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China's remarkable economic performance over the last 30 years resulted from reforms that met the specific conditions of China at any point in time. Starting with a heavily distorted and extremely poor economy, China gradually reformed by improving incentives in agriculture, phasing out the planned economy and allowing non-state enterprise entry, opening up to the outside world, reforming state enterprises and the financial sector, and ultimately by starting to establish the modern tools of macroeconomic management. The way China went about its reforms was marked by gradualism, experimentation, and decentralization, which allowed the most appropriate institutions to emerge that delivered high growth that by and large benefited all. Strong incentives for local governments to deliver growth, competition among jurisdictions, and strong control of corruption limited rent seeking in the semi reformed system, whereas investment in human capital and the organizations that were to design reforms continued to provide impetus for the reform process. Learning from other countries' experience was important, but more important was China's adaptation of that experience to its own particular circumstances and needs.

Distributed by NUS Press for the East Asian Institute. What will the upcoming 20th Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC) bring, and what will the next decade of CPC rule look like? Who will rule China and what future do they envision for the Party and China? In this volume, the East Asian Institute in Singapore brings together an exceptional team of world-leading China experts from Asia, the United States, Europe and Australia to set out the future implications of trends in CPC politics and governance in CPC General Party Secretary Xi Jinping's "New Era." The essays collected in this volume bring together cutting-edge research and insights into China's economy, society, politics, military and international relations targeted at a professional audience in government, business, the media, NGOs and universities. The book is distributed Open Access under a Creative Commons license, and sold in print editions in Asia.

AbstractThe New Development Bank (NDB) was established in 2015 by the grouping of Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa (referred to as the BRICS). The establishment of the NDB was one of the outcomes of the economic and political dissatisfaction arising out of the growing disparity between the BRICS' development needs, their share of the world economy, and their representation in the established institutions of the global financial architecture. The paper examines the origins of NDB, the unique aspects of its governance structure, innovations in its operational model, and the challenges it currently faces. The paper concludes that 9 years after its establishment, NDB has completed the core foundational work required of a new multilateral development bank. It is undoubtedly an interesting experiment in the creation of a new international financial institution, and it has made a good and solid start. However, the current global environment is very different from the world of 9 years ago. If the NDB can navigate well the current challenges and if it can scale up significantly, then the NDB indeed has the potential to make a significant impact on the global architecture of development finance. Whether it does so, remains to be seen.

The long road from capitalism to capitalism the Eastern European economies have made has been paved with many economic problems, but the transition from a command economy into a market economy is likely to become a bumpy ride as well. Apart from the major real economic reforms that have to take place, combined with virtual turnaround of the political structure, several countries aiming to reform face a monetary problem as well. Due to persistent state budget deficits, financed by the printing press, a so called monetary overhang threatens the reform process. Monetary overhang is here defined as the excess of money supply over demand at the current price level and at world market interest rates. The consequences of the monetary overhang under a planning system are obvious: the fixity of prices prevents the real money supply from falling to its equilibrium level, and the situation of repressed inflation translates into long queues in front of shops, forced savings, and, if not checked, into a flourishing black market and corruption. The official exchange rate is overvalued, but import demand is checked by rationing of foreign exchange.

Background: Coronary artery calcification (CAC) has been proposed to be the underlying mechanism of the increased risk of coronary heart disease with reductions in glomerular filtration rate (GFR). Since renal function diminishes with aging we examined the association between GFR and CAC in the Rotterdam Study, a population-based study of elderly individuals. Methods: The study was performed in 1703 subjects without a history of coronary heart disease. GFR was estimated using the modification of diet in renal disease equation. We used analysis of covariance to test for mean differences in CAC between GFR tertiles. Results: The mean CAC scores in the middle and lowest GFR tertile did not significantly differ from the mean CAC score in the highest GFR tertile (geometric mean CAC score 4.1 and 4.3 vs 4.2). In a multivariable model the mean CAC score did also not differ between the GFR tertiles. As the interaction term between age and GFR was significant (P = 0.037), we divided the population in two age categories based on median age of 70 years. Below 70 years, the mean CAC scores did not differ between the GFR tertiles. Above median age, mean CAC score in the lowest GFR tertile was significantly higher than the mean CAC score in the highest tertile in a multivariable model (CAC 4.9 vs 4.5, p = 0.010). Conclusion: In this population-based study we observed that the association between CAC and GFR is modified by age. In participants at least 70 years of age, a decrease in GFR was associated with increased CAC.