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China: An International Journal (CIJ), indexed and abstracted in SSCI, JCR and CC/Social and Behavioral Sciences of Thomson Reuters

The East Asian Institute (EAI) is pleased to announce that, effective from December 2010, China: An International Journal (CIJ) will be indexed and abstracted in the renowned and authoritative interdisciplinary citation indexes of Thomson Reuters:

Social Sciences Citation Index^®;

Journal Citation Reports/Social Sciences Edition; and

Current Contents^®/Social and Behavioral Sciences.

The earliest issue of CIJ available for access in Thomson Reuters database is volume 7, issue 1, published in March 2009.

EAI Weekly Talking Point

Tuesday, 10 January 2012

Taiwan's Election 2012

China sits, as cool as a cucumber, at the Taiwan election 2012 spectator grandstand watching the tight race between Taiwan's incumbent president Ma Ying-jeou and the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP)'s presidential candidate Tsai Ing-wen.

The reason is obvious. Political environment in Taiwan has matured tremendously since the last presidential election in 2008, and the controversial advocacy for pro-independence from the DPP is very much subdued today. Tsai Ing-wen even proposed forming a coalition government if she wins the election, suggesting her moderate, non-radical political stance.

Tuesday, 20 December 2011

North Korean Leader Kim Jong-il dies at 69

Where flow of news and information is tightly controlled behind North Korea's thick shroud of secrecy, it is a case of "watch and wait" for the world, especially South Korea, the United States, China and Japan following the news of the death of North Korean "Dear Leader" Kim Jong-il. South Korean armed forces were actually put on high alert.

A hermit nation cocooned in extreme isolationism, North Korea is little known, and much less about Kim Jong-il's youngest son, the "Great Successor" Kim Jong-un. Hence, commentaries by analysts and observers are mainly hypothetical guesswork.

Tuesday, 13 December 2011

China's Central Economic Work Conference

Analysts viewed the opening day of the annual Central Economic Work Conference that gathered the powerful Politburo of the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) on December 12 as largely a disappointing empty talk.

in focus

Intellectual Property Rights in China: Consumer Culture and the Well-known Mark Protection

Friday, 16 December 2011 In 2009, China turned the table around after Beijing's No. 1 Intermediate People's Court ordered Microsoft to stop selling Windows with Zhongyi Chinese fonts without permission. Microsoft had infringed a Chinese company's intellectual property rights (IPR). Close to two decades ago in 1991, Microsoft sued Shenzhen University for manufacturing fake Microsoft hologram labels, an act of trademark infringement. This episode reflects that China is quick in incorporating intellectual property rights regimes into its economy. The importance of IPR in China has increasingly become a "national strategy".

Labour Reallocation, Productivity Growth and Dualism in China

Tuesday, 6 December 2011 Dualism has long been a distinguished feature of many developing economies. Following China's opening up, growth in the rural agricultural sector had decreased from 1980 to 2008. Before the mid-1990s, labour reallocation was concentrated on rural non-agriculture sectors. Coastal China enjoys more output growth contributed by labour reallocation from agriculture to rural non-agriculture and urban sectors after the mid-1990s. This structural change's effect on output growth was stronger in the 1980s and the 1990s than that of the 2000s.

China's South China Sea Diplomacy: Dilemmas and Policy Options

Friday, 2 December 2011 The wide schism between China and other claimant states in the approach to territorial disputes of the South China Sea (SCS) is a major dispute in itself. China insists on a bilateral approach to territorial disputes, while other parties advocate multilateralism. The existing international mechanisms have limited effects on the SCS disputes. Despite China’s arduous diplomatic efforts, provocations and tensions in the SCS do not seem to abate.

Hong Kong and Shanghai as International Financial Centres

Friday, 25 November 2011 Shanghai and Hong Kong have increasingly been seen as competing domestically and internationally in the financial sector since the early 2000s. In 2009, China's State Council, the central government's top decision-making body, formally approved Shanghai's plans to become an international financial centre (IFC) by 2020.

Medical Malpractice, Violence and Hospital Governance in China

Friday, 18 November 2011 Since the 2000s, increasing violence against physicians which saw an annual growth rate of 13% between 2006 and 2010, has been observed in many hospitals in China, attributed largely to medical malpractice disputes. Over 10,000 doctors, approximately one percent of total medical practitioners in China, are physically attacked per year.

LATEST China AnalysEs

CHINA'S FOREIGN POLICY IN 2011: COPING WITH SHIFTING GEOPOLITICS AND MAINTAINING STABLE EXTERNAL RELATIONS

ZHENG Yongnian, LYE Liang Fook & CHEN Gang, 23 December 2011

China's foremost foreign policy challenge in 2011 was to grapple with a United States that has made a geopolitical and economic shift to the Asia-Pacific. This shift has affected the dynamics of big power relations in the region. China, nevertheless, did not overreact but sought stable ties with major powers and friendly cooperation with its neighbours. It also tempered expectations of its role in the Eurozone debt situation. With an impending leadership succession in 2012, China will place a premium on maintaining a stable external environment.

CHINA'S POLITICS IN 2011: MAINTAINING STATUS QUO AND PREPARING FOR LEADERSHIP SUCCESSION

ZHENG Yongnian, Chen Gang, & LYE Liang Fook, 23 December 2011

In 2011, the Chinese government overcame a string of challenges ranging from inflation and corruption, to social unrest. However, the government's soaring fiscal revenue in the aftermath of a global financial crisis has sparked a domestic backlash of guofu minqiong (the state is rich, the people are poor). Social protests, particularly Internet-based ones, in 2011 were largely driven by global upheavals elsewhere. The flurry of "independent candidates" for grass-root parliamentary elections and the arrest of political critic Ai Weiwei reflected the growing tension between state and society. On the Party front, the Chinese Communist Party has been busy reshuffling thousands of Party and administrative officials at various levels to prepare for the leadership succession scheduled for the 18th Party Congress in 2012.

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