Asia Centre

September 10-11^th , Brussels, EIAS.

Organised on a regular basis by the INPR (Taiwan) in partnership with Asia Centre (Paris), the CSIS (Hawaï) and the ISDS (Philippines). Issues to be addressed:

CLIMATE POLICIES AFTER COPENHAGEN 1. Lessons for China from the Copenhagen Summit 2. Carbon tax: an appraisal of the debate 3. Towards a low-carbon economy? 4. The Copenhagen summit viewed as a success.

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[download China Analysis n°27]

Information - registration: chinaanalysis@centreasia.org

CLOSE UP ON THE NEWS

1. “What was wrong with Hatoyama’s diplomacy?”,

– Hosoya Yûichi, Associate Professor, Keio University/Visiting Professor, Sciences-Po Paris.

2. “An Assessment of DPJ’s Agricultural Policy”,

– Ohno Tsunemasa, WTO Researcher.

POINTS OF NEWS

Terashima Jitsurô, «More commonsense in concept and structure: towards a rebuilding of the Japanese-American alliance», Sekai, February 2010, pp. 118-125. (translated from the Japanese by Guibourg Delamotte, Asia Centre).

Yara Tomohino, «Why are the American bases concentrated on Okinawa?», Sekai, May 2010, pp. 134-136. (translated from the Japanese by Guibourg Delamotte, Asia Centre).

Aketagawa Tôru, «What is the agreement on the bases which is so often mentioned in the same breath as the security treaty?», Sekai, May 2010, pp. 136-137. (translated from the Japanese by Guibourg Delamotte, Asia Centre).

Maedomari Hiromori, «Is the term ‘sympathy budget’ accurate? For whom is it intended and what is it about?», Sekai, May 2010, pp. 140-141.(translated from the Japanese by Guibourg Delamotte, Asia Centre).

Wednesday 23 June, 2010, Sciences Po Paris.

Yu Yongding is Professor at the Post-Graduate School of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) and President of the China Society of World Economics.  He was formerly the academic member of the Monetary Policy Committee of the People's Bank of China (PBOC) and a member of National Advisory Committee of the 11th Five Years Plan of National Reform and Development Commission (NDRC).  His main research interests are in macroeconomics and the world economy.

A representative from French Treasury (DGTPE) will discuss.

June 25, 2010, Paris.

Annual seminar on Chinese Contemporary Politics.

According to Francois Godement, the EU should take advantage of the few areas where it has real leverage, and focus its relationship with China around the following five issues: trade and investment policy, industry and technology, climate change, nuclear proliferation, and human rights. Ahead of September's European Council discussions on relations with strategic partners such as China, Francois Godement advises Europe's leaders to waste no time in understanding how to get the most out of relations with Beijing.

Read the ECFR Policy Brief

June 3-4, 2010, Hong Kong.

An International Conference organized by:

Hong Kong Baptist University, Department of Government and International Studies,

Asia Centre and

French Centre for Research on Contemporary China, Hong Kong.

While the violent tremors of the global financial crisis seem now to dissipate, and as dust has started settling, it is time to revisit the 2007-2008 events, look back at the changes in the global and financial system brought by the crisis and assess the new status acquired by China.

Simultaneously, in order to better comprehend China’s responses, it is appropriate to compare them with what other economies or group of economies have done to deal with the global financial crisis. In this conference, we have chosen to compare China with the European Union because this exercise has not attracted as much attention as the China-United States comparison. While the fever around the G2 mirage remains pretty high, it seems more appropriate to measure and forecast the future role played by China in the global financial system in view of the EU’s, the world largest economic entity and another key member of the G20 group that has attempted since late 2008 to coordinate the major economies’ responses to this new global financial crisis...

May 21, 2010, Paris.

Annual Seminar of Asia Centre Southeast Asia Observatory

Within the last decade, China has given a decisive impulse to its “new” diplomatic policy and has developed close partnerships with selected countries or regions. Due to geographical proximity, historical links and strategic reasons (be they either raw materials, markets, political or security rapprochement), Southeast Asia has been one of the targets of this “smile diplomacy” and “charm offensive”.
  
China’s relations with Southeast Asia offer an interesting study case since it not only deepens our understanding of a new pattern for regional relations but also because it may announce and reveal the way and mode Beijing favours to enhance its global diplomacy. The “win/win” formula Beijing has actively promoted since 1997 might need some further analysis and nuance to separate the short-term public relations campaign from concrete actions on the field. In its quest for “harmony” and a peaceful environment, China is alternating soft power tools with authoritative pressure in what could be interpreted as a calculated ambiguity.

April 16, 2010, voxeu.org

The delayed announcement of a US decision over China’s exchange-rate policy has stoked the fire of debate over trade relations. This column argues that the efforts of China’s main trade partners – the EU as well as the US – would be better spent on ensuring a steady rebalancing of China’s economy towards greater private consumption and imports rather than simply currency revaluation.

Up to the summer of 2008, qualifying China’s economic strategy as a case of mercantilism looked like an open and shut case. China’s global trade surplus had been snowballing, particularly with the EU and the US. Its external account surplus exceeded 10% of GDP, a unique case made even more unique by the huge population size of China – we are not talking about a city emporium economy such as Hong Kong or Singapore, where re-export is a way of life and external trade a multiple of GDP. Since 1994, a peg to the currency of the US, which had the largest symmetrical trade deficit and current-account deficit, literally ensured that the trade imbalance would only get larger until something gave way in either economy.

In the race to the bottom that characterises competition under conditions of globalisation, China seemed to lead the way. Household income relative to GDP had declined to a record low share of 34 %. That China had conceded, after years of stonewalling, a crawling revaluation of its own currency against the dollar looked suspiciously like an indirect admission of guilt. The revaluation was certainly not on the scale of what was needed to take care of the problem, but it was a political recognition of its existence. This revaluation did reach 21% between 2005 and 2008, but at a time when the dollar had entered into a steep decline against the euro, the yen and other currencies. China’s competitive advantage was mostly preserved, albeit redirected.

Even then, various arguments were used to counter the accusation of a mercantilist use of currency valuation to capture surplus value. China was really assembling final products from goods and parts imported from the rest of East Asia, resulting in a triangular trading pattern. Foreign firms were involved in as much as 60% of China’s exports – and the slice of added value accruing to China could be quite small. The classic example used to be the Nike shoe, where design, process, distribution and advertising made up most of the costs, and manufacturing in China was trivially low. The contemporary example is Apple’s iPhone, assembled in China by a Taiwanese firm from imported parts, where it is claimed the Chinese added value is no more than $4 per phone.

Two macroeconomic arguments were also used to defend China’s trade surplus. One was the asymmetry resulting from the conditions of China’s admission to the WTO. As a developing country, it had not had to open up services, capital markets and public procurement, while its massive labour supply ensured a nearly flat level for wages in the assembly sector. The second argument, still widely used, results from the asymmetry with the US itself. For cognoscenti, the argument is not about currency manipulation and mercantilism or protectionism. “It’s the imbalance, stupid”, is the prevailing assumption. Since the US had chosen to run a deficit and favour spending and borrowing over saving and producing, the resulting financing need had by definition to be made up by a corresponding supply from China. The imbalance between US spending and Chinese saving was the factor behind the trade surplus, and not a mercantilist monetary policy. And US economic policy was driving the trend, not China’s own decisions.