Territorial Urbanization and the Party-state in China: Economy, Politics and Exigencies of the Mao Era
Research Forum Lecture by Carolyn Cartier, University of Technology Sydney
Vortrag 06.07.2016, 16:00 Uhr - 18:00 Uhr, Building LE, Room 736, Forsthausweg, Campus Duisburg
This seminar introduces territorial urbanization in China through the historical conditions and research design problems of the Chinese administrative divisions and urbanization in relation to comparative territorial thought. The Chinese Party-state maintains powers to establish new cities and enlarge and merge existing ones, and even eliminate others whereas the literature on urbanization in China often subsumes party-state territorialization practices under internationally recognizable epistemologies such as urban and regional planning and simplifies and contains their urban-economic transformations to fixed spaces in zone development. This seminar pursues the territorial reproduction of state power through three cases: the Shanghai Pudong New Area, where a territorial merger doubled its size and central policy imagines the future of China’s international financial center; a ‘political economy of rank’ in Suzhou, a prefecture-level city in the Yangzi River delta, where Party officials adjust the administrative divisions in relation to official appointments and ‘rank boosting’; and in Changzhou, a prefectural city that faces limits to growth in relation to strong surrounding counties and the exigencies of the Mao-era territorial ‘cut’ in the 1950s.
CV
Carolyn Cartier (BA, MA, PhD, University of California, Berkeley) is Professor of Human Geography and China Studies at the University of Technology Sydney. She is chief investigator of ‘The Geography of Power in China: Urban Expansion and Administrative Empire’, a collaboration with the Center for Research on the Administrative Divisions in China. Her research program focuses on urban and regional change from perspectives on spatial transformation behind the spectacle of rapid growth in China, spanning subjects from territorial governance to the politics of culture and urban aesthetics and the production/consumption transition in the contemporary city. She has sat on and chaired the the U.S. Social Science Research Council International Dissertation Fellowship Final Selection Committee, and has been an editor of Urban Geography and associate editor of Eurasian Geography and Economics. She is a past Fulbright Fellow in Hong Kong and is currently an associate member of the Centre for China in the World at the Australian National University.
Kontakt:
DFG Research Training Group 1613 "Risk and East Asia"
IN-EAST Fachschaft Grill Party - BBQ Students Union
Sonstiges 08.07.2016, 17:00 Uhr, ASTA-Keller in building LF, Lotharstr. 65, Campus Duisburg
The students union (Fachschaft) of our institute invites all BA- and MA-students to join the IN-EAST Fachschaft Grill Party. Free food and drinks!!! Please register via email: fs-oawiss@uni-due.de
Promoting a robot barrier free society? Political, societal and ethical aspects of the Robot Revolution Initiative of the Abe Cabinet
Research Forum Lecture by Cosima Wagner, Freie Universität Berlin
Vortrag 13.07.2016, 16:00 Uhr - 18:00 Uhr, Building LE, Room 736, Forsthausweg 2, Campus Duisburg
Exposé
Promoting a „robot barrier free society“? Political, societal and ethical aspects of the „Robot Revolution Initiative“ of the Abe Cabinet“
According to the recent “Robot Revolution Realization”-initiative of the Abe Cabinet, Japan is expected to lead the implementation of service robots into everyday life, especially in the field of elderly care, and become “world’s most advanced robot showcase“ as a “robot barrier free society”. Due to an allegedly “natural” relation-ship to material objects – including robots – a high acceptance of robots as technical tools for elderly people in Japan is expected. While this has still to be proven, it has been concluded, that more discussions on what kind of robot technology tools are desired by future users (caregivers, elderly people, physicians, disabled persons etc.), which prices they are willing to pay and which societal change could occur due to their implementation are needed.
After an overview of the governmental “Robot Revolution Initiative”, the paper will then introduce critical views on recent social robotics’ promotion with a special focus on the quest for a “roboethics” movement in Japan. What initiatives have been taken so far to implement ethical concerns as well as user interests into the development of service robot technology (best practice examples)? How are risks of the further implementation of service robot technology into everyday life assessed? Is it possible to overcome the “retrospective engineering approach” only to learn from mistakes of the past and instead take a “proactive approach to treat socio-ethical problems of robotics” (Honda 2013) as a responsible innovation-process?
By discussing these questions and other aspects of the interdependence of scientific-technological and societal change in Japan, the paper also aims at initiating a debate on the methodological approach of Science and Technology Studies for Japanese Studies scholarship.
We are happy to welcome Cosima Wagner, Freie Universität Berlin, to speak at the IN-EAST research forum.
Kontakt:
DFG Research Training Group 1613 "Risk and East Asia"
Der Abendvortrag findet in englischer Sprache statt. Herr Dr. Niu widmet sich in seinem Vortrag der Neuausrichtung der chinesischen Außenpolitik unter Xi Jinping unter besonderer Berücksichtung der von China neu begründeten Institutionen AIIB und OBOR (Neue Seidenstraßeninitiative). Er beleuchtet den Wandel der sino-amerikanischen Beziehungen und den Aufstieg Chinas zu einer neuen globalen Gestaltungsmacht.
Dr. Haibin Niu is a senior fellow, deputy director of the Center for American Studies and assistant director of the Institute for International Strategic Studies at the Shanghai Institutes for International Studies (SIIS). Dr. Niu joined SIIS after gaining his PhD of International Relations at Fudan University 2006. His current research work focuses on China’s international Strategy, emerging powers, and Latin America. He is also vice secretary general of Chinese Association of Latin American Studies. He has been a visiting scholar in Brazil, South Africa, United States, and Germany. http://siis.academia.edu/HaibinNiu
Research Forum Lecture Xueguang ZHOU (Stanford University): "The spatial mobility of local officials in the Chinese bureaucracy: Some preliminary findings and their implications."
This talk introduces a current research project of Prof. Xuegang Zhou that analyzes patterns of spatial mobility in a large Chinese bureaucracy. He proposes a theoretical model of stratified mobility and discuss its empirical implications. The rest of the talk reports some preliminary findings on these patterns and considers their implications for governing China.
ABOUT
Xueguang Zhou is the Kwoh-Ting Li Professor in Economic Development, a professor of sociology and a senior fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies of Stanford University. His main area of research is institutional changes in contemporary Chinese society, focusing on Chinese organizations and management, social inequality, and state-society relationships.
One of Zhou's current research projects is a study of the rise of the bureaucratic state in China. He works with students and colleagues to conduct participatory observations of government behaviors in the area of environmental regulation enforcement, in policy implementation, in bureaucratic bargaining, and in incentive designs. With colleagues and students, he also studies patterns of career mobility and personnel flow among different government offices to understand intra-organizational relationships in the Chinese bureaucracy.
For more information, please visit the IN-EAST website, link below.
The IN-EAST School of Advanced Studies is pleased to announce that Gaurav Raheja, Associate Professor, Department of Architecture & Planning,Joint Faculty, Centre for Excellence in Transportation Systems, Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Roorkee, India is currently visiting the IN-EAST School of Advanced Studies.
Abstract
This presentation shall bring to light a perspective on accessibility planning and interventions for people with disabilities in major transit terminals in urban context. It
About
Dr. Gaurav Raheja is an Associate Professor of Architecture at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Roorkee with over 10 years of teaching and research experience. His key area of research interest includes accessibility planning, universal design, inclusive systems, human-space studies and visual methods of research. is founded with a larger aim of including diversitiy of mobility perspectives in these transport terminals including infrastructure, information and services. Revisiting and interpreting the concepts of disability and accessibility, it intends to share experiences from live consultancy projects of conducting accessibility audits of Indira Gandhi International Airport (Terminal – 3), New Delhi and New Delhi Railway Station as a key access consultant. The basic philosophy of accessibility as an after thought and the changing meaning of mobility with human and urban perspectives becomes part of the discussions. It shares narratives of on ground realities, with governmental policy frameworks in Indian context as an experience of making urban mobility seamless, accessible and inclusive for all. It is most likely that an extended discussion becomes valid and relevant to a perspective of evaluating urban spaces and transit systems for accessbility planning and human inclusion as a broader subject in ideating smart urban futures.
