Hysterectomy is the most common non-pregnancy-related major surgery performed on women in the United States. Close to 600,000 women in the United States undergo the procedure each year, with annual costs exceeding $5 billion. By age 60, more than one-third of women in the United States have had a hysterectomy.

Many believe that the high U.S. hysterectomy rate is a result of an expansion of the accepted indications for hysterectomy. More reasons are listed for removal of the uterus than for any other organ, with indications ranging from life-threatening cancer of the genital tract to menstrual pain. In the United States, hysterectomy is widely accepted by medical professionals and by the public as an appropriate treatment for uterine cancer and for various common non-cancerous uterine conditions that produce disabling levels of pain, discomfort, uterine bleeding, emotional distress, and related symptoms.

With so many possible indications for hysterectomy, the decision as to when to perform the procedure may be a great contributing factor in the different rates of hysterectomy between countries. This study poses the question, "Does individual physician decision-making affect hysterectomy rates in different countries?"

This collection of papers stems from a recent World Bank project focused upon the contentious issue of whether government has played any positive role in the success of the so-called "high-performing" Asian economies. It goes beyond the influential World Bank volume The East Asian Miracle to chart a middle ground that recognizes diversity among the different East Asian economies, as well as the evolutionary nature of government intervention.

Reprint from Living with China: U.S.-China Relations in the Twenty-First Century (New York: W.W.Norton, 1997).

Reprint from Journal of Far Eastern Business originally printed Autumn, 1994.

There are huge discrepancies between the official Chinese and U.S. estimates of the bilateral trade balance. The discrepancies are caused by different treatments accorded to re-exports through Hong Kong, re-export markups, and trade in services. Deficit-shifting between China, on the one hand, and Hong Kong and Taiwan, on the other, due to direct investment in China from Taiwan and Hong Kong, is partly responsible for the growth in the China–United States bilateral trade deficit. The 1995 China–United States bilateral balance of trade in goods and services, adjusted by both re-exports and re-export markups, may be estimated as US$23.3 billion, a large deficit but considerably smaller than the often-cited official U.S. figure of US$33.8 billion.

This volume, composed of nine provocative chapters by prominent Chinese specialists, analyzes Chinese economic change — the break-up of collective farming, the growth of private commerce, and the decentralization of industry.

Ezra Vogel contrasts the potential of China to industrialize with the rapid post-war industrial breakthroughs made by Japan, Taiwan, and South Korea. He believes China, despite starting with a lower average income and lower educational level than these other east Asian nations, possesses the drive and determination to make rapid industrial progress before the mid-21st century.

David Zweig explores the dilemmas which result from continued regulatory controls on some sectors of the Chinese rural economy combined with deregulation of other sectors.

The Chinese village receives the keen attention of Thomas Gold and Jean C. Oi. Gold examines "decollectivization" in terms of how village leadership continues to maintain the power of the collective over the peasants and the nature of peasant "entrepreneurship" that has emerged. Oi suggests that diversification and particularly the industrialization of the village economics following reforms allow the collective to endure as an entity but with a different character.

• Ramon H. Meyers focuses on how the significance of the CCP's decision to initiate new economic reforms, first in 1978 and again in 1984, will influence the overall economic development in China. Robert Dernberger assesses the rate and structure of Chinese economic growth.
• Justin Yifu Lin explores the agricultural expansion during 1980 and 1984 as a result of the household responsibility system reform. The impact of the reform on saving and investment mechanisms receives the attention of Bruce Reynolds.
• Dorothy Solinger discusses Wuhan's comprehensive urban economic reform in terms of decentralization, leasing, stocks, bonds, bankruptcy, manager responsibility, markets, and trade centers.
• Victor C. Falkenheim explores China's efforts at decentralization of the economy through fostering regional reforms.

These authors, through their explorations and observations of China's efforts at reform, present a dynamic picture of change. However, they have not overlooked the staggering problems facing China's advancement into the 21st century. The China specialists who contributed to this volume provide a comprehensive view of China's path toward full industrialization.