultural heritage. Arts education is increasingly popular.  Many inspirational artists are now the toast of the international art world and “Chinese Contemporary" is one of the most rapidly appreciating segments of the global art market.

 

The Stanford Arts Forum will be hosted by Professor Jindong Cai from Stanford’s Center for East Asian Studies. It is hoped that this forum will become a platform for exploring visual and performing arts in America and China, and for creating a vibrant dialogue on arts and culture.

 

The event will begin with three vibrant visual artists who will share the podium to discuss their works and views.  Jiang Jie is an artist and professor at the China Central Academy of Fine Arts.  She will focus on three of her works in order to explore how an artistic creation can continue to change and evolve.  Cui Xiuwen has just opened a multi-media exhibition in Peking University called “Light.”  Using sculptures, videos, animation and one painting, she will discuss her exhibition and share the view on her approach to light through body, heart, soul, and fate.  Chen Man is one of the most celebrated photographers in China and her topic is “the philosophy of images.”  Jinqing Cai, chairman of Christies’ China, will moderate the panel discussion following each individual’s presentation. Ms. Cai also will give her view of China contemporary arts. 

 

The renowned pipa player Zhao Cong was a visiting artist/scholar at Stanford University in 2014.  She is a strong advocate for creating new music to combine Chinese tradition with the world of contemporary music. She will demonstrate and perform some of her new pieces that merge east and west on the ancient instrument. 

 

This event has been organized especially for Stanford alumni in Beijing, but is also open to the general public.

To register, please visit: 

http://web.stanford.edu/~kkutella/BeijingPublicTalk2016.fb

 

 

Stanford Center at Peking University 

Langrun Yuan, Peking University

 

Conferences

In Beijing, experts examine China's rise and the changing global order

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On the heels of the IISS Shangri-La Dialogue, scholars, members of think tanks and former U.S. and Chinese government officials came to Beijing to discuss what many participants considered “the most important bilateral relationship” in the world: the relationship between the United States and China. As former U.S. Ambassador John Negroponte described during his opening remarks, the relationship, “if properly managed,” can result in an enormous boon for the world; but if mismanaged, can bring great harm to global stability and prosperity.

Stanford and Peking University jointly hosted a forum titled “A Changing Global and Political Order: Perspectives from China-United States Cooperation” on June 6-7 in Beijing. All attendees, who participated in their capacity as private individuals, acknowledged that a level of uncertainty and tension clouds the bilateral relationship, exemplified most clearly in the territorial disputes in the South China Sea. Having participated in the restoration of Sino-U.S. relations in 1972, Negroponte and former Chinese Ambassador Wu Jianmin remarked upon the geopolitical rationale that first motivated this rapprochement: to counter the Soviet Union. They noted that the bilateral relationship has grown increasingly robust and multi-dimensional over time. For example, Wu cited that trade between the United States and China has increased exponentially, from a mere US$1 billion in 1978 to $550 billion in 2015. Investment, economic cooperation and competition have also grown. Despite disagreements on regional security matters, both countries have worked together on global challenges such as climate change, North Korean and Iranian nuclear issues, anti-piracy efforts and the Ebola outbreak.

However, with China’s rapid rise, both militarily and economically, and as the developing world has gained increasing clout on the world’s stage, many participants suggested that the current global order, originally envisaged in 1944 with the Bretton-Woods Agreement, needed an update. Many participants, especially on the Chinese side, stated that the “balance of power was shifting” with the G7/G8 yielding economic momentum to the G20. The American participants generally did not share Chinese views of a power transition, but conceded that reforms were necessary to the global order to take into account China’s meteoric rise.  Participants did not dispute the benefits that China has derived from the current international order and most agreed that some type of evolutionary change is needed to increase inclusivity. As one participant asked regarding China’s perception of the United States (and vice versa), “Are we foes, enemies or friends?” Despite such ambiguity, U.S.-China cooperation is essential to effecting any type of change.

Questions were rife and specificity was scant with respect to what the key changes were or the mechanisms by which those reforms should be effected, however. Which countries should partake in this decision-making body? Should other entities and institutions other than nation-states be included? What are the rules of participation and criteria for membership? How large should the governing body be? What key reforms need to be undertaken?

Both Negroponte and Wu disavowed the zero-sum mentality of the Cold War, which, Wu stated, continues to impact perceptions on both sides. They both highlighted the critical importance of frequent dialogue by the Chinese and American heads of state and by their militaries. Calling summit-level meetings between the two presidents “indispensable,” Negroponte emphasized that “[both] leaders have to understand [the] viewpoints and attitudes of each country” in order to formulate the right policies. Negroponte added, “[d]iplomacy at that level is probably more important than it has ever been.”

As this summary of the forum is posted, we note with sadness the untimely death of Ambassador Wu Jianmin on June 18, 2016, in a tragic car accident in Wuhan, China.

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Photo gallery from the conference

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