Podcasts about macropolo

 AI is all the rage right now. There are billions of dollars now flowing into the space, with large and small companies all competing to create the next big thing. But in addition to lots of money, building new AI models requires top-tier researchers. So, who's attracting the best? And what does it take to be considered top talent in AI anyway? On this episode we speak with Damien Ma, managing director at MacroPolo, the in-house think tank of the Paulson Institute. Damien helps put together MacroPolo's Global AI Talent Tracker, which monitors the flow of top-tier AI researchers around the world. We discuss who's winning the AI talent war so far, the purported talent drain in China, competition from India, and much more.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

China has surpassed the United States as a leading producer of artificial intelligence (AI) talent, producing almost half of the world's top AI researchers, according to a study by think tank MacroPolo. This marks a significant shift from three years ago when China produced about one-third of the top AI talent. The research highlights the importance of attracting and retaining global talent to maintain the U.S.'s leadership in AI. China's success in nurturing AI talent is attributed to its heavy investment in AI education, although its programs are not heavily focused on the generative AI technology dominating the U.S. AI industry. Policymakers face the challenge of countering Chinese espionage while fostering the flow of top Chinese computer engineers into the U.S. --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tonyphoang/message

This week on Sinica, a live recording from October 10 in Chicago, Kaiser asks Chang-Tai Hsieh of the Booth School of Business at the University of Chicago, Damien Ma of the Paulson Institute's think tank MacroPolo, and our own Lizzi Lee, host of The Signal with Lizzi Lee, to right-size the peril that the Chinese economy now faces from slow consumer demand, high youth unemployment, a troubled real estate sector, and high levels of local government debt. This event was co-sponsored by the University of Chicago's Becker-Friedman Institute, the Paulson Institute, and The China Project. 06:32 – What is the current state of the Chinese economy?11:14 – The origins of China's crisis in comparison to crises from 1990 in Japan and 2008 in the U.S.14:25 – Real estate sector's role in the crisis and possible solutions22:51 – The significance of able management during times of crisis. Is this a crisis of confidence or expectations?29:34 – The question of the general direction of the Chinese economy 43:33 – What does an actual debt crisis look like in China?48:00 – The right U.S. policy towards China in light of current affairsThe complete transcript of the show is now in the main podcast page for the episode!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

In this episode of the ChinaPower Podcast, we are joined by Ilaria Mazzocco to discuss China's booming automotive industry. Ilaria explains that the Chinese government's support for the industry plays a big role in its rapid developments. She also unpacks the growing popularity of Chinese-manufactured vehicles and Chinese car brands. Finally, Ilaria highlights the need for the United States and the European Commission to provide incentives for their companies to be more innovative to compete with the Chinese auto industry. Dr. Ilaria Mazzocco is a senior fellow with the Trustee Chair in Chinese Business and Economics at CSIS. Prior to joining CSIS, she was a senior research associate at the Paulson Institute, where she led research on Chinese climate and energy policy for Macropolo, the institute's think tank. She holds a PhD from the John Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), where her dissertation investigated Chinese industrial policy by focusing on electric vehicle promotion efforts and the role of local governments.

This week on Sinica, our friends at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs invited us for a live show taping before a small group. Kaiser is joined by Lizzi Lee, MIT-trained economist-turned-reporter who hosts the Chinese-language show "Wall Street Today" as well as The China Project's "Live with Lizzi Lee," both on Youtube; and by Damien Ma, who heads the Paulson Institute's in-house think tank MacroPolo. These two top-shelf analysts of Chinese politics break down what was important — and what was just a sideshow — at the 20th Party Congress, and offer their knowledgeable perspectives on the individuals named to key posts and what this likely means for China's direction. Don't miss this one!2:40 – Findings from MacroPolo's “fantasy PBSC” experiment 8:18 – Did China watchers overemphasize Xi Jinping's political constraints? 12:31 – Support for Li Qiang across different political factions17:23 – The changing factional composition of Chinese elite politics20:20 – Return of the technocrats23:27 – “Generation-skipping” in China's recent political promotions28:26 – The selection of Cai Qi32:46 – Li Shulei as a successor to Wang Huning 37:07 – The future of China's economic leadership39:52 – Selection of the vice premiers 41:18 – The future of China's diplomatic core45:28 – The Hu Jintao episode49:22 – Revising the “Zero-COVID” policy51:17 – Reassessing China's intentions vis-à-vis Taiwan A transcript of this podcast is available at TheChinaProject.com.Recommendations: Lizzi: Prestige, Manipulation, and Coercion: Elite Power Struggles in the Soviet Union and China after Stalin and Mao by Joseph TorigianDamien: Slouching Towards Utopia by Brad DeLongKaiser: "Taiwan, the World-Class Puzzle," a Radio Open Source podcast hosted by Christopher LydonSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

China's economy has grown faster than any other over the last 40 years — but there are troubling signs ahead. How could a Chinese economic downturn affect people in the rest of the world? Houze Song, a fellow at MacroPolo who specializes in the Chinese economy, explains how slowing economic growth, an aging society, and a looming property crisis have implications not just for China, but for the United States and beyond. (Click here for a full transcript of this podcast) 1:17 What is the general trend of China's economic outlook? 2:21 What indicators measure the health of China's economy? 3:37 What are the challenges facing China's economy? 7:25 How will a slowing Chinese economy affect the United States? About the speaker: https://www.ncuscr.org/podcast/chinas-slowing-economy/ Follow Houze Song on Twitter: @hzong Subscribe to the National Committee on YouTube for video of this interview. Follow us on Twitter (@ncuscr) and Instagram (@ncuscr). Visit our website for more U.S.-China Insights: https://www.ncuscr.org/us-china-insights

MineralPolitik: REEs, If the Price is Right— Aditya PareekThe global contention for securing Rare Earth Elements(REE) supply chains is in full swing. Since the COVID-19 pandemic began, three countries have primarily been the movers and shakers of the REE world, the current market hegemon China, Australia, and the US. This is directly consequential to India’s national interests, as China is its strategic adversary, and the US and Australia are its Quad allies willing to cooperate with New Delhi to counter China. However, apart from a Competition Commission of India(CCI) probe into India’s state-owned India Rare Earths Limited(IREL) for abuse of “its dominant position”,  “by indulging in prohibitive increase in the sillimanite prices”, there has been little movement or development in India’s own REEs sector. ChinaChina has moved to centralise and consolidate a major chunk of its heavy REE industry under one state-controlled and supervised company, China Rare Earth Group. As this briefing by renowned business consultancy, Dezan Shira & Associates says, The new conglomerate will make up 62 per cent of China’s national heavy rare earth production.The move is meant to ensure China’s effective control on the pricing of key heavy REEs “such as dysprosium and terbium”, this will have consequences for the worldwide pricing of these heavy REEs and their supply chains.The prohibition of  “foreign investments in exploration, mining, and beneficiation of rare earth, radioactive minerals, and tungsten”, under broader state-issued negative lists. Contrary to the Hainan Free Trade Port negative list, which says no restrictions on foreign investment will be applicable in the REE sector.Another consolidated conglomerate with light REE producers and processing companies in China may be constituted soon for similar reasons of controlling the price of REEs.Consistent with the picture painted by Dezan Shira & Associates, this report in Bloomberg talks of a meeting between China’s automakers, electronics producers and the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. The meeting was reportedly aimed at discussing measures to bring down the surging prices of REEs, which is leading to higher production costs and affecting several key high tech industries.It is also interesting to note that the Laotian Ministry of Plans and Development has been warm to China’s Tong Lee Seung Industrial Development Company exploring REEs on Laotian territory. To make matters a little complicated, this Radio Free Asia report talks about the possible uprooting of villagers from the Laotian land in question.  AustraliaAmong the Quad countries, Australia has emerged as the most proactive threat to China’s REEs sector dominance. The much talked about Lynas Rare Earths Ltd has seen record profits and revenue, which, according to this Reuters report is due to strong demand for Electric Vehicles(EV). Lynas was the recipient of much Australian government aid and investment recently, and the growth in its revenue and business is a positive development. According to this FT report, Australia is looking to repeat this success with another company called Hastings Technology Metals which has set up a mine called Yangibana REEs mine in Western Australia’s Gascoyne region. The Australian government will provide “A$140mn (US$100mn)” of the total A$400mn( approx. US$ 286mn) borrowed capital needed for the project. As the FT article says, If all falls in place, It is likely that Hastings can become the second-largest exporter of Australian REEs. Hastings can potentially supply as much as “8 per cent of global demand for neodymium and praseodymium”, which are critical REEs used in manufacturing high-efficiency magnets for industrial and defence applications, among others.The REEs supplied by Hastings will primarily go to the European auto industry, including vendors like Thyssenkrupp(which also makes naval submarines and warships under its HDW subsidiary). Australia can capture as much as 30% of the total REEs market globally in the future. This is in contrast to China’s existing control of 70-90%(according to varying estimates) of the worldwide REEs market.USA new bill has been introduced in the US Senate, sponsored by Republican Sen. Tom Cotton and Democrat Sen. Mark Kelly, aimed at breaking China’s vice on the global REEs supply chain. Called the “Restoring Essential Energy and Security Holdings Onshore for Rare Earths (REEShore) Act”, it seeks to stop the use of Chinese REEs in US Department of Defence supplies. Under the bill, US Defence contractors will be required to source their REEs from elsewhere within a 4-year time frame(by 2026), with waivers applicable only in special cases. The waivers will only be allowed if REEs of the required “quantity and quality are not available at reasonable prices from sources outside of” China, and if “such a waiver is in the interests of national security”.The manufacturers of weapons supplied to the US Department of Defence will be required to declare where the REEs used in their products were sourced from.The US would need to establish a strategic REEs and REE products reserve that can support them even in case of a supply chain disruption for over a year.The US will investigate China’s policies and practices in the REEs sector and if any sanctions by the US for any transgressions are required.The US would encourage the production and use of REEs sourced domestically and from its allies instead of adversaries like China.CyberPolitik: Moving ahead on deep synthesis tech regulation— Sapni G K2022 started with interesting developments on the technology regulation front. As discussed in the previous edition of this Newsletter, China’s regulatory experiments on emerging technology are underway in full swing. This week we have more information and analysis on further tech regulation experiments from China. The Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) released the draft Provisions on the Administration of Deep Synthesis Internet Information Services last week. These draft regulations cover a broad range of technologies that use deep synthesis, which is defined as the use of technologies using generative sequencing algorithms to make text, images, audio, video, virtual scenes, or other information, as represented by deep learning and virtual reality. Media coverage of the same appears to place more emphasis on deepfakes, which is only one amongst the many use cases of deep synthesis technologies. The provisions envision regulation as a mix of increased self-regulation alongside state supervision. Unlike other laws and drafts published recently, this draft misses a lot of granularity in the approach towards institutional capacity on regulation. It provides for contentious and controversial provisions such as real-name identity verification for users of deep synthesis services. Interestingly, this might be one of the first pieces of regulation that may have been drafted with the metaverse in mind, as the draft points to Virtual Reality as a field of application. The lack of free rein to experiment in a space where American companies have a demonstrated advantage could result in displeasure from Chinese Tech giants. This could also have interesting consequences in the application of deep synthesis technologies in military tech, as my colleague Megha wrote here. The presumed leaders of developing global norms on regulation have been slow in catching up against such technologies. Law and regulation have historically trailed miles behind technology. It is fascinating to see changes in this dynamic. However, caution must be exercised in replicating such exercises. Multitudes of emerging technology essentially expand the horizon of expression. Deepfakes have been famously used as media of criticism, parody, and sarcasm. It is not to discredit the harms that have been perpetrated through the use of deep synthesis technology – notoriously the cases of revenge porn and financial crimes. Clearly, the line between regulation and censorship is thin. This draft also reflects the continued trend of China's heightened attempts to regulate cyberspace under the guise of preventing the propagation of false information in the interest of national security and social stability. It can only be hoped that the Chinese population and their freedoms are not sacrificed for these regulatory experiments.Matsyanyaaya: A Four-Point Action Plan for Quantum Technologies (An edited version of this article came out in the Hindustan Times on January 15th, 2022)— Arjun GargeyasIn the 2020 Budget speech, finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced the National Mission for Quantum Technologies and Applications (NM-QTA) with a total outlay of ₹8000 crores over five years for strengthening the quantum industry in the country. A Lok Sabha question posed in July 2021 enquired about the status and progress of the mission. In response, the Minister of State for Science and Technology, Jitendra Singh, mentioned that the mission had not yet received approval. Singh also announced that no funds were allocated, disbursed, or utilised under NM-QTA during the financial year 2020-21.With no credible advancements made by the government, there is a need to rethink how the proposed NM-QTA will evolve if India plans to harness the benefits of quantum technology. The focus should be to develop an overarching strategy for the next 10-15 years.  Adequate attention to those who can contribute to developing quantum technology must be the government’s top priority. In the current scenario, our view is that the government must follow a four-fold path to build a robust quantum ecosystem in the country.First, the primary focus must be on establishing centres of excellence dedicated to quantum science and technology within academic institutions as well as government research institutes. Quantum technology remains a field highly concentrated in long-term research and development (R&D). Even the famed quantum industry of China started in a university laboratory, led by Pan Jianwei at the University of Science and Technology of China in 2008. In 2022, China boasts of developing the world’s first quantum satellite, creating a quantum communication line between Beijing and Shanghai, and owning two of the world’s fastest quantum computers. This was the result of a decade of research carried out in the hope of achieving critical breakthroughs. Hence, a majority of the Indian government’s outlay has to be pumped into institutions specialising in quantum R&D.Second, the establishment of “quantum innovation hubs” in partnership with selected state governments can help direct investments efficiently and build a well-connected quantum research network in the country.  These hubs, set up with the help of government resources, can serve as centres of collaboration between academia and the private sector. Finally, it is the responsibility of both the union and state governments to establish a conducive fiscal and legal environment to foster innovation. This can potentially attract international firms to conduct their research in the country while involving local talent.Third, the power of startups and large corporations, like Google, Microsoft and IBM, involved in developing quantum technology and applications must be harnessed. The government must recognise the leaps made by these companies. While academic institutions are largely involved on the research side, quantum tech corporations and startups are vital in converting and commercialising this research into products that can be of use. The government must facilitate connections between academic institutions and industry to translate research into real-world applications.Finally, the necessity of international cooperation cannot be ignored. The quantum value chain remains highly complicated, and it will be hard for India to remain self-reliant to build a successful quantum ecosystem. The first step could be for the government to engage with its allies in key groupings such as Quad and BRICS. Technology alliances are gaining traction, and India must look at signing some bilateral or multilateral agreements to leverage others’ growth in the domain. This is imperative for India to win critical technology transfer deals, get external technical advice or mentoring, and establish state-of-the-art facilities for joint R&D on quantum technologies.The government has taken the first step by acknowledging the importance of quantum technologies through its plan of kick-starting a national mission in the country. The global quantum industry has already taken incredible strides and seen massive investments made by both governments and the private sector in recent years. India, which has fallen behind other technologically advanced states in the field of quantum technology, cannot afford to miss the bus this time.Read the full discussion document on ‘Building India’s Quantum Ecosystem’ published by The Takshashila Institution.Matsyanyaaya: Pardesi, Pardesi, Aana Nahin! — Pranay Kotasthane (@pranaykotas)Over the last few weeks, a few reports suggest that Technopolitik has intensified in another critical dimension: cross-border movement of high-tech human capital.Nikkei reported that South Korea intends to keep a close tab on the movement of chip engineers across its borders. The purported objective is to discourage Chinese companies from poaching engineers and prevent tech leaks.In January, SCMP reported that Australia and Japan now require foreign students enrolled in "sensitive" science and technology subjects to hand over detailed background data. Of course, the primary motivation, in this case, is again China.These actions follow related developments in the US. In the first week of the year, a Chinese national pleaded guilty to stealing trade secrets from Monsanto and transferring it to the Chinese government. There was also a rather embarrassing case against an MIT professor of Chinese descent, alleging that he had failed to disclose his affiliation with Chinese institutions. The US government subsequently dropped the case.All these incidents point towards a significant shift in technology geopolitics. As some technology areas get labelled as "critical" or "strategic", movements of professionals and international tie-ups involving China will be scrutinised closely. In other words, human capital movement restrictions will be the next frontier in pursuit of high-tech self-sufficiency.The movement of human capital is an underrated aspect of technology geopolitics. It is a force multiplier in high-tech research and is perceived as such by nation-states. This is especially true in today's high-tech areas where international collaborations are easy, efficient, and effective. For instance, MacroPolo, a think tank, notes that over half of all top-tier AI researchers are immigrants or foreign nationals working in another country.The host and source countries both benefit due to a dense comingling of researchers. While the benefits for the host country are obvious, the source country benefits over a longer-term — through connections to a better research ecosystem, by way of returning immigrants, or in rare cases, through blatant economic espionage.China's attempt at tech self-sufficiency through talent transfer has three independent aspects. First, the party-state has tried to use industrial espionage for strategic advantage. Second, attracting human capital is seen as a legitimate path to indigenisation. Talent poaching may sound evil but is a fair strategy to build a local ecosystem by attracting talent from outside, in the hope that their prior knowledge will accelerate homegrown efforts. Third, there has been an organic movement of Chinese researchers back home with better living conditions and opportunities — outcomes of robust economic growth for nearly three decades.It is tough to estimate which of the three aspects have contributed more to China's rapid strides in gaining high-tech expertise. Regardless, as a whole range of technologies gets labelled as “strategic”, the first of the three aspects will gain narrative dominance, leading to stricter controls on tech transfer and people movement.Such moves will have significant costs to both China and the host countries. But once technologies start getting defined in national security terms, cost-benefit calculations fall aside. While other countries might suffer costs, they are likely to go ahead and put barriers to the movement of people into China. To be sure, China has invited these moves onto itself because of its geopolitical conduct.The mileage of restricting human capital movement may vary widely. For instance, nearly 10 per cent of Australia's university students are Chinese. For the government to align interests and develop the capacity to effectively screen them all is going to be a gargantuan task. Similarly, the flow of technology ideas and professionals from China into the US is too large to restrict.Ultimately, the second-order effects at the level of international collaborations might be more significant. Scientists from these countries are likely to reduce collaborations with their Chinese counterparts, fearing government restrictions on funding and higher scrutiny on outputs.This augurs well for India and Indians though. The China sized gap in students and researchers can only be filled by one other country. We will keep a close eye on this dimension of Technopolitik.Our Reading Menu[Opinion] US hawks and Chinese communists agree: no rare earths for Pentagon by Alex Lo[Column] The Future Of EVs Depend On Rare Earths. Should The US Still Delegate To China? by Ken Silverstein[Opinion] Rare Earths: Fighting for the Fuel of the Future by y Brendan P. Dziama, Juan Manuel Chomón Pérez, and Andreas Ganser[Article] How Quantum Tech Could Upend Global Power Structures by Taylor Owen[Report] Is seeing still believing? The deepfake challenge to truth in politics by William A. Galston This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit hightechir.substack.com

This week on Sinica, Kaiser chats with Damien Ma, managing director and co-founder of the Paulson Institute's think-tank, MacroPolo. Damien discusses MacroPolo's new forecast of the property market in China and the likely impact of the predicted contraction of that market. Damien also offers advice on what smart China-watchers will be keeping their eyes on in the coming, highly political year in China in the leadup to the 20th Party Congress. And he shares the amusing story of what happened the evening after he last appeared on Sinica way back when.2:58 – Damien recalls how he nearly led Sinica's interns to their doom one fateful night in 20147:23 – MacroPolo's forecast of the property market through 202516:28 – How will local governments fund themselves without land sales?20:11 – Damien's take on Xi Jinping's "common prosperity" agenda28:53 – Understanding China today through the lens of scarcity30:49 – Tips for watching developments in China in this political year40:00 – Cool stuff from MacroPoloA transcript of this conversation is available on SupChina.com.Recommendations:Damien: Derek Thompson, "America is Running on Fumes," in The Atlantic.Kaiser: Peter Jackson's epic Beatles documentary Get Back on Disney+See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

The topic: Producing any podcast series is a journey featuring plenty of twists and turns. And producing a series on U.S.-China relations can be especially challenging considering such a vast intertwined history to be addressed, on top of all the modern divergent views, outright disputes, and key players. As we near the end of our own podcast series, “Searching for Common Ground,” Professor David Skidmore and I thought it made sense to compare notes with another duo who recently published their own U.S.-China podcast just over a year ago. Our guests: Matt Sheehan and Holly He are the team behind “Heartland Mainland: The Iowa China Podcast,” a 2020 production of the Chicago-based Paulson Institute's think tank, MacroPolo. Matt is a nonresident fellow at MacroPolo who has served as a foreign correspondent in China and previously lived on the mainland for more than five years. He researches and writes on the Sino-U.S. technology relationship and ties between California and China. He grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area, studied political science at Stanford, and in 2018 was shortlisted for the Young China Watcher of the Year Award. In 2019 he published “The Transpacific Experiment,” a book exploring the pre-pandemic ties and tensions between Silicon Valley and China. Holly is a research associate at MacroPolo, where she also works in web analytics and multimedia production. She previously worked as a multimedia fellow for the Texas Tribune, scripted and edited documentaries for CNN International, and worked with the Kindling Group in Chicago. She graduated from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University. Full episode transcript: https://david-skidmore.medium.com/kyle-munson-and-david-skidmore-interview-with-matt-sheehan-and-holly-he-961eb903d708. The series: David Skidmore and Kyle Munson produced this podcast series in conjunction with Skidmore's Spring 2021 U.S.-China international relations course at Drake University. Your hosts: David Skidmore is a Professor of Political Science at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa, where he has taught since 1989. Skidmore's teaching and research focuses on U.S. foreign policy and U.S.-China relations. During the 1996-97 academic year, he taught at the Johns Hopkins-Nanjing University Center for Chinese and American Studies in Nanjing, China. He also served as a Fulbright Scholar based at the University of Hong Kong in 2010-2011. He is past Director of the Principal Financial Group Center for Global Citizenship (2002-2017) and the Nelson Institute for Diplomacy and International Affairs (2012-2017), both at Drake University. Skidmore is author, co-author or editor of six books including a monograph titled The Unilateralist Temptation in American Foreign Policy (Routledge, 2011), and has published numerous articles or chapters in various academic journals and books. His most recent research focuses on China's Belt and Road Initiative. His editorial writing has appeared in Fortune, U.S. News and World Report, Salon, The Conversation, the Diplomat, Global Times and the Des Moines Register. Kyle Munson is a journalist, writer, podcaster, and content strategist who currently works in content marketing and financial services. He previously spent 24 years with The Des Moines Register/Gannett in a variety of roles, including eight years as columnist. In 2017 he was awarded a grant from the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting to report on U.S.-China relations early in the Trump administration as Amb. Terry Branstad began his tenure in Beijing. That resulted in the project “Iowa in the Heart of China.” Munson also reported on Chinese President Xi Jinping's 2012 visit to Iowa. He has volunteered and served as a board member w --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/uschina/message

Hello and welcome to another episode of the Dongfang Hour China Aero/Space News Roundup! Without further ado, the news update from the week of 25 - 31 January. 1) News of Geely’s satellite constellation (and Qingdao Shanghe Aerospace Technology)According to media reports, the Qingdao SCO Demonstration Zone officially kicked off the Qingdao Aerospace Science & Tech New Industry Project, which is a huge construction project over a land area of over 20,000 m2 and will host the Qingdao Shanghe Aerospace Technology Company.Qingdao Shanghe was founded in August 2020, and is 100% owned by Geespace, a subsidiary of Geely Group based in Zhejiang and that has invested massively in satellite manufacturing. Qingdao Shanghe was registered with an initial capital of 100 million RMB. This seems like a sign of Geely's determination regarding its comms/satnav constellation project in LEO, announced in 2020. While Geely's satellite manufacturing plans have been moving forward rapidly, there had been quite few updates on the constellation project itself.2) Carbon fiber cryogenic tank for liquid oxygen (CALT)Last week we saw CALT announce that it had successfully manufactured a 3.35m diameter carbon composite cryogenic tank for liquid oxygen. This is first in China for a tank with such a large diameter.CALT’s article mentioned a decrease in mass of 30% compared to previous aluminium alloy tanks (1.7g/cm3 vs 2.8g/cm3). The academy also believes that cost can be reduced by 25% compared to previous tank models, and that manufacturing speed would increase compared to metal-based tanks. There will no doubt be further testing to ensure the technology is mature before integrating a Long March rocket.3) Article from MacroPolo about Rising Stars in China’s Political HierarchyGreat piece from MacroPolo this week about the rising stars in the Communist Party apparatus. Noteworthy for the space sector is the fact that several former CASC/CASIC/CNSA high-level people have gone into politics. The article mentions Yuan Jiajun, a former VP of CASC who had completed his PhD at Beihang, worked on Lunar and Mars missions, and is now the Party Secretary of Zhejiang Province, one of China’s wealthiest. Also highlighted is Xu Dazhe, a former high-level manager at CASIC and the CNSA who has since become Governor, and now Party Secretary, of Hunan Province in central China.4) HNA Group enters bankruptcy restructuringHNA Group is a large privately-owned conglomerate based in Haikou (Hainan province), and until very recently, a Fortune 500 company. Its core activities are historically in aviation through its subsidiary HNA Aviation, which in turn handles over 14 airlines, including China’s fourth-largest airline Hainan Airlines.HNA Group came under government scrutiny in 2017, and crumbling under the massive amount of debt it had created, began selling many of its assets. At the climax of the shopping spree in 2017, HNA Group was reported to have accumulated 1 trillion RMB of assets, 500 billion RMB of debt, and have ramifications in more than 2300 companies. This eventually led to the bankruptcy restructuring this week.It’s hard to say how things will go for HNA Group further down the road. 2020 has not been kind to the company, with the coronavirus stifling the aviation business. Yet HNA Group is such a key company to Hainan province, in both economic & employment terms, that it is hard to see the local government letting the situation reach liquidation.---------------------------------------------Follow us on YouTube, LinkedIn, Twitter (https://twitter.com/DongFangHour), as an audio podcast, and on our official website: https://www.dongfanghour.com/

Topics Discussed and Key Points:●      The increasing simultaneous “closeness” and “friction” between California and China●      What makes California special to China as opposed to other U.S. states?●      Matt speaks on co-hosting the Heartland Mainland: The Iowa China Podcast●      Emerging tech trends in China●      Eroding trust in Chinese tech platforms●      Key takeaways on MacroPolo's October 2020 report on what China will look like in 2025●      How AI, blockchain, and other emerging technologies will transform Chinese society●      How China is able to consistently stay on the cutting edge of AI●      Why China has been incredibly malleable and willing to overhaul its society over time●      What Silicon Valley thinks of Chinese tech Episode Summary:Today on The Negotiation, we speak with Matt Sheehan, Fellow, and Researcher at MacroPolo, the digital think tank of The Paulson Institute. MacroPolo covers politics, economics, technology, and energy in China. Matt's portfolio features writings on technology in China and its interactions with the U.S. and the rest of the world. His subfield focuses on artificial intelligence, a topic to which he has dedicated 90% of the last three years of his work.In 2016, Matt wrote The Transpacific Experiment: How China and California Collaborate and Compete for our Future. His thesis for the book is that “California is Ground Zero for a new era and a new type of U.S.-China relationship.”Matt notes that the relationship between the U.S. and China back in 2010 was characteristically more distant and “trade-based”. Around 2018, that relationship had become more “ground-level and face-to-face” as a result of the opportunities generated via the gradual influx of Chinese students, investors, immigrants, and homebuyers over the years. Matt's book goes into how California (i.e. Silicon Valley and Hollywood) and China have been both collaborative and competitive at the same time.Listen in as Matt explains how the multifaceted powerhouse that is California influences the trajectory of China's economic growth. He also dives deep into what he means by the two regions being collaborative and competitive at the same time.Matt then describes Iowa's unexpected importance to the U.S.-China relationship and why he, in fact, co-hosted and co-produced the Heartland Mainland: The Iowa China Podcast. He goes on to speak on the future of the Chinese tech ecosystem as written about in MacroPolo's October 2020 report. Finally, Matt reflects on shifting perceptions of China through the years and how the country is able to stay so malleable all this time. Key Quotes:“Even as California and China have become closer in recent years, that closeness also brings a lot of new frictions.” “In five years, I don't foresee chip restrictions and export controls hobbling Chinese transition to this industrial tech juggernaut that it wants to become. But as we stretch it out further to 2025 to 2030 and beyond, I do think that restrictions on China's ability to access leading-edge semiconductors are eventually going to serve as a bit of a cap on how far they can go with this foundational technology.”

Why is KFC so big in China? What is the “Toilet Revolution” and why does it matter? How does Chinese propaganda work? How have bicycles' role in Chinese society evolved over time? Neil Thomas of MacroPolo takes on this grab bag.  Note this is a rebroadcast from November 2018.    Please consider supporting ChinaTalk at glow.fm/chinatalk. Outtro music is a KFC vs McDonalds rap battle. Get bonus content on Patreon See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Why is KFC so big in China? What is the “Toilet Revolution” and why does it matter? How does Chinese propaganda work? How have bicycles’ role in Chinese society evolved over time? Neil Thomas of MacroPolo takes on this grab bag.  Note this is a rebroadcast from November 2018.    Please consider supporting ChinaTalk at glow.fm/chinatalk. Outtro music is a KFC vs McDonalds rap battle.

Jen Zhu Scott (Executive Chairman of The Commons Project and Founding Principal of Radian Partners) and Paul Triolo (Geotechnology Head, Eurasia Group and Senior Advisor, MacroPolo) join Hank Paulson to discuss the state of the US-China tech competition, what it means for the future of national security, and what to expect from a Biden administration on technology policy. Jen Zhu Scott: https://www.weforum.org/people/jennifer-zhu-scott Paul Triolo: https://www.paulsoninstitute.org/staff/paul-triolo/

In COVID-related news, Nature publishes a review of COVID-19 AI tools, emphasizing that most tools are still in development and largely unproven. Inserm selects Expert System’s AI support for its COVID-19 research and its group of over 10,000 researchers. Researchers provide in open-source a large annotated dataset of CT and X-ray images from COVID-19 patients, called the BIMCV COVID-19+. In regular AI news, Microsoft announces that it will not sell its facial recognition technology to police departments in the US until a national law is in place to help govern its use. On that note, a new federal bill in development, the Justice in Policing Act, contains policy guidelines on the use and limitations of facial recognition technology for police. OpenAI releases a commercial product API for accessing its AI models, to include the 175B parameter GPT-3, although other researchers are expressing concern over the lack of accountability on bias. Facebook announces the winner of its Deepfake Challenge, where the winning model achieved at 65% accuracy on a set of 10,000 previously unseen clips. And Boston Dynamics makes its robot dog, Spot, available for sale at $74,500 plus tax. In research, a team at Duke University introduces PULSE, which sharpens blurry images, in essence by exploring the space of plausible high-res images that could result in the blurry image. The report of the week comes from Perry World House, who published the results of a Policy Roundtable on AI hosted last fall. The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute and the International Committee of the Red Cross offer their take on Limits on Autonomy in Weapon Systems, by identifying the practical elements of human control. The review of the week from University of Waterloo provides an overview of text detection and recognition in the wild. MacroPolo provides a snapshot of Global AI Talent, using participants from the 2019 NeurIPS. Spring-Verlag provides yet another free text, from Eiben and Smith, on an Introduction to Evolutionary Computing. And NavyCon 2020 provides brief snapshots on “navies, science fiction, and great power competition” from a host of participants. Click here to visit our website and explore the links mentioned in the episode. 

This week, Kaiser and Jeremy speak with Michael Schuman, a reporter and writer who’s been covering China for 23 years, about his new book, Superpower Interrupted: The Chinese History of the World. The book sets out to present world history as China has understood it, and what that understanding of history tells us about what the China of today really wants. 11:12: Notable historical books on China that have withstood the test of time17:48: What Chinese exceptionalism means34:45: When historical context matters, and when it doesn’t42:11: Michael Schuman’s insights on what China wants Recommendations:Jeremy: The work of SupChina’s very own society and culture editor, Jiayun Feng. Click here to explore more of her work. Michael: The Analects, a work attributed to Confucius and his peers.Kaiser: The “Frankenstein” That Wasn’t: A Realistic Appraisal of Today’s China, an essay by Damien Ma of MacroPolo. Like the podcasts at SupChina? Help us out by taking this brief survey.

The road to economic recovery after COVID-19 will look quite different for China compared to its response during the last global financial crisis. Houze Song is a research fellow at the Paulson Institute’s think tank, MacroPolo. He characterizes Ch

The road to economic recovery after COVID-19 will look quite different for China compared to its response during the last global financial crisis. Houze Song is a research fellow at the Paulson Institute’s think tank, MacroPolo. He characterizes China’s approach […]

The United States and China have historically maintained an organic relationship of exchange in the tech world: sharing financial capital, professional talent, innovative research and ideas. At the same time, individual companies have competed for dominance in each other’s and global markets. Yet as cases like Huawei have shown, in recent years Washington has chosen to increasingly restrict and monitor the tech industry's ties to China, in an effort to contend with Beijing's own involvement within this field. In this episode of U.S.-China Insights, expert Matt Sheehan explains the collaborative and competitive nature of the U.S.-China tech relationship, and how it will be affected by attempts to 'securitize' and even decouple the tech sector. Matt Sheehan is a fellow at the Paulson Institute's think tank, MacroPolo, where he leads the team’s work on U.S.-China technology issues, specializing in artificial intelligence. He is the author of "The Transpacific Experiment: How China and California Collaborate and Compete for our Future."

In the finale of “Heartland Mainland: The Iowa China Podcast,” head out to the Iowa Caucuses and flip the script on our show. After examining Iowa-China ties from our own perspective -- rooted in years of experience in China and lots of research in Iowa -- this time we ride along to a caucus with Kyle Munson, an esteemed Iowa columnist who did his own deep dive into China ties. We take you out to Slater, Iowa to hear how Kyle stumbled into becoming one of the leading experts on connections between his home state and the People’s Republic of China. We then peer into the weird world of the Iowa Caucuses, asking how the decisions made there -- and the chaos that ensued -- will shape the US-China relationship for years to come. Heartland Mainland is brought to you by MacroPolo, the think tank of the Paulson Institute in Chicago. Producers and Co-hosts: Holly He and Matt Sheehan Assistant Producer: Woojae Julia Song Student Fellow: Shiyun Wen Illustrator: Young Kim

On this episode of the Belt and Road Podcast, Erik Myxter-iino speaks with former MacroPolo Summer Associate Lauren Baker - about her article that looks at differing opinions of governmental and non-governmental elite opinion of Chinese investment in Mozambique. Read Lauren's article "Bridging Perceptions: China in Mozambique " here: https://macropolo.org/analysis/china-mozambique-elite-perceptions/Recommendations: Lauren - The entire MacroPolo website, and subscribe to their newsletter Erik - MacroPolo's Anecdotes video series 2) Decarbonizing the Belt and Road: A Green Financing Roadmap3) The Farewell

Connectivity has become an important aspect of international relations. Ritika Passi joins Hamsini Hariharan to discuss different connectivity projects and their geopolitics. For questions or comments, reach out to the host @HamsiniH or on Instagram @statesofanarchy. Read More: Reconnecting Asia China Research by AIDDATA China Global Investment Tracker World Bank Reports on The Belt and Road Initiative Macro Polo by the Paulson Institute

This week on Sinica, Neil Thomas of MacroPolo sits down with Kaiser to talk about what we know — and what we don’t know — about popular support for the Chinese political leadership. Taking into account the effects of censorship and propaganda, how much “natural” regime support is left, and what explains it? 8:51: How reliable are public opinion surveys of regime support?19:53: Ian Johnson’s NYT op-ed on the October 1 parade22:20: The Party and the People38:18: Anniversaries and “dark anniversaries” — the significance of 201943:56: Hong Kong and Party legitimacyRecommendations:Neil: “Twists in the Belt and Road,” by Ryan Manuel. Kaiser: New episodes of The China History Podcast on the Warlord Period.

Entrepreneurs, students, local politicians, and others in California and China are forging connections across a wide array of fields. Who are these people? What do their activities mean for the bilateral relationship and the world in the 21st century? Journalist Matt Sheehan tells the stories of some of the individuals tying our two countries together in his new book, The Transpacific Experiment: How China and California Collaborate and Compete for Our Future. Mr. Sheehan selects a few people in the real estate, film, AI, and electric vehicle industries to illustrate the relationship’s complexity. On September 10, 2019, Matt Sheehan discussed his new book, and offered his analysis of how individuals on both sides of the Pacific compete as well as cooperate. Matt Sheehan is a fellow at the Paulson Institute’s think tank, MacroPolo, where he leads the team’s work on U.S.-China technology issues, specializing in artificial intelligence. Based in Oakland, he was formerly the China correspondent for The WorldPost. From 2010 to 2016, Mr. Sheehan lived and worked in Xi’an and Beijing. He then moved back to the Bay Area to work as an analyst, consultant, and writer on topics connecting China and California. In 2018, he was selected as a finalist for the Young China Watcher of the Year award. His work has been published in The Atlantic, Vice News, Foreign Policy, The WorldPost, The Huffington Post, MIT Technology Review, and elsewhere. He has been quoted or cited in numerous media outlets, including Reuters, The Financial Times, The New York Times, The San Francisco Chronicle, The Diplomat, Dagens Nyheter, and The South China Morning Post, among others.

Matt Sheehan, former China correspondent for the Huffington Post and current fellow at the MacroPolo think tank, discusses his new book, The Transpacific Experiment: How China and California Collaborate and Compete for Our Future. In this episode, Matt talks through a few select chapters of his book with Jeremy and Kaiser, such as the fracturing linkages between Silicon Valley and the Chinese tech industry, the story of Dalian Wanda entering the United States, and his outlook on the future of the U.S.-China relationship.What to listen for on this week’s Sinica Podcast:16:23: Matt describes the thought process within universities courting overseas Chinese students hurt by funding cuts and the recession: “There’s a sense that if we as a society, as an economy, as a government, are not willing to step up to the plate on a national or state level, then local actors are going to do whatever they need to do, or whatever they can to fill those holes…And I think the same thing happened in universities across the board. They knew that they weren’t going to be able to reverse the effects of the financial crisis or the long term defunding of our public education. As they looked around, the most promising source right there, was China.” 42:02: What is the toll being taken on tech ecosystems between the U.S. and China? Matt provides his take: “Right now, with the trade war and all the tensions, I see a lot of this as our attempt to ‘resolve’ the paradox — bring these things into balance, not through further integration, but by tearing apart many of those links at the ground level. Preventing integration in terms of people, sealing off money from going between them, and also looking to basically seal off ideas in one way or another.”Recommendations: Jeremy: Jeremy’s two favorite Chinese films, both classics by Zhang Yimou: To Live and Keep Cool. Matt: A call to action for more people to study and research the artificial intelligence relationship between the United States and China.Kaiser: Europe: A History, by Norman Davies.

Episode 50 of TechBuzz China is unique: it's our first live recording! It features co-host Rui Ma in conversation with author and journalist Matt Sheehan, currently a fellow based at the Paulson Institute's MacroPolo think tank. It was recorded at the August 13 launch of Matt's new book, The Transpacific Experiment: How China and California Collaborate and Compete for Our Future. As our co-hosts have commented on previous episodes, we respect Matt as one of the smartest and most thoughtful voices on U.S.-China topics. Though his book covers content and industries that we at TechBuzz usually do not, these topics are crucial to understanding the greater context that defines U.S-China tech today — especially given today's geopolitical situation.Listen to find out: What does Matt think are some of the long-term repercussions of the Chinese education system, and how they may ultimately impact the decisions and preferences of Chinese tech talent? What does Matt mean when he writes that the Bay Area is to those born and raised in China what Shanghai is like for Americans — and what is the deeper insight here? How do Chinese tech companies often choose to compete in places like India, Brazil, and Indonesia, as compared with American ones, and why? What about Hollywood-U.S. ties: will Hollywood continue to win over hearts and wallets in China, despite the trade war and other macro factors? What about flows of capital between the U.S. and China — how have they been affected? Importantly, what does Matt predict for the future of the Transpacific Experiment, and why should TechBuzz listeners care about its outcomes?You can purchase (and review!) Matt's book on Amazon. As always, you can find these stories and more at pandaily.com. If you enjoy our content, please do let us know by leaving us an iTunes review, liking our Facebook page, and tweeting at us at @techbuzzchina! Thank you also to our listeners over at our partner, dealstreetasia.com.We are grateful for our supportive and talented producers, Shaw Wan and Kaiser Kuo, and for our intern, Wang Menglu. Thank you!Listeners who are interested in visiting China but never knew where to begin should check out Pandaily's one-week immersion into China's tech scene, taking place October 13-19, 2019: decode.pandaily.com. This trip is not to be confused with TechBuzz China's inaugural invite-only China Investor Trip for public market investors, which will be held from October 7-13. Watch out for TechBuzz meetups held in your city!

Episode 50 of TechBuzz China is unique: it’s our first live recording! It features co-host Rui Ma in conversation with author and journalist Matt Sheehan, currently a fellow based at the Paulson Institute’s MacroPolo think tank. It was recorded at the August 13 launch of Matt’s new book, The Transpacific Experiment: How China and California Collaborate and Compete for Our Future. As our co-hosts have commented on previous episodes, we respect Matt as one of the smartest and most thoughtful voices on U.S.-China topics. Though his book covers content and industries that we at TechBuzz usually do not, these topics are crucial to understanding the greater context that defines U.S-China tech today — especially given today’s geopolitical situation. Listen to find out: What does Matt think are some of the long-term repercussions of the Chinese education system, and how they may ultimately impact the decisions and preferences of Chinese tech talent? What does Matt mean when he ...

Episode 50 of TechBuzz China is unique: it’s our first live recording! It features co-host Rui Ma in conversation with author and journalist Matt Sheehan, currently a fellow based at the Paulson Institute’s MacroPolo think tank. It was recorded at the August 13 launch of Matt’s new book, The Transpacific Experiment: How China and California Collaborate and Compete for Our Future. As our co-hosts have commented on previous episodes, we respect Matt as one of the smartest and most thoughtful voices on U.S.-China topics. Though his book covers content and industries that we at TechBuzz usually do not, these topics are crucial to understanding the greater context that defines U.S-China tech today — especially given today’s geopolitical situation. Listen to find out: What does Matt think are some of the long-term repercussions of the Chinese education system, and how they may ultimately impact the decisions and preferences of Chinese tech talent? What does Matt mean when he writes that the Bay Area is to those born and raised in China what Shanghai is like for Americans — and what is the deeper insight here? How do Chinese tech companies often choose to compete in places like India, Brazil, and Indonesia, as compared with American ones, and why? What about Hollywood-U.S. ties: will Hollywood continue to win over hearts and wallets in China, despite the trade war and other macro factors? What about flows of capital between the U.S. and China — how have they been affected? Importantly, what does Matt predict for the future of the Transpacific Experiment, and why should TechBuzz listeners care about its outcomes? You can purchase (and review!) Matt’s book on Amazon. As always, you can find these stories and more at pandaily.com. If you enjoy our content, please do let us know by leaving us an iTunes review, liking our Facebook page, and tweeting at us at @techbuzzchina! Thank you also to our listeners over at our partner, dealstreetasia.com. We are grateful for our supportive and talented producers, Shaw Wan and Kaiser Kuo, and for our intern, Wang Menglu. Thank you! Listeners who are interested in visiting China but never knew where to begin should check out Pandaily’s one-week immersion into China’s tech scene, taking place October 13-19, 2019: decode.pandaily.com. This trip is not to be confused with TechBuzz China’s inaugural invite-only China Investor Trip for public market investors, which will be held from October 7-13. Watch out for TechBuzz meetups held in your city!

In news items, Andy and Dave discuss China’s call for international cooperation on a code of ethics for AI. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) unveils the first intergovernmental standards for AI policies, with support from 42 countries. The US Army has invited the design of prototypes for the Next-Generation Squad Weapon, which may include wind-sensing and even facial-recognition technology. DARPA’s Spectrum Collaboration Challenge (SC2) presents an essay at IEEE Spectrum, which describes the challenges of making the most out of an increasingly crowded electromagnetic spectrum, including running contests for better spectrum management, and using Colosseum as the test ground. Google announces the ‘AI Workshop,’ which offers early access to AI capabilities and experiments. In research, Google DeepMind announces an AI that has achieved human-level performance in Quake III Arena Capture the Flag mode; among other things, human players rated the AI as “more collaborative than other humans” (though had mixed reaction to the AI as their teammates). Google Research presents HOList, an environment for machine learning of higher-order theorem proving. Research from Oxford University creates a model for human-like machine thinking by mimicking the prefrontal cortex for language-guided imagination. A paper from Jeff Cline at Uber AI Labs suggests a different approach to Artificial General Intelligence, by means of AI-generating algorithms that learn how to produce AgI. MacroPolo produces a series of 6 charts on Chinese AI talent. CBInsights compiles the view of 52 “experts” on “How AI Will Go Out of Control.” Blum, Kopcroft, Kannan, and Microsoft release Foundations of Data Science; Hutter, Kotthoff, Vanschoren, and Springer-Verlag make Automated Machine Learning available. The Purdue Symposium on Ethics, Technology, and the Future of War and Security releases a video on the Ethical, Legal, and Social Implications of Autonomy and AI in Warfare. The University of Colorado Boulder creates an Index of Complex Networks (ICON). And Alexander Reben creates a repository of 1 million fake AI-generated faces. Click here to visit our website and explore the links mentioned in the episode. 

This week on ChinaEconTalk, host Jordan Schneider discusses China’s aviation industry with Neil Thomas, Research Associate at the Paulson Institute’s in-house think tank, MacroPolo. Focusing on Boeing’s long history in China, they explore how the company’s interactions with the state have actually proven to be a microcosm of the larger U.S.-China relationship — from early involvement navigating business in the Mao era to the more recent period of strategic competition. Jordan and Neil reflect on this remarkable evolution, and debate whether China’s dependence on U.S. aviation technology is sustainable or even desirable from a Chinese perspective.

This week on ChinaEconTalk, host Jordan Schneider discusses China's aviation industry with Neil Thomas, Research Associate at the Paulson Institute's in-house think tank, MacroPolo. Focusing on Boeing's long history in China, they explore how the company's interactions with the state have actually proven to be a microcosm of the larger U.S.-China relationship — from early involvement navigating business in the Mao era to the more recent period of strategic competition. Jordan and Neil reflect on this remarkable evolution, and debate whether China's dependence on U.S. aviation technology is sustainable or even desirable from a Chinese perspective. Get bonus content on Patreon See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Get the book - https://amzn.to/2Xka1dg  In this episode, Brendan Carr and Dinny McMahon discuss the Chinese economy in 2019. Dinny McMahon is the author of China's Great Wall of Debt. He spent ten years as a financial journalist in China, including six years in Beijing at The Wall Street Journal, and four years with Dow Jones Newswires in Shanghai, where he also contributed to the Far Eastern Economic Review. In 2015, he left China and The Wall Street Journal to take up a fellowship at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, a think tank in Washington DC, where he wrote China's Great Wall of Debt. Dinny is an Australian who currently lives in Chicago, where he works at MacroPolo, a think tank focused on Chinese economic issues. Dinny's newsletter - https://www.dinnymcmahon.com/

How did China end up with more bicycles than any other country in the world? This conversation is based on The Rise, Fall, and Restoration of the Kingdom of Bicycles by Neil Thomas, which he wrote for MacroPolo. 

Why is KFC so big in China? What is the “Toilet Revolution” and why does it matter? How does Chinese propaganda work? How have bicycles’ role in Chinese society evolved over time? Neil Thomas of MacroPolo takes on all this in ChinaEconTalk’s latest show.

Why is KFC so big in China? What is the “Toilet Revolution” and why does it matter? How does Chinese propaganda work? How have bicycles' role in Chinese society evolved over time? Neil Thomas of MacroPolo takes on all this in ChinaEconTalk's latest show. Get bonus content on Patreon See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

What is the history of Google in China? Does the company have any hope of bringing its search engine back into the Chinese market? How does China’s development of artificial intelligence stack up against the rest of the world’s? To answer these questions, Matt Sheehan of MacroPolo makes his triumphant return to ChinaEconTalk.

What is the history of Google in China? Does the company have any hope of bringing its search engine back into the Chinese market? How does China's development of artificial intelligence stack up against the rest of the world's? To answer these questions, Matt Sheehan of MacroPolo makes his triumphant return to ChinaEconTalk. Get bonus content on Patreon See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

China's economy is currently the world's second largest, by GDP, and is generally expected to overtake the U.S. economy within the next decade. In this episode, the Paulson Institute's Damien Ma, a leading expert on Chinese economic trends, discusses with Neysun Mahboubi the key features defining China's economy today, and some likely forecasts for the near future, with particular attention to the policy and personnel implications of the recent 19th Party Congress. This episode was recorded on December 1, 2017 at the Center for the Study of Contemporary China, in connection with the Center's post-Congress policy roundtable featuring Damien Ma and other experts.  Damien Ma is Fellow and Associate Director of the Think Tank at the Paulson Institute, focused on investment and policy programs and leads on various research projects and activities. He is co-author of the book, In Line Behind a Billion People: How Scarcity Will Define China's Ascent in the Next Decade; he is editor of The Economics of Air Pollution in China by Ma Jun, who was the chief economist of China's central bank; and he has written on the Chinese economy for many outlets including The Atlantic, Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, The New Republic, and Slate. He is also co-creator of MacroPolo, a digital hub for cutting edge research on China's political economy. Music credit: "Salt" by Poppy Ackroyd, follow her at http://poppyackroyd.com  Special thanks to Wendy Leutert and Nick Marziani

"Having read hundreds and hundreds of these cases, I have decided that I'm never going to drive in China." That is what Benjamin Liebman, the director of the Center for Chinese Legal Studies at Columbia University, concluded after his extensive review of laws relating to traffic violations in Hubei Province. Geoffrey Sant, a partner at the law firm Dorsey & Whitney, notes that traffic accidents in China are substantially more fatal than traffic accidents in the U.S. While the U.S. only sees about one death per 70 traffic accidents, China sees one death per four accidents. Whether it be the explosion of car ownership and road infrastructure (new drivers in new places), more drunk and reckless driving, an expectation that traffic laws (such as stopping at red lights even when no one is coming) are "optional," or a variety of other factors, Chinese roads can be dangerous. There are also some quirks in the legal system that create perverse incentives, leading to some pretty extreme cases. For example, as Geoffrey detailed in an article on Slate, more than a few videos have surfaced of drivers intentionally running over or otherwise killing people they have injured on the road. The reason for this? In China, the liability payout for an accidental traffic death is a small fraction of what you have to pay out if you cripple someone for years. The way that courts deal with these extreme cases, as well as more routine traffic tort cases, reveals a lot about the function of courts in Chinese society. That is what Geoffrey and Ben argue and discuss in this live Sinica Podcast, recorded on February 26 at the offices of Dorsey & Whitney in New York. Recommendations: Jeremy: The Twitter feed of Tong Bingxue 仝冰雪 (@tongbingxue), a great place to find rare old photos and videos of China. Geoffrey: Persuasive Business Proposals: Writing to Win More Customers, Clients, and Contracts, written by his father, Tom Sant. It’s useful for writing pitches when you’re trying to get people to hire you — for example, when you’re a lawyer trying to get clients. Ben: The Handpulled Noodle, a restaurant in New York at the corner of 148th and Broadway, which serves genuine Xinjiang noodles. And China in Ten Words, by Yu Hua, which explores the lack of trust in Chinese society. Kaiser: The work of MacroPolo, specifically, a piece by Evan Feigenbaum titled “A Chinese Puzzle: Why Economic ‘Reform’ in Xi's China Has More Meanings than Market Liberalization.”  

Joy Ma, product manager of MacroPolo initiative at the Paulson Institute, talks about how her team created an interactive map that visualizes major Chinese investments in every US state, as well as how she views the Capitol Hill's curb on some Chinese mega-deals. Credits:Coco Yim for interviewing and editingSiddhant Ramakrishna for engineering

Joy Ma, product manager of MacroPolo initiative at the Paulson Institute, talks about how her team created an interactive map that visualizes major Chinese investments in every US state, as well as how she views the Capitol Hill's curb on some Chinese mega-deals. Credits:Coco Yim for interviewing and editingSiddhant Ramakrishna for engineering

This episode examines the development of two competing conceptions of Asia - an “Economic Asia,” characterized by trade integration and a rising tide of interconnected growth, and a “Security Asia” beset by powerful nationalisms and clashing security concepts. After reviewing the predictions he made in a co-authored 2012 essay about Asia’s trajectory, our guest, Evan Feigenbaum, discusses how China and the United States exert influence and the evolving roles of each in the region. He examines current trends to explore whether the model of two colliding “Asias” remains valid and where he believes the region is headed in the future. Dr. Evan Feigenbaum is Vice Chairman of the Paulson Institute at The University of Chicago and the Co-Founder of its new digital venture, MacroPolo. In October 2012, Dr. Feigenbaum’s essay, co-authored with Robert Manning in Foreign Policy and titled, “A Tale of Two Asias,” attacked the idea of a supposed “Asian Century." Dr. Feigenbaum leads the Paulson Institute’s political economy and investment-related programs, including the Institute’s think tank. He was twice a Deputy Assistant Secretary of State in the George W. Bush Administration.  

China's northeast, a region that in the 1970s comprised over 10% of national GDP, now only makes up 3%. In this interview, Song Houze walks listeners through the policy challenges facing the rustbest. He also provides some context behind two developments that recently made international news: a famous entrepeneur berating a local official for squeezing his ski resort and provincial-level GDP revisions.. For more research, see his recent series up on Macropolo on the province of Liaoning. Get bonus content on Patreon See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

China's northeast, a region that in the 1970s comprised over 10% of national GDP, now only makes up 3%. In this interview, Song Houze walks listeners through the policy challenges facing the rustbest. He also provides some context behind two developments that recently made international news: a famous entrepeneur berating a local official for squeezing his ski resort and provincial-level GDP revisions.. For more research, see his recent series up on Macropolo on the province of Liaoning.

Gillian Wong has been reporting from China since 2008 and is now the news director for Greater China at the Associated Press. High-profile stories Gillian has covered include the 2012 Tibetan self-immolations and the downfall of Bo Xilai 薄熙来. Her husband, Josh Chin, works as a foreign correspondent for the Wall Street Journal, where he has covered China since 2007. Prior to the Journal, Josh was a research fellow at the Asia Society’s Center on U.S.-China Relations, where he helped produce the China Boom Project. Between the two of them, Gillian and Josh have covered a host of China-related topics, ranging from cybersecurity to Xinjiang. They talk to Kaiser and Jeremy about their paths to becoming journalists, their experience of the changing working conditions for journalists in China, and their efforts to create diverse and representative narratives — complicated, and sometimes aided, by the fact that they are both at least part ethnically Chinese. Recommendations: Jeremy: Memphis, Tennessee, an American cultural destination and the musical hometown of B.B. King and Elvis Presley. Kaiser: Matt Sheehan’s piece on California’s transformation into an epicenter for U.S.-China relations, “Welcome to Chinafornia: The Future of U.S.-China Relations.” As a second recommendation, The Polish Officer, by Alan Furst, which does an incredible job of re-creating an old-world style of language and immersing the reader in its respective time and space. Gillian: The audiobook reading by Tom Perkins of John Pomfret’s The Beautiful Country and the Middle Kingdom. (Listen to John Pomfret discuss his book on Sinica.) Josh: The Paulson Institute’s MacroPolo initiative, which uses the latest research to decode China’s economy, urbanization, and development. A lot of great data all in one accessible, punny place. Also check out Gillian and Josh’s coauthored front-page piece, “China’s new tool for social control: A credit rating for everything.”