**Due to space restrictions, this event has reached capacity and we will no longer be taking RSVPs. Everyone is still welcome to attend but please plan to arrive early as seating is on a first come, first serve basis.**

Under the Hu-Wen leadership, China announced a shift in its development policy from a policy program that mainly emphasizes economic growth to one that pursues a “harmonious society.” The harmonious society program was a response to rapid increases in inequality during the 1990s, and its aim has been to ensure that the benefits from growth are widely shared.    

In recent years have the benefits from growth been widely shared? Has income inequality increased or decreased during the Hu-Wen era?

Drawing on recent findings from the China Household Income Project, a collaborative survey research project monitoring changes in incomes and inequality, Professor Terry Sicular will discuss recent trends in inequality and poverty in China. 

Terry Sicular is professor of economics at the University of Western Ontario. She received her doctorate at Yale and has taught at Stanford and Harvard. She is a specialist on the Chinese economy, speaks Mandarin, and has been studying and travelling to China for more than 30 years. Her recent research examines incomes and inequality in China, as well as related topics such as educational attainment and its intergenerational transmission, and the impact of housing reforms on household income and wealth. She has published widely in scholarly journals and books, and is as a contributor to and co-editor of Inequality and Public Policy, published by Cambridge University Press (2008). She has served as a consultant to international donor organizations, and is a leader in the ongoing, China Household Income Project, a collaborative research project that conducts a nationwide household survey and monitors trends in China’s incomes and inequality.

This event is part of the China's Looming Challenges series. 

The team of leaders who will take the helm in China beginning next year—the so-called “Fifth Generation”—will be better educated, have greater exposure to the outside world, and extensive experience implementing policies that have facilitated sustained economic growth and growing international influence. They may view issues somewhat differently than their predecessors but have risen to the top by going along to get ahead and are unlikely to propose radical policy initiatives.  But they must confront a growing number of challenges fueled by China’s past success and recent behavior and will be constrained by structural features of the Chinese system and integration into the global market.

Thomas Fingar is the Oksenberg-Rohlen Distinguished Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI). In 2009, he was the Payne Distinguished Lecturer at FSI. From May 2005 through December 2008, he served as the first deputy director of national intelligence for analysis and, concurrently, as chairman of the National Intelligence Council.

This event is part of the China's Looming Challenges series.