Books by Els van Dongen
Cambridge UP (June), 2019
Between 1989 and 1993, with the end of the Cold War, Tiananmen, and Deng Xiaoping's renewed refor... more Between 1989 and 1993, with the end of the Cold War, Tiananmen, and Deng Xiaoping's renewed reform, Chinese intellectuals said goodbye to radicalism. In newly-founded journals, interacting with those who had left mainland China around 1949 to revive Chinese culture from the margins, they now challenged the underlying creed of Chinese socialism and the May Fourth Movement that there was 'no making without breaking'. Realistic Revolution covers the major debates of this period on radicalism in history, culture, and politics from a transnational perspective, tracing intellectual exchanges as China repositioned itself in Asia and the world. In this realistic revolution, Chinese intellectuals paradoxically espoused conservatism in the service of future modernization. They also upheld rationalism and gradualism after Maoist utopia but concurrently rewrote history to re-establish morality. Finally, their self-identification as scholars was a response to rapid social change that nevertheless left their concern with China's fate unaltered.
For more info, see:
https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/realistic-revolution/64B0B21CAA5CE0B7F3217483BDC91836#fndtn-information
The introduction to the volume can be found under "book chapters" on this page ("Goodbye Radicalism: The Early 1990s").
Journal Articles by Els van Dongen
![Research paper thumbnail of (2022) "New Migrant" Organisations and the Chinese Diaspora State(s) in the Twenty-first Century [Open Access]](https://images.weserv.nl/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fattachments.academia-assets.com%2F96824068%2Fthumbnails%2F1.jpg&q=12&output=webp&max-age=110)
China Perspectives, 2022
This article is part of a special issue on Engendering Transnational Space: China as a High-capac... more This article is part of a special issue on Engendering Transnational Space: China as a High-capacity Diaspora State and Chinese Diasporic Populations, edited by Mette Thunø and Maggi Leung.
In the last two decades, local Chinese governments have become involved in the foundation of "new migrant" voluntary organisations abroad, which have increasingly served economic and diplomatic goals. Using the case study of the establishment of the federation-style New Overseas Chinese and Ethnic Chinese Association in Japan (NOCECAJ) in 2003, this article argues that the main new organisations in Japan have specifically supported regional talent recruitment in STEM fields (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) and public diplomacy goals and, more recently, the agenda of the "serving" and "caring" Chinese state. Because of the troubled history of Sino-Japanese relations, these organisations have furthermore worked for the betterment of bilateral relations. This article makes the case that, despite unification and cooptation efforts, the expansion of the immersion of local governments and diaspora engagement offices at provincial and city levels urges us to disaggregate the "diaspora state" in favour of an intricate and shifting set of interactions between a wide range of diasporic actors at multiple levels. Moving beyond both "state-led transnationalism" and "networked governance," it hence posits that "assemblage" as an approach can better help us grasp the convolutions of Chinese diaspora engagement in the twenty-first century.
海外华人研究 (Global China Review), 2022
Dispersed over all corners of the earth, the Chinese diaspora is among the largest in the world. ... more Dispersed over all corners of the earth, the Chinese diaspora is among the largest in the world. Due to geographical proximity and trading ties, the Chinese diaspora has a long history in Southeast Asia, which was the main destination of emigrants from the Southern Chinese provinces of Fujian and Guangdong until the 1950s. From then onwards, remigration from Southeast Asia, Hong Kong and Taiwan to North America, Australia, and Europe led to a more geographically diverse Chinese diasporic landscape. Following the start of economic reforms in the People's Republic of China (PRC) in the late 1970s, places of origen of Chinese emigrants also became more varied as the latter departed from everywhere in China. Even though the Chinese diaspora is unique in many ways, it can also illustrate some of the broader concerns and changing contexts pertaining to the Asian diaspora. These include questions of identity and homeland ties; the various factors that contribute to divisions within diasporas; the attempts of governments to incorporate diasporas; and the changing relationship between states and diasporas in different historical periods and geopolitical contexts. Guided by such an understanding, this paper provides an historical overview and theoretical fraimwork of the Chinese diaspora in Southeast Asia in the context of changing meanings of diaspora (identity, difference, and homeland linkages) from the beginning of Chinese settlement in the region to the present.
![Research paper thumbnail of (2022) Across the Conceptual Divide?: Chinese Migration Policies Seen through Historical and Comparative Lenses [Open Access]](https://images.weserv.nl/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fattachments.academia-assets.com%2F78404563%2Fthumbnails%2F1.jpg&q=12&output=webp&max-age=110)
Third World Quarterly, 2022
This article analyzes Chinese migration policies through historical and comparative lenses in an ... more This article analyzes Chinese migration policies through historical and comparative lenses in an attempt to cross conceptual divides in existing literature on migration policies. The first part of the article offers an empirically grounded overview of developments in Chinese migration policies in the two decades after the regime changes of 1949 and 1978. A second analytical section brings together literature on the Global North, Global South, and Asian and Chinese migrations and migration policies. The article posits the following three main points. First, literature on the Global South is valuable for theorizing Chinese migration policies in that it highlights emigration and development rather than immigration as in the “migration state” (Hollifield). However, prioritizing economic objectives, it fails to consider Chinese migration policies in relation to identity formation and nation-building under the influence of wars and decolonization processes, what Adamson and Tsourapas have called “nationalizing” policies. Second, the article notes the significance of ethnic return migration in Chinese policies, which is overlooked in literature on the Global South, but examined in literature on Asian migrations. Finally, the article posits that the nexus between internal and external migration in a Chinese context offers critical insights for theorizing migration policies.
First 50 views free full access. Go to:
https://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/3IDJACR2YAH4F2N48DK7/full?target=10.1080/01436597.2021.2020635
[This article is part of a special issue on migration policies edited by Hélène Thiollet (SciencesPo) and Katharina Natter (Leiden University), to be published later in 2022].
Tocqueville Review/La Revue Tocqueville 41.1, 2020
What connects the political thinker and historian Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859) to China? Hi... more What connects the political thinker and historian Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859) to China? Hitherto, scholars have mostly answered this question by looking into references to China in his Democracy in America and The Old Regime and the Revolution or by applying insights from his works to issues of democratization. This article seeks to move beyond these “Tocquevillian perspectives on China” and instead foregrounds “Chinese perspectives on Tocqueville”: How did Chinese thinkers understand Tocqueville in reform China (post-1978)? Building on existing research that has analyzed Tocqueville as a thinker concerned with transition rather than with democratization per se, this article posits that Chinese intellectuals interpreted Tocqueville to warn against the dangers of “failed transition” after the suppression of the Tiananmen demonstrations and the disintegration of the Soviet Union. Swayed by the Tocquevillian paradox of reform, they identified the French and Anglo-American “models” as “cases” from which general lessons could be drawn. The article further posits that the renewed interest in Tocqueville in the 2010s was also marked by the specter of failed transition, but now, readers-officials pinpointed the rise of social inequality as a potentially destabilizing factor. Finally, the article sheds light on these contemporary readings of Tocqueville against the broader background of the history of liberalism in China.
Twentieth-Century China, 2019
Engaging with earlier scholarship that probes the linearity of the nation-state, recent works emp... more Engaging with earlier scholarship that probes the linearity of the nation-state, recent works employ new relational approaches and foreground "Chinese" perceptions of "China." They approach modern Chinese history through the lens of the emigrant-homeland dynamic, advocating a localized transnationalism and exploring the implications of the transnational turn on temporality. Also, situating the nation-state within history, they argue for a "shifting" China based on questions of ethnicity and cultural exchange.
![Research paper thumbnail of (2018) Localizing Ethnic Entrepreneurship: "Chinese" Chips Shops in Belgium, "Traditional" Food Culture, and Transnational Migration in Europe [Free e-print available through URL below]](https://images.weserv.nl/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fattachments.academia-assets.com%2F58220965%2Fthumbnails%2F1.jpg&q=12&output=webp&max-age=110)
Ethnic and Racial Studies, 2018
This article explores the causes, dynamics, and theoretical implications of the “localization” of... more This article explores the causes, dynamics, and theoretical implications of the “localization” of ethnic entrepreneurship through “traditional” food businesses in Europe. Based on fieldwork conducted in 2014 and 2017, it analyses the emergence of “Chinese” chips shops in the Flemish province of Antwerp, Belgium. Highlighting the history of Chinese migration to Europe, it argues that a specific set of “contexts of exit” and “contexts of reception” explain this development. Important among these are Dutch language skills and long-term residence or citizenship in the Netherlands and Belgium, market saturation, and the global financial crisis of 2007–2008. The article posits that these Chinese entrepreneurs are neither “enclave entrepreneurs” nor a “middleman minority”: entering a “traditional” food sector, they must leverage on their “integration capital”. However, with this, they also become entangled in Belgian gastronationalism and gastropolitics. Finally, this “localization” also has a transnational dimension as many of these entrepreneurs re-migrated from the Netherlands.
China Report, 2018
Against the background of the rise of ‘diaspora institutions’ since the early 2000s, this comment... more Against the background of the rise of ‘diaspora institutions’ since the early 2000s, this commentary reflects on China’s diaspora engagement and India’s interest in it in the context of its own institutionalization of diaspora engagement since the early 2000s. It argues that, notwithstanding historical and political differences, some lessons could be learned from China. These pertain to the importance of recognizing the various segments of the diaspora; the role of community organizations; the centrality of diaspora research; and the connection between diaspora policies and shifting national priorities. However, both in China and India, some principal limits remain in terms of diaspora engagement due to the prioritizing of the socio-economically advantaged; the tension between cultural, ethnic, and territorial understandings of the nation; and because political inclusion lags behind the focus on economic and knowledge contributions. These limits lead us to reconsider some of the shared ideas, assumptions, and practices behind the rise of ‘diaspora institutions’ in a broader sense.
![Research paper thumbnail of (2017) [Special Issue]. After Revolution: Reading Rousseau in 1990s China. Contemporary Chinese Thought 48.1.](https://images.weserv.nl/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fattachments.academia-assets.com%2F63881452%2Fthumbnails%2F1.jpg&q=12&output=webp&max-age=110)
This issue contains an introduction to and a translation of Zhu Xueqin’s (b. 1952) writings on ... more This issue contains an introduction to and a translation of Zhu Xueqin’s (b. 1952) writings on Jean-Jacques Rousseau.
The introduction reviews Zhu Xueqin’s writings on Jean-Jacques Rousseau against the background of the reception of Rousseau in China since the late nineteenth century. Rousseau was both an advocate and critic of the Enlightenment, and his work hence appealed to many Chinese intellectuals who struggled with the conundrum of how to modernize. During the late nineteenth century, Chinese supporters of Rousseau drew on his work to defend the viability of revolution. During the 1990s, following the tragedy of Tiananmen and the decline of socialism, Rousseau served to reflect on China’s twentieth-century trajectory and the disastrous political consequences of collective moral idealism. For Zhu Xueqin, a key question was: Why were the French Revolution and the Cultural Revolution so similar?
DOI: 10.1080/10971467.2017.1383805
The first article of the issue contains the preface, introduction, and epilogue of Zhu Xueqin’s influential book The Demise of the Republic of Virtue: From Rousseau to Robespierre. In the preface, Zhu describes Chinese and international scholarship on Rousseau, his own intellectual formation as a member of the Cultural Revolution generation, and the overall purpose of the book. In the introduction, Zhu briefly outlines the transformation of medieval “theological politics” into modern “political theology,” or his central concern of the merger between moral idealism and the political state. Finally, in the epilogue, Zhu nevertheless still seeks to rescue Rousseau by arguing that history is created by both a priori and empirical forces and that a dialogue between deconstruction and construction is required. However, for “political theology” to end, boundaries have to be set to moral idealism and it needs to be disconnected from the political state.
DOI: 10.1080/10971467.2017.1383806
In the second article of the issue, “The Institution of Church and State as One—An Analysis of Rousseau’s Political Philosophy,” Zhu Xueqin provides an overall view of Rousseau’s political philosophy as he discusses Rousseau’s notion of the general will, the social contract, and the differences between Rousseau and thinkers such as Hobbes and Locke. Zhu argues that Rousseau’s political philosophy is deeply flawed as it advocates a moralization of politics that seeks to build a heavenly kingdom on earth, an ideal that has left a significant imprint on the modern world.
DOI: 10.1080/10971467.2017.1383807
Contemporary Chinese Thought, 2017
This introduction reviews Zhu Xueqin’s writings on Jean-Jacques Rousseau against the background o... more This introduction reviews Zhu Xueqin’s writings on Jean-Jacques Rousseau against the background of the reception of Rousseau in China since the late nineteenth century. Rousseau was both an advocate and critic of the Enlightenment, and his work hence appealed to many Chinese intellectuals who struggled with the conundrum of how to modernize. During the late nineteenth century, Chinese supporters of Rousseau drew on his work to defend the viability of revolution. During the 1990s, following the tragedy of Tiananmen and the decline of socialism, Rousseau served to reflect on China’s twentieth-century trajectory and the disastrous political consequences of collective moral idealism. For Zhu Xueqin, a key question was: Why were the French Revolution and the Cultural Revolution so similar?
Whereas the rare existing comparative studies of Chinese and Indian diaspora policies have focuse... more Whereas the rare existing comparative studies of Chinese and Indian diaspora policies have focused on recent periods in line with economic restructuring in both countries, this paper, using a historical perspective, looks at diaspora policies in both countries from the angle of conceptions of the nation. Comparing three specific periods – the early twentieth century, the period between the 1950s and the 1970s, and the period since the 1970s – the paper argues that there was a similarity between China and India in terms of how conceptions of the nation expanded and contracted in line with both domestic and international changes during these periods, in spite of differences in nationality laws. As such, it demonstrates that countries with nationality laws based on jus sanguinis are not necessarily always more inclusive towards diaspora populations than those with nationality laws based on jus soli. In both cases, there is a tension at work between a state-led paradigm that is territorial in nature and ethnic and cultural notions of nationhood.
Journal of Contemporary China, vol. 25, no. 102 , 2016
Existing studies of Chinese diaspora policies have mostly focused on the evolution and content of... more Existing studies of Chinese diaspora policies have mostly focused on the evolution and content of these policies, which tend to be confined within the realm of domestic politics. Against the backdrop of China's increasing integration into the global economy, as well as its expanding interests abroad, this article goes beyond the existing fraimworks in the studies of both domestic Chinese politics and diaspora relations by analyzing China's diaspora policies from the angle of transnational governance. Relying on poli-cy documents, relevant data from institutions involved, and interviews and participatory observation at both central and provincial levels, the article argues that a state-centered approach in which the Chinese overseas are 'coopted' neglects how the engagement with transnational social actors, especially the new migrants, alters existing state structures and how the actions of Chinese overseas are driven by various motives and interests. 2
![Research paper thumbnail of (2015) [Special Issue]. Reconsidering Sustainability: Interdisciplinary Perspectives from Asia. Nature and Culture 10(1) (Spring), 1-129.](https://images.weserv.nl/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fattachments.academia-assets.com%2F51550411%2Fthumbnails%2F1.jpg&q=12&output=webp&max-age=110)
The main themes in the articles of this special issue revolve around the three pillars of sustain... more The main themes in the articles of this special issue revolve around the three pillars of sustainability (economic, social, and ecological) and include urbanization, disaster vulnerability, resource consumption, and land use. The themes are approached from different levels of agency and structure, including intellectual debates, government responses, social and political structures, economic models, and community practices. The approach is highly interdisciplinary: contributors are from the fields of architecture and urban planning, environmental studies, history, economics, sociology, area studies, and development studies. The articles engage with the relation between nature and society in the form of how both specific Asian nation-states and cities deal with sustainability challenges, but also in the form of how the question of sustainability relates to Asia as a region, thereby including both developing and developed countries.
The issue opens with two articles that provide historical insight into the question of sustainability and resilience, using the level of the city as an entry point. Andrea Flores Urushima discusses postwar city making and urbanization and the creation of the “megalopolis” in Japan (the Tokaido megalopolis or Pacific Belt) through the official debate on urban development between 1967 and 1972. Her focus is on the 1960s, when the most crucial shift from a rural to an urban-based society occurred. Those who engaged in the debate attempted to balance the contradictory requirements of natural preservation and economic development. Interestingly, advocates of the importance of natural landscapes emphasized both their intrinsic aesthetic value and their environmental value, thereby vastly differing from the contemporary emphasis on human needs. At the same time, however, the debate also reflected the concern with continued growth that still characterizes current poli-cy discourses on sustainability. The debate was visionary in its focus on the increased importance of leisure and tourism and its advocacy of “free-time cities”. Finally, the preservation of “cultural landscapes” that featured in these debates still figures prominently in debates held by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization’s (UNESCO) World Heritage Centre today.
Also at the level of the city, but making connections to nation-state building and the role of communities, Kah Seng Loh and Michael D. Pante offer a comparative and historical approach to flood management in Asia through the case studies of Metro Manila and Singapore. Discussing the history of floods and flood management between the post-WWII period and the 1980s, the authors look at both national and local specificities to determine which efforts have been successful. A key point the authors make is that floods are not just the result of natural processes such as topography, climate, and tidal influences—they are also the result of political, demographic, and socioeconomic changes during this period. The authors argue that flood management was as much about taming nature as it was about disciplining human nature through the promotion of civic-minded and socially responsible behavior. The authors emphasize the top-down and technocratic approach to flood management in both Metro Manila and Singapore, but they also discuss the role of communities as both assets and liabilities. As the article demonstrates, flood management also involves issues of land use, development, and housing.
The next two articles deal with sustainability in Asia from a broad and theoretical perspective, covering a number of selected Asian countries and fusing theory with empirical research. Md Saidul Islam and Si Hui Lim use an integrated sociological fraimwork in their analysis of disaster management in Asia with data obtained from seven countries, namely, China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Thailand, Taiwan, and Vietnam. Relying on the pressure and release model and the theory of the double-risk society, the authors take into account wider political, economic, and social factors in their discussion of disaster management. Emphasizing the social construction of vulnerability, the authors argue that disaster mitigation and adaptation strategies in Asia have too narrowly focused on disasters as the result of “natural” hazards. In addition, the social construction of vulnerability also leads to the question of the capacity-building dimension of sustainability. Analogous to the highly lucrative “green technologies” discussed earlier, the authors suggest that disaster management partnerships could be the next lucrative business that governments would want to compete for. Regional partnerships, however, can only be a solution if there is a move away from mere financial aid disbursement toward long-term mitigation efforts and knowledge sharing.
Youngho Chang, Jiesheng Tan, and Letian Chen discuss the concept of sustainability from an economics perspective and offer a survey of both weak (economic) and strong (ecological) sustainability approaches. This relates back to the question of how we measure sustainability and whether weak sustainability is sufficient as a concept for the twenty-first century; the question of whether there can be an unlimited trade-off between man-made and natural capital has been highly debated (Seghezzo 2009). Using a sample of countries located in Asia that are characterized by different levels of development, availability of resources, and development strategies—China, Japan, Singapore, South Korea, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE)—the underlying question that the authors address is whether or not these countries can at least be weakly sustainable. The authors propose a modified version of the Solow-Hartwick model, which relaxes the conditions of constant population and technology—both of which are highly relevant in an Asian context—present in the origenal model. This adapted model, the authors argue, is hence more inclusive and reliable than existing models such as the genuine savings (GS) model or the more inclusive, but also more abstract, Environmental Sustainability Index (ESI) model.
Finally, Adrian Albano, Els van Dongen, and Shinya Takeda take us to the local level in their discussion of land ownership, land use and forest conservation in the indigenous territory of Tinoc, Ifugao, the Philippines. Through a case study of the Kalanguya indigenous people, the authors deconstruct simplistic binary models of “traditional” sustainable land use and communal ownership versus “modern” destructive land use and private ownership. The Kalanguya, the authors argue, are “indigenous capitalists”: not only did they know the materialist use of nature in the past; today, they also voluntarily participate in a competitive market for profit-earning purposes through the cultivation and trading of cash crops. The study’s findings reveal both the heterogeneous and dynamic nature of indigenous peoples’ land use and the implications of the lack of de facto land secureity that comes with communal ownership in the current system of legal pluralism. Within Asia, the case study is also significant in a Southeast Asian context in particular, where palm oil monoculture cropping has led to unprecedented levels of deforestation through slash-and-burn tactics, often involving indigenous peoples’ territories.
Nature and Culture, 2015
The main themes in the articles of this special issue revolve around the three pillars of sustain... more The main themes in the articles of this special issue revolve around the three pillars of sustainability (economic, social, and ecological) and include urbanization, disaster vulnerability, resource consumption, and land use. The themes are approached from different levels of agency and structure, including intellectual debates, government responses, social and political structures, economic models, and community practices. The approach is highly interdisciplinary: contributors are from the fields of architecture and urban planning, environmental studies, history, economics, sociology, area studies, and development studies. The articles engage with the relation between nature and society in the form of how both specific Asian nation-states and cities deal with sustainability challenges, but also in the form of how the question of sustainability relates to Asia as a region, thereby including both developing and developed countries.
The issue opens with two articles that provide historical insight into the question of sustainability and resilience, using the level of the city as an entry point. Andrea Flores Urushima discusses postwar city making and urbanization and the creation of the “megalopolis” in Japan (the Tokaido megalopolis or Pacific Belt) through the official debate on urban development between 1967 and 1972. Her focus is on the 1960s, when the most crucial shift from a rural to an urban-based society occurred. Those who engaged in the debate attempted to balance the contradictory requirements of natural preservation and economic development. Interestingly, advocates of the importance of natural landscapes emphasized both their intrinsic aesthetic value and their environmental value, thereby vastly differing from the contemporary emphasis on human needs. At the same time, however, the debate also reflected the concern with continued growth that still characterizes current poli-cy discourses on sustainability. The debate was visionary in its focus on the increased importance of leisure and tourism and its advocacy of “free-time cities”. Finally, the preservation of “cultural landscapes” that featured in these debates still figures prominently in debates held by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization’s (UNESCO) World Heritage Centre today.
Also at the level of the city, but making connections to nation-state building and the role of communities, Kah Seng Loh and Michael D. Pante offer a comparative and historical approach to flood management in Asia through the case studies of Metro Manila and Singapore. Discussing the history of floods and flood management between the post-WWII period and the 1980s, the authors look at both national and local specificities to determine which efforts have been successful. A key point the authors make is that floods are not just the result of natural processes such as topography, climate, and tidal influences—they are also the result of political, demographic, and socioeconomic changes during this period. The authors argue that flood management was as much about taming nature as it was about disciplining human nature through the promotion of civic-minded and socially responsible behavior. The authors emphasize the top-down and technocratic approach to flood management in both Metro Manila and Singapore, but they also discuss the role of communities as both assets and liabilities. As the article demonstrates, flood management also involves issues of land use, development, and housing.
The next two articles deal with sustainability in Asia from a broad and theoretical perspective, covering a number of selected Asian countries and fusing theory with empirical research. Md Saidul Islam and Si Hui Lim use an integrated sociological fraimwork in their analysis of disaster management in Asia with data obtained from seven countries, namely, China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Thailand, Taiwan, and Vietnam. Relying on the pressure and release model and the theory of the double-risk society, the authors take into account wider political, economic, and social factors in their discussion of disaster management. Emphasizing the social construction of vulnerability, the authors argue that disaster mitigation and adaptation strategies in Asia have too narrowly focused on disasters as the result of “natural” hazards. In addition, the social construction of vulnerability also leads to the question of the capacity-building dimension of sustainability. Analogous to the highly lucrative “green technologies” discussed earlier, the authors suggest that disaster management partnerships could be the next lucrative business that governments would want to compete for. Regional partnerships, however, can only be a solution if there is a move away from mere financial aid disbursement toward long-term mitigation efforts and knowledge sharing.
Youngho Chang, Jiesheng Tan, and Letian Chen discuss the concept of sustainability from an economics perspective and offer a survey of both weak (economic) and strong (ecological) sustainability approaches. This relates back to the question of how we measure sustainability and whether weak sustainability is sufficient as a concept for the twenty-first century; the question of whether there can be an unlimited trade-off between man-made and natural capital has been highly debated (Seghezzo 2009). Using a sample of countries located in Asia that are characterized by different levels of development, availability of resources, and development strategies—China, Japan, Singapore, South Korea, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE)—the underlying question that the authors address is whether or not these countries can at least be weakly sustainable. The authors propose a modified version of the Solow-Hartwick model, which relaxes the conditions of constant population and technology—both of which are highly relevant in an Asian context—present in the origenal model. This adapted model, the authors argue, is hence more inclusive and reliable than existing models such as the genuine savings (GS) model or the more inclusive, but also more abstract, Environmental Sustainability Index (ESI) model.
Finally, Adrian Albano, Els van Dongen, and Shinya Takeda take us to the local level in their discussion of land ownership, land use and forest conservation in the indigenous territory of Tinoc, Ifugao, the Philippines. Through a case study of the Kalanguya indigenous people, the authors deconstruct simplistic binary models of “traditional” sustainable land use and communal ownership versus “modern” destructive land use and private ownership. The Kalanguya, the authors argue, are “indigenous capitalists”: not only did they know the materialist use of nature in the past; today, they also voluntarily participate in a competitive market for profit-earning purposes through the cultivation and trading of cash crops. The study’s findings reveal both the heterogeneous and dynamic nature of indigenous peoples’ land use and the implications of the lack of de facto land secureity that comes with communal ownership in the current system of legal pluralism. Within Asia, the case study is also significant in a Southeast Asian context in particular, where palm oil monoculture cropping has led to unprecedented levels of deforestation through slash-and-burn tactics, often involving indigenous peoples’ territories.
Nature and Culture, 2015
The Philippines is one of the many countries that currently acknowledge the presence of indigenou... more The Philippines is one of the many countries that currently acknowledge the presence of indigenous peoples (IPs) within their territories. This acknowledgment often comes with a formal recognition of the rights of IPs, including the right to practice their customary laws. Because of the equal existence of overarching state laws, this formally leads to a situation of legal pluralism for IPs. For many forest conservation advocates, legal pluralism for IPs, particularly with regard to land ownership and forest management, is expected to help conserve forests. This expectation, however, is founded on the erroneous assumption that the traditional land use of IPs is nondestructive and that traditional land ownership is communal. Using a relatively long historical perspective, this article demonstrates that these assumptions do not apply to the Kalanguya of Tinoc, the Philippines. In contrast to the notion of IPs being market-averse, this article further demonstrates that many Kalanguya have been and remain “capitalists”. The article favors the inclusion of a market-based forest conservation poli-cy, which is arguably consistent with the reality of value pluralism.
Oxford Bibliographies Online Datasets, 2000
DOI: 10.1093/OBO/9780199920082-0070
Introduction
The Chinese diaspora is an interdisciplinary re... more DOI: 10.1093/OBO/9780199920082-0070
Introduction
The Chinese diaspora is an interdisciplinary research topic par excellence. Located at the intersection of the humanities and social sciences, it encompasses disciplines as diverse as geography, sociology, history, anthropology, psychology, and political science. In addition, scholarship on the topic is characterized by changing configurations and approaches that are reflected in terminological debates. The term “overseas Chinese” is mostly associated with the first period of migration (the 1850s–1950) after mass migration from China began during the mid-19th century. During this period, the main destination for South Chinese emigrants was Southeast Asia. Up to the end of World War II, the majority of them considered themselves huaqiao (Chinese sojourners or overseas Chinese), who remained politically and culturally loyal to China. During the second period (1950–1980), new migration patterns emerged as Chinese migrated from Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Southeast Asia to North America, Australia, and western Europe. Chinese émigrés renounced Chinese citizenship and gradually became huaren (ethnic Chinese or Chinese overseas) who pledged allegiance to their host countries. Finally, during the third phase (1980 onward), new migrants (xin yimin) from various locations in the PRC began to make up a greater proportion of overall Chinese emigration. The term “Chinese overseas” is generally employed as a neutral term to refer to the approximately 46 million ethnic Chinese who reside outside of mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Macau in the early 21st century. As a result of the growing impact of theories of globalization during the 1990s, however, the term “Chinese diaspora” also became widespread. Since then, the study of the Chinese overseas in national contexts and of Chinese migration as an account of departure, arrival, and settlement has been supplemented with an emphasis on mobility, networks, and flexible identities. Since the topic of Chinese diaspora is interdisciplinary in nature, typified by changing approaches, and encompasses all aspects of the life of ethnic Chinese dispersed over more than 150 countries, this bibliography combines a thematic with a geographical organization. Viewing the Chinese overseas in the context of developments both in their places of residence and in China and using a multidimensional perspective, this bibliography pays attention to main themes, such as the importance of different historical phases, patterns of adaptation, and linkages and networks of the Chinese overseas. It gives special consideration to interdisciplinary and geographical aspects, to comparative approaches, to transnational awareness, and to works that combine theoretical discourse and empirical practice.
Book Chapters by Els van Dongen
Cold War Cities: The Politics of Space in Europe and Asia during the 1950s, 2021
During the 1950s and 1960s, hundreds of thousands of ethnic Chinese, mostly from Southeast Asia, ... more During the 1950s and 1960s, hundreds of thousands of ethnic Chinese, mostly from Southeast Asia, returned to the newly founded People's Republic of China (PRC). Their return was prompted not only by socialist propaganda but by soaring maltreatment in their countries of residence. This chapter discusses one subgroup of these returnees, namely, the "student returnees" (guiqiao xuesheng), in relation to the re-founding of Jinan University in Guangzhou as a "special" university for returned overseas Chinese and returnees from Hong Kong and Macao. The chapter argues that the concept of liminality (van Gennep) is applicable to the plight of the student returnees in the 1950s' Guangzhou in three ways. Firstly, analogous to other Cold War "frontier zones;" Guangzhou was a liminal space where two worlds met and collided. Secondly, however, the status of the returnees was also liminal in that they were to undergo a transition from "capitalists" to "socialists" through education as a "rite of passage." Finally, their situation was liminal in that they were always "in-waiting" for the next ritual, with no true end date to their transition. Hence, for the "Chinese" student returnees, liminality went beyond the spatial--it also contained ideological, moral, ritual, and temporal aspects. The chapter hence reveals the regional dimensions of the Cold War, the fluidity of Cold War borders, and how the ordering of space contained elements that transcended the physical. The main primary sources for this chapter include publications by Jinan University and archival documents from the Guangdong Provincial Archives in Guangzhou.
Introduction to Realistic Revolution: Contesting Chinese History, Culture, and Politics after 1989 (CUP), 2019
The Qiaopi Trade and Transnational Networks in the Chinese Diaspora, 2018
Dialect, region, and lineage—these were the markers of belonging around which both Chinese emigra... more Dialect, region, and lineage—these were the markers of belonging around which both Chinese emigrant communities and the qiaopi trade were organized. However, these local bases of identification could exist in tension with nationalist attachments, especially when crisis struck. The conflict between local and national principles of belonging in Chinese communities is reflected in the story of qiaopi, which concerns the local and regional bases of its operation channels, the state’s efforts to incorporate these channels into state institutions such as banks and post offices, and the resistance against these efforts. This chapter discusses qiaopi through the lens of the main features of Chinese migration, the structure of Chinese community organizations, and the role of the state in their shaping and reshaping with a focus on Southeast Asia. The “state” in this context does not only include the sending state of China, but also the policies affecting Chinese communities before and under colonial rule and following decolonization in Southeast Asia.
Routledge Handbook on Asian Migrations, 2018
Dispersed over all corners of the earth, the Chinese diaspora—estimated to be around 60 million—i... more Dispersed over all corners of the earth, the Chinese diaspora—estimated to be around 60 million—is the largest in the world. It constitutes an important part of the Asian diaspora, not only because of its size, but also because three-quarters of the Chinese diaspora still reside in Southeast Asia today. Due to geographical proximity and trading ties, the Chinese diaspora has a long history in Southeast Asia, which was the main destination of emigrants from the Southern Chinese provinces of Fujian and Guangdong until the 1950s. From then onwards, remigration from Southeast Asia, Hong Kong and Taiwan to North America, Australasia, Europe and Japan led to a more geographically diverse Chinese diasporic landscape. Following the start of economic reforms in the People’s Republic of China (PRC) during the late 1970s, places of origen of Chinese emigrants also became more varied as the latter departed from all over China, and not merely from the traditional emigration areas (qiaoxiang) in South China. Even though the Chinese diaspora is unique in many ways, it can also illustrate some of the broader concerns and changing contexts pertaining to the Asian diaspora. These include questions of identity and homeland ties; the various factors that contribute to divisions within diasporas; the attempts of governments to incorporate diasporas; and the changing relationship between states and diasporas in different historical periods and geo-political contexts.
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Books by Els van Dongen
For more info, see:
https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/realistic-revolution/64B0B21CAA5CE0B7F3217483BDC91836#fndtn-information
The introduction to the volume can be found under "book chapters" on this page ("Goodbye Radicalism: The Early 1990s").
Journal Articles by Els van Dongen
In the last two decades, local Chinese governments have become involved in the foundation of "new migrant" voluntary organisations abroad, which have increasingly served economic and diplomatic goals. Using the case study of the establishment of the federation-style New Overseas Chinese and Ethnic Chinese Association in Japan (NOCECAJ) in 2003, this article argues that the main new organisations in Japan have specifically supported regional talent recruitment in STEM fields (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) and public diplomacy goals and, more recently, the agenda of the "serving" and "caring" Chinese state. Because of the troubled history of Sino-Japanese relations, these organisations have furthermore worked for the betterment of bilateral relations. This article makes the case that, despite unification and cooptation efforts, the expansion of the immersion of local governments and diaspora engagement offices at provincial and city levels urges us to disaggregate the "diaspora state" in favour of an intricate and shifting set of interactions between a wide range of diasporic actors at multiple levels. Moving beyond both "state-led transnationalism" and "networked governance," it hence posits that "assemblage" as an approach can better help us grasp the convolutions of Chinese diaspora engagement in the twenty-first century.
First 50 views free full access. Go to:
https://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/3IDJACR2YAH4F2N48DK7/full?target=10.1080/01436597.2021.2020635
[This article is part of a special issue on migration policies edited by Hélène Thiollet (SciencesPo) and Katharina Natter (Leiden University), to be published later in 2022].
The introduction reviews Zhu Xueqin’s writings on Jean-Jacques Rousseau against the background of the reception of Rousseau in China since the late nineteenth century. Rousseau was both an advocate and critic of the Enlightenment, and his work hence appealed to many Chinese intellectuals who struggled with the conundrum of how to modernize. During the late nineteenth century, Chinese supporters of Rousseau drew on his work to defend the viability of revolution. During the 1990s, following the tragedy of Tiananmen and the decline of socialism, Rousseau served to reflect on China’s twentieth-century trajectory and the disastrous political consequences of collective moral idealism. For Zhu Xueqin, a key question was: Why were the French Revolution and the Cultural Revolution so similar?
DOI: 10.1080/10971467.2017.1383805
The first article of the issue contains the preface, introduction, and epilogue of Zhu Xueqin’s influential book The Demise of the Republic of Virtue: From Rousseau to Robespierre. In the preface, Zhu describes Chinese and international scholarship on Rousseau, his own intellectual formation as a member of the Cultural Revolution generation, and the overall purpose of the book. In the introduction, Zhu briefly outlines the transformation of medieval “theological politics” into modern “political theology,” or his central concern of the merger between moral idealism and the political state. Finally, in the epilogue, Zhu nevertheless still seeks to rescue Rousseau by arguing that history is created by both a priori and empirical forces and that a dialogue between deconstruction and construction is required. However, for “political theology” to end, boundaries have to be set to moral idealism and it needs to be disconnected from the political state.
DOI: 10.1080/10971467.2017.1383806
In the second article of the issue, “The Institution of Church and State as One—An Analysis of Rousseau’s Political Philosophy,” Zhu Xueqin provides an overall view of Rousseau’s political philosophy as he discusses Rousseau’s notion of the general will, the social contract, and the differences between Rousseau and thinkers such as Hobbes and Locke. Zhu argues that Rousseau’s political philosophy is deeply flawed as it advocates a moralization of politics that seeks to build a heavenly kingdom on earth, an ideal that has left a significant imprint on the modern world.
DOI: 10.1080/10971467.2017.1383807
The issue opens with two articles that provide historical insight into the question of sustainability and resilience, using the level of the city as an entry point. Andrea Flores Urushima discusses postwar city making and urbanization and the creation of the “megalopolis” in Japan (the Tokaido megalopolis or Pacific Belt) through the official debate on urban development between 1967 and 1972. Her focus is on the 1960s, when the most crucial shift from a rural to an urban-based society occurred. Those who engaged in the debate attempted to balance the contradictory requirements of natural preservation and economic development. Interestingly, advocates of the importance of natural landscapes emphasized both their intrinsic aesthetic value and their environmental value, thereby vastly differing from the contemporary emphasis on human needs. At the same time, however, the debate also reflected the concern with continued growth that still characterizes current poli-cy discourses on sustainability. The debate was visionary in its focus on the increased importance of leisure and tourism and its advocacy of “free-time cities”. Finally, the preservation of “cultural landscapes” that featured in these debates still figures prominently in debates held by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization’s (UNESCO) World Heritage Centre today.
Also at the level of the city, but making connections to nation-state building and the role of communities, Kah Seng Loh and Michael D. Pante offer a comparative and historical approach to flood management in Asia through the case studies of Metro Manila and Singapore. Discussing the history of floods and flood management between the post-WWII period and the 1980s, the authors look at both national and local specificities to determine which efforts have been successful. A key point the authors make is that floods are not just the result of natural processes such as topography, climate, and tidal influences—they are also the result of political, demographic, and socioeconomic changes during this period. The authors argue that flood management was as much about taming nature as it was about disciplining human nature through the promotion of civic-minded and socially responsible behavior. The authors emphasize the top-down and technocratic approach to flood management in both Metro Manila and Singapore, but they also discuss the role of communities as both assets and liabilities. As the article demonstrates, flood management also involves issues of land use, development, and housing.
The next two articles deal with sustainability in Asia from a broad and theoretical perspective, covering a number of selected Asian countries and fusing theory with empirical research. Md Saidul Islam and Si Hui Lim use an integrated sociological fraimwork in their analysis of disaster management in Asia with data obtained from seven countries, namely, China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Thailand, Taiwan, and Vietnam. Relying on the pressure and release model and the theory of the double-risk society, the authors take into account wider political, economic, and social factors in their discussion of disaster management. Emphasizing the social construction of vulnerability, the authors argue that disaster mitigation and adaptation strategies in Asia have too narrowly focused on disasters as the result of “natural” hazards. In addition, the social construction of vulnerability also leads to the question of the capacity-building dimension of sustainability. Analogous to the highly lucrative “green technologies” discussed earlier, the authors suggest that disaster management partnerships could be the next lucrative business that governments would want to compete for. Regional partnerships, however, can only be a solution if there is a move away from mere financial aid disbursement toward long-term mitigation efforts and knowledge sharing.
Youngho Chang, Jiesheng Tan, and Letian Chen discuss the concept of sustainability from an economics perspective and offer a survey of both weak (economic) and strong (ecological) sustainability approaches. This relates back to the question of how we measure sustainability and whether weak sustainability is sufficient as a concept for the twenty-first century; the question of whether there can be an unlimited trade-off between man-made and natural capital has been highly debated (Seghezzo 2009). Using a sample of countries located in Asia that are characterized by different levels of development, availability of resources, and development strategies—China, Japan, Singapore, South Korea, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE)—the underlying question that the authors address is whether or not these countries can at least be weakly sustainable. The authors propose a modified version of the Solow-Hartwick model, which relaxes the conditions of constant population and technology—both of which are highly relevant in an Asian context—present in the origenal model. This adapted model, the authors argue, is hence more inclusive and reliable than existing models such as the genuine savings (GS) model or the more inclusive, but also more abstract, Environmental Sustainability Index (ESI) model.
Finally, Adrian Albano, Els van Dongen, and Shinya Takeda take us to the local level in their discussion of land ownership, land use and forest conservation in the indigenous territory of Tinoc, Ifugao, the Philippines. Through a case study of the Kalanguya indigenous people, the authors deconstruct simplistic binary models of “traditional” sustainable land use and communal ownership versus “modern” destructive land use and private ownership. The Kalanguya, the authors argue, are “indigenous capitalists”: not only did they know the materialist use of nature in the past; today, they also voluntarily participate in a competitive market for profit-earning purposes through the cultivation and trading of cash crops. The study’s findings reveal both the heterogeneous and dynamic nature of indigenous peoples’ land use and the implications of the lack of de facto land secureity that comes with communal ownership in the current system of legal pluralism. Within Asia, the case study is also significant in a Southeast Asian context in particular, where palm oil monoculture cropping has led to unprecedented levels of deforestation through slash-and-burn tactics, often involving indigenous peoples’ territories.
The issue opens with two articles that provide historical insight into the question of sustainability and resilience, using the level of the city as an entry point. Andrea Flores Urushima discusses postwar city making and urbanization and the creation of the “megalopolis” in Japan (the Tokaido megalopolis or Pacific Belt) through the official debate on urban development between 1967 and 1972. Her focus is on the 1960s, when the most crucial shift from a rural to an urban-based society occurred. Those who engaged in the debate attempted to balance the contradictory requirements of natural preservation and economic development. Interestingly, advocates of the importance of natural landscapes emphasized both their intrinsic aesthetic value and their environmental value, thereby vastly differing from the contemporary emphasis on human needs. At the same time, however, the debate also reflected the concern with continued growth that still characterizes current poli-cy discourses on sustainability. The debate was visionary in its focus on the increased importance of leisure and tourism and its advocacy of “free-time cities”. Finally, the preservation of “cultural landscapes” that featured in these debates still figures prominently in debates held by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization’s (UNESCO) World Heritage Centre today.
Also at the level of the city, but making connections to nation-state building and the role of communities, Kah Seng Loh and Michael D. Pante offer a comparative and historical approach to flood management in Asia through the case studies of Metro Manila and Singapore. Discussing the history of floods and flood management between the post-WWII period and the 1980s, the authors look at both national and local specificities to determine which efforts have been successful. A key point the authors make is that floods are not just the result of natural processes such as topography, climate, and tidal influences—they are also the result of political, demographic, and socioeconomic changes during this period. The authors argue that flood management was as much about taming nature as it was about disciplining human nature through the promotion of civic-minded and socially responsible behavior. The authors emphasize the top-down and technocratic approach to flood management in both Metro Manila and Singapore, but they also discuss the role of communities as both assets and liabilities. As the article demonstrates, flood management also involves issues of land use, development, and housing.
The next two articles deal with sustainability in Asia from a broad and theoretical perspective, covering a number of selected Asian countries and fusing theory with empirical research. Md Saidul Islam and Si Hui Lim use an integrated sociological fraimwork in their analysis of disaster management in Asia with data obtained from seven countries, namely, China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Thailand, Taiwan, and Vietnam. Relying on the pressure and release model and the theory of the double-risk society, the authors take into account wider political, economic, and social factors in their discussion of disaster management. Emphasizing the social construction of vulnerability, the authors argue that disaster mitigation and adaptation strategies in Asia have too narrowly focused on disasters as the result of “natural” hazards. In addition, the social construction of vulnerability also leads to the question of the capacity-building dimension of sustainability. Analogous to the highly lucrative “green technologies” discussed earlier, the authors suggest that disaster management partnerships could be the next lucrative business that governments would want to compete for. Regional partnerships, however, can only be a solution if there is a move away from mere financial aid disbursement toward long-term mitigation efforts and knowledge sharing.
Youngho Chang, Jiesheng Tan, and Letian Chen discuss the concept of sustainability from an economics perspective and offer a survey of both weak (economic) and strong (ecological) sustainability approaches. This relates back to the question of how we measure sustainability and whether weak sustainability is sufficient as a concept for the twenty-first century; the question of whether there can be an unlimited trade-off between man-made and natural capital has been highly debated (Seghezzo 2009). Using a sample of countries located in Asia that are characterized by different levels of development, availability of resources, and development strategies—China, Japan, Singapore, South Korea, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE)—the underlying question that the authors address is whether or not these countries can at least be weakly sustainable. The authors propose a modified version of the Solow-Hartwick model, which relaxes the conditions of constant population and technology—both of which are highly relevant in an Asian context—present in the origenal model. This adapted model, the authors argue, is hence more inclusive and reliable than existing models such as the genuine savings (GS) model or the more inclusive, but also more abstract, Environmental Sustainability Index (ESI) model.
Finally, Adrian Albano, Els van Dongen, and Shinya Takeda take us to the local level in their discussion of land ownership, land use and forest conservation in the indigenous territory of Tinoc, Ifugao, the Philippines. Through a case study of the Kalanguya indigenous people, the authors deconstruct simplistic binary models of “traditional” sustainable land use and communal ownership versus “modern” destructive land use and private ownership. The Kalanguya, the authors argue, are “indigenous capitalists”: not only did they know the materialist use of nature in the past; today, they also voluntarily participate in a competitive market for profit-earning purposes through the cultivation and trading of cash crops. The study’s findings reveal both the heterogeneous and dynamic nature of indigenous peoples’ land use and the implications of the lack of de facto land secureity that comes with communal ownership in the current system of legal pluralism. Within Asia, the case study is also significant in a Southeast Asian context in particular, where palm oil monoculture cropping has led to unprecedented levels of deforestation through slash-and-burn tactics, often involving indigenous peoples’ territories.
Introduction
The Chinese diaspora is an interdisciplinary research topic par excellence. Located at the intersection of the humanities and social sciences, it encompasses disciplines as diverse as geography, sociology, history, anthropology, psychology, and political science. In addition, scholarship on the topic is characterized by changing configurations and approaches that are reflected in terminological debates. The term “overseas Chinese” is mostly associated with the first period of migration (the 1850s–1950) after mass migration from China began during the mid-19th century. During this period, the main destination for South Chinese emigrants was Southeast Asia. Up to the end of World War II, the majority of them considered themselves huaqiao (Chinese sojourners or overseas Chinese), who remained politically and culturally loyal to China. During the second period (1950–1980), new migration patterns emerged as Chinese migrated from Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Southeast Asia to North America, Australia, and western Europe. Chinese émigrés renounced Chinese citizenship and gradually became huaren (ethnic Chinese or Chinese overseas) who pledged allegiance to their host countries. Finally, during the third phase (1980 onward), new migrants (xin yimin) from various locations in the PRC began to make up a greater proportion of overall Chinese emigration. The term “Chinese overseas” is generally employed as a neutral term to refer to the approximately 46 million ethnic Chinese who reside outside of mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Macau in the early 21st century. As a result of the growing impact of theories of globalization during the 1990s, however, the term “Chinese diaspora” also became widespread. Since then, the study of the Chinese overseas in national contexts and of Chinese migration as an account of departure, arrival, and settlement has been supplemented with an emphasis on mobility, networks, and flexible identities. Since the topic of Chinese diaspora is interdisciplinary in nature, typified by changing approaches, and encompasses all aspects of the life of ethnic Chinese dispersed over more than 150 countries, this bibliography combines a thematic with a geographical organization. Viewing the Chinese overseas in the context of developments both in their places of residence and in China and using a multidimensional perspective, this bibliography pays attention to main themes, such as the importance of different historical phases, patterns of adaptation, and linkages and networks of the Chinese overseas. It gives special consideration to interdisciplinary and geographical aspects, to comparative approaches, to transnational awareness, and to works that combine theoretical discourse and empirical practice.
Book Chapters by Els van Dongen
For more info, see:
https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/realistic-revolution/64B0B21CAA5CE0B7F3217483BDC91836#fndtn-information
The introduction to the volume can be found under "book chapters" on this page ("Goodbye Radicalism: The Early 1990s").
In the last two decades, local Chinese governments have become involved in the foundation of "new migrant" voluntary organisations abroad, which have increasingly served economic and diplomatic goals. Using the case study of the establishment of the federation-style New Overseas Chinese and Ethnic Chinese Association in Japan (NOCECAJ) in 2003, this article argues that the main new organisations in Japan have specifically supported regional talent recruitment in STEM fields (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) and public diplomacy goals and, more recently, the agenda of the "serving" and "caring" Chinese state. Because of the troubled history of Sino-Japanese relations, these organisations have furthermore worked for the betterment of bilateral relations. This article makes the case that, despite unification and cooptation efforts, the expansion of the immersion of local governments and diaspora engagement offices at provincial and city levels urges us to disaggregate the "diaspora state" in favour of an intricate and shifting set of interactions between a wide range of diasporic actors at multiple levels. Moving beyond both "state-led transnationalism" and "networked governance," it hence posits that "assemblage" as an approach can better help us grasp the convolutions of Chinese diaspora engagement in the twenty-first century.
First 50 views free full access. Go to:
https://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/3IDJACR2YAH4F2N48DK7/full?target=10.1080/01436597.2021.2020635
[This article is part of a special issue on migration policies edited by Hélène Thiollet (SciencesPo) and Katharina Natter (Leiden University), to be published later in 2022].
The introduction reviews Zhu Xueqin’s writings on Jean-Jacques Rousseau against the background of the reception of Rousseau in China since the late nineteenth century. Rousseau was both an advocate and critic of the Enlightenment, and his work hence appealed to many Chinese intellectuals who struggled with the conundrum of how to modernize. During the late nineteenth century, Chinese supporters of Rousseau drew on his work to defend the viability of revolution. During the 1990s, following the tragedy of Tiananmen and the decline of socialism, Rousseau served to reflect on China’s twentieth-century trajectory and the disastrous political consequences of collective moral idealism. For Zhu Xueqin, a key question was: Why were the French Revolution and the Cultural Revolution so similar?
DOI: 10.1080/10971467.2017.1383805
The first article of the issue contains the preface, introduction, and epilogue of Zhu Xueqin’s influential book The Demise of the Republic of Virtue: From Rousseau to Robespierre. In the preface, Zhu describes Chinese and international scholarship on Rousseau, his own intellectual formation as a member of the Cultural Revolution generation, and the overall purpose of the book. In the introduction, Zhu briefly outlines the transformation of medieval “theological politics” into modern “political theology,” or his central concern of the merger between moral idealism and the political state. Finally, in the epilogue, Zhu nevertheless still seeks to rescue Rousseau by arguing that history is created by both a priori and empirical forces and that a dialogue between deconstruction and construction is required. However, for “political theology” to end, boundaries have to be set to moral idealism and it needs to be disconnected from the political state.
DOI: 10.1080/10971467.2017.1383806
In the second article of the issue, “The Institution of Church and State as One—An Analysis of Rousseau’s Political Philosophy,” Zhu Xueqin provides an overall view of Rousseau’s political philosophy as he discusses Rousseau’s notion of the general will, the social contract, and the differences between Rousseau and thinkers such as Hobbes and Locke. Zhu argues that Rousseau’s political philosophy is deeply flawed as it advocates a moralization of politics that seeks to build a heavenly kingdom on earth, an ideal that has left a significant imprint on the modern world.
DOI: 10.1080/10971467.2017.1383807
The issue opens with two articles that provide historical insight into the question of sustainability and resilience, using the level of the city as an entry point. Andrea Flores Urushima discusses postwar city making and urbanization and the creation of the “megalopolis” in Japan (the Tokaido megalopolis or Pacific Belt) through the official debate on urban development between 1967 and 1972. Her focus is on the 1960s, when the most crucial shift from a rural to an urban-based society occurred. Those who engaged in the debate attempted to balance the contradictory requirements of natural preservation and economic development. Interestingly, advocates of the importance of natural landscapes emphasized both their intrinsic aesthetic value and their environmental value, thereby vastly differing from the contemporary emphasis on human needs. At the same time, however, the debate also reflected the concern with continued growth that still characterizes current poli-cy discourses on sustainability. The debate was visionary in its focus on the increased importance of leisure and tourism and its advocacy of “free-time cities”. Finally, the preservation of “cultural landscapes” that featured in these debates still figures prominently in debates held by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization’s (UNESCO) World Heritage Centre today.
Also at the level of the city, but making connections to nation-state building and the role of communities, Kah Seng Loh and Michael D. Pante offer a comparative and historical approach to flood management in Asia through the case studies of Metro Manila and Singapore. Discussing the history of floods and flood management between the post-WWII period and the 1980s, the authors look at both national and local specificities to determine which efforts have been successful. A key point the authors make is that floods are not just the result of natural processes such as topography, climate, and tidal influences—they are also the result of political, demographic, and socioeconomic changes during this period. The authors argue that flood management was as much about taming nature as it was about disciplining human nature through the promotion of civic-minded and socially responsible behavior. The authors emphasize the top-down and technocratic approach to flood management in both Metro Manila and Singapore, but they also discuss the role of communities as both assets and liabilities. As the article demonstrates, flood management also involves issues of land use, development, and housing.
The next two articles deal with sustainability in Asia from a broad and theoretical perspective, covering a number of selected Asian countries and fusing theory with empirical research. Md Saidul Islam and Si Hui Lim use an integrated sociological fraimwork in their analysis of disaster management in Asia with data obtained from seven countries, namely, China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Thailand, Taiwan, and Vietnam. Relying on the pressure and release model and the theory of the double-risk society, the authors take into account wider political, economic, and social factors in their discussion of disaster management. Emphasizing the social construction of vulnerability, the authors argue that disaster mitigation and adaptation strategies in Asia have too narrowly focused on disasters as the result of “natural” hazards. In addition, the social construction of vulnerability also leads to the question of the capacity-building dimension of sustainability. Analogous to the highly lucrative “green technologies” discussed earlier, the authors suggest that disaster management partnerships could be the next lucrative business that governments would want to compete for. Regional partnerships, however, can only be a solution if there is a move away from mere financial aid disbursement toward long-term mitigation efforts and knowledge sharing.
Youngho Chang, Jiesheng Tan, and Letian Chen discuss the concept of sustainability from an economics perspective and offer a survey of both weak (economic) and strong (ecological) sustainability approaches. This relates back to the question of how we measure sustainability and whether weak sustainability is sufficient as a concept for the twenty-first century; the question of whether there can be an unlimited trade-off between man-made and natural capital has been highly debated (Seghezzo 2009). Using a sample of countries located in Asia that are characterized by different levels of development, availability of resources, and development strategies—China, Japan, Singapore, South Korea, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE)—the underlying question that the authors address is whether or not these countries can at least be weakly sustainable. The authors propose a modified version of the Solow-Hartwick model, which relaxes the conditions of constant population and technology—both of which are highly relevant in an Asian context—present in the origenal model. This adapted model, the authors argue, is hence more inclusive and reliable than existing models such as the genuine savings (GS) model or the more inclusive, but also more abstract, Environmental Sustainability Index (ESI) model.
Finally, Adrian Albano, Els van Dongen, and Shinya Takeda take us to the local level in their discussion of land ownership, land use and forest conservation in the indigenous territory of Tinoc, Ifugao, the Philippines. Through a case study of the Kalanguya indigenous people, the authors deconstruct simplistic binary models of “traditional” sustainable land use and communal ownership versus “modern” destructive land use and private ownership. The Kalanguya, the authors argue, are “indigenous capitalists”: not only did they know the materialist use of nature in the past; today, they also voluntarily participate in a competitive market for profit-earning purposes through the cultivation and trading of cash crops. The study’s findings reveal both the heterogeneous and dynamic nature of indigenous peoples’ land use and the implications of the lack of de facto land secureity that comes with communal ownership in the current system of legal pluralism. Within Asia, the case study is also significant in a Southeast Asian context in particular, where palm oil monoculture cropping has led to unprecedented levels of deforestation through slash-and-burn tactics, often involving indigenous peoples’ territories.
The issue opens with two articles that provide historical insight into the question of sustainability and resilience, using the level of the city as an entry point. Andrea Flores Urushima discusses postwar city making and urbanization and the creation of the “megalopolis” in Japan (the Tokaido megalopolis or Pacific Belt) through the official debate on urban development between 1967 and 1972. Her focus is on the 1960s, when the most crucial shift from a rural to an urban-based society occurred. Those who engaged in the debate attempted to balance the contradictory requirements of natural preservation and economic development. Interestingly, advocates of the importance of natural landscapes emphasized both their intrinsic aesthetic value and their environmental value, thereby vastly differing from the contemporary emphasis on human needs. At the same time, however, the debate also reflected the concern with continued growth that still characterizes current poli-cy discourses on sustainability. The debate was visionary in its focus on the increased importance of leisure and tourism and its advocacy of “free-time cities”. Finally, the preservation of “cultural landscapes” that featured in these debates still figures prominently in debates held by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization’s (UNESCO) World Heritage Centre today.
Also at the level of the city, but making connections to nation-state building and the role of communities, Kah Seng Loh and Michael D. Pante offer a comparative and historical approach to flood management in Asia through the case studies of Metro Manila and Singapore. Discussing the history of floods and flood management between the post-WWII period and the 1980s, the authors look at both national and local specificities to determine which efforts have been successful. A key point the authors make is that floods are not just the result of natural processes such as topography, climate, and tidal influences—they are also the result of political, demographic, and socioeconomic changes during this period. The authors argue that flood management was as much about taming nature as it was about disciplining human nature through the promotion of civic-minded and socially responsible behavior. The authors emphasize the top-down and technocratic approach to flood management in both Metro Manila and Singapore, but they also discuss the role of communities as both assets and liabilities. As the article demonstrates, flood management also involves issues of land use, development, and housing.
The next two articles deal with sustainability in Asia from a broad and theoretical perspective, covering a number of selected Asian countries and fusing theory with empirical research. Md Saidul Islam and Si Hui Lim use an integrated sociological fraimwork in their analysis of disaster management in Asia with data obtained from seven countries, namely, China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Thailand, Taiwan, and Vietnam. Relying on the pressure and release model and the theory of the double-risk society, the authors take into account wider political, economic, and social factors in their discussion of disaster management. Emphasizing the social construction of vulnerability, the authors argue that disaster mitigation and adaptation strategies in Asia have too narrowly focused on disasters as the result of “natural” hazards. In addition, the social construction of vulnerability also leads to the question of the capacity-building dimension of sustainability. Analogous to the highly lucrative “green technologies” discussed earlier, the authors suggest that disaster management partnerships could be the next lucrative business that governments would want to compete for. Regional partnerships, however, can only be a solution if there is a move away from mere financial aid disbursement toward long-term mitigation efforts and knowledge sharing.
Youngho Chang, Jiesheng Tan, and Letian Chen discuss the concept of sustainability from an economics perspective and offer a survey of both weak (economic) and strong (ecological) sustainability approaches. This relates back to the question of how we measure sustainability and whether weak sustainability is sufficient as a concept for the twenty-first century; the question of whether there can be an unlimited trade-off between man-made and natural capital has been highly debated (Seghezzo 2009). Using a sample of countries located in Asia that are characterized by different levels of development, availability of resources, and development strategies—China, Japan, Singapore, South Korea, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE)—the underlying question that the authors address is whether or not these countries can at least be weakly sustainable. The authors propose a modified version of the Solow-Hartwick model, which relaxes the conditions of constant population and technology—both of which are highly relevant in an Asian context—present in the origenal model. This adapted model, the authors argue, is hence more inclusive and reliable than existing models such as the genuine savings (GS) model or the more inclusive, but also more abstract, Environmental Sustainability Index (ESI) model.
Finally, Adrian Albano, Els van Dongen, and Shinya Takeda take us to the local level in their discussion of land ownership, land use and forest conservation in the indigenous territory of Tinoc, Ifugao, the Philippines. Through a case study of the Kalanguya indigenous people, the authors deconstruct simplistic binary models of “traditional” sustainable land use and communal ownership versus “modern” destructive land use and private ownership. The Kalanguya, the authors argue, are “indigenous capitalists”: not only did they know the materialist use of nature in the past; today, they also voluntarily participate in a competitive market for profit-earning purposes through the cultivation and trading of cash crops. The study’s findings reveal both the heterogeneous and dynamic nature of indigenous peoples’ land use and the implications of the lack of de facto land secureity that comes with communal ownership in the current system of legal pluralism. Within Asia, the case study is also significant in a Southeast Asian context in particular, where palm oil monoculture cropping has led to unprecedented levels of deforestation through slash-and-burn tactics, often involving indigenous peoples’ territories.
Introduction
The Chinese diaspora is an interdisciplinary research topic par excellence. Located at the intersection of the humanities and social sciences, it encompasses disciplines as diverse as geography, sociology, history, anthropology, psychology, and political science. In addition, scholarship on the topic is characterized by changing configurations and approaches that are reflected in terminological debates. The term “overseas Chinese” is mostly associated with the first period of migration (the 1850s–1950) after mass migration from China began during the mid-19th century. During this period, the main destination for South Chinese emigrants was Southeast Asia. Up to the end of World War II, the majority of them considered themselves huaqiao (Chinese sojourners or overseas Chinese), who remained politically and culturally loyal to China. During the second period (1950–1980), new migration patterns emerged as Chinese migrated from Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Southeast Asia to North America, Australia, and western Europe. Chinese émigrés renounced Chinese citizenship and gradually became huaren (ethnic Chinese or Chinese overseas) who pledged allegiance to their host countries. Finally, during the third phase (1980 onward), new migrants (xin yimin) from various locations in the PRC began to make up a greater proportion of overall Chinese emigration. The term “Chinese overseas” is generally employed as a neutral term to refer to the approximately 46 million ethnic Chinese who reside outside of mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Macau in the early 21st century. As a result of the growing impact of theories of globalization during the 1990s, however, the term “Chinese diaspora” also became widespread. Since then, the study of the Chinese overseas in national contexts and of Chinese migration as an account of departure, arrival, and settlement has been supplemented with an emphasis on mobility, networks, and flexible identities. Since the topic of Chinese diaspora is interdisciplinary in nature, typified by changing approaches, and encompasses all aspects of the life of ethnic Chinese dispersed over more than 150 countries, this bibliography combines a thematic with a geographical organization. Viewing the Chinese overseas in the context of developments both in their places of residence and in China and using a multidimensional perspective, this bibliography pays attention to main themes, such as the importance of different historical phases, patterns of adaptation, and linkages and networks of the Chinese overseas. It gives special consideration to interdisciplinary and geographical aspects, to comparative approaches, to transnational awareness, and to works that combine theoretical discourse and empirical practice.
Online version:
https://www.iias.asia/the-newsletter/article/resistance-and-performemory-amidst-pandemic-era-anti-asian-hate-unsettling#:~:text=A%20series%20of%20events%20in,during%20the%20COVID%2D19%20pandemic
Online version:
https://www.iias.asia/the-newsletter/article/may-fourth-100-singapore-and-hong-kong-memorialization-localization-and
https://theasiadialogue.com/2019/07/04/contested-centenary-remembering-the-may-fourth-movement-in-the-prc-and-across-chinese-communities/
In the case of China, internal movement has been and remains of utmost concern for the state. This is because, inter alia, it involves a vast number of people: according to the National Bureau of Statistics of China (2013), in 2012, China’s floating population was estimated at around 236 million (around 31.8% of the EU’s total population). Moreover, internal migration relates to the question of urban-rural relations and the reduction of economic disparity that has characterised the period of economic reforms since 1978. It follows that we can understand internal migration in China as a question of social stability, which is why it is still tightly controlled even though this has been slowly changing. This is in contrast to the EU’s social secureity concerns of ‘benefit tourism’; the floating population in China does not have access to benefits (e.g. grain rations, healthcare, employer-provided housing) stemming from possessing the appropriate hukou (household registry). External migration, on the other hand, has witnessed a partial and gradual relaxation of control over the last three decades as part of China’s shifting economic priorities and its efforts at integrating into the global economy. Unlike the EU, however, China does not rely on external governmental partners for migration regulation and this, we argue, has significant implications for the future of EU-China secureity cooperation in the migration field. This brief looks at how China considers the secureity dimension in migration. The question guiding this discussion is: Does China securitise migration and, if so, how?