Stanford University

Kathleen Stephens, 2013–14 Koret Fellow, to join the Korean Studies Program

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Kathleen Stephens, former U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of Korea, will join the Korean Studies Program (KSP) at Stanford University’s Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (Shorenstein APARC) as the program’s 2013–14 Koret Fellow.

"Kathy Stephens was perhaps the most popular American ambassador ever with South Koreans, because of her long experience, deep knowledge, and great love for Korea and its people," says Shorenstein APARC director Gi-Wook Shin. "As one of the United States' most experienced and senior professional diplomats, she will make a major contribution to the research, educational, and outreach efforts of the Korean Studies Program and Shorenstein APARC in the coming year."

Ambassador Stephens aims to write a book about aspects of Korea’s modern journey, with particular attention to South Korea’s political development, to the impact of cultural and social change on its politics, and to the role of the United States. The book will draw from her experience over the decades working in and on Korea, buttressed and expanded upon by research using both English and Korean-language sources. In the winter quarter she will teach Issues in U.S.-Korea Relations, a Center for East Asian Studies (CEAS) course.

Ambassador Stephens recently completed thirty-five years as a career diplomat in the U.S. Foreign Service. She was Acting Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs in 2012, and U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of Korea, 2008 to 2011.

Ambassador Stephens has served in numerous posts in Washington, Asia, and Europe. From 2005 to 2007 she was Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for the Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs (EAP). While Deputy Assistant Secretary of State in the Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs (EUR) from 2003 to 2005, she focused on post-conflict and stabilization issues in the Balkans. Other Washington assignments included Director for European Affairs at the National Security Council during the Clinton Administration, Senior United Kingdom Country Officer in the European Bureau, and Director of the State Department’s Office of Ecology and Terrestrial Conservation in the Bureau of Oceans, Environment and Scientific Affairs.

Ambassador Stephens’ overseas postings have included Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassy in Lisbon, Portugal (1998–2001), and U.S. Consul General in Belfast, Northern Ireland (1995–1998) during the consolidation of ceasefires and negotiation of the Good Friday Agreement. Earlier foreign assignments included consular and public affairs officer in Guangzhou, China, chief of the internal political unit in Seoul, principal officer of the U.S. Consulate in Busan, Korea, and political officer in fracturing Yugoslavia.

Ambassador Stephens has received numerous State Department awards, including Linguist of the Year in 2010, and the 2009 Presidential Meritorious Service Award. Other awards and recognition include the Korean government’s Sejong Cultural Prize (2013), the Korean YWCA’s Korea Women’s Leadership “Special Prize” Award (2010), and in 2011 the Pacific Century Institute’s Building Bridges Award, the Outstanding Achievement Award from the American Chamber of Commerce in Korea, and the Kwanghwa Medal of Diplomatic Merit from the Korean government. Her book, Reflections of an American Ambassador to Korea, based on her Korean-language blog, was published in 2010.           

Ambassador Stephens was born in El Paso, Texas and grew up in Arizona and Montana. She holds a BA (Honors) in East Asian studies from Prescott College, an MA from Harvard University, and honorary doctoral degrees from Chungnam National University and the University of Maryland. Ambassador Stephens studied at the University of Hong Kong and was an instructor at the Outward Bound School of Hong Kong. She was a Peace Corps volunteer in Korea in the 1970s.

The Koret Fellowship was established in 2008 through the generosity of the Koret Foundation to promote intellectual diversity and breadth in the KSP by bringing leading professionals in Asia and the United States to Stanford to study U.S.-Korea relations. The fellows conduct their own research on the bilateral relationship, with an emphasis on contemporary relations, with the broad aim of fostering greater understanding and closer ties between the two countries.

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Yanling (Linda) He

Shorenstein APARC
Encina Hall E301
616 Serra Street
Stanford, CA 94305-6055

(650) 725-2507 (650) 723-6530
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Yanling (Linda) HE joins the Walter H.Shorentein Asia-Pacific Research Center (Shorenstein APARC) during the 2013-14 academic year from Sun Yat-sen University, where she serves as Professor at the School of Government, and Co-Director of the Center for Chinese Public Administration Research (CCPAR).

Her research interests encompass topics of urban governance, Chinese political and administrative reform, and civil society development in China. During her time at Shorenstein APARC, Yanling will participate in a comparative study of social stability during China’s urbanization process.

Yanling is currently the co-director of the Center for Chinese Public Administration Research (CCPAR) at Sun Yat-sen University, which is strongly supported by the Ministry of Education and is the leading research center in development for public administration in China. Yanling also serves as one the chief-editors with the Journal of Public Administration, China. She is actively involved with the community as a public policy consultant in a number of local governments across China.

Yanling has a multi-disciplinary educational background: holding a PhD in Sociology; a MA in Public Administration; and a BA in Philosophy.

Empirical Investigation of Declining Childbirth: Psychosocial and Economic Conditions in Japan

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Background: For the past two decades, more and more women in certain European countries, Japan, and the United States are giving birth to their first child at a considerably later age than ever before. It remains unclear as to what extent this age-related general fertility decline is affected by changing social and cultural norms.

Method: The Global Centers of Excellence Survey was conducted by Osaka University in Japan (n=5313) in 2009. Multivariate regression analyses were conducted to examine the impact of psychosocial norms, cultural differences, and economic conditions on the perception of childbearing.

Results: The findings suggest that a subjective measure of happiness has a significant influence on childbearing. A society with income inequalities between classes discourages childbearing. It is observed that women’s higher labor force participation generates a negative impact on mother-child relations which causes discouragement of childbearing. A higher female labor force participation stemmed from a transition of a traditional society into a modern and market-oriented society discourages childbearing.

Conclusions/implications: A woman’s decision to delay childbearing is based on her perception of psychosocial norms with surrounding economic environment and her own value of opportunity in the market oriented society. Childbearing also imposes psycho-economic burdens on the working population under mix of a traditional, patriarchal society, and a modern market oriented framework. Childbearing incentives could be a strategic policy to encourage positive attitudes of childbearing in general and proper welfare policy, labor law(s), employment conditions, and social security system for a working mother with a child or children.

Key words: Childbearing, socioeconomic factors, psychosocial norms, subjective happiness

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Asia Health Policy Program working paper # 36
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Housing Windfalls and Intergenerational Transfers in China

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In this paper, we study the impact of housing reform and the rapid development of the housing market in China on parental wealth and financial transfers they receive from children. During the 1990s, the Chinese government gave property rights to many urban residents who had been allocated housing by their danwei employers. These unexpected windfalls were substantial in size, and grew with the rapid increase in housing prices over time, significantly impacting the asset holdings and wealth of affected urban residents. We find that these exogenous changes in wealth had a considerable impact on transfers received from adult non-resident children. We also find a non-linear relationship between transfers and recipient wealth, and strong evidence for altruistic transfer motives.

Maria Porter is an Assistant Professor at Michigan State University in the Department of Agricultural, Food, and Resource Economics. She is currently involved in research projects in Burkina Faso, China, and the UK. This research involves work on intra-household labor allocation decisions, factors influencing households’ adoption of new agricultural technologies, understanding adult children’s motivations for giving transfers and support to parents, and household bargaining between spouses. She employs a variety of research methods, including randomized control trials, laboratory experiments, and survey data analysis. Maria holds a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Chicago. Before coming to MSU, she was a research fellow at the University of Oxford. She has taught graduate courses in household and development economics, and undergraduate courses in intermediate microeconomics and development economics.

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Maria Porter Assistant Professor Speaker Michigan State University in the Department of Agricultural, Food, and Resource Economics
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NHI Reform in Taiwan: Recent Developments

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Co-sponsored by the Center of East Asian Studies, Stanford University

Prominent health policy expert—Rachel Lu from Taiwan—will share her view on recent health policy developments in the region, drawing on her extensive research and policy background.

Jui-fen Rachel Lu, Sc.D., is a Professor in the Department of Health Care Management, at Chang Gung University (CGU) in Taiwan, where she teaches comparative health systems, health economics, and health care financing and has served as department chair (2000-2004), Associate Dean (2009-2010) and Dean of College of Management (2010-2013).  She earned her B.S. from National Taiwan University, and her M.S. and Sc.D. from Harvard University, and she was also a Takemi Fellow at Harvard (2004-2005) and is an Honorary Professor at Hong Kong University (2007-2014), a guest professor at Huazhong University of Science and Technology (2010-2013), and an adjunct professor at Xi’an Jiaotong University (2011-2014) in China.  Her devotion to teaching driven by her firm belief in the value of education and investment in human minds was recognized by the Award of Excellence in Teaching conferred by CGU in both 2002 and 2013.

Her research focuses on 1) the equity issues of the health care system; 2) impact of the NHI program on health care market and household consumption patterns; 3) comparative health systems in Asia-Pacific region.  She is a long-time and active member of Equitap (Equity in Asia-Pacific Health Systems) research network and is currently the coordinator for the catastrophic payment component of Equitap II research project which involves 21 country teams and is jointly funded by IDRC, AusAID, and ADB.  Professor Lu has also been appointed to serve as a member on various government committees dealing with health care issues in Taiwan, such as National Health Insurance Supervisory Committee (DOH), Hospital Management Committee(DOH), and Hospital Global Budget Payment Committee (BNHI), etc.  Dr. Lu received the Minister Wang Jin Naw Memorial Award for Best Paper in Health Care Management presented by Kimma Chang Foundation in 2002 and was the recipient of IBM Faculty Award in 2009.  She has published papers in Health Affairs, Medical Care, Journal of Health Economics, Health Economics, Social Science and Medicine, Health Economics, Policy and Law, Osteoporosis International, Health and Quality of Life Outcomes, and Taiwan Economic Review etc, and is the author of “Health Economics”(a textbook in Chinese) and various book chapters.  

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Jui-fen Rachel Lu Professor in the Department of Health Care Management Speaker Chang Gung University in Taiwan
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The Land of the Sinking Sun

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Phillip Lipscy examines Japan's military decline and its implications for regional security in a coauthored article in Foreign Policy.
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Japan under the DPJ

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The Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) came to power in 2009 with a commanding majority, ending fifty years of almost uninterrupted Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) rule. Then, in 2012, just over three years later, the DPJ lost power in an equally stunning landslide loss to the LDP. This volume examines the DPJ’s remarkable ascendance, its policies once in power, and its dramatic fall.

What explains the DPJ’s rapid rise to power? Why was policy change under the DPJ limited, despite high expectations and promises of bold reform? Why has the party been paralyzed by internecine conflict?

Chapters in the volume cover: DPJ candidate recruitment; the influence of media coverage; nationalization of elections; electoral system constraints on policy change; the role of third parties; municipal mergers; the role of women; transportation policy; fiscal decentralization; information technology; response to the Fukushima nuclear disaster; security strategy; and foreign policy. Japan under the DPJ makes important contributions to the study of Japanese politics, while drawing upon and advancing scholarship on a wider range of issues of interest to political scientists.

Examination copies: Desk, examination, or review copies can be requested through Stanford University Press.

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The Politics of Transition and Governance

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Kenji E. Kushida
Phillip Lipscy
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Shorenstein APARC
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Jean-Marc Blanchard

Shorenstein APARC
Stanford University
Encina Hall E301
Stanford, CA 94305-6055

(650) 723-9741 (650) 723-6530
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Visiting Professor
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Jean-Marc F. Blanchard (白永辉) joins the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (Shorenstein APARC) from July-October 2013 from the School of International and Public Affairs (SIPA) at Shanghai Jiaotong University (SJTU) where he serves as Professor, Assistant Dean for International Cooperation and Exchange, and Executive Director of the SJTU SIPA Center for the Study of Multinational Corporations.

His research interests include Chinese outward foreign direct investment (FDI), inward FDI into China, Chinese foreign economic policy, Chinese foreign energy policy, multinational corporations, and economic globalization.  During his time at Shorenstein APARC, he will conduct research on the politico-economy of Chinese OFDI.

Blanchard is a co-author of Economic Statecraft and Foreign Policy (2013), a co-editor of and contributor to Governance, Domestic Change and Social Policy in China (forthcoming 2013); “China and Soft Power” (Asian Perspective special issue, 2012); New Thinking about The Taiwan Issue (2012), Multidimensional Diplomacy of Contemporary China (2010), Harmonious World and China’s New Foreign Policy (2008), and Power and the Purse (2000), and the author of more than three dozen refereed journal articles and book chapters.

Blanchard is former Associate Editor of the Journal of Chinese Political Studies (JCPS), a member of the Editorial Board for the JCPS, and a member of the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations.  He previously served as President of the Association of Chinese Political Studies (2010-2012).

Blanchard received his PhD in political science from the University of Pennsylvania and AB in economics from U.C. Berkeley.  Prior to his career in academia, Blanchard worked for the U.S. government Federal Savings & Loan Insurance Corporation and Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and for the investment banking firm Kelling, Northcross, & Nobriga.

Peigang Li

Shorenstein APARC
Stanford University
Encina Hall E301
Stanford, CA 94305-6055

(650) 736-0771 (650) 862-9660 (650) 723-6530
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Visiting Scholar
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Peigang Li joins the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (Shorenstein APARC)  as a visiting scholar for the 2013-2014 acedemic year. He is currently an Investment Portfolio Manager for Hollyhigh International Capital, the first investment banking firm specializing in mergers and acquisitions (M&As) in Mainland China.   

His research interests include studying China‘s economic development and other areas of economic history in East Asian countries. During his time at Shorenstein APARC, Peigang will participate in a research project with the Stanford China Program, where he will evaluate China’s economic situation, and assess its future development for sustainability through institutional change. 

Peigang received a Masters in Power Electric Automation Control from the Northeast China Institute of Electric Power Engineering. After working as a power automation software engineer, his interests in the financial community led him to enter into the investment field. Peigang soon became an industry stock analyst, and a mutual fund manager.

Charlotte Lee

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Associate Director, China Program
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Charlotte Lee was the associate director of the China Program at the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center at Stanford University. Prior to that she was an assistant professor in the Department of Government at Hamilton College. From 2012-14, she was Minerva Chair in the Department of Political Science at the U.S. Air Force Academy. As Minerva Chair, she conducted research and briefings on issues in U.S.-China relations. In 2013, she was a visiting assistant professor at Stanford’s Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center.

Her research on China has been published in peer-reviewed journals. She recently completed a book manuscript on reforms taking place in the Chinese Communist Party entitled Training the Party: Party Adaptation and Elite Training in Reform-Era China (forthcoming, Cambridge University Press).

She has taught classes on Chinese politics, international relations, geopolitics and comparative politics. She holds a doctorate and master’s degree in political science from Stanford, where she was an NSF Graduate Research Fellow. Her bachelor’s degree is in Asian studies and political economy from the University of California, Berkeley.

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