Director's Seminar

Wednesday, February 4, 2009 4:15 pm
Director's Seminar
Political Expression in the Chinese Blogosphere: Satire, Advocacy, and
Critiques of State Policy
Ashley Esarey, An Wang Postdoctoral Fellow, Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies,
Harvard University.

About the talk: Ashley Esarey considered subtle forms of political expression, including political satire, coded criticism of the state, and advocacy in the writings of popular Chinese bloggers. The advent of blogging has provided citizens of the People's Republic with a medium to make sophisticated critiques of the regime without encountering harsh repression.

About the speaker: Ashley Esarey studied Diplomacy and World Affairs at Occidental College and Japanese at Waseda University in Tokyo, prior to receiving Chinese-language training at Taiwan Normal University. He received his MA, MPhil, and PhD degrees in political science from Columbia University and served as Luce Fellow of Asian Studies and Assistant Professor of Comparative Politics at Middlebury College. Esarey has worked as a journalist for print and broadcast media and as East Asia consultant for Freedom House's Freedom of the World and Freedom of the Press surveys.

He has testified at Congress and addressed the Council on Foreign Relations. His recent publications concern the effect of commercialization on media control in China, political expression in the Chinese blogosphere, and intellectual pluralism and dissent in China and Taiwan (a book chapter co-authored with Merle Goldman). At the Fairbank Center, Esarey is writing a book about media, politics, and power in contemporary China.

Tuesday, March 3, 2009 4:00 pm
Director's Seminar
The Communist Party of China and Local Financial Reform
Lynette Ong, Assistant Professor of Political Science, University of Toronto; An Wang
Postdoctoral Fellow, Fairbank Center, Harvard University
Location: CGIS South Building, 1730 Cambridge Street, Room S153, Cambridge, MA

About the Talk: Professor Ong examined how far the recent Rural Credit Cooperative institutional reforms have reduced local political influence on their operations and addressed the problems of insider control and collective action in corporate governance.

About the Speaker: Lynette Ong received her PhD in Political Science at Australian National University in 2007. She works on the political economy of rural finance in China. Her research speaks to the literature on rural development in China and the political economy of finance in transition countries. Dr. Ong will be completing a book manuscript during her fellowship at the Fairbank Center.

Friday, April 3, 2009 4:00 pm
Director's Seminar
China's Rise in an Era of Climate Change
Andrew Kennedy, Princeton-Harvard China and the World Postdoctoral Fellow, Fairbank Center, Harvard University

About the Talk: China's soaring demand for energy poses a variety of new challenges for its foreign policy.  Yet there is no consensus within China as to how to address these challenges, and Beijing remains unsure of how to proceed.  Dr. Kennedy discussed the emerging debate within China concerning national energy security, outlining several distinct views on this question and their implications for China's international relations in the future. 

About the Speaker: Andrew Kennedy is a Princeton-Harvard China and the World Postdoctoral Fellow at the Fairbank Center. He received his PhD in 2007 from the Department of Government here at Harvard. His recently completed book manuscript, The Origins of Audacity: National Efficacy Beliefs and the International Ambitions of Mao and Nehru, asks why leaders sometimes act boldly in foreign policy when the international system offers reasons for restraint. While at the Fairbank Center this year, he is beginning a new project that compares China and India's approaches to energy and environmental security in the post-Cold War era. He will be joining the faculty of the Crawford School of Economics and Government at The Australian National University in July of this year.

Wednesday, April 8, 2009   4:00 pm
Director’s Seminar
"Could Not Help But Be Shocked and Angry...."  Rethinking the Taiwan Strait Crisis of 1995-1996
Todd Hall, Postdoctoral Fellow, Princeton-Harvard China and the World Program, Fairbank Center

About the Talk: Dr. Hall discussed the PRC's behavior during the Taiwan Strait Crisis of 1995-1996 in light of international relations theory. He argued that current approaches within international relations are insufficient to explain how the PRC sought to signal its intentions in this situation. Dr. Hall proposed looking at the ways in which shared understandings of emotional behavior shape the choices of state actors when selecting courses of action. His research has focused on German-Israeli relations, Sino-American relations, and the responses of various state governments to the September 11 attacks.

About the Speaker: Todd Hall is a postdoctoral fellow at the Fairbank Center in the Princeton-Harvard China and the World Program. He received his PhD in Political Science from the University of Chicago in 2008 and is interested in the role of emotional behavior in international relations.

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