Geography Archives: China

  Translator’s note: “Regarding the present upsurge of worker action in China, liberals have used their discursive power in the overseas media to frame the strike wave as a tale of workers’ struggle for ‘independent unions,’ as if this were a repetition of Solidarnosc.  What do Chinese workers want?  What is the direction of the […]

Under the radar screen at the US-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue (SE&D) last month, the US and China continued to discuss a bi-lateral investment treaty (BIT).  If the final negotiated text looks like the majority of US BITs it could threaten financial stability and economic growth in China. The US and China began negotiations toward […]

As the United Nations Security Council moves toward a vote on a resolution imposing additional sanctions on Iran over its nuclear activities, China is being remarkably silent, at least in public.  In the wake of the announcement of the Iran-Turkey-Brazil Joint Declaration in Tehran on May 17 and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s announcement in […]

President Obama’s already diminishing chances to “steamroll” the Iran-Turkey-Brazil Joint Declaration by ramming new sanctions against the Islamic Republic through the United Nations Security Council during the next few weeks got even smaller this morning, when Israeli naval commandos stormed Turkish-flagged ships in international waters off Gaza, killing at least 16 people in the process. […]

  Abstract: China’s integration into the global economy, while rapid, has been managed as part of a wider liberalization process.  The structural changes in the rural economy arising from these twin processes have led to widening intra-rural inequalities.  To address these, the central leadership has, in Polanyian manner, moved to counter some of the adverse […]

Cf. See, also, Andrew Fischer, “On China” (MRZine, 29 March 2010). Andrew Fischer is Senior Lecturer at the International Institute of Social Studies of Erasmus University Rotterdam.  This PowerPoint file was presented at the IDEAs Conference on “Reforming the Financial System: Proposals, Constraints and New Directions,” Muttukadu, Chennai, India, 25-27 January 2010; it is reproduced […]

The United States and China seem to have reached an agreement with regard to the exchange rate between their two currencies.  The agreement is that the U.S. government will stop yelling about it, and China will do whatever it wants to do, which will probably include some modest rise in the renminbi some time in […]

In the midst of its Nuclear Security Summit and in the wake of President Obama’s bilateral meeting with China’s President Hu yesterday, the Obama Administration is vigorously spinning the U.S. and Western media that it has won Chinese support for new sanctions against the Islamic Republic over its nuclear activities.  To say the least, this […]

Prabhat Patnaik: I think there is an important difference, it seems to me, between the situation in the case of the advanced capitalist countries, or even the case of Japan, on the one hand, and in the case of countries like India and possibly even China at the moment.  In the case of the advanced […]

  Andrew Fischer: The Chinese oversaving, I think, is a false argument.  If you say it’s because of Chinese oversaving, what you’re basically implying is that Chinese households save a lot of money because their consumption is being repressed because of industrial policies in China that take money away from households and direct it toward […]

Sometimes headlines really do convey powerful messages.  That was certainly the case with an AFP story, which appeared late last week under the headline, “Saudis Deny Discussing Pressure on China over Iran with US.”   The story was prompted by Secretary of Defense Robert Gates’ visits to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates last week. […]

China and India are generally regarded as the two large countries in the developing world that are the “success stories” of globalisation.  This success has been defined by the high and sustained rates of growth of aggregate and per capita national income; and the substantial reduction in income poverty.  Further, both China and India are […]

Yesterday, President Obama declared that the international community is “moving along fairly quickly” toward imposing new multilateral sanctions on Iran.  Today, the Obama Administration followed that up by announcing new unilateral financial sanctions against individuals and corporate entities associated with the Revolutionary Guards.  The Administration proclaims that its “engagement” policy has been successful, after all, […]

The new secretary general of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), Muratbek Sansyzbayevich Imanaliev, said at a news conference in Beijing earlier this week that the conflict in Afghanistan and expanding the SCO’s members to include Iran and Pakistan were the top issues on the SCO’s agenda in 2010.  Certainly, these issues are likely to dominate […]

  With the world economy’s center of gravity shifting from the West to the East, led by China’s rising economic and corresponding political power, the year 2010 may witness a series of epoch-making events in Asia. 日中首脳会談、「友愛」で外交デビュー Hatoyama (left) and Hu, 22 September 2009 A grand rapprochement between Japan and China could be one such […]

  In yet another demonstration of the (in)effectiveness of the Obama Administration’s quixotic quest to get China on board for what Secretary of State Hillary Clinton used to call “crippling sanctions,” the Chinese foreign ministry announced that Vice Foreign Minister He Yafei, who has been representing Beijing at meetings of the P5+1 political directors regarding […]

  Cf.  “In Mao’s era the health of the population was one of the country’s proudest boasts.  But the market-oriented reforms of the 1980s and 1990s gradually shattered the country’s social safety nets, including its once famous healthcare system, making it difficult for many rural and urban residents to afford treatment.  In reaction to this, […]

  A common explanation for the US presence in Afghanistan is Washington’s interest in Central Asian fuel sources — natural gas in Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan and petroleum in Kazakhstan.  The idea of Zalmay Khalilzad and others was to bring a gas pipeline down through Afghanistan and Pakistan to energy-hungry India.  Turkmenistan became independent of Moscow […]

  Paul Jay: . . . How bad is unemployment in China now?  And how much worse might it get if the yuan were to appreciate? Minqi Li: Well, it’s reported that during the current crisis about 40 million Chinese workers have already lost jobs.  And, of course, if there is a further appreciation of […]

Mousavi, Rafsanjani, and their supporters get an F in foreign policy: “‘Death to China!’ and ‘Death to Russia!’ chanted supporters of presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi during a sermon by influential former president Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, according to news reports” (Kristen Chick, Christian Science Monitor, 17 July 2009). “Death to China!  Death to Russia!” […]