Society

FSI researchers work to understand continuity and change in societies as they confront their problems and opportunities. This includes the implications of migration and human trafficking. What happens to a society when young girls exit the sex trade? How do groups moving between locations impact societies, economies, self-identity and citizenship? What are the ethnic challenges faced by an increasingly diverse European Union? From a policy perspective, scholars also work to investigate the consequences of security-related measures for society and its values.

The Europe Center reflects much of FSI’s agenda of investigating societies, serving as a forum for experts to research the cultures, religions and people of Europe. The Center sponsors several seminars and lectures, as well as visiting scholars.

Societal research also addresses issues of demography and aging, such as the social and economic challenges of providing health care for an aging population. How do older adults make decisions, and what societal tools need to be in place to ensure the resulting decisions are well-informed? FSI regularly brings in international scholars to look at these issues. They discuss how adults care for their older parents in rural China as well as the economic aspects of aging populations in China and India.

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Industrial clusters are ubiquitous in history and the contemporary developing world. While many of them grow dynamically, others stagnate. This study explores factors affecting the success and failure of cluster-based industrial development based primarily on own case studies conducted in East Asia, South Asia, and sub-Saharan Africa as well as historical studies in Japan and Europe. It is found that the key to the successful development is multi-faceted innovations, encompassing technical and managerial innovations or improvements. Since innovative ideas spill over, collective actions which attempt to internalize externalities often play a role in sustainable development of industrial clusters. An implication is that stagnant clusters can be vitalized if multi-faceted innovations can be stimulated by policy means.   

 

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xian sheng xie zhen
Keijiro Otsuka is a Professor of Development Economics at the Graduate School of Economics at the Kobe University and a Chief Senior Researcher at the Institute of Developing Economies in Tokyo. He was a professor at the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies (GRIPS) from April 2001 to March 2016. He received a Ph.D. in economics from the University of Chicago in 1979.

He was a core member of World Development Report 2013: Jobs. He was also President of International Association of Agricultural Economists (IAAE) from 2009 to 2012. He received Purple-Ribbon Medal from the Japanese Government in 2010.

He has been conducting comparative analyses on cluster-based industrial development, poverty and income distribution, land reform and land tenure, and Green Revolution between Asia and Africa. He published 123 articles in refereed international journals and 23 coauthored and coedited books. He is Fellows of International, American, and African Association of Agricultural Economists.

Kei Otsuka Professor, Kobe University
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xiuxiao_wang.jpg Ph.D.

Xiuxiao Wang joins the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (APARC) during the 2016-17 academic year from Central University of Finance and Economics'(CUFE) Department of Sociology where he serves as an associate professor. He also holds a Research Fellowship at the Center for Studies on China’s Overseas Development in CUFE.

His research interests focus mainly on organizational sociology and institutional transition in contemporary China. While emphasizing Danwei is the pillar of institutional infrastructure in urban China and the power/authority structure is the key to understand Danwei system, his dissertation and a few recent publications shed some light on the past, present and future of Danwei system (单位体制) in China, trying to comprehend the institutional causes underlying its persistence and/or transition after the Reform initiated in the late 1970s, as well as the (unintended) consequences that this organizational transformation has brought to world's largest population.

During his one-year visit at APARC, Wang will work on his latest more challenging project, to explore the transition of power/authority structure (if any), both within and among different (ideal) types of organizations, alongside the continuum of core-periphery distribution of power/authority. Thus, government authority, state-owned enterprise, shiye danwei (事业单位), private enterprise and social organization will be scrutinized simultaneously in a comparative analytical framework to uncover, hopefully, the mystery of social governance at basic level urban China. Besides his own research, he will also seek opportunity to participate in China Program as well as other related interdisciplinary programs at APARC.

Wang's publications include peer-reviewed journal articles appeared on Chinese Journal of Sociology, Comparative Economic & Social System and Sociological Review of China. He also contributed several chapters and coauthored a book titled The In-Group Differentiation of Chinese Christians: Interaction between Subject and Object of Classification in a Northeast Church (2015).

While his research stays relatively focused on organizational sociology and Danwei study, Wang's teaching and reading interests cover a wider range of subjects, including Classic and Modern Sociological Theories, Qualitative Research Methods, Social Scientific Study of Religions, Contemporary China, and China’s Overseas Development.

Wang holds a Ph.D. (2010) and MA (2007) in sociology from Renmin University of China, and a BA (2005) in sociology from Hunan Normal University.

 

Department of SociologyCentral University of Finance and EconomicsNo.39, South College Road, Haidian DistrictBeijing, China 100871Email: wangxiuxiao@outlook.comPhone: +86 135-8175-7433
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Stanford professor Andrew Walder has been awarded the Founder’s Prize from the journal Social Science History for his paper, “Rebellion and Repression in China, 1966-1971.” The journal’s editorial board selects one recipient annually for exemplary scholarly work.

Using data from 2,213 historical county and city annals, the paper charts the breadth of the Chinese Cultural Revolution, its evolution through time and the repression through which state structures were rebuilt in the post-Mao era.

Walder, who is a senior fellow in the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and director emeritus of the Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center, has long studied the sources of conflict, stability and change in communist regimes. He recently published China under Mao, a book that explores the rise and fall of Mao Zedong’s radical socialism.

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Lisa Griswold
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A long line of research has shown that women live longer than men, yet according to Karen Eggleston, director of the Asia Health Policy Program, and four other Stanford health researchers, mortality rate differences between men and women are much more variable than previously thought, following predictable patterns. Life expectancy differs depending on time, location and socioeconomic circumstance, not on biological factors alone, according to their newly published findings.

The researchers found that women have greater resilience when faced with socioeconomic adversity in a developing country—living nearly 10 years longer than men on average—but this pattern changes as the country evolves. Developed countries typically have smaller gaps in mortality rates between men and women than developing countries do.

Japan and South Korea are outliers, however, with higher mortality rate differences between men and women than is average for developed countries. In addition to the prevalence of male smoking, one possible explanation they draw is the lack of career-related opportunities for women in Japan and South Korea, two countries that have low gender wage equity among Organisation of Economic Co-operation and Development members.

Eggleston, who is part of the core faculty at the Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center, et al. suggested the idea that reducing gender inequality may help narrow the mortality gap: men increase years lived when fewer barriers for women exist, but concluded that their findings supporting this conclusion merit further inquiry.

Their findings were published in the August edition of SSM – Population Health and highlighted in an earlier column on Voxeu.

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A woman walking in Tokyo, Japan.
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Does entrepreneurship cause local employment and wage growth, and if so, how large is the impact? Empirical analysis of such a question is difficult because of the joint determination of entrepreneurship and economic growth. This article uses two different sets of variables—the homestead exemption levels in state bankruptcy laws from 1975 and the share of metropolitan statistical area (MSA) overlaying aquifers—to instrument for entrepreneurship and examine urban employment and wage growth between 1993 and 2002. Despite using different sets of instrumental variables, the ranges of two-stage least squares estimates are surprisingly similar. A 10% increase in the birth of small businesses increases MSA employment by 1.3–2.2%, annual payroll by 2.4–4.0%, and wages by 1.2–2.0% after 10 years. Furthermore, an accounting exercise shows that the employment and payroll growth from entrepreneurship are not confined to the initially created businesses but spillover to the aggregate urban economy.

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Journal of Economic Geography
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Yong Suk Lee
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The Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (APARC) at Stanford is now accepting applications for the Shorenstein Postdoctoral Fellowship in Contemporary Asia, an opportunity made available to two junior scholars for research and writing on Asia.

Fellows conduct research on contemporary political, economic or social change in the Asia-Pacific region, and contribute to Shorenstein APARC’s publications, conferences and related activities. To read about this year’s fellows, please click here.

The fellowship is a 10-mo. appointment during the 2017-18 academic year, and carries a salary rate of $52,000 plus $2,000 for research expenses.

For further information and to apply, please click here. The application deadline is Dec. 16, 2016.

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It is tempting to characterize the recent round of North Korea missile and nuclear tests as only the latest example of the provocative behavior of its brash young leader, Kim Jong Un. A simultaneous launch of three medium-range missiles, mounted on mobile launchers, was defiantly timed to coincide with China’s hosting of the G20 summit in Hangzhou. And the latest nuclear test, the fifth carried out by North Korea, seemed designed to assert its status as a nuclear weapons power ahead of the U.S. presidential vote, Sneider writes.

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Toyo Keizai Online
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Rennie J. Moon has been selected as the 2016-17 Koret Fellow in the Korea Program at Stanford’s Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (APARC). She will join the center next January to study diversity in higher education and teach a student course.

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Moon is an associate professor at the Underwood International College at Yonsei University in Seoul, South Korea. Her research explores the interrelationships among globalization, migration and citizenship, and internationalization of higher education.

Moon, a graduate of Stanford’s Graduate School of Education, Ph.D. ‘09, has collaborated with Stanford professor Gi-Wook Shin on a multiyear research project that examines diversity in higher education in East Asia. She co-edited the book Internationalizing Higher Education in Korea: Challenges and Opportunities in Comparative Perspective published earlier this year.

Stanford professor Francisco O. Ramirez, an expert on international comparative education and sociology of education, recognized her scholarly contributions to the field.

“Moon is a creative contributor to the ‘world society perspective’ in the social sciences,” said Ramirez, noting that Moon's work has been published in leading journals of international comparative education, Comparative Education Review and Comparative Education.

Supported by the Koret Foundation, the Koret Fellowship brings professionals to Stanford to conduct research on contemporary Korean affairs. In 2015, the fellowship expanded its focus to include social, cultural and educational issues in North and South Korea, and aims to identify emerging scholars working on those areas.

During her fellowship, Moon will also give public talks and be a lead organizer of the Koret Workshop, an international conference held annually at Stanford.

“As an alum, I’m very pleased and excited to spend my sabbatical year at Stanford,” Moon said. “Over the last few years, I’ve been collaborating on various research projects with Professor Shin and other colleagues at APARC. I’m looking forward to a productive fellowship during which I hope to bring these evolving projects to fruition.”

Moon holds a doctorate and master’s degree in international comparative education from Stanford and a bachelor’s degree in French from Wellesley College.

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How do weak organizations engage in mobilization under duress? Based on ethnographic work inside labor organizations in China, this talk makes the case that in a repressive environment, civil society organizations can mobilize through a counter-intuitive mechanism. Instead of amassing the crowds to take to the streets, groups can mobilize without the masses. Rather than citizens forming groups in order to trigger larger-scale contention, they form groups in order to better contend as individuals or as small bands of the aggrieved. The clear advantage of this strategy is that it lowers the cost of activism in an authoritarian state. Because it is highly risky for civil society groups to organize large-scale contention, they must devise ways to work around this constraint. Civil society groups coach citizens to adopt a grammar of contention that effectively threatens local social stability and challenges the moral authority of officials. However, at the point of contention, these groups disperse. By sending out only a sole contender or a limited number of contenders to confront state authorities, organizations minimize their risk of being targeted by authorities.

 

Diana Fu is an assistant professor of Asian Politics at the University of Toronto. Her research examines the relationship between popular contention, state power, and civil society, with an emphasis on contemporary China. Her book manuscript, Mobilizing Without the Masses in China examines state control and civil society contention under authoritarian rule. Based on two years of ethnographic research that tracks the development of informal labor organizations, the book explores counterintuitive dynamics of organized contention in post-1989 China.  

Prior to joining the Univeristy of Toronto, Professor Fu was a Walter H. Shorenstein Postdoctoral Fellow at the Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center, Stanford University and a Predoctoral Fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Political Science. She holds a D.Phil. in Politics and an M.Phil. in Development Studies with distinction from Oxford University, where she studied as a Rhodes Scholar. 

Diana Fu <i>Assistant Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Toronto</i>
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