Search results

In the article author examines a concept of circular economy showing that it lays the foundation for global stable development. A new business model will take into account the need for easy product maintenance, reuse and further processing from the very start. There is a growing trend of investments in circular economy, but the largest contributors are waste collection and processing. The main prerequisites for the circular economy as a necessary business model were identified including lack of fossil fuels and the limited availability of all types of natural resources, the increase of the consumers of the middle class, the new opportunity of problems resolution with the help of "big data" concept, legislative changes and management globalization, etc. A number of issues arise concerning the environmental effects of circularity of plastic products in Europe and the US which islargely materialized through international transportation with initial point of production in China.

The reasoning behind North Korea's continued efforts to develop a nuclear deterrent remains puzzling to many, with the heavy costs and behavior of the regime leading to the belief that it is irrational. This paper argues that North Korea's nuclear weapons program is instead a rational strategy for the regime. The perceived threat from South Korean and American military forces, as well as its own ineffective conventional forces, make a North Korean nuclear program a viable and relatively cheap deterrent. Its limited foreign relations and near-total dependence on China largely insulate it from economic punishment. Finally, the nature of the regime allows it to disregard popular opinion while forcing it to accommodate military demands for a nuclear deterrent. The necessity of nuclear weapons for defence and the few downsides of possessing them means that Pyongyang is unlikely to give them up, thus dooming denuclearization efforts to failure.

In Regional and International factors that Prolong the Syrian Crisis, Eduardo W. Aboultaif provides an analytical survey of the various regional and international players who are directly or indirectly involved in the Syrian crisis. Aboultaif elucidates the subtle differences between political and economic concerns and explains, for example, how states often are willing to ignore their immediate economic interest when faced with political factors that are seen as national security threats. Aboultaif further describes the inter-consecutiveness of events in Syria and events in Russia, China and Iran, thereby revealing the logic underlying support to the Asad regime. Perhaps most important, and up to the time in which Aboultaif completed this article, the unwillingness of Arab states, and to a lesser extent Turkey, to act directly in the region without American support has served to define the nature of the regional conflict and, explains, to a large extent, the continuity of the crisis. ; Publisher PDF

The point of departure for this thesis is that science, technology (S&T) and global politics are co-productive of each other. Situated at the intersections of Science and Technology Studies and International Relations, it explores the interactions between S&T and global politics on the level of discourses, institutions, representations and identities. Its three case studies focus on international S&T cooperation between Austria and China, science diplomacy and satellite imagery analysis in the context of security policy. As a cumulative thesis it presents three articles published in /accepted by international peer-reviewed publications. ; Ausgangspunkt der Dissertation ist ein Verständnis von Wissenschaft, Technologie (W&T) und globaler Politik als ko-produktiv. Situiert an der Schnittstelle von Wissenschafts-und Technologieforschung und Internationalen Beziehungen untersucht die Dissertation die Interaktionen von W&T und globaler Politik auf der Ebene von Diskursen, Institutionen, Repräsentationen und Identitäten. Die Fallstudien behandeln internationale W&T Kooperationen, Wissenschaftsdiplomatie sowie Satellitenbildanalyse im Kontext von Sicherheitspolitik. Als kumulative Dissertation baut die Arbeit auf drei Artikeln auf, die in internationalen Publikationen veröffentlicht / akzeptiert wurden.

Globalization of the urban real estate market, which was originally local, has generated new capital flows worldwide that have reinforced the secondary circuit. Barcelona has not been immune to this process, at least since Spain's integration into the European Union in 1986. Many legal changes in foreign investment regulations have been introduced in Spain, especially in the housing market. The latest major investments in real estate have been made by former socialist countries, notably the People's Republic of China and Russia, which both belong to the BRICS group. Chinese localization strategies have been more concentrated. With this theoretical background, the aim of the paper is to analyze the strategies of these recent appropriations of Barcelona's residential space, in the framework of other economic Chinese investments and in competition with other Mediterranean ports. The main conclusion of this study is related to the definition of Barcelona's Chinatown, its changing location, and processes of social differentiation.

The underlying spatial forces of firm networking practices are understudied in the literature of economic geography. This paper aims to reveal patterns and mechanisms of networking practices and relates them to China's transitional context based on empirical data from a firm survey in the Pearl River Delta. It addresses the localisation effect as the primary factor in explaining the selection of networking partners. The results of this paper suggest a strong tendency towards networking with local government agencies vis-a-vis weak linkages with business partners. Furthermore, it reveals that the intent of bonding with local authorities through interpersonal relationships increases with the localisation of customers. Meanwhile, firms are more likely to pursue learning-oriented networks with competitors as the number of suppliers in the same city increases. The findings add to the understanding of network relations in China, in particular to the rationales behind relations to local government officials.

On 28 June 2016, Kazakhstan won a non-permanent seat at the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) after outvoting ASEAN-backed Thailand to represent the Asia-Pacific in the UN body. Kazakhstan will serve for a two-year term starting this year, alongside non-permanent members Japan, Egypt, Ukraine, Uruguay, Senegal, Sweden, Bolivia, and Ethiopia – the latter three being newly elected non-permanent members – and permanent members US, China, Russia, France, and UK. Kazakhstan's ascension to the UNSC significantly indicates Central Asia's presence and relevance in the global stage. Arguably, Kazakhstan's election is fitting: not only does it stand for the Muslim community's interests and concerns before the most powerful UN agency, but is also symbolic of the effort to have greater and more diversified representation and perspectives in the global arena. While Kazakhstan may be a young country, it has shown that it can contribute to international peace and stability.

In December 2016, Philippine Trade Secretary Ramon M. Lopez expressed the country's decision to put its full weight behind the Asian trade pact Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) after President Rodrigo R. Duterte criticized the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement by highlighting the restrictive nature of its provision on intellectual property rights covering pharmaceuticals. The decision to back RCEP can also be viewed as a vital component of the Duterte administration's foreign policy objective which mainly focuses on realizing economic integration in Asia. More importantly, the Philippine government's willingness to enter into large trade deals like the RCEP with advanced Asian economies outlines two key insights on how it perceives the trajectory of free trade agreements (FTAs) in the region. Firstly, FTAs will expand to cover non-trade aspects of economic cooperation. Secondly, China will play a very critical role in determining the direction of Asian FTAs but fair treatment must be afforded to all member economies.

The economy of India is the sixth largest economy in the world measured by Purchasing Power Parity (PPP). The country is classified as a newly industrialized country, one of the G-20 major economies, a member of BRICS and a developing economy with an average growth rate of approximately 7 percent over the last two decades. India's economy became the world fastest growing major economy in the last quarter of 2014, surpassing the People's Republic of China. The long-term growth perspective of the Indian economy is positive due its young population, corresponding low dependency ratio, healthy saving and investment rates, and increasing integration into the global economy. This paper deals with the impact of Narendra Modi's Government on various socio economic sectors of Indian economy. This study is trying to analyse the progressively changes in various economic variables through implementing various welfare programmes in present Indian economy and after the Modi came into power.

With the reform movement in 1978, the Chinese government began to make great efforts to develop its country's education. Xi Jinping's administration has continued these efforts, attempting to achieve a world-class education system by 2020. This paper will examine the accomplishments of the Chinese education system in the post-Mao era, and discuss the gap between the current status of Chinese education and the requirements of a world-class education, ultimately arguing that there is still a big gap between a Chinese education and the most advantaged education systems in the world. To establish a globalized educational system, build world-class universities, and train internationally recognized Chinese scholars, this paper suggests that it is necessary for China to scrutinize and reshape its educational philosophy, since a philosophy of education is the guiding principle for any country to achieve the goal of providing its citizens with a world-class education.

This work examines the question of how, in a world with more than 190 countries, in which we can anticipate that states (or their representatives) will argue differently on both an international level and with regard to their national legal systems, the universalisation of social human rights (Art. 22–25 Universal Declaration of Human Rights – UDHR; Art. 6, 9, 11 International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights – ICESCR) can be understood by means of empirical evidence. The study's interpretation of these social rights is based on primary documents from the periods in which the UDHR and ICESCR were drafted, national reports submitted by signatories of the ICESCR, and the constitutions, national laws and regulations of five countries in the world (Germany, Mexico, Russia, China and India). By focusing on basic social security cover, this work demonstrates that there has been some universalisation of social human rights, specifically from the beginning of the 1990s.

The debate surrounding the challenge of improving coherence in European Union (EU) foreign policy is ongoing. EU Delegations (EUDs), operating under the European External Action Service (EEAS) were recently established to provide a focal point for the EU in third countries, providing potential for improving EU coherence. Using the case study of the EUDs, this article adds to theorizations of EU coherence – defined as the absence of contradictions between policies and positions, and between words and deeds – through elaborating the notion of external engagement coherence. Questioning the assumption that improvement of EU foreign policy coherence leads to the improvement of its effectiveness, the article analyses perceptions of the EUDs in three EU strategic partners – China, Russia and India. The article finds that the creation of the EUDs does not necessarily mean more perceived coherence for the EU. In spite of this finding; EUDs were nevertheless often viewed as effective, especially in certain areas.

Indonesian President Sukarno established the Games of the New Emerging Forces (ganefo) not only as an alternative to the Olympic Games in the 1960s, but also as part of a systemic challenge to the international status quo. They occurred twice, once in Indonesia in 1963 and again (as "Asian ganefo") in Cambodia in 1966. The ganefo drew on Asian left-nationalism and neutralism and foreshadowed a possible alternative United Nations that Sukarno planned to call the Conference of the New Emerging Forces (conefo), with membership from the People's Republic of China and other Asian states. This research note explores the link between sports, Indonesian nationalism and neutralism, ideas of Indonesian martial masculinity, and global politics during the 1960s in East Asia. Contrary to the ideal of the International Olympic Committee (ioc) to keep sports and politics separate, it suggests that both the ioc and Sukarno's Indonesia mixed sports and politics, but in very different ways.

The traditional configuration of content on top and comments on the bottom on most websites often dismiss comments as of secondary importance to content. This article looks at how comment culture(s) in China operate outside of the top-bottom dichotomy where comments are increasingly supplanting content as the main form of consumable media. Through case studies of two types of Chinese comment cultures— gailou culture and danmu culture—I explore how user-generated comments can work to subvert established hierarchies in a highly visible and public manner. I invoke traditional Chinese aesthetic perspectives to visualize the multiple layers of interactions that enable the reconfiguration of the temporal/spatial order contesting the unitary narrative. In doing so, I seek to shed light on not only these distinct modes of commenting practices but also the creation of a new aesthetic of consumption that is inseparable from the formation of the Chinese postmodern subjectivity.

In recent decades East Asia has become the center of global economic dynamism. Despite this, the region is home to a significant number of unresolved territorial disputes that threaten to undermine peace and stability. This article aims to synthesize the concepts of role‐power gaps from Power Cycle Theory (PCT) and patterns of amity and enmity from Regional Security Complex Theory in an effort to increase their respective ability to determine the likelihood of peaceful transitions and stable relations in the region. The first section presents the main principles of PCT and how amenable the theory is to a synthesis with Regional Security Complex Theory. The second section assesses critical points in which the United States, Japan, China, and South Korea find themselves and how these can influence policymaking. The third section provides a brief overview of patterns of amity and enmity that characterize the relationship between these states. The fourth section synthesizes the critical points.