Abstracts and Bio-data
"The World of Silver: Currencies and the Global Economy since the 16th Century"
As the trade of commodities and services as well as the capital flow increase, the
mutual dependence of national and regional economies in the world, namely
globalization, has deepened since the 1990s. Especially, not only for the settlement of
business but also for foreign investment, more money move around the world. People
regard the phenomenon with mixed feelings. On the one hand, as the recent global
financial crisis illuminates, the national economies have got vulnerable to external
shocks, if they have depended too much on the international financial market to
finance economic development. On the other hand, following the introduction of
EURO in 2002, Asian countries intend to have economies in the region unite more
closely by establishing a common monetary unit and expanding the market for bonds
and securities.
From a historical perspective, however, the integration of economies in the
world is not totally new. For example, from the 16th century on, the long-distance
trade linked Asia, North and South America, and Europe. Silver was the dominant
medium to settle those transactions. Absorbing a large amount of silver for monetary
use, China was the center of world-wide circulation of silver. Even after many
countries chose the gold-standard currencies from the mid-19th century, China
continued the silver-standard monetary system. However, when the gold-standard
based international monetary system came to the end in the middle of the Great
Depression, the silver-standard Chinese economy could not avoided the negative
effects of the global financial crisis. How were economies in the world related
through transaction mediated with silver? How did Chinese monetary and financial
system work with its connections with the global flow of silver? This paper looks
into mechanisms of the world economy linked with the flow of silver, namely, “the
world of silver” and considers its implication to the current globalization of economy.
------------------------Tomoko Shiroyama received her Ph. D. from Harvard University (History, 1999)
and is presently professor of economic history at Hitotsubashi University in Tokyo.
Her recent publication China during the Great Depression: Market, State, and the
World Economy, 1929-1937 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Asia Center,
2008) analyzes Chinese economy during the global economic crisis in the 1930s and
its impact on her monetary and financial system. Currently staying in London as
visiting fellow at Department of Economic History, LSE (2008-2009), she engages in
the various projects on China and the world economy, including overseas Chinese,
market institutions of open ports, and risk and insurance in the Chinese economy.
“The Cultural Biography of Ballet”
Revolutionary ballets like the Red Girl’s Regiment educated and electrified the
proletariats, spread the gospel of communism/feminism, and carried the Cultural
Revolution to its zenith during the height of the Cold War. How did ballet travel to
China and lodge itself in the sophisticated and enduring Chinese performing art? This
paper traces ballet’s journey to China. It more importantly explores how patriotic
Chinese artists and intellectuals redefined and indigenised this bourgeois genre for a
proletarian revolution. In doing so, it will highlight the global current of Chinese
Diaspora, the advent of artistic modernity and the entrepreneurship of Chinese
patriotism.
------------------------Zheng Yangwen received her PhD from Cambridge University. Her major
publications include The Social Life of Opium in China (CUP, 2005); "Swan Lake to
Red Girl's Regiment: Ballet's Sinicisation", in The Cambridge Companion to Ballet
(CUP, 2007); "Hunan: Laboratory of Reform and Land of Revolution", Modern Asian
Studies 42, 6 (2008), Personal Names in Asia: History, Culture, Identity" (co-edit
with Charles J-H Macdonald, NUS Press, 2009); Negotiating Asymmetry: China's
Place in Asia (co-edit with Anthony Reid, NUS Press, 2009); and The Body in Asia
(co-edit with Bryan S. Turner, Berghahn Books, 2009).
SEATO and Burma's Civil War: The Failure of Cold War Appeal in the mid-1950s
Amongst the many reasons cited for the failure of the South East Asia Treaty
Organization (SEATO), SEATO's meager representation in the Southeast Asian
region itself finds itself pretty high on most lists. The question of why it failed to
develop a substantial regional base of support is more complicated. In Burma's case,
scholars point to factors as varied from the peaceful inclinations of Buddhism to the
potential threat of a PRC invasion if membership in the organization was taken up.
This paper explores an intellectual approach to the Cold War that reflected domestic
constraints and conditioned the responses of the Nu regime to recruitment strategies
by the Eisenhower administration.
------------------------Michael W. Charney received his PhD in Southeast Asian History from the
University of Michigan in 1999. After two years as a postdoctoral research fellow
with the Centre for Advanced Studies at the National University of Singapore, he
joined the Department of History at the School of Oriental and African Studies
(London), where he is now Senior Lecturer of South East Asian History. His research
focuses on the relationship between literati and the state and their impact on Burmese
politics and society. Dr. Charney, in addition to co-editing three books on Asian
migrants, has published two books on the intellectual history of Burma (2006) and
warfare in Southeast Asia (2004), and A History of Modern Burma (Cambridge
University Press, 2009).
"Environmental Cooperation in East Asia: Comparison with the European Region
and the Effectiveness of Environmental Aid"
Regional environmental regimes have been emerging in Europe, North America, and
East Asia since the 1970s. The regions have also been fields for experiments in
innovative methods of international environmental governance. Japan is one of the
major actors promoting an environmental cooperation regime is East Asia. This paper
would like to analyze the characteristics of the environmental cooperation regime of
the East Asian region in comparison with the environmental cooperation regime of
Europe. In addition, this paper would also like to analyze the effectiveness of regional
environmental cooperation in East Asia, focusing on environmental aid as a major
policy instrument. Japan directly or indirectly (through the World Bank and ADB)
tried to promote the development of environmental cooperation by the use of
environmental aid. These aid programs were closely related to setting up the regime,
and interaction between various actors involved in such aid highlights the important
aspects of the operation of the regional environmental regime.
------------------------Hideaki Shiroyama is a professor of public administration at the Graduate School of
Law and Politics and the Graduate School of Public Policy, The University of Tokyo.
He studies about policy making process in Japan, international administration and its
implementation at national administration, and the environmental/safety policy,
especially focusing on the interface between science/ technology and politics.
His recent publications include “Administrative Reorganization and Public Sector
Reform in Japan” in The Public Sector in Transition: East Asia and the European
Union Compared (Berlin: Nomos, 2007), “The Harmonization of Automobile
Environmental standards between Japan, the United States and Europe: The
‘Depoliticizing strategy’ by Industry and the Dynamics between Firms and
Governments in a Transnational Context,” Pacific Review vol. 20-3, “Japan's Policy
and Interface Arrangement with International Organizations: Financial and Other
Resource Flows,” in Japanese Responses to Globalization: Politics, Security,
Economics and Business (Palgrave Macmillan, NY, 2006), “Technology Innovation
and Diffusion for Environmental Protection – The Roles of Public Policies, Corporate
Strategies and Civic Actions from an Interaction Perspective,” in Energy Market
Restructuring and the Environment: Governance and Public Goods in Global
Integrated Market (The University Press of America, 2002), Governance of Science
and Technology (Toshindo, 2007. In Japanese), The Structure of International Aid
Administration (University of Tokyo Press, 2007. In Japanese).