China (Continuación)

MundoAsia, ,

China’s national legislature has adopted sweeping changes to the country’s Environmental Protection Law, revisions that have been hailed as major steps toward saving China’s environment from rampant degradation.

The authorities will now have stronger enforcement powers, including the right to detain persistent violators for up to 15 days and to fine polluters more heavily than before. Some legally registered civil-society organizations will now be able to initiate public-interest litigation as well.

The law, approved late last month, solidifies the use of environmental targets to assess bureaucrats, who for too long have been measured primarily on economic performance. It also increases transparency by requiring major violators to disclose pollution data and local governments to release information on environmental quality and enforcement.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoÁfrica

For nearly a decade, as China made a historic push for business opportunities and expanded influence in Africa, most of the continent’s leaders were so thrilled at having a deep-pocketed partner willing to make big investments and start huge new projects that they rarely paused to consider whether they were getting a sound deal.

China has peppered the continent with newly built stadiums, airports, hospitals, highways and dams, but as Africans are beginning to fully recognize, these projects have also left many countries saddled with heavy debts and other problems, from environmental conflict to labor strife. As a consequence, China’s relationship with the continent is entering a new and much more skeptical phase.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAsia, , , ,

The China National Overseas Oil Corporation (CNOOC) began drilling in Vietnamese-claimed waters last week, accompanied by more than 70 vessels, including armed Chinese warships. At first glance, this might look like merely another front in China’s quest for natural resources, which has taken Chinese companies to seemingly every corner of the earth.

Yet what is happening in the South China Sea is actually far more dangerous than what has come before — and the forces driving it go well beyond pursuit of energy riches. The United States needs to face up to the full magnitude of the Chinese challenge to have any hope of successfully confronting it.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAsia,

Since Hong Kong was handed over by the British to China in 1997, the territory’s seven million residents have been free to govern themselves with relatively little interference from Beijing. That freedom is now under threat, frustration with Beijing is mounting, and the possibility of violence is growing.

Although Beijing’s hand can be felt in many areas, its increasing meddling in local politics is most troubling. The central government had promised Hong Kongers they could directly elect their leader in 2017, but it has yet to approve a process for nominating candidates. Beijing appears to want candidates screened by a Beijing-friendly nomination committee, thus dashing hopes for real electoral choice.…  Seguir leyendo »

InternacionalEconomía,

A report last month that China’s economy will soon become the world’s largest has sparked worries. Normally calm observers are taking the news as a sign that China is overtaking America as an economic power.

But much as counting warships or troops often provides a misleading measure of military might, tallying up gross domestic product — the figure behind the latest headlines — yields a warped picture of China’s economic rise.

By most meaningful yardsticks, China is still less economically powerful than the United States. The problem with the new numbers starts with how they compare economies’ sizes. The World Bank tables that show China passing the United States compare the two countries using “purchasing power parity,” which measures national incomes in terms of what they can buy at home.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAsia

The last time I saw my father was on Feb. 2, 2013. We were at the international airport in Beijing, about to board a flight to America for him to spend a year as a visiting scholar at Indiana University. I was 18, and was coming along for a few weeks to help him settle in.

We had checked in and were waiting as our passports were inspected. The guards closely examined my father’s documents, then typed information into their computers. Suddenly, security agents arrived and pulled us out of the line. We were put into a small room, without food or a bathroom.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAsia,

In February, while I finished work on a book about China, a publishing company in Shanghai asked for an early copy, in order to begin a translation. The book follows people I’ve come to know, some prominent, others not, as they try to change their lives in a country throbbing with possibility — individuals like Gong Haiyan, a farmer’s daughter and businesswoman who envisions herself in a “race against the clock, to seize the initiative before it’s lost.”

After reading the manuscript, an editor in Shanghai replied with enthusiasm, but also sent me a list of politically active people in the narrative who, he wrote, “would be difficult” to include in the Chinese edition: a lawyer (Chen Guangcheng), an artist (Ai Weiwei), three writers (Liu Xiaobo, Murong Xuecun, Han Han) and “a few others.”…  Seguir leyendo »

Sex Abuse and China's Children

MundoAsia, , ,

When I was 13, living in the outskirts of Nanjing, my math teacher molested all the girls in our class, including me. Under the pretense of checking my work, he would lean over me, his face so close that I could smell his garlic breath, and he’d move his hand up my shirt, touching my chest.

Apart from trying to avoid him, we didn’t take any action. We knew what he was doing was wrong, but it never occurred to us to report him. A teacher in a Chinese classroom holds tremendous authority over students, and we didn’t even know the term “sexual abuse.”…  Seguir leyendo »

Reimaginar el futuro urbano de China

MundoAsia,

Cerca de 100 millones de chinos viven en la pobreza extrema y alrededor de 275 millones gastan menos de $2 al día. La abrumadora mayoría de los pobres de China habitan en áreas rurales y muchos de ellos esperan lograr acceso a una mejor calidad de vida en las ciudades, donde es más fácil encontrar empleos con mejores salarios. De hecho, en las tres y media décadas pasadas, la impresionante cifra de 500 millones de chinos han dado ese paso, elevando con ello la proporción de población urbana del país desde menos de un 20% en 1980 a un 50% hoy en día.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAsia,

Después de muchos meses con indicadores económicos desalentadores, el Consejo de Estado chino ha revelado un paquete de «miniestímulo», centrado en la construcción de vivienda social y la expansión del ferrocarril. La decisión llega un mes después de que el primer ministro Li Keqiang declaró que China había fijado su meta de crecimiento anual en «alrededor del 7,5 %», la misma del año pasado. Las implicaciones son claras. Si bien el crecimiento impulsado por el consumo continúa como meta de largo plazo para China, la infraestructura seguirá –al menos en el corto plazo– como motor principal de la economía de ese país.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAsiaInternacionalOrden Mundial

El mayor riesgo geopolítico de nuestro tiempo no es un conflicto entre Israel y el Irán por la proliferación nuclear. Tampoco es el de un desorden crónico en un arco de inestabilidad que ahora se extiende desde el Magreb hasta el Hindu Kush. Ni siquiera es el de una segunda guerra fría entre Rusia y Occidente por Ucrania.

Todos esos son riesgos graves, desde luego, pero ninguno lo es tanto como el mantenimiento del carácter pacífico del ascenso de China. Por eso resulta particularmente preocupante oír a funcionarios y analistas japoneses y chinos comparar la relación bilateral de sus países con la existente entre Gran Bretaña y Alemania en vísperas de la primera guerra mundial.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAsia, , ,

The mounting tensions between Tokyo and Beijing over the small chain of islands in the East China Sea called the Senkaku by Japan and the Diaoyu by China have profound implications for United States interests and the future of Asia.

Both Tokyo and Washington can do more to reduce tensions, but the fundamental problem is China’s pattern of coercion against neighbors along its maritime borders. Any American plan to ease the strain between Japan and China should convince Beijing that coercion will no longer work — but that dialogue and confidence building measures might.

The competing Japanese and Chinese claims to the islands, which are under Japanese control, are rooted in obscure historical documents and verbal understandings.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAsia, , ,

The United States has been a destabilizing force in the dispute between China and Japan over the sovereignty of a small chain of islands in the East China Sea. Not only did Washington create the problem in 1971 by arbitrarily returning the administrative rights of the islands to Japan, but America’s claim that its security alliance with Japan applies to the tiny islands has emboldened Tokyo to take a more aggressive stance toward Beijing.

A peaceful resolution of the issue ultimately depends on the willingness of the Japanese government to acknowledge the dispute and pursue more reconciliatory policies toward China. But a major factor is whether Washington will shift its strategy to help rein in Japan and adopt a more reasonable stance that accommodates Beijing’s concerns about its maritime interests and security environment.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAsia, ,

Más de una tercera parte de la población mundial vive en sólo tres países: China, la India e Indonesia. Como los tres están experimentando importantes transiciones políticas, ya se trate de elegir a un nuevo dirigente o de experimentar las primeras decisiones decisivas de un dirigente recién instalado, este momento es decisivo para la configuración del futuro de la economía mundial. Si Narendra Modi y Joko “Jokowi” Widodo vencen en las próximas elecciones de la India y de Indonesia, respectivamente, se sumarán al Presidente de China, Xi Jinping, para impulsar el crecimiento económico regional, con lo que probablemente contribuyan a que el ascenso de Asia a la preeminencia económica mundial se produzca antes de lo que el mundo imaginó jamás.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAsia, , ,

Premier Li Keqiang wants to wean the Chinese economy off its dependence on export trade in cheap electronics, clothes, toys and tchotchkes of all variety. Let the Chinese people consume instead, he says, and let them consume products and services of high value.

But how do you take a developing country like China, where saving has traditionally been favored over spending, and transform it into a nation of mass consumers? Simple, Li explains: You urbanize it, because city dwellers earn much more and spend much more.

China's urban dwellers are 53.7% of the population (by contrast, developed countries are 80% urban on average).…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAsia, , ,

While the world focuses on Ukraine, ships and planes from Japan and China challenge each other almost every day near a few square miles of barren islets in the East China Sea that Japan calls the Senkaku and China calls the Diaoyu islands. This dangerous rivalry dates to the late 19th century, but the flare-up that led to widespread anti-Japan demonstrations in China in September 2012 began when the Japanese government purchased three of the tiny islets from their private Japanese owner. The issue is bound to arise during President Obama’s upcoming visit to Japan.

When the United States returned Okinawa to Japan in May 1972, the transfer included the disputed islets that the United States had administered after 1945.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAsia,

Since Xi Jinping became president of China, there has been a sustained crackdown on advocates of democracy and civil society. A couple hundred Chinese citizens have been arrested and tried or await trial. Lawyer and activist Xu Zhiyong , a founding leader of the New Citizens’ Movement, was arrested in July; his four-year prison sentence was upheld this month. The sentences of other New Citizens’ Movement leaders, including Ding Jiaxi, Li Wei, Zhao Changquing and Zhang Baocheng, were recently announced: Each will be imprisoned for at least two years.

Many people mistakenly think that the New Citizens’ Movement did not have a chance to do much before being wiped out.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAsia

Tradicionalmente, a la hora de evaluar los ejes del cambio iniciado hace más de tres décadas en China con Deng Xiaoping otorgamos más importancia a la reforma que a la apertura al exterior. Sin embargo, para una civilización que ha vivido siglos y siglos encerrada en sí misma, es la apertura al mundo la clave de mayor trascendencia. De hecho, nunca China ha sido tan interdependiente como ahora y ello señala una transformación de gran envergadura.

Del mismo modo, hoy día, cuando China asiste a una oleada de nuevas reformas, gran parte del acento se traslada a la magnitud de los cambios económicos, ciertamente importantes porque deben auspiciar un nuevo modelo de desarrollo y reforzar y completar los engarces pendientes con el exterior incluso en áreas de tanta relevancia como la financiera.…  Seguir leyendo »

InternacionalEconomía

China’s release of its lowest growth rate in six quarters is triggering quite divergent reactions this morning among market analysts -- from those who view it as confirmation of a secular growth slowdown in China's bubble-prone economy, to those who see it as evidence of a potentially successful reform movement by those stewarding the world’s second largest economy.

Predictions about the implications of a China slowdown for the rest of the world are also all over the map. Some feel that this will inevitably lower global growth and increase the risk of financial instability; others deem it part of a much-desired global rebalancing that puts the world on a more solid economic footing.…  Seguir leyendo »

MundoAsia

Los mercados siempre están en la búsqueda de una historia, y los inversionistas, al parecer, han encontrado una nueva este año en China. La desaceleración del crecimiento del país y los riesgos financieros crecientes han originado una ola de pesimismo que hace que los economistas en todo el mundo prevengan sobre un colapso inminente.

Sin embargo, los pronósticos desesperados en cuanto a China han abundado a lo largo de los últimos treinta años, y ninguno se ha materializado. ¿Son realmente distintos los de ahora?

La respuesta rápida es no. Al igual que los pronósticos del pasado, las advertencias de ahora se basan en antecedentes históricos e indicadores universales contra China, que tiene características económicas únicas, y sencillamente no se pueden analizar certeramente.…  Seguir leyendo »