A Spatial-Temporal Analysis of Health Care and Mortality Inequalities in China

Two geographers specializing in China TYalyze that country's health care inequality from 1990 to 2008, for the purpose of: (1) examining spatial-temporal variations of health care inequality at multiple scales (the regional, provincial, and county levels); (2) exploring whether economic growth and transition to a market economy have exacerbated the unevenness of health care; and (3) analyzing the impact of health care inequality on health outcomes, especially mortality. The authors apply GIS-based spatial statistical methods to detect spatial-temporal patterns of health care, and use multilevel regression to examine the linkages between health care, mortality, and regional economic inequality, and ultimately to assess the sensitivity of health care inequality to geographic scale and examine whether reforms implemented to date have resulted in more equitable access to health care. The paper also demonstrates how the concurrent transitions of decentralization, marketization, globalization, and urbanization in China have interactively contributed to health care inequality and mortality.     

21世纪的东亚:文化建设与文化交流国际学术研讨会综述

“21世纪的东亚:文化建设与文化交流”是由北京大学与澳门理工学院共同举办的国际学术研讨会,探讨东亚地区在全球化大潮之下,如何理性地审视自己的传统文化,有效应对外来挑战,把握文化建设的主动权,促进东亚国家的文化交往与文化繁荣。会议讨论的热点问题包括传统文化的现代价值、国际关系与东亚文化、全球化背景下的文化、文化保护与文化传播、东亚文化建设、“东亚意识”与华人社会文化倾向等方面。     

The global and regional constitution of nations: the view from East Asia

ABSTRACT. While the origins of nationalism are sought in global historical trends, few analysts have shown how nations themselves are constituted and re‐shaped by circulating global power, ideas and models. The view from East Asia shows that these circulations are mediated by regional developments and interactions which bind these nations together in rivalry and interdependence. The histories of China, Japan and Korea have been closely tied together since the end of the nineteenth century and, with a gap of about thirty years during the Cold War, have intensified once again. The global and regional constitution of nations produces a dialectic between its global form and aspirations and misrecognition of this constitution arising from the self‐perception of nationalism as historically immanent. This tension between the global constitution and national misrecognition contributes to the tenacity of nationalism. It also allows us to get a better grasp of the relationship between historical change and structure in nationalism and the relationship between state and popular nationalisms in the countries of the region.     

Global Public Policy,Transnational Policy Communities,and Their Networks

Public policy has been a prisoner of the word “state.” Yet, the state is reconfigured by globalization. Through “global public–private partnerships” and “transnational executive networks,” new forms of authority are emerging through global and regional policy processes that coexist alongside nation‐state policy processes. Accordingly, this article asks what is “global public policy”? The first part of the article identifies new public spaces where global policies occur. These spaces are multiple in character and variety and will be collectively referred to as the “global agora.” The second section adapts the conventional policy cycle heuristic by conceptually stretching it to the global and regional levels to reveal the higher degree of pluralization of actors and multiple‐authority structures than is the case at national levels. The third section asks: who is involved in the delivery of global public policy? The focus is on transnational policy communities. The global agora is a public space of policymaking and administration, although it is one where authority is more diffuse, decision making is dispersed and sovereignty muddled. Trapped by methodological nationalism and an intellectual agoraphobia of globalization, public policy scholars have yet to examine fully global policy processes and new managerial modes of transnational public administration.     

关于"全球化"与"美国化"的几点思考

在当今国内外学术界,“全球化”和“美国化”是频繁出现的两个词汇。通过对这两个词汇引发的几个问题进行考察,可以看出,全球化不等于美国化,在全球化推动之下正在形成的全球文化与美国文化并无必然的联系,全球化不会阻碍文化的发展,反而给文化的发展提供更为辽阔的空间。     

Connecting high school and university teachers in national and international contexts: perspectives from the 2012 Bangalore workshop of the AAG-CGGE

This paper focuses on the Center for Global Geography Education teaching workshop held in Bangalore, India, in March 2012 which served as a collaborative forum linking geography teachers in secondary and higher education in the USA and India. It considers the inclusion of the Advanced Placement Human Geography teachers from the USA and the building of global teaching content in collaborative teams as a useful way to connect geography teachers across institutional contexts. Based on a survey of workshop participants, it also highlights some of the issues that need to be addressed for further strengthening of high school–university linkages within national and across international contexts.     

全球化背景下城市文化地理研究的新趋势

文化全球化背景下,在城市的快速转型过程中,城市文化发展和演进面临更多新要素的触动:\"异质文化\"日渐冲击或渗透着城市本底文化,影响城市文化发展的主要因子也更多从自然环境要素始向人文因素转变,即城市本底文化生存的\"土壤\"正在发生革命性改变,从而使城市文化表现出更多时代内涵、时尚意韵和新景观。本文基于国内外相关研究进展,讨论全球化背景下城市文化地理研究的新态势,以期对新时期国内文化地理学的研究有所裨益。     

ANALYSIS OF REGIONAL DIFFERENCES IN MATERIAL WELFARE OF THE POPULATION: THE GEORGIAN SSR

Spatial differences in the material welfare of the population of the Georgian SSR are evaluated on the basis of five per capita indices (monetary income, total savings, number of motor vehicles, retail trade turnover, and provision of basic services) for 61 administrative units of varying type, including ASSRs, rayons, and cities under union republic jurisdiction. Rankings on individual indices are then aggregated into a summary rating. Major cities and areas of commercial agriculture (tea, citrus) tended to have higher summary ratings than mountainous areas with difficult topography and climate and remote from major markets (translated by Jay Mitchell; PlanEcon, Inc.; Washington, DC 20005).     

China's Dynamic Industrial Sector: The Automobile Industry

Two leading Beijing- and Singapore-based economic geographers examine the recent developments and spatial change in China's automobile industry (currently the world's third largest). The paper covers changes in market share among major automobile transnational corporations as well as domestic assemblers; industrial restructuring in the form of product diversification (SUVs to hybrid cars) and production concentration; the massive increase in exports of motor vehicles; and the rise of new automobile production centers. Also included in the paper is a case study of the firm Chery to illustrate the development path of Chinese domestic car assemblers. The embeddedness of transnational corporations and deregulation by the Chinese government are advanced as the two major factors that shape the car industry's geographic distribution in China. Journal of Economic Literature, Classification Numbers: D20, F21, L62. 15 figures, 2 tables, 46 references.     

Globalizing Flowscapes and the Historical Archaeology of the Mormon Domain

Historical archaeology within the Mormon Domain should focus upon the globalizing flowscapes defined by Arjun Appaduri: ethnoscapes, mediascapes, technoscapes, financescapes, and ideoscapes. This perspective moves archaeological scholarship away from attempts to identify a single “Mormon Culture Pattern” and illustrate that pattern's collapse to processes of Americanization and Globalization after Utah achieved statehood. By shifting the focus to the relationships of exchange organized using the flowscapes, the Mormon Domain becomes an ideal venue to explore the roots of globalization's bifurcating tendency to deterritorialize nations and regions by connecting local places with transnational population movements. This intellectual perspective will further align historical archaeology in Utah and the Great Basin with general trends in historical archaeology, New Western History, and New Mormon History.