Stanford University

Environment

FSI scholars approach their research on the environment from regulatory, economic and societal angles. The Center on Food Security and the Environment weighs the connection between climate change and agriculture; the impact of biofuel expansion on land and food supply; how to increase crop yields without expanding agricultural lands; and the trends in aquaculture. FSE’s research spans the globe – from the potential of smallholder irrigation to reduce hunger and improve development in sub-Saharan Africa to the devastation of drought on Iowa farms. David Lobell, a senior fellow at FSI and a recipient of a MacArthur “genius” grant, has looked at the impacts of increasing wheat and corn crops in Africa, South Asia, Mexico and the United States; and has studied the effects of extreme heat on the world’s staple crops.

Hideichi Okada

Shorenstein APARC
Encina Hall E317
616 Serra Street
Stanford, CA 94305-6055

(650) 725-2375 (650) 213-6374 (650) 723-6530
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Sasakawa Peace Fellow
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Hideichi Okada joins the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (Shorenstein APARC) from September, 2013 until March, 2014 as Sasakawa Peace Fellow with the Japan Studies Program (JSP).

His research interests encompass energy policies and trade policies in the context of possible cooperation between Japan and the U.S. During his time at Shorenstein APARC, Okada will be working to launch New Dialogue Program for future cooperation on various areas between Japan and the U.S., and other Asia Pacific countries.

Okada served as Vice Minister for International Affairs, Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) from 2010 to 2012, where he promoted international trade and investment, and expanded industrial cooperation with various countries. He also served as Director General of Trade Policy Bureau (2008-2010) and Director General of Commerce and Information Policy Bureau of METI (2007-2008). He worked for Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi as his executive assistant, where he dealt with policies on economy, industry, energy, science and technology, and environment, and with public relations (2001-2006). He was a professor at GRIPS (2006-2007) and a visiting scholar at Harvard Law School and IR/PS, University of California, San Diego in 2007.

Okada was born in Tokyo in 1951. He received LL.M. degree from Harvard Law School (1981) and graduated from the University of Tokyo with a LL.B. (1976). Currently, he is Senior Adviser, NTT Data Institute of Management and Consulting.

The Trans-Pacific Partnership and Taiwan's Future Development Strategy

Abstract:

On October 11 and 12th, the Democracy in Taiwan Project at the Center for Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law, in cooperation with the Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center, will hold its 8th annual conference, on the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). The TPP is a free trade agreement currently being negotiated by at least nine Pacific Rim countries that has the potential to re-shape economic relations in the region for the coming decades. This conference will bring together policymakers and scholars from Taiwan with leading specialists from other Asian countries and the U.S. to examine the evolution, geopolitics and future of the TPP, and also to consider how Taiwan is responding to the challenge of freer trade and what its strategy for deepening its trade relations and maintaining its economic development should be.

 

Among the issues to be addressed are:

  • How the economic and trading environment of East Asia is evolving, and what Taiwan’s future place will be in that regional environment.
  • The development of the Trans-Pacific Partnership as a potentially far-reaching new economic and strategic framework for the region, including the origins and evolution of the TPP, US participation and China’s response, and the implications for the balance of power in East Asia.
  • Taiwan’s response to the challenge of freer trade to date, including the impact on US-Taiwan relations and domestic constituencies for free trade in Taiwan.
  • The perspectives of other key countries in the region toward the TPP, including Japan, Korea, Singapore, and the People’s Republic of China.

This event is co-sponsored by The Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center

 

Conference Resources

 

Agenda

Speaker Bios

Presentations

Conference Papers

Conference Report (full report, abridged report)

 

 

Conferences

Jun Lu

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

(650) 726-0977 (650) 862-7897 (650) 723-6530
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Visiting Professor
LU,_Jun_1_3x4.jpg MA, PhD

LU Jun joins the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center during the 2013-2014 academic year from the School of Government of Peking University where he serves as a full professor.

His research interests include urban and regional economics in China; international comparative studies of the spatial distribution of local public goods; and the developmental trends of local public finance. During his time at Shorenstein APARC, Lu Jun will do a comparative research between USA and China of how to eliminate the spatial mismatch effect of local public goods in the metropolitan area. In the meantime, he will collect valuable research materials for his forthcoming textbook of Local Government Economics.

Lu is director of Urban and Regional Management Department of School of Government, Peking University, vice director of Center for Chinese Urban and Regional Study and research fellow of Institute of Capital Development of Peking University. He is the anonymous referee of publication of Comparative Economic & Social Systems, European Studies and World Economics in China.

Other authored books by Lu include The Evolution of Urban External Space and Regional Economy（2002), Fiscal and Financial Policy Instruments in Regional development (2004). He is also the first author of Tax Competition and Regional Urbanization – An Example of Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei Province（2010）and Transformation & Redevelopment of Old Urban Industrial Areas（2011), Study on World cities（2011), and co-author of Spatial Agglomeration of Manufacturing Industry in Beijing Metropolitan Area（2011).

Lu Jun holds a PHD in Urban Economics from Nankai University and an MA in Real Estate Economics from Capital University of Economics and Business, and a postdoctoral researcher of the department of Urban and Environmental Sciences at Peking University.

Chunquan Liu

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Corporate Affiliate Visiting Fellow
Chunquan_Liu.jpg MBA

Chunquan Liu is a corporate affiliate visiting fellow with the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (Shorenstein APARC) for 2013-14.  He has over 20 years of work experience in China's energy industry.  In 2005, he established the Beijing Petrochemical Engineering Company (BPEC), which later became part of the Yanchang Petroleum Group Company (YCPC) in 2010.   As the engineering and technology subsidiary of YCPC, BPEC plays an important role in the group's strategic plan, new technology development and innovation, engineering design, and project mangement.  Currently, he serves as the CEO of BPEC.

While at Shorenstein APARC, Liu will research 1) international advanced technology, know-how and best practices; 2) how to find the right solution integrated with heavy oil, coal and gas suitable for China's energy structure and situation; and 3) how to make the significant improvement on the energy efficiency and emission reduction.

Liu received his bachelor's degree from China Petroleum University, his master's degree (EMBA) from Peking University and his master's degree in environmental technology from Tsinghua University.

Guangmu Liu

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Corporate Affiliate Visiting Fellow, 2013-14
Guangmu_Liu.jpg MS

Guangmu Liu is a corporate affiliate visiting fellow at the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (Shorenstein APARC) for 2013-14.  He has worked at BoHai Drilling Company (BHDC), a subsidiary company of China National Petroleum Company (CNPC) for 22 years.  His positions included the vice manager of the second drilling company and general manager of the number one drilling company, and most recently, he was responsible for the overseas market.  Currently, he serves as the assistant president of BHDC.  Liu received his bachelor's degree from the University of Geology of Chengdu and his master's degree in the oil and gas field from JiangHan Petroleum University.

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

Paragraphs

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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Publication Type
Working Papers
Publication Date
Journal Publisher
Asia Health Policy Program working paper # 36
Authors

Great Games: Chinese Relations with South and Central Asia

China and the World

This multiyear project, coordinated by Thomas Fingar, Oksenberg-Rohlen Distinguished Fellow, at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies at Stanford University, looks sequentially and systematically at China’s interactions with countries in all regions and across many issue areas. The project seeks to clarify China’s objectives and policies to achieve them, but it also seeks to identify and explain the goals and policy calculations of other countries that see opportunities and perils associated with China’s greater activism on the world stage.

Phase one of the project examined China’s engagement with Japan, the Republic of Korea (ROK), and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. Scholars and foreign policy practitioners from China, Japan, the ROK, Russia, and the United Stated discussed these questions at a two-day workshop in Beijing in March 2012. Participants from several Southeast Asian countries also attended the workshop to ensure that questions explored were broad enough to facilitate comparisons and the search for patterns and learning across issues and areas at the follow-on regional workshop held in Singapore in November 2012.

The Singapore workshop, phase 2, discussed China's objectives and policies with respect to Southeast Asia, but focused primarily on the ways in which China's approach and actions are perceived by individual countries in the region and what regional countries seek to achieve with respect to China. Implicit in some of the presentations was the notion that China was trying to restore its traditional primacy in the region and to prevent any country inside or outside of Southeast Asia from exercising greater regional influence. Other participants emphasized material goals, including access to resources, markets for Chinese goods, and fostering economic dependence on China. Participants agreed that China's influence and impact are large and growing, and that states in the region are pursuing different strategies to advance their own interests and maximize their own freedom of action.

The third workshop, to be held at Stanford University on June 20-21, 2013, will examine China’s relationship with South and Central Asia. While there is a focus on the bilateral relationship between China and India, the largest and most powerful regional actor, the conference will also look at other key bilateral relationships, such as with Pakistan, and at interactions on a regional level, including in the economic sphere. The workshop will explore the management of cross border issues such as migration flows, water, and energy resource development. The sessions on Central Asia will offer broader understanding of China’s intersection with other powers such as Russia and India in that region.

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Bechtel Conference Center

Conferences

The LDP’s Historic Comeback in the 2012 Japanese Election

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Please note date change to June 6

On December 16, 2012, Japan’s Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), which was swept from power in 2009 by the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) after more than half a century of dominance, roared back with a landslide of its own. Entering the election with only 118 of 480 seats in the House of Representatives, the lower house of the National Diet, the LDP emerged with a whopping 294 seats, more than a third of them captured by first-time candidates. Moreover, the LDP and its long-time coalition partner, the Komeito, jointly surpassed the two-thirds threshold needed to override vetoes from the upper house, the House of Councillors, where the coalition lacks a majority—at least until the upper house election this July. The incumbent DPJ, which had taken power with an even more impressive 308 seats in 2009, retained just 57 seats this time, barely managing second place after three difficult years in government.

How did the LDP do it? In this presentation, Smith will highlight the key findings of two chapters on the LDP’s candidate selection and election results from the forthcoming volume, Japan Decides 2012 (Palgrave Macmillan, 2013), edited by Robert Pekkanen, Steven R. Reed, and Ethan Scheiner.

 

Philippines Conference Room

Daniel M. Smith

Walter H. Shorenstein
Asia-Pacific Research Center
Encina Hall, Room C331
616 Serra St.
Stanford, CA 94305-6055

(650) 724-5656 (650) 723-6530
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Shorenstein Postdoctoral Fellow
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Daniel M. Smith was a postdoctoral fellow at the Walter H. Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (Shorenstein APARC) during the 2012–13 academic year.

He is an expert on Japanese politics whose research interests include political parties, elections and electoral systems, candidate recruitment and selection, and coalition government. During his time at Shorenstein APARC, he will be completing a book manuscript about the causes and consequences of political dynasties in developed democracies, with a particular focus on Japan.

Smith earned his PhD and MA in political science from the University of California, San Diego, and his BA in political science and Italian from the University of California, Los Angeles. He has conducted research in Japan as a Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology research scholar at Chuo University (2006–2007), and as a Fulbright IIE dissertation research fellow at the Institute of Social Science at the University of Tokyo (2010–2011). After completing his fellowship at Shorenstein APARC, he will join the Department of Government at Harvard University as an assistant professor.

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Daniel M. Smith Shorenstein Postdoctoral Fellow, Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center Speaker Stanford University
Seminars

Research Presentations (4 of 5) - Deshpande, Masuda, Shi

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In this session of the Shorenstein APARC Corporate Affiliate Visiting Fellows Research Presentations, the following will be presented:

 

Sanat Deshpande, "Best Practices in Pharmaceutical Supply Chain Management"

The pharmaceutical supply chain is very complex and highly responsible to ensure that the right drug reaches the right person at the right time in the right condition to meet the medical needs to fight against disease.  Anything less than 100% service level is unacceptable.  The pharmaceutical industry is facing a series of challenges such as counterfeiting and cold chain management.  In addition to these challenges, developed countries like the United States are also dealing with the patent cliff and healthcare reforms.  There is a growing oversight by the regulatory authorities across the world to ensure patient safety when it comes to pharmaceuticals.  In his presentation, Deshpande will discuss the growth of the pharmaceutical industry focusing on the challenges faced by the supply chain and key areas where companies can improve for the future.

 

Ryo Masuda, "What Can the Cable TV Industry Learn from the Strengths of Over-The-Top Providers"

One of the biggest concerns for the cable TV (CATV) industry in the United States has been the competition with Over-the-Top providers (OTT).  OTT providers like Netflix and Hulu have been successful in penetrating its service in recent years by providing customers with TV content over the internet for a cheaper monthly flat rate.  Masuda has analyzed the current fundamental differences in service strategies of CATV and OTT providers and their customer behavior. In his research presentation, Masuda tries to answer the question – “Can the CATV industry really compete with OTT providers and what can we learn from those strengths to develop services in the future?” 

 

Wei Shi, "A Comparison Between the U.S. and China's Credit Card Markets - The Englightenment to the Development of ICBC's Credit Card Business"

Based on a statement of the basic information of China’s credit card market development and a comparison to that of the United States, Shi has researched the main problems that China’s credit card industry currently faces.  He has focused especially on the case for the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC) by studying market conditions, credit environment, management risks, and regulatory policy, as well as the reasons and causes of these conditions.  Based on his findings, Shi proposes suggested solutions that will help to further develop the credit card business at ICBC. 

Philippines Conference Room

Sanat Deshpande Speaker Reliance Life Sciences
Ryo Masuda Speaker Sumitomo Corporation
Wei Shi Speaker Industrial and Commercial Bank of China
Seminars
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