July 18th, 2008

Besieged South Korean president needs to make a fresh start

Shorenstein APARC director Gi-Wook Shin says that President Lee still has time to recover from the diplomatic missteps that have characterized his first months in office. He urges Lee to focus his U.S. policy on establishing a strong relationship with the incoming American president. Article in Korean. Read more »

July 17th, 2008

Comparative pharmaceutical policy and "prescribing cultures"

The July/August issue of Health Affairs, the leading U.S. health policy journal, focuses on China and India. The special issue includes an article on China's pharmaceutical policy by five contributors to "Prescribing Cultures and Pharmaceutical Policy in the Asia-Pacific," a book forthcoming in 2009 from the Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center series with Brookings Institution Press.
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July 16th, 2008

Does it matter how you pay doctors and hospitals? Evidence from the Asia Pacific

The organizing committee of the "Provider Payment Incentives in the Asia Pacific" conference -- including health economists from Shorenstein APARC, Peking University, Tsinghua University, and Seoul National University -- reviewed submissions in June 2008 and accepted sixteen. The conference papers cover payment issues in Korea, Japan, China, Taiwan, Thailand, Tajikistan, the Philippines, and the US, examined from a range of disciplines (e.g., economics, health services research/health policy, public health, medicine, and ethics). Read more »

July 15th, 2008

India continues its rise as local governments produce needed infrastructure changes

While in London, Senior Research Scholar Rafiq Dossani spent time discussing the reasons behind India's continued rise and his recent book India Arriving: How This Economic Powerhouse is Redefining Global Business with CNBC's Europe Tonight host Guy Johnson.

• » CNBC - Europe Tonight

PESD Releases Case Study of Kuwait Petroleum Corporation

In a region popularly associated with monolithic states controlling secretive but effective national oil companies, Kuwait presents a surprising picture of bitterly divided government and a chaotic and fragmented oil sector. PESD affiliate Paul Stevens dissects the historical legacies and tangled webs of interaction with government that explain the current performance and erratic strategy of Kuwait Petroleum Corporation.

• » Kuwait Petroleum Corporation: Searching for Strategy in a Fragmented Oil Sector

Pyongyang expected to sign Treaty of Amity and Cooperation. Is membership in the East Asia Summit next?

South East Asia Forum Director, Donald Emmerson discusses what impact, if any, there will b e on US-North Korean relations and ASEAN-North Korean relations once Pyongyang signs the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation at next week's Southeast Asian regional security meeting in Singapore. Read more »

July 11th, 2008

David Victor Comments on G-8 Climate Talks

Leaders of the Group of Eight nations agreed to cut greenhouse gas emissions but divisions remain. David Victor was quoted in New York Times and PBS NewsHour with Jim Lehrer about the agreements.

• » New York Times
• » PBS NewsHour

July 10th, 2008

Democracy in Taiwan program releases first book, edited by Diamond and Gilley

In Political Change in China: Comparisons with Taiwan, CDDRL's Democracy in Taiwan program marshals commentary from leading experts on what lessons, if any, Taiwan's experience of democratization might hold for China's future. The volume was co-edited by Larry Diamond and includes a chapter by Weitseng Chen, one of CDDRL's 2007-08 Hewlett Fellows.
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July 9th, 2008

Op-ed: Shultz's engagement with Soviets offers lessons today for Iran, says McFaul

When George Shultz became Secretary of State in 1982, writes Michael McFaul in DemocracyArsenal.org, he began to challenge the Reagan administration's policy of disengagement, arguing that the United States needed to engage both the Soviet leaders but also Soviet society. Shultz's approach toward engaging the Soviets offers profound lessons for today's Iran debate: not just engagement, but also an expanded agenda that includes human rights and democracy. Read more »

July 8th, 2008

National War Powers Commission recommends War Powers Consultation Act of 2009

The National War Powers Commission, co-chaired by former Secretaries of State James A. Baker, III and Warren Christopher, today recommended that Congress repeal the War Powers Resolution of 1973 and substitute a new statute that would provide for more meaningful consultation between the president and Congress on matters of war. FSI is one of five partnering institutions to the Commission.
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Another Look at Renewables on India's Sagar Island

India's Sagar Island is renowned among Hindu devotees for its pilgrimage sites and in the renewable energy community for its locally-managed solar and wind projects. Field work by PESD Researcher Sam Shrank corroborates some of the benefits of these off-grid electricity generators but suggests that the business model for running them is not as sustainable or replicable as the literature implies.

• » Another Look at Renewables on India's Sagar Island

July 3rd, 2008

In wake of Yongbyon explosion, Sneider is still critical of deal with Pyongyang

Center's Associate Director for Research Daniel Sneider and former Pantech fellow Scott Snyder both criticize the agreement made with Kim Jong Il's government. "As always with North Korea, it's disappointing and frustrating" says Snyder.

• » Daniel C. Sneider
• » Scott Snyder

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Taiwan should be included in joint talks on developing resources of the South China Sea says Shorenstein APARC Visiting Scholar Song Yann-huei

"Taiwan has territorial rights, sovereign rights and jurisdiction over islands in the South China Sea and the East China Sea, as well as, developmental and managerial rights to important resources in these areas," says Dr. Yann-huei Song. "It will be difficult for the South China Sea and the East China Sea to become truly peaceful and cooperative maritime areas" if Taiwan were not included in talks about developing the resources of these areas. Dr. Song would like to correct the translation in the online English version of the article. He says the translation says that in "2002 Taiwan built a runway on Itu Aba Island of the Spratly Island group in the South China Sea. In fact, it was built at the end of 2007, and Taiwan's President Chen visited the island by C-130 military cargo plane on February 2, 2008."

• » Taipei Times: "Include Taiwan in China Sea talks"

July 2nd, 2008

Jojarth proposes conditional distribution of oil revenues scheme for petrostates like Kazakhstan

In Caspian oil giant Kazakhstan there are two types of cranes--the idle ones and the busy ones, writes Christine Jojarth in FSI In The World, a new faculty blog for the Freeman Spogli Institute. The idle and the busy cranes both stand for different answers to petrostates' most burning policy question--how to best use the ballooning governmental revenues from the thriving oil and gas sector. Save or spend?--is the 500 billion dollar question. Read more »

Former Summer Fellow interviews Desmond Tutu and Mugabe spokesperson

SW Radio Africa journalist and 2006 Draper Hills Summer Fellow Violet Gonda speaks to two individuals on the program Hot Seat this week--and the contrast between them couldn't be more pronounced. The first is an attempt at an interview with Robert Mugabe's press Secretary, George Charamba, who replied with threats, insults, and accusations. Violet then spoke with one of the most respected men in the world, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who restores some hope for Zimbabweans. Read more »

McFaul, Diamond call for 'New Way' in foreign assistance, to include development

In a report released on June 10, a high-impact group of development experts including CDDRL Director Michael McFaul and FSI senior fellow Larry Diamond call on Congress and the president to modernize U.S. foreign assistance by including development as a key component.10
Read more »

New offering from Stanford education program puts students on 'Road to Beijing'

The Stanford Program on International and Cross-Cultural Education (SPICE) has taken on world religions, Russian leaders and Aztec history. Now it's boiling down the glory and controversy of China's history, culture and politics in time for the Summer Olympics in Beijing. Read more »

Video: Toledo discusses poverty in Latin America

Alejandro Toledo, former president of Peru and FSI Distinguished Visiting Payne Lecturer, discusses poverty in Latin America on Link TV.

• » Link TV: Status of poverty in Latin America

Newsweek International Special Reports

PESD scholars Burton Richter and David Victor have pieces in the International Edition of Newsweek. Richter explains why France's nuclear power program puts it in the catbird seat on tackling global warming. Victor laments that high food prices have created an opportunity for governments to cut harmful farm subsidies--and governments are, for the most part, doing the opposite.

• » Newsweek: The Nuclear Option
• » Newsweek: Putting Rich Farmers First

Q&A: Inside Yongbyon nuclear plant

CISAC Co-Director Siegfried Hecker talks to Al Jazeera about being one of the few outsiders to have visited North Korea's Yongbyon nuclear facility, what he saw on his visits to the plant, and how likely he thinks it is that North Korea will give up its nuclear program. Read more »

July 1st, 2008

PESD Carbon Storage Project Database released

PESD researchers Varun Rai, Ngai-Chi Chung, Mark Thurber, and David Victor have released the PESD Carbon Storage Project Database, which tracks all publicly declared carbon capture and storage (CCS) projects worldwide. The database lays bare the slow pace of development of CCS projects relative to what is needed if CCS is to become an important "wedge" for fighting climate change.

• » PESD Carbon Storage Project Database

June 26th, 2008

Putting a face to the EU

The failure of Irish voters to ratify the Lisbon Treaty points to a problem for Europe that goes far beyond that specific referendum, writes Stanford lecturer and FSI advisory board member Richard Morningstar. The vote in Ireland, coupled with the rejection by voters in France and the Netherlands in 2005 of the now failed European Constitution, provides indisputable proof that many European citizens are strongly suspicious of the European Union and that European leaders must take strong action to remedy the misperceptions of those citizens. Read more »

Video blog: Cohen, Lindsay on 'Obamacons'

Program on Global Justice Director Joshua Cohen video debates Brink Lindsay from the Cato Institute on conservative judges, a war that goes on forever, and why we should care about inequality between the well-off and the filthy rich. Read more »

June 25th, 2008

South Korean President Lee's first 100 days have seen little movement towards narrowing the divide between Korea's left and right, says Center's Director, Gi-Wook Shin

In looking back at President Lee's first 100 days, Gi-Wook Shin and a former Pantech Fellow, John Feffer, assess the issues in Korea today. "With a big margin in his victory, President Lee thought and misunderstood that he had a mandate to do whatever he wanted to do and that backfired, " says Shin. Read more »

June 24th, 2008

CDDRL scholar talks to KQED Forum about violence in Zimbabwe

Zvisinei Sandi, a writer from Zimbabwe and a Scholar Rescue Fellow at CDDRL, talks to Michael Krasny on KQED Forum about increasing violence in Zimbabwe. Read more »