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October 18, 4-5:00 p.m. California time/ October 19, 8-9:00 a.m. Japan time

The recent LDP Presidential Election ended with Fumio Kishida defeating Taro Kono in the final round to become the LDP President and then Prime Minister of Japan, succeeding Yoshihide Suga, who stepped down amidst mounting political challenges dealing with COVID and its economic consequences. This was a closer election than most other LDP Presidential elections with a great deal of intrigue about how the publicly popular Kono might fare against Kishida, who the senior LDP leadership preferred. What does this election process tell us about Japanese politics today, and how will LDP fare in the upcoming House of Representatives Election? Will Kishida last longer than Suga as Prime Minister, and what do opposition parties have to do to stop the dominant LDP to change Japanese politics? In this webinar, two leading experts on the topic, Rieko Kage (University of Tokyo) and Dan Smith (Columbia University), address these questions, moderated by Kiyoteru Tsutsui, Deputy Director of the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center, where he is also Director of the Japan Program.

Panelists

Rieko Kage is Professor of Political Science at the University of Tokyo.  She graduated from the Faculty of Law at Kyoto University and earned her Ph.D. from the Department of Government, Harvard University.  She is the author of Civic Engagement in Postwar Japan (2011) and Who Judges? Designing Jury Systems in Japan, East Asia, and Europe (2010), both of which have been published from Cambridge University Press, and she has published broadly on issues relating to judicial politics, political participation, and public opinion.  Her most recent article, "War, Democratization, and Generational Cohort Effects on Participation in Japan" is forthcoming from Electoral Studies.

 

 

 

Daniel M. Smith is the Gerald L. Curtis Visiting Associate Professor of Modern Japanese Politics and Foreign Policy in the Department of Political Science and School of International and Public Affairs at Columbia University. He is the author of Dynasties and Democracy (Stanford University Press, 2018), and numerous articles on Japanese politics, party politics, and elections. He is also a co-editor of the Japan Decides election series. From 2012 to 2013, he was a postdoctoral fellow at the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (APARC) at Stanford University.

 

 

 

 

Moderator

Kiyoteru Tsutsui is the Henri H. and Tomoye Takahashi Professor, Professor of Sociology, Senior Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, and Deputy Director of the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center, where he is also Director of the Japan Program. He is the author of Rights Make Might: Global Human Rights and Minority Social Movements in Japan (Oxford University Press, 2018), co-editor of Corporate Social Responsibility in a Globalizing World (Oxford University Press, 2016) and co-editor of The Courteous Power: Japan and Southeast Asia in the Indo-Pacific Era (University of Michigan Press, forthcoming 2021). 

This event is part of the Asia Health Policy Program's 2021-22 Colloquium series "Aligning Incentives for Better Health and More Resilient Health Systems in Asia”

Three prominent demographers discuss China's demographic change with insights from the seventh national census. Topics include the pace of urbanization, the more balanced sex ratio, increasing educational attainment, population aging, potential impacts of the pandemic, and recently announced changes in family planning and retirement policies.

Wang Feng is professor of sociology at the University of California, Irvine, and an adjunct professor of sociology and demography at Fudan University in Shanghai, China. He has done extensive research on global social and demographic changes, comparative population and social history, and social inequality, with a focus on China. He is the author of multiple books, and his research articles have been published in venues including Population and Development Review, Demography, Science, The Journal of the Economics of Aging, The Journal of Asian Studies, The China Journal, and International Migration Review. He has served on expert panels for the United Nations, the World Economic Forum, and as a senior fellow and the director of the Brookings-Tsinghua Center for Public Policy. His work and views have appeared in media outlets, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, Financial Times, The Guardian, Economist, NPR, CNN, BBC, and others.

Cai Yong's research focuses on China's one-child policy and its implications for fertility and social policies. The one-child policy, engineered to control China's population growth by restricting fertility to one child per couple, has been controversial for many reasons, including the policy's questionable demographic and economic assumptions, the ethical concerns regarding direct state intrusion into family matters, and its negative social and demographic impacts. Cai's work has contributed to an emerging consensus on China's fertility change and the impact of the one-child policy. Specifically, his work shows that: China's fertility has dropped to a level well below the replacement; the demographic impact of the one-child policy was modest, much less than the government's claim of 400 million averted births; socioeconomic development played a critical role in driving China's fertility decline; and the socioeconomic impacts of low fertility and population aging are substantial. The consensus on these issues, to which Cai contributed, provided the empirical and scientific foundation that persuaded the Chinese government to end the three-decade-long policy.

Cai continues to monitor China's fertility in the post-one-child era, but with a new focus on international comparisons on sustained low fertility and population aging, both from a micro perspective about individual responses and family dynamics and from a macro perspective about social welfare regimes and public transfers.

Li Shuzhuo is currently University Distinguished Professor of Population and Development Policy Studies, Honorary Director of the Institute for Population and Development Studies, School of Public Policy and Administration, Xi’an Jiaotong University, and consulting professor at the Morrison Institute for Population and Resource Studies, Stanford University. He is a member of the Social Sciences Committee of the Ministry of Education of China. His research is focused on population and social development as well as public policies in contemporary China, including population policies and development, gender imbalance and sustainable social development, aging and health, migration and integration.

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In September 2020, President Xi Jinping declared that China would achieve carbon neutrality by 2060.  This climate pledge is widely considered the most ambitious of all made to date, especially since the world’s largest carbon-emitting nation is still at a developing stage and has not yet achieved its emissions peak.  With the 26th UN Climate Change Conference of the Parties (COP26) on the horizon, the world is eager to learn about any potential new pledges from the Chinese leadership.  This talk will provide an overview of climate governance under President Xi Jinping and draw on the presenter’s work on local implementation of air pollution policies in China to discuss potential lessons for its ongoing efforts to curb carbon emissions.

Shiran Victoria Shen’s research primarily examines the organizational causes of and responses to environmental crises, with particular understanding of how local politics shape air pollution and climate management in China.  Professor Shen graduated Phi Beta Kappa and with high honors from Swarthmore College and holds an M.S. in civil and environmental engineering and a Ph.D. in political science, both from Stanford University.

 

 

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This event is part of the 2021 Fall webinar series, Perfect Storm: Climate Change in Asia, sponsored by the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center.

 

 

Abstract: The fiscal federalism and decentralization literatures suggest that larger cities often deliver better public goods more effectively because of scale economies. Yet small cities exhibit higher rates of access to basic health and education services in Brazil, India, and Indonesia. Why is this the case? Building on modernization theory and models from urban economics, we argue that citizens in smaller cities prioritize investments in basic health and education facilities because there are few low- cost substitutes for government offerings, and because they face few characteristically “urban” problems, such as congestion and insecurity. Residents of larger cities, in contrast, prioritize investment in a wider set of policy areas because they experience more negative externalities from urban growth and can turn to a larger supply of non-state providers of basic social services. Moreover, public officials in smaller cities find it easier to earn political returns for investments in “divisible” infrastructure for service delivery, such as schools and clinics, because they can coordinate lobbying and credit-claiming more effectively than politicians in larger cities. We illustrate the mechanisms underlying these differences across policy areas through data analysis and paired comparison of representative cities of different sizes in Brazil, and with shadow cases from Indonesia.

Alison Post is an Associate Professor of Political Science and Global Metropolitan Studies.  Her research lies at the intersection of comparative urban politics and comparative political economy, with regional emphases on Latin America and South Asia. Her research examines regulation and business-government relations, decentralization, and urban politics and policy.  She is the author of Foreign and Domestic Investment in Argentina: The Politics of Privatized Infrastructure (Cambridge University Press, 2014) and articles in the Annual Review of Political Science, Comparative Politics, Governance, Perspectives on Politics, Politics & Society, Studies in Comparative International Development, World Development, and other outlets. She is currently the President of the Urban and Local Politics section of the American Political Science Association and Chair of the Steering Committee for the Red de Economía Política de America Latina (Repal). 

LIVESTREAM HERE: https://tinyurl.com/apostlive

This event is co-sponsored by Center for Latin American Studies and Center for South Asia

 

Asia Health Policy Program (AHPP) 2021-22 Colloquium series "Aligning Incentives for Better Health and More Resilient Health Systems in Asia”

Friday, October 29, 2021, 8:30am - 9:30am (Beijing time)

This paper investigates the impact of China’s reform of the system for medical payments from traditional fee-for-service to prospective payment in the form of diagnosis-related group. The paper explores comprehensive aspects of the reform, taking advantage of a large-scale administrative data set from a pilot city in China. It finds that medical expenditure per admission dropped by 7.3 percent, with greater impact on patients who spent a larger amount. To better understand the changes, further decompositions find that the expenditure reduction is fully explained by reduction in the quantity of services instead of using cheaper ones, and by reduction in the use of drugs but not reduction in other types of services, including examination, treatment, and nursing care. In addition, no evidence is found on quality deterioration or behavioral responses, including upcoding and cream skimming. Hospitals maintained their revenue through attracting more patients to contend with cost containment induced by the payment reform.

Julie Shi is Associate Professor of Health Economics in the School of Economics and the School of Global Health Development at Peking University. Dr. Shi’s research focuses on the design and impact of health care payment systems, the economics of health insurance coverage, drug regulations, and the trend of medical expenditures. Shi’s work has contributed to the theory and practice of China’s payment system reform. Her research on health insurance includes the impact of insurance on medical utilization. She has conducted academic and policy research on government regulations on prescription drugs. She also works on the trend of expenditures for patients with catastrophic diseases.

Dr. Shi’s undergraduate degree is from Tsinghua university and her PhD is from Boston University, both in economics. Before joining Peking University, she was a post-doctoral fellow at Harvard Medical School. Her work has published on leading academic journals including Journal of Public Economics, Journal of Health Economics, and Health Economics. She received awards for paper of the year in 2014 from the National Institute of Health Care Management (NIHCM) in the United States. She has conducted multiple projects for central and local governments in China for policy recommendation.

 

Jakarta time: Friday, October 8, 2021 07:00 - 08:30 AM

Students often ask themselves: Do I want to be a specialist or a generalist? A hedgehog digging deeper or a fox ranging wider? The answer embedded in Gita Wirjawan’s life so far is unequivocal: Go broad. Think big. And be optimistic. For his weekly virtual podcast Endgame, Gita has interviewed many people, including Stanford’s Southeast Asia Program director Don Emmerson.  Don will turn the tables and interview Gita in this event. Gita will highlight life lessons from his international childhood and consider questions such as these: How well or poorly is Indonesia coping with corrupted governance, religious extremism, Covidian infection, and climate change? How should it respond to worsening US-China relations? To China’s efforts to control the South China Sea? To America’s exit from Afghanistan? To Myanmar’s brutal junta and ASEAN’s apparent impotence? Worldwide, looking forward, is eco-suicide avoidable? Will surveillance technology doom liberal democracy? If there is a global endgame to be played, how should concerned actors play it? Have present perils made Gita’s proactive optimism all the more necessary? Or all the more naïve? Attend the event and find out.

Gita Wirjawan is the founding chairman of the Ancora Group of private-equity investors and wealth managers in Indonesia. He has held leadership positions in Citibank, JP Morgan, and other such firms. His philanthropy sustains the Ancora Foundation, which seeks to improve access to quality education in Indonesia across a range of endeavors—from funding the training of kindergarten teachers to endowing scholarships for students to attend universities around the world including Stanford. His passion for sports led Gita to chair Indonesia’s badminton association (2012-16). His public service career has included heading Indonesia’s trade ministry (2011-14) and investment coordinating board (2009-2011). A jazz pianist, he has performed in concerts and composed and played pieces in more than a dozen albums. His degrees include masters in business administration (Baylor) and public policy (Harvard). Indonesia’s School of Government and Public Policy sponsors his wide-ranging podcast “Endgame with Gita Wirjawan.”

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Co-sponsored by the Stanford Center at Peking University.

In honor of its release, contributors Mary Bullock, Thomas Fingar, and David M. Lampton will join editor Anne Thurston for a panel discussion of their volume Engaging China: Fifty Years of Sino-American Relations (Columbia University Press, 2021).

Recent years have seen the U.S.-China relationship rapidly deteriorate. Engaging China brings together leading China specialists—ranging from academics to NGO leaders to former government officials—to analyze the past, present, and future of U.S.-China relations. Bullock, Fingar, Lampton, and Thurston will reflect upon the complex and multifaceted nature of American engagement with China since the waning days of Mao’s rule. What initially motivated U.S.’ rapprochement with China? Until recent years, what logic and processes have underpinned the U.S. foreign policy posture towards China? What were the gains and the missteps made during five decades of America’s engagement policy toward China? What is the significance of our rapidly deteriorating bilateral relations today? Speakers will tackle these questions and more at this critical time when tensions between the U.S. and China continue to intensify.

For more information about Engaging China or to purchase a copy, please click here.

Mary Bullock, president emerita of Agnes Scott College, is an educator and scholar of U.S. – China relations. She served as the founding executive vice-chancellor of Duke Kunshan University from 2012-2015. Previous positions include distinguished visiting professor at Emory University, director of the Asia Program of the Woodrow Wilson Center, and director of the Committee on Scholarly Communication with the People’s Republic of China. She is vice-chair of the Asia Foundation, a trustee of the Henry Luce Foundation, and a member of the Schwarzman Academic Advisory Committee and the Council on Foreign Relations. She received her M.A. and Ph.D. in Chinese history from Stanford University. Her most recent publications include The Oil Prince’s Legacy: Rockefeller Philanthropy in China (2011) and, as co-editor, Medical Transitions in Twentieth Century China (2014).
 

Thomas Fingar is a Shorenstein APARC Fellow in the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies at Stanford University. He was the inaugural Oksenberg-Rohlen Distinguished Fellow from 2010 through 2015 and the Payne Distinguished Lecturer at Stanford in 2009. From 2005 through 2008, he served as the first deputy director of national intelligence for analysis and, concurrently, as chairman of the National Intelligence Council. Fingar served previously as assistant secretary of the State Department’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research (2000-01 and 2004-05), principal deputy assistant secretary (2001-03), deputy assistant secretary for analysis (1994-2000), director of the Office of Analysis for East Asia and the Pacific (1989-94), and chief of the China Division (1986-89). Between 1975 and 1986 he held a number of positions at Stanford University, including senior research associate in the Center for International Security and Arms Control.

Fingar's most recent books are The New Great Game: China and South and Central Asia in the Era of Reform, editor (Stanford, 2016), Uneasy Partnerships: China and Japan, the Koreas, and Russia in the Era of Reform (Stanford, 2017), and Fateful Decisions: Choices that will Shape China’s Future, co-edited with Jean Oi (Stanford, 2020).
 

David M. Lampton is Senior Fellow at the SAIS Foreign Policy Institute and Professor Emeritus at Johns Hopkins--SAIS. Immediately prior to his current post he was Oksenberg-Rohlen Fellow at Stanford University’s Asia-Pacific Research Center from 2019-2020. For more than two decades prior to that he was Hyman Professor and Director of China Studies at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies. Lampton is former Chairman of the The Asia Foundation, former President of the National Committee on United States-China Relations, and former Dean of Faculty at SAIS. Among many written works, academic and popular, his most recent book (with Selina Ho and Cheng-Chwee Kuik) is Rivers of Iron: Railroads and Chinese Power in Southeast Asia (University of California Press, 2020). He received his B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. degrees from Stanford University in political science where, as an undergraduate student, he was a firefighter. Lampton has an honorary doctorate from the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Far Eastern Studies. He is a Life Trustee on the Board of Trustees of Colorado College and was in the US Army Reserve in the enlisted and commissioned ranks.

Anne Thurston is the director of the Grassroots China Initiative, where she works with local NGOs in China. Thurston is a former associate professor at Johns Hopkins SAIS, assistant professor at Fordham University, and was a China staff member at the Social Science Research Council. She has been the recipient of fellowships from the Rockefeller Foundation, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the United States Institute of Peace, the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars and the National Endowment for the Humanities. Thurston is also a member of the National Committee on US-China Relations. Thurston is the author of numerous publications, including The Noodle Maker of Kalimpong: The Untold Story of My Struggle for Tibet (2015), and Muddling Toward Democracy: Political Change in Grass Roots China (1998). She received her Ph.D. in political science from the University of California, Berkeley.

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Peter Martin joins us to discuss his recent book, China's Civilian Army: The Making of Wolf Warrior Diplomacy. Chinese diplomacy in the past several years has become more assertive and its diplomats have used sharper language, earning them the title "wolf warriors." The book traces the roots of China's approach to diplomacy back to the communist revolution of 1949 and tells the story of how it's evolved through social upheaval, famine, capitalist reforms and China's rise to superpower status. It draws on dozens of interviews and -- for the first time -- on the memoirs of more than 100 retired Chinese diplomats.

Peter Martin is a political reporter for Bloomberg News. He has written extensively on escalating tensions in the US-China relationship and reported from China's border with North Korea and its far-western region of Xinjiang. He previously worked for the consultancy APCO Worldwide in Beijing, New Delhi, and Washington, where he analyzed politics for multinational companies. In Washington, he served as chief of staff to the company's global CEO. His writing has been published by outlets including Foreign Affairs, the National Interest, the Guardian, the Jamestown China Brief, the Diplomat and the Christian Science Monitor. He holds degrees from the University of Oxford, Peking University and the London School of Economics.