FSI's research on the origins, character and consequences of government institutions spans continents and academic disciplines. The institute’s senior fellows and their colleagues across Stanford examine the principles of public administration and implementation. Their work focuses on how maternal health care is delivered in rural China, how public action can create wealth and eliminate poverty, and why U.S. immigration reform keeps stalling.
FSI’s work includes comparative studies of how institutions help resolve policy and societal issues. Scholars aim to clearly define and make sense of the rule of law, examining how it is invoked and applied around the world.
FSI researchers also investigate government services – trying to understand and measure how they work, whom they serve and how good they are. They assess energy services aimed at helping the poorest people around the world and explore public opinion on torture policies. The Children in Crisis project addresses how child health interventions interact with political reform. Specific research on governance, organizations and security capitalizes on FSI's longstanding interests and looks at how governance and organizational issues affect a nation’s ability to address security and international cooperation.
The pattern and logic of China’s interactions with other countries and the international system as a whole were clear and predictable for 35 years, but developments during the past few years suggest that Beijing may have concluded that it is no longer necessary to follow the strategy articulated by Deng Xiaoping in the late 1970s. Is the break with the past more apparent than real, or has Xi Jinping determined that China can (or must) be more demanding and less accommodating than it was when the country was less prosperous and less powerful? Is what we are witnessing now a temporary aberration or the first indication that we have entered a new phase of China’s rise and integration into the global system?
Thomas Fingar is the inaugural Oksenberg-Rohlen Distinguished Fellow in the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies at Stanford University. He was the Payne Distinguished Lecturer at Stanford during January to December 2009.
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. He served previously as assistant secretary of the State Department’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research (2004–2005), principal deputy assistant secretary (2001–2003), deputy assistant secretary for analysis (1994–2000), director of the Office of Analysis for East Asia and the Pacific (1989–1994), and chief of the China Division (1986–1989). Between 1975 and 1986 he held a number of positions at Stanford University, including senior research associate in the Center for International Security and Arms Control.
Fingar is a graduate of Cornell University (AB in government and history, 1968), and Stanford University (MA, 1969 and PhD, 1977 both in political science). His most recent book is Reducing Uncertainty: Intelligence Analysis and National Security (Stanford University Press, 2011).
Why have Indonesia, South Korea, the Philippines, and Thailand proven so recurrently vulnerable to political crises? In their new volume, Incomplete Democracy in the Asia-Pacific, Giovanna Dore, Jae Ku, and Karl Jackson cite the relative absence of participation between elections, the continued influence of traditional social structures, the incomplete emergence of civil society organizations, public opinions of democracy and authoritarian rule, and the persisting weaknesses of political parties. Their book shows how mass attitudes and behaviors enable continued elite control of these electoral democracies, and conclude that although there are substantial differences between them, the chronic problem of democracy in Asia has been the lack of mobilized public demand for good governance.
Karl D. Jackson directs Asian Studies at SAIS and heads its Southeast Asia Studies Program. He has served as the national security advisor to the US vice president, special assistant to the US president, senior director for Asia on the National Security Council, deputy assistant secretary of defense for East Asia and the Pacific, and senior advisor to the president of the World Bank. He was a professor of political science at the University of California, Berkeley (1972–1991). His degrees are from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (PhD) and Princeton University (BA).
Giovanna Maria Dora Dore is a fellow in the Asian Studies Program at SAIS. For over a decade, as a political economist in the World Bank Group, she has focused on economic change and institutional development in Asia. She has a PhD in Political Economy and Southeast Asia Studies and an MA from SAIS and a Laurea Magistralis in Philosophy and Contemporary History from the Catholic University of Milan.
Jae H. Ku directs the U.S.-Korea Institute at SAIS. He has taught courses at SAIS, Brown University, and Yonsei University, and Sookmyung Women’s University in Seoul. He has a PhD from SAIS, an MSc from the London School of Economics and Political Science, and a BA from Harvard University.
Seoul faces challenges that are not very different from other global cities, said Mayor Park Won Soon, the public figure who leads the South Korean city of over 10 million people, concluding that the key to solving them is by better engaging and empowering citizens.
“We tore down the silos,” said Park, speaking to a Stanford audience about his efforts to improve Seoul’s bureaucracy and access for citizens.
At McCaw Hall, Park discussed his background as a scholar, civic activist and philanthropist, emphasizing how it provides him perspective as a leader, and the acumen to think differently to address a wide range of issues affecting Seoul, including poverty, climate change and an aging population.
Park’s visit to Stanford University was sponsored by the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia Pacific Research Center (APARC) in the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. The event was part of the Asia-Pacific Leaders Forum, a seminar series that brings Asian leaders to Stanford to share their experiences. In 2013, the series hosted Ban-Ki Moon, U.N. Secretary General, and in 2009, then-South Korean assembly member, now president, Park Geun-hye.
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Gi-Wook Shin, director of Shorenstein APARC, introduced Mr. Park, referencing their connection and past projects to a crowd of nearly 275 people, including Korean community members and media.
“We’ve known each other as colleagues and friends for a number of years," Shin said, "so it is a pleasure to host Mayor Park, and hold a public forum to hear [his] vision."
Shin and Park established a fellowship for Korean NGO leaders, and awarded it to 30 leaders over three years.
Fighting for equality
As a university student in 1975, Park protested against South Korea’s government led by President Park Chung-hee, a military leader who ruled under highly authoritarian law. Mr. Park was imprisoned for his activism and eventually expelled from school, but his enthusiasm for justice and democracy never waned, he said.
He said the political and social chaos during those years in South Korea motivated him to pursue justice through other channels, going on to become a human rights lawyer and into public office as mayor in 2011.
South Korea gradually transitioned into a democracy in the 1980s, influenced in large part by many sweeping civil movements. The country has since stabilized, and now enjoys cultural and economic success in the world today.
Park speaks to the audience about governance, emphasizing the importance of communication.
But, there is a “shadow behind the miracle,” said Park, referring to the myriad of societal problems that Seoul still faces, like many cities dealing with the effects of urbanization.
He said the only way to identify and address problems is through a highly participatory system of governance, and one that isn’t afraid to think of new solutions to old problems.
“A city that constantly collaborates and innovates to improve the quality of life for citizens,” he said, those are the efforts that create an environment “where people live in harmony and where people are happy.”
Park said listening to the voices of Seoul citizens is a cornerstone of his administration’s approach. And he has a motto that matches.
“Citizens are the mayor,” is the saying that Park administration attempts to fulfill through a variety of initiatives, including those led by the Seoul Innovation Bureau, a new administrative branch established to bring fresh ideas into the city’s paradigm.
Park’s administration holds town hall meetings and uses some of the latest technology to initiate dialogue with citizens, including SNS text messaging, social media and Wikiseoul, an online blog-style platform, to communicate policies and receive feedback.
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Park says Seoul’s success is because of 10 million citizens and many institutions that have supported the city’s growth. He holds popular support in the city, and was recently reelected for a second mayoral term in June 2014, winning by a wide margin.
He said other countries are beginning to replicate his administration’s model, from e-governance activities to energy policy, calling it the “Seoul effect.”
Closing out the speech, Park said inclusiveness is the essence of good governance.
“If you want to travel fast go alone, but if you want to travel far, go together,” he said, citing a well-known proverb.
Below is the full video and transcript of his presentation.
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Park Won Soon, Mayor of Seoul, gives a speech at Stanford University.
In Indonesia on the day of this talk, for the first time ever in that country, a directly elected president will be inaugurated to replace his also directly elected predecessor. In the Philippines, in contrast, voters will go to the polls to elect their president on 9 May 2016 for the sixteenth time since 1935. But this comparison is far too narrow to sustain a comparison of democracy’s present quality and future durability in these two countries. Age could be a mere chronological achievement; a mature democracy could be moribund; and some argue that in both nations, overriding their different histories, crony capitalism continues to debilitate ostensibly accountable rule. In his own assessment of democracy’s roots, results, and prospects in Indonesia and the Philippines, Prof. Mendoza will address, inter alia, these questions: Which country is more democratic procedurally? Which country is more democratic substantively, in terms of governance and performance? And which country is more likely to remain democratic in times to come? His answer to each of these questions will also call for explanation: Why?
Amado M. Mendoza, Jr. is a prominent political economy and policy scholar in the Philippines. He was the lead investigator on the Philippines for the Global Integrity Report 2010. More recent activities have included directing a course on the political dimensions of national security at the National Defense College of the Philippines and writing an on-line column at Interaksyon.com analyzing Southeast Asian issues and developments. A piece in Iteraksyon on 6 October 2014, for example, highlighted tax compliance as a key requisite for improved governance in the Philippines. As an unwilling alumnus of the detention centers of the Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos in the 1970s, Prof. Mendoza has a personal interest in democracy as well.
As the new academic year gets underway, the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center’s Corporate Affiliates Program is excited to welcome its new class of fellows to Stanford University.
The 2014-15 fellows and their affiliations are listed below:
Liang Fang, China Sunrain Solar Energy Co., Ltd.
Wataru Fukuda, Shizuoka Prefectural Government
Zhao Han, PetroChina
Yoshihiro Kaga, Ministry of Economy, Trade & Industry, Japan
Tsuyoshi Koshikawa, Ministry of Finance, Japan
Jaigeun Lim, Seoul Metropolitan Government
Yun Bae Lim, Samsung LIfe Insurance
Feng Lin, ACON Biotechnology
Yasunori Matsui, Mitsubishi Electric
Tatsuru Nakajima, Sumitomo Corporation
Shingo Nakano, Ministry of Economy, Trade & Industry, Japan
Ryuichi Ohta, Japan Patent Office
Jong Soo Paek, Samsung Electronics
Rajeev Prasad, Reliance Life Sciences
Ryuichiro Takeshita, Asahi Shimbun
Ryo Wakabayashi, Sumitomo Corporation
Changbao Zhang, PetroChina
At Stanford, the fellows will audit classes, work on English language skills, and conduct individual research projects. At the end of the year, they will give formal presentations on their research findings. At the Center, they will have the opportunity to consult with Shorenstein APARC's scholars and attend events featuring visiting experts from around the world. The fellows will also participate in special events and site visits to gain a firsthand understanding of business, society and culture in the United States.
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The 2014-15 Corporate Affiliate Visiting Fellows stand on the front steps of Encina Hall.
The China Program’s "New Approaches to China" series features scholars and practitioners who are focused on policy-relevant research questions that offer a fresh examination of enduring themes in the study of contemporary China. These themes include the sustainability of China's growth model, resilience of the Chinese party-state, frictions in Chinese state-society relations, and China's evolving relationship with a dynamic region and global system.
The 3rd Plenum of the 18th Party Congress unveiled details of the reforms to come under Xi Jinping’s rule of China. But how significant are they? Are the proposed reforms sufficient to tackle the challenges that China faces? Can they be achieved? Are they contradictory? These questions are all the more pressing given Xi Jinping’s seemingly divergent policy directions in the economic and political realms.
The 'rise of China' has become the preoccupation of policymakers, academics, and business leaders from the United States and Japan to Europe. But as Bloomberg News argued in a recent editorial, "they should be more concerned about what happens if the country's growth falters." A China whose growth is slowing would mean a China with less capital to invest, at home and globally, and whose markets and economy would be less able to provide an engine of growth for others, close at hand in Asia and in North America and Europe.
The Stanford China Program, in cooperation with the Center for East Asian Studies, will host a special series of seminars to examine China as a major political and economic actor on the world stage. Over the course of the autumn and winter terms, leading scholars will examine China’s actions and policies in the new global political economy. What is China’s role in global governance? What is the state of China’s relations with its Asian neighbors? Is China being more assertive both diplomatically as well as militarily? Are economic interests shaping its foreign policies?
Co-sponsored by the Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law and the Southeast Asia Program
The recent reversal of democracy in Thailand has been rapid, dramatic, and increasingly thorough. Generals in civilian guise now manage the country. Their coup in May restored, in effect, a Cold War-era nexus of the military, the monarchy, and the bureaucracy. That trinity thwarted communism and enabled development but fell victim to its own success, as formerly marginalized Thais became vocal stakeholders seeking better lives. Democracy and growth spawned new wealth and new players, triggering sharp conflicts among elites competing for the first time for mass support. In the fading twilight of a gloried monarch, Thai politics before and since the 2014 coup amount to a long and no-longer latent endgame over the weighting and balancing of royalty, bureaucracy, and military, and the implications for democracy. Prof. Pongsudhirak will construe the contest and assess the stakes for Thailand, Southeast Asia, and the larger world.
Thitinan Pongsudhirak is an associate professor in Chulalongkorn University’s Faculty of Political Science. A prolific and prize-winning author, his latest writings include articles on Thai politics in the Journal of Democracy and on the Mekong region in Foreign Affairs. He taught at the University of Yangon earlier this year and has been a visiting scholar at, among other places, SAIS (2011) and Stanford (2010). His alma maters include the London School of Economics (PhD) and UC-Santa Barbara (BA).
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FSI-Stanford Humanities Center International Visiting Scholar
Thitinan Pongsudhirak is a high-profile expert on contemporary political,
economic, and foreign-policy issues in Thailand today He is also a
prolific author; witness his op ed, "Moving beyond Thaksin," in
the 25 February 2010Wall Street Journal.
Pongsudhirak is not senior in years, but he is in stature. His
career path has been meteoric since he earned his BA in political science
with distinction at UC-Santa Barbara not long ago. In 2001 he received
the United Kingdom's Best Dissertation Prize for his doctoral thesis at
the London School of Economics on the political economy of Thailand's
1997 economic crisis.
Since 2006 he has held an associate professorship in international
relations at Thailand's premier institution of higher education,
Chulalongkorn University, while simultaneously heading the Institute of
Security and International Studies, the country's leading think tank on
foreign affairs.
His many publications include: "After the Red Uprising," Far East
Economic Review, May 2009; "Why Thais Are Angry," The New York
Times, 18 April 2009; "Thailand Since the Coup," Journal of
Democracy, October-December 2008; and "Thaksin: Competitive
Authoritarian and Flawed Dissident," in Dissident Democrats: The
Challenge of Democratic Leadership in Asia, ed. John Kane et al.
(2008). He has written on bilateral free-trade areas in Asia,
co-authored a book on Thailand's trade policy, and is admired by
Southeast Asianist historians for having insightfully revisited, in a
2007 essay, the sensitive matter of Thailand's role during World War
II.
He was a Salzburg Global Seminar Faculty Member in June 2009, Japan
Foundation's Cultural Leader in 2008, and a Visiting Research Fellow at
the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies (Singapore) in 2005. For
ten years, in tandem with his academic career, he worked as an analyst
for The Economist's Intelligence Unit.
Director, Institute of Security and International Studies
Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok
Park speaks to the audience about governance, emphasizing the importance of communication.
Thitinan Pongsudhirak is an associate professor in Chulalongkorn University’s Faculty of Political Science. A prolific and prize-winning author, his latest writings include articles on Thai politics in the Journal of Democracy and on the Mekong region in Foreign Affairs. He taught at the University of Yangon earlier this year and has been a visiting scholar at, among other places, SAIS (2011) and Stanford (2010). His alma maters include the London School of Economics (PhD) and UC-Santa Barbara (BA).