Over the last hundred years, the cigarette has become a pillar of consumer life in China and many parts of the world. In 2010, the Chinese tobacco industry produced over two trillion cigarettes, generating over U.S. $90 billion in taxes and profits. Over 300 million Chinese citizens now use cigarettes every day, and tobacco kills 90 times more people each year than HIV/AIDS in China.

How has the cigarette become so integrated into the fabric of everyday life across the People’s Republic of China?

The importance of answering this question is unmistakable, but very little historical research and writing has examined China’s cigarette industry from the mid-20th century to the present. To get to the heart of this question, historians, health policy specialists, sociologists, anthropologists, business scholars, and other experts will meet Mar. 26 and 27 at the new Stanford Center at Peking University for a conference organized by the Asia Health Policy Program. They will examine connections intricately woven over the past 60 years between marketing and cigarette gifting, production and consumer demand, government policy and economic profit, and many other dimensions of China’s cigarette culture.

About the event: The speakers will take questions regarding the February 29 agreement between the United States and North Korea that provided for the delivery of U.S. food aid, a moratorium on North Korean nuclear and missile tests, and the entrance of international inspectors into facilities at Yongbyon.

About the speakers:

Siegfried S. Hecker is co-director of the Stanford University Center for International Security and Cooperation, Senior Fellow of the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, and Professor (Research) in the Department of Management Science and Engineering. He is also director emeritus at the Los Alamos National Laboratory, where he served as director from 1986-1997 and senior fellow until July 2005. He received his B.S., M.S., and PhD degrees in metallurgy from Case Western Reserve University. His current professional interests include plutonium research, cooperative nuclear threat reduction with the Russian nuclear complex, and global nonproliferation and counter terrorism. He is a fellow of numerous professional societies and received the Presidential Enrico Fermi Award.

John Lewis is the William Haas Professor of Chinese Politics, emeritus, and an FSI senior fellow by courtesy. He is an expert on Chinese politics, U.S.-China relations, China's nuclear weapons program, U.S. policy toward Korea and health security issues in northeast Asia. He founded and directed the Center for East Asian Studies, in 1969-1970; the Center for International Security and Arms Control (now the Center for International Security and Cooperation, or CISAC) from 1983 to 1991; and the Northeast Asia-United States Forum on International Policy (now APARC), from 1983 to 1990. He currently directs CISAC's Project on Peace and Cooperation in the Asian-Pacific Region.

David Straub was named associate director of the Korean Studies Program (KSP) at the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (Shorenstein APARC) on July 1, 2008. Prior to that he was a 2007–08 Pantech Fellow at the Center. Straub is currently writing a book on recent U.S.-South Korean relations. He is also a member of the New Beginnings policy research group on U.S.-South Korean relations, which is co-sponsored by Shorenstein APARC and the New York-based Korea Society. An educator and commentator on current Northeast Asian affairs, Straub retired in 2006 from his role as a U.S. Department of State senior foreign service officer after a 30-year career focused on Northeast Asian affairs. He worked over 12 years on Korean affairs, first arriving in Seoul in 1979.

Note: This event will follow a shortened science seminar by Dr. Len Weiss titled "The Mysterious Flash of 9/22/1979: The Case for an Israeli Nuclear Test"