In our third episode, I am excited to feature international development consultant Xiao'Ou Zhu. Before every newspaper was using the Hambantota Port as the fearful case of China using "debt diplomacy" Xiao'Ou was doing the on-the-ground fieldwork using China Harbour's Engineering Group's role in the creation of the port as a case showing how important Chinese State Owned Enterprises are in Belt and Road Countries and how many BRI projects are really a bottom-up phenomenon rather than the often reported top-down projects. 

Recommendations: 
Xiao'Ou Zhu: Read anything about the 1952 Rice-Rubber Agreement 
Erik: From Impediment to Adaptation: Chinese Investments in Myanmar's New Regulatory Environment" by Siusue Mark and Youyi Zhang in Journal of Current SE Asian Affairs 2/2017 71-100

3: A History of the Hambantota Port in Sri Lanka - The Importance of Chinese State Owned Enterprises and Host Country Elite Politics in the Belt and Road - Xiao'Ou Zhu

A podcast that covers the latest news, research and analysis of China's growing presence in the developing world.
Co-Hosted by Erik Myxter-Iino and Juliet Lu
Edited by Taili Ni

Social Sciences

Science & Medicine

News

Science

News Commentary

Leland Lazarus joins Juliet to talk about Chinese and Taiwanese engagement in Latin America and the Caribbean, from official diplomatic activities to BRI projects to transnational organized crime. 

Leland Lazarus is the Associate Director of National Security at Florida International University’s Jack D. Gordon Institute of Public Policy. He is an expert on China’s relations with Latin America and the Caribbean, and manages a team of researchers and interns that collect data and analysis on U.S. national security and governance in the region. Fluent in both Mandarin and Spanish, he holds an M.A. in U.S.-China Foreign Policy at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, and a B.A. in International Relations at Brown University. His past experience includes work in the U.S. Embassy for Barbados and the Eastern Caribbean, the U.S. Consulate General in Shenyang, China, and former work as an Associate Producer at China Central Television and as a Fulbright Scholar in Panama.  
Recommendations:

Leland:Earth League International's work, particularly that of Andrea Crosta, founder, executive director, and board memberChinese Activities in LAC Dashboard (soon to release 2.0)FIU flagship conference: Hemispheric Security Conference on May 9 and 10Juliet:China in Global Capitalism: Building International Solidarity Against Imperial Rivalry by Eli Friedman, Kevin Lin, Rosa Liu, Ashley Smith (coming June 2024)

Leland Lazarus on Triads, Taiwan, and China's Forum Diplomacy in Latin America and the Caribbean

Bowen Gu joins Juliet and Erik on the podcast to talk about environmental justice and China's coal investments in Indonesia, with a focus on Gu's recent paper: Black gold and green BRI: A grounded analysis of Chinese investment in coal-fired power plants in Indonesia (2024).

Bowen Gu is a PhD student at the Institute of Environmental Science and Technology, Autonomous University of Barcelona (ICTA-UAB). Her research looks into coal-related environmental justice movements in China and broader regions under the Belt and Road Initiative. 

Recommendations:
 
Erik:Terror Capitalism: Uyghur Dispossession and Masculinity in a Chinese City by Darren Byler (2022)The symphonies of Glenn Branca (especially no.10)
Bowen:Land, Water, Air, and Freedom: The Making of World Movements for Environmental Justice by Joan Martínez-Alier (2023)Album of Indonesian music (name tk)
Juliet:The Railpolitik: Leadership and Agency in Sino-African Infrastructure Development by Yuan Wang (2023)

Environmental Justice and Coal-Fired Power Plants in Indonesia with Bowen Gu

Professor Omolade Adunbi joins Juliet and Erik on the podcast to talk about China's free trade zones in Nigeria. Adunbi is the Director of the African Studies Center, Professor of Anthropology and Afroamerican and African Studies, Professor of Law, and Faculty Associate in the Program in the Environment at the University of Michigan. His research explores issues related to governance, infrastructures of extraction, environmental politics and rights, power, violence, culture, transnational institutions, multinational corporations, and the postcolonial state.


Recommendations:

Omolade:Music of Fela KutiPower, Knowledge, Land: Contested Ontologies of Land and its Governance in Africa by Laura German (2022)
Erik:Episode of the Sinica Podcast: Robert Daly of the Kissinger Institute on the morality of U.S. China policyLaufey's music, specifically her new album Bewitched
Juliet:Cooperating for the Climate: Learning from International Partnerships in China's Clean Energy Sector by Joanna Lewis (2023)


An Anthropological Understanding of Chinese-financed Special Economic Zones in Nigeria with Omolade Adunbi

Juliet, Erik, and guest Tim Ruhlig discuss technical standards, China’s growth in technical industries and its increasing influence in leading and setting standards, and the new geopolitics of technical standardization and interdependence. Tim Ruhlig is a senior fellow at the German Council on Foreign Relations, where he researches Europe-China relations, German-China relations, Hong Kong politics, and Chinese foreign industrial policy, He is the founder of the Digital Power China (DPC) Research Consortium, which brings together European engineers and Chinese scholars to carry out policy-relevant research on the PRC’s growing digital technology footprint and its implications for Europe. 
 Recommendations: Tim: The Emperor’s New Road: China and the Project of the Century, Jonathan Hillman (2020)U.S.-Taiwan Relations: Will China's Challenge Lead to a Crisis? Bonnie Glaser, Ryan Hass, Richard Bush (2023)Film: “To Life” Zhang Yi Mou (1994)Wildland: The Making of America's Fury, Evan Osnos (2021)Erik: "Barbie Heimer"—Barbie (2023) and Oppenheimer (2023) movies on the same day (recommendation is Barbie is the better movie)Juliet:“Even China Isn’t Convinced It Can Replace the U.S.” Jessia Chen Weiss (2023)

How China is Reshaping International Technical Standards with Tim Rühlig

Before the shovels hit the dirt, before a developer gets construction permits, before an MOU is signed, there exists a huge process of project feasibility, planning, and pre-approval. That process is incredibly complex and costly, but a new Multilateral Cooperation Center for Development Finance (MCDF) has been established to help. Shuang Liu joins Juliet and Erik on this episode to discuss how this might help kick start and expand the pipeline of more sustainable projects, and her broader goals in working at the World Resources Institute.

Shuang Liu is the China Finance Director and Acting Director at the Sustainable Finance Center at the World Resources Institute. She leads the Center's work on China finance and the Belt and Road Initiative, and works with governments, private financial institutions, NGOs, and other partners to enhance the regulatory framework and provide enabling conditions to shift China's investment to sustainable finance. She holds a master's degree in environmental and resource economics from University College London and a bachelor's in economics from Peking University.

Her article on the Panda Paw Dragon Claw blog is entitled, "Can a Chinese-led multilateral initiative help unlock more sustainable infrastructure in the Global South?"

Recommendations:

Shuang:An Odyssey: A Father, a Son, and an Epic by Daniel Mendelsohn (2018)
Juliet:Try to bike more in the summer, or pick up any activity that is good for both yourself and the planet!
Erik:Outsourcing Repression episode of the Pekingology podcast with Lynette H. Ong and host Jude Blanchette Outsourcing Repression: Everyday State Power in Contemporary China by Lynette H. Ong (2022)

3: A History of the Hambantota Port in Sri Lanka - The Importance of Chinese State Owned Enterprises and Host Country Elite Politics in the Belt and Road - Xiao'Ou Zhu

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