2011-2012 USCI Events

September 27, 2011

Why Taiwan Matters: Small Island, Global Powerhouse

Shelley Rigger is Brown Professor of Political Science at Davidson College in North Carolina. She’s taught there since 1993. Rigger is a graduate of Princeton and Harvard and is one of the foremost experts on Taiwan. She’s the author of Politics in Taiwan: Voting for Democracy (1999) and From Opposition to Power: Taiwan's Democratic Progressive Party (2001), as well as monographs such as Taiwan’s Rising Rationalism: Generations, Politics and ‘Taiwanese Nationalism (2006) and many articles. 

October 6, 2011

North Korea: Following the Chinese Road?

U.S.-China Institute Senior Fellow Mike Chinoy shared his insights and pictures after returning from his fifteenth visit to North Korea. For a quarter century, Chinoy reported from Asia for CNN. He’s the author of China Live: People Power and the Television Revolution and Meltdown: The Inside Story of the North Korean Nuclear Crisis.

November 9, 2011

Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of China

Ezra Vogel is professor emeritus of sociology at Harvard University where he taught 1964-2000. He is one of the most influential scholars of East Asia, contributing vital books on China and Japan. His China-focused titles include Canton Under Communism (1969) and One Step Ahead in China: Guangdong Under Reform (1989). In addition to these seminal works, Vogel has edited a number of others, including Living with China : U.S./China Relations in the Twenty-First Century (1997). Professor Vogel is a member of the USC US-China Institute Board of Scholars.

November 17, 2011

“Harmonious Society” in Action: A Look at Two of the Tools the Chinese Communist Party is using to Mitigate Socio-economic Tensions

Derek Liu looked at what drives the provision of social welfare in China. He argued that the central authorities are able to use promotion as a mechanism to shape policy at the local level despite decentralization.

 Christina Chen examined how China’s government has responded to workers’ demands for higher wages and better working conditions. Chen’s work is informed by provincial-level data from the 1990s to today as well as interviews with officials in a number of locations.

January 20, 2012

Taiwan Election 2012: Outcomes and Implications for U.S.-Taiwan-China Ties

Incumbent Ma Ying-jeou of the Kuomintang was reelected president of Taiwan on Saturday, Jan. 14. A panel featuring specialists who observed the election and others who have long studied Taiwanese society and politics discussed how Ma was able to defeat of Tsai Ing-wen of the Democratic Progressive Party and why it matters for the people of Taiwan, for Taiwan-China relations, and for US-Taiwan-China ties.

January 26, 2012

Premiere Screening of Assignment: China – The Week that Changed the World

USCI produced a new documentary film, Assignment: China – The Week That Changed the World. The film contains remarkable and previously unreleased footage of the Nixon visit, interviews with Chinese officials, people who worked for Nixon, as well as many of the journalistic luminaries who accompanied the president. These include Dan Rather and Bernard Kalb of CBS, Ted Koppel and Tom Jarriel of ABC, Barbara Walters of NBC, Max Frankel of the New York Times, Stanley Karnow of the Washington Post, and many others.

February 2, 2012

Talking with Chinese about Press Freedom: The Play Top Secret in China

Co-written by Geoffrey Cowan and late journalism professor Leroy Aarons, Top Secret is an inside look at the New York Times and Washington Post's decision to publish a top-secret study documenting the United States' involvement in Vietnam. The play won the Corporation for Public Broadcasting's Gold Medal for Excellence in Best Live Entertainment. and in fall 2011 was performed in Beijing, Guangzhou, and Shanghai before packed auditoriums.

February 22, 2012

Designated Drivers: State Capitalism in China’s Auto Industry

China's unprecedented level of growth over the past three decades, combined with a financial crisis in the West, have led many to question whether free-market capitalism is the better system for generating sustainable economic growth. G.E. Anderson’s in-depth look at industrial development in China’s auto industry revealed not only how China surpassed the U.S. to become the world’s largest market for autos, but also political principles that have shaped China’s approach to industrial planning in general.

March 2, 2012

A Conversation with Ambassador Jason Yuan

Upon his election in 2008, President Ma Ying-jeou dispatched Jason Yuan to represent Taiwan in Washington, D.C. Ma has just been reelected and in many respects Taiwan's relations with both the United States and China are stable and healthy, but problems remain. Jason Yuan is one of Taiwan's most senior diplomats and discussed U.S.-Taiwan ties and cross-strait relations.

April 3, 2012

Housing Matters: Resident Protesters in Urban China

Housing reform has been at the core of China’s market economy and its success. Large scale demolition and relocation in urban China has visibly improved the lives of millions but also left hidden human wreckage at its wake. Domicide, violence, corruption, and arbitrary compensation have led to heightened housing dispute and persistent residents protest throughout Chinese cities in the past three decades. Exploring what else was demolished along with old neighborhoods and what else, other than highrises, has risen at their ruins, Shao examined urban protesters and their evolving  identities.

April 17, 2012

Covering China: A Conversation with Rob Schmitz

China's economic rise is one of the most dramatic and complex stories of our time. Reporting on the rapid and sweeping changes underway in there and what those changes mean for the Chinese and everybody else is a great challenge. Rob Schmitz of Marketplace helped us understand a wide range of stories from currency debates and stimulus spending to inflation worries and how families seek to prepare their children to compete in the global economy. In March he generated a lot of discussion by reporting that a widely heard and discussed report about conditions at FoxConn factories turning out Apple and other products had been fabricated. His report led to an unprecedented retraction of Mike Daisey’s story by This American Life.

2012-2013 Events

2010-2011 Events/Documentary Series

2009-2010 Events/Documentary Series

USCI also organizes programs for K-12 educators. Proceed to the K-12 Curriculum section of our website for more information.