Modern-day markets do not arise spontaneously or evolve naturally. Rather they are crafted by individuals, firms, and most of all, by governments. Thus "marketcraft" represents a core function of government comparable to statecraft and requires considerable artistry to govern markets effectively. Just as real-world statecraft can be masterful or muddled, so it is with marketcraft. 

In his new book, Steven Vogel builds his argument upon the recognition that all markets are crafted then systematically explores the implications for analysis and policy. In modern societies, there is no such thing as a free market. Markets are institutions, and contemporary markets are all heavily regulated. The "free market revolution" that began in the 1980s did not see a deregulation of markets, but rather a re-regulation. Vogel looks at a wide range of policy issues to support this concept, focusing in particular on the US and Japan. He examines how the US, the "freest" market economy, is actually among the most heavily regulated advanced economies, while Japan's effort to liberalize its economy counterintuitively expanded the government's role in practice. 

Marketcraft demonstrates that market institutions need government to function, and in increasingly complex economies, governance itself must feature equally complex policy tools if it is to meet the task. In our era-and despite what anti-government ideologues contend-governmental officials, regardless of party affiliation, should be trained in marketcraft just as much as in statecraft.

SPEAKER

Steven K. Vogel, Il Han New Professor of Asian Studies and a Professor of Political Science at the University of California, Berkeley

BIO

Steven K. Vogel is the Il Han New Professor of Asian Studies and a Professor of Political Science at the University of California, Berkeley. He specializes in the political economy of the advanced industrialized nations, especially Japan. He recently completed a book, entitled Marketcraft: How Governments Make Markets Work (Oxford, 2018), which argues that markets do not arise spontaneously but rather are crafted by individuals, firms, and most of all by governments.  Thus “marketcraft” represents a core function of government comparable to statecraft.  The book systematically reviews the implications of this argument, critiquing prevalent schools of thought and presenting lessons for policy.  Vogel is also the author of Japan Remodeled: How Government and Industry Are Reforming Japanese Capitalism (Cornell, 2006) and co-editor (with Naazneen Barma) of The Political Economy Reader: Markets as Institutions (Routledge, 2008). His first book, Freer Markets, More Rules: Regulatory Reform in Advanced Industrial Countries  (Cornell, 1996), won the Masayoshi Ohira Memorial Prize. He edited his mother’s book, Suzanne Hall Vogel, The Japanese Family in Transition: From the Professional Housewife Ideal to the Dilemmas of Choice(Rowman & Littlefield, 2013), and a volume on U.S.-Japan Relations in a Changing World(Brookings, 2002).  He won the Northern California Association of Phi Beta Kappa Teaching Excellence Award in 2002, and the UC Berkeley Faculty Award for Outstanding Mentorship of Graduate Student Instructors in 2005.  He has been a columnist for Newsweek-Japan and the Asahi Shimbun, and he has written extensively for the popular press.  He has worked as a reporter for the Japan Times in Tokyo and as a freelance journalist in France. He has taught previously at the University of California, Irvine and Harvard University. He has a B.A. from Princeton University and a Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of California, Berkeley.

For directions to the Jen-Hsun Huang Engineering Center, please click here.

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The Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) commenced operations on January 16, 2016. The Bank has approved 24 projects totaling US$4.26 billion to date, and its approved membership totals 84 with 64 members having completed all membership requirements and 20 prospective members in the process of finalizing their membership.
 
President Jin Liqun will give his assessment of the bank’s first two years – its accomplishments and challenges – and the future direction of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank. What is the potential impact of AIIB’s financing for regional infrastructure, trade connectivity and economic relations? How can multilateral institutions and various stakeholders best address the US$26 trillion infrastructure gap (from 2016 to 2030) in Asia? How is the AIIB distinguishing itself from other multilateral development banks like the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank? What is the AIIB’s commitment and contributions toward global economic governance and best international practices?

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Jin Liqun is the inaugural President and Chair of the Board of Directors of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB). Before being elected as the Bank’s first president, he served as Secretary-General of the Multilateral Interim Secretariat (MIS) tasked with establishing AIIB. Immediately prior to assuming the role of Secretary-General of the MIS, he was Chair of China International Capital Corporation Limited, China’s first joint-venture investment bank. From 2008 to 2013, he served as Chair of the Supervisory Board, China Investment Corporation. From 2009 to 2012, he served as Deputy Chair then subsequently as Chair of the International Forum of Sovereign Wealth Funds. From 2003 to 2008, Jin was Vice President, and then Ranking Vice President, of the Asian Development Bank (ADB), in charge of programs for South, Central and West Asia and private sector operations. He joined the Ministry of Finance in 1980, where he served as Director General and Assistant Minister before becoming Vice Minister in 1998. He was also a Member of the State Monetary Policy Committee. Earlier in his career, he served as Alternate Executive Director for China at the World Bank and at the Global Environment Facility as well as Alternate Governor for China at ADB. Jin holds a master’s degree in English Literature from Beijing Institute of Foreign Languages (now Beijing Foreign Studies University). He was also a Hubert Humphrey Fellow in the Economics Graduate Program at Boston University from 1987 to 1988. Jin is a national of the People’s Republic of China.

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Making Money: How Taiwanese Industrialists Embraced the Global Economy is a record of a thirty-year research project that Gary G. Hamilton and Kao Cheng-shu began in 1987.  A distinguished sociologist and university administrator in Taiwan, Kao and his research team (which included Prof. Hamilton during his frequent visits to Taiwan) interviewed over 800 owners and managers of Taiwanese firms in Taiwan, China, and Vietnam.  Some were re-interviewed over ten times during this period.  The length of this project allows them a vantage point to challenge the conventional interpretations of Asian industrialization and to present a new interpretation of the global economy that features an enduring alliance between, on the one hand, American and European retailers and merchandisers and, on the other hand, Asian contract manufacturers, with Taiwanese industrialists becoming the most prominent contract manufacturers in the past forty years.

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Gary G. Hamilton is a Professor Emeritus of International Studies and Sociology at the University of Washington.  He specializes in historical/comparative sociology, economic sociology, with a special emphasis on Asian societies. He is an author of numerous articles and books, including most recently Emergent Economies, Divergent Paths, Economic Organization and International Trade in South Korea and Taiwan (with Robert Feenstra) (Cambridge University Press, 2006), Commerce and Capitalism in Chinese Societies (London: Routledge, 2006), The Market Makers: How Retailers Are Changing the Global Economy (co-editor and contributor, Oxford University Press, 2011; paperback 2012), and Making Money: How Taiwanese Industrialists Embraced the Global Economy (with Kao Cheng-shu, Stanford University Press, 2018).

 

This event is organized by the Taiwan Democracy and Security Project, part of the U.S.-Asia Security Initiative at Shorenstein APARC. Formerly the Taiwan Democracy Project at CDDRL.

GSVlabs is a startup and corporate innovation accelerator located in the heart of Silicon Valley in Redwood City. It houses more than 180 startups and supports corporate innovation programs for more than 25 corporations. During the past few years, GSVlabs has welcomed numerous startups from foreign countries such as Brazil, Mexico, Thailand, China, Korea, Germany, Austria just to name a few. In many cases, these foreign startup acceleration programs are funded by large corporations and governments that see long-term economic benefits of supporting such activities in Silicon Valley. In this public forum, Atsuko Jenks will discuss examples of such corporate and government funded accelerator programs and implications for the efforts by Japanese corporations and Japanese government organizations to accelerate corporate innovation and economic growth of Japan.

SPEAKER:

Atsuko Jenks, Managing Director, Japan, GSVlabs

BIO:

Atsuko oversees development and implementation of corporate innovation and new business development accelerator programs for Japanese corporations at GSVlabs in Redwood City. She is also an advisor for two Silicon Valley technology startups, Grabit and Viewpoint Systems. For nearly 20 years, Atsuko has advised and worked with both US and Japanese companies, assisting them with their cross-Pacific alliance and partnership strategies as well as technology licensing and various commercial agreements. Atsuko is also active in non-profit work as a Board Member of Stanford Business School Alumni Association, an Executive Committee Member of The Tech Museum of Innovation, the San Francisco Chapter President of Tsuda University Alumnae Association, and a member of Stanford Business School Alumni Consulting Team. She was previously Director of Japan Division with Williams-Sonoma in San Francisco, and Consultant at Bain in Tokyo Office.  Atsuko holds BA from Tsuda University in International Relations and Global Studies, and MBA from Stanford Graduate School of Business.

AGENDA:

4:15pm: Doors open
4:30pm-5:30pm: Talk and Discussion
5:30pm-6:00pm: Networking

RSVP REQUIRED: