By Bulbul Gupta

Bulbul Gupta is the Grants Manager for Programs and Private Philanthropy at The Asia Foundation. She can be reached at bgupta@asiafound.org.

Six months ago, a major earthquake struck central China, leaving nearly 88,000 people dead or missing, injuring hundreds of thousands, and leaving over five million homeless. The quake, with a magnitude of 8.0, was centered in Wenchuan County in Sichuan Province, and was felt as far away as Beijing, Bangkok, and Hanoi. In the days and weeks afterwards, Asia Foundation staff worked together to share program ideas and identify main areas to focus relief efforts on urgent and medium-term needs primarily in Sichuan and Gansu provinces.

Flattened homes in front of the Yingfeng Chemical Factory, which also had a large ammonia leak after the earthquake

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Participants at a forum held last week in Seoul want you to steal their ideas. Organized by The Asia Foundation, and supported by KDI School of Public Policy and Management and the Korea Business Council for Sustainable Development, the group gathered from countries across Asia to discuss how to address local and regional environmental threats while enhancing development and economic growth.

In the keynote address that opened the day-long event, Terry Foecke, managing partner of Materials Productivity LLC and senior environmental consultant at The Asia Foundation, set the tone for the day. “A sustainable project incorporates ideas that are packaged for theft,” he said. “These are concepts that are so good and so obvious that people will want to replicate them.”
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By Scott Snyder

Scott Snyder is a Senior Associate at The Asia Foundation and can be reached at ssnyder@asiafound-dc.org. A more complete version of this article was originally published by CSIS.

The XXIX Beijing Olympiad, an event that had preoccupied Chinese leaders for almost a decade as they sought to utilize the games to project to domestic and international audiences China’s accomplishments on an international stage, has framed many issues in Sino-Korean relations, especially given the many resonances between the 1988 Olympics in Seoul and the Beijing Olympics two decades later. But now that the Olympics are over, Chinese leaders may adopt a different frame for viewing the world and the Korean peninsula, the details of which have begun to emerge in the “post-Olympics era.”

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The below was originally posted this week by the Sierra Club of California.

Sierra Club California got a rare opportunity to take part in a landmark international effort today. Representatives of China’s Hunan Province came to Sacramento with The Asia Foundation to learn about how California makes information available to the public. They wanted to know how California public interest groups – including Sierra Club California and the Public Policy Institute of California – interact with the government to obtain information, particularly environmental information.
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Bruce Tolentino, The Asia Foundation’s Director for Economic Reform and Development Programs, continues to provide insight on the U.S. financial crisis’ impact in Asia. This week, he noted that a major recession in the United States would “hit export-heavy tech industries in Taiwan, South Korea and China hard” in addition to countries with large garment and textile sectors that export to the US and European markets.

Dr. Tolentino can be reached at btolentino@asiafound.org.

By V. Bruce J. Tolentino

Bruce Tolentino is The Asia Foundation’s Director for Economic Reform and Development Programs. He can be reached at btolentino@asiafound.org.

Over the past few weeks, as the U.S. financial system has reeled from a shocking series of major “adjustments,” Asia’s economists and bankers remind themselves of the key lessons — painfully taught — by the Asian financial crisis of the late 1990s:  (a) all markets are linked; (b) financial markets are much more volatile than others and thus require more stringent oversight and regulation; and (c) refocusing on economic fundamentals is key to long-term recovery and growth.

Taking the long view, the medium-to-long term impact of the U.S. financial crisis on Asia is likely to be muted.
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With rumors of Korean President Kim Jong-Il’s ailing health abounding, Former Korean Minister of Foreign Affairs and Ambassador to the U.S, Han Sung-Joo addressed packed crowds in Washington and San Francisco at the formal launch of The Asia Foundation’s America’s Role in Asia.  Ambassador Han asked: “The question is, is North Korea more or less likely to give up its nuclear weapons if there is a government change; or, if Mr. Kim Jong Il becomes incapacitated, is North Korea going to become more or less dangerous than now?”  At both the National Press Club and the Cosmos Club in Washington, DC, and at the Four Seasons in San Francisco, Ambassador Han addressed policymakers, Asian and U.S. diplomats, executives, journalists and philanthropists.
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By Allen Choate

Allen Choate is the Vice President for Partners in Asia Development at The Asia Foundation. He is based in Hong Kong and can be reached at achoate@asiafound.org.

In Chinese folk culture, “8” is the luckiest and most auspicious of all numbers. So it’s no accident that the Beijing opening ceremonies for the 29th Olympiad will kick off at exactly 8 PM on the 8th day of the 8th month of the year 2008. The five mascots for the Beijing Olympics are cute and kitschy, as all previous Olympic mascots have been. But the Beijing mascots also are suffused with Chinese symbolism, with four animals (panda, swallow, fish, Tibetan Antelope) and the flame representing the five traditional Chinese “elements” — sea, forest, earth, sky and fire — and having names that can be combined to express fellowship in Mandarin. While the program for the opening ceremonies remains a closely guarded secret, there are rumors that the dragon and the phoenix will be making appearances. Both of these mythical creatures are associated with a resurgent and ascending China.
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By Kye Young

Kye Young is the Grants Manager for Corporate and Foundation relations at The Asia Foundation. He is based in San Francisco, but is currently working in the Foundation’s Beijing office.

On a recent weekend, I visited the center of Beijing’s international art scene: the 798 Art District. This area, once a site of numerous electronics factories, has been transformed into a vibrant community of art galleries, shops, cafes, and restaurants. Each time I come to 798, I notice something different. Whether it’s a new modern gallery space, or a quaint teahouse, the district’s continuous evolution has made it a requisite stop on every trip I make to China’s capital city.

During this most recent visit, I was struck by the starkly contrasting themes at work in many of the pieces of art. From oil paintings to prints, and from sculptures to stylized photography, many artists seem to reference China’s rocket-like trajectory towards modernization and to cleverly juxtapose it against more traditional Chinese images. There were charcoal drawings depicting historical Chinese scenes of Guilin hills shrouded in clouds, but the ancient hills were replaced with skyscrapers, antennas, and cranes. Another included a sculpture exhibit that presented photos of present-day migrant laborers embossed on bricks and arranged in a formation reminiscent of the terra cotta warriors in Xi’an. A third, stirring example incorporated gloves actually used to construct the city’s new Olympic Stadium.
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By David M. Lampton

The following is an excerpt from the newly-published book, “The Three Faces of Chinese Power: Might, Money, and Minds,” by David M. Lampton, Director of the China Studies Program at Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies. Reprint permission granted by the author, a Trustee of The Asia Foundation. For information on the book, contact University of California Press. It can be purchased on amazon.com.

China’s elite and public opinion leaders have a national grand strategy. For them, the next twenty years provide a strategic opportunity. In a February 23, 2004, Politburo study session, General Secretary and President Hu Jintao could not have been clearer when he said, “Take a broad view of the world while analyzing the situation; see clear-headedly the serious challenges posed by the intensifying international competition; see clear-headedly the difficulties and risks in the road ahead; [and] grasp firmly and conscientiously use well this period of important strategic opportunity.” The next twenty years are expected to be an era of continuing American dominance in which Beijing’s principal tasks are to get along with Washington while relentlessly building the nation’s military, economic, and ideational power. At the end of this period China will be better able to defend and advance its interests. And while most Chinese hope to build a cooperative relationship with America in the coming decades, they are also aware of other possibilities, just as they are mindful of the many uncertainties that stand between the present day and twenty years of continued, uninterrupted, high-speed growth.
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