Suchergebnisse

In China, the standard of the minimum livelihood guarantee system (also known as the dibao standard) is a cash-valued standard measured by household per capita income that functions as a poverty threshold in dibao, similar to the poverty line established in many other countries. China's dibao standard is very significant as it determines how many applicants can receive the benefits and how much the beneficiaries can receive from the governments. Therefore, it is an important task for the central government to have a scientific guideline for setting the dibao standard, and for the local government to establish a proper dibao standard. This article analyses the goals and principles of the dibao standard and evaluates its adequacy and effectiveness in the broader social assistance system. The article concludes by proposing several policy recommendations to further improve the dibao standard. (China/GIGA)

Based on case studies of the author's first-hand experience, this paper calls attention to the awareness of cultural imperialism by the exploration of discourse implicature in business context across cultures. It is assumed by analysis that the cultural imperialism exists verbally, textually or non-verbally through the behavior of individual interlocutors, who preserve an outdated awareness of cultural-goods against cultural-humble. The cultural awareness serves as the dynamics for the production of communicative behavior and discourse implicature. The effective communication to get rid of such cultural imperialism relies on three major elements, i.e. a sober cultural understanding, a mastery of both source and target languages and an appropriate communicative behavior.

Over the past twenty years, social researchers have had increasingly to turn from domestic to international and global perspectives in their efforts to account for growing levels of social inequality and in their search for practical policy solutions. It is against this background that China's recent experience is to be appreciated. The combined programme of economic reform coupled with an open‐door policy has achieved much, yet has been accompanied by marked increases in social inequality. Until recently, most experts seemed to believe this trend to be a mere transitional "by‐product" of domestic economic reform. Further social reform, backed by sustained economic growth, would be sufficient to resolve the problem. However, the facts now suggest otherwise. Sustained economic growth and reform, especially from the later 1990s, has been accompanied by ever‐widening social inequality, with no signs of an end in sight. This is a critical period. China is now on the eve of entry into the WTO, with all the anxieties as well as rewards this signals for the Chinese people. Against this background the present paper weighs up the likely impact of globalization on China's social structure and its systems of social protection. It concludes by offering suggestions for international social policy advance both "longitudinal" (between developed and developing countries) and "latitudinal" (between developing countries in competition with each other). Only by means of such "joint efforts" might China hope to escape the "social protection dilemmas" associated with entry into the WTO.

ABSTRACTThis paper reviews the characteristics of poverty in rural China, focussing on regional absolute poverty in particular. It comments on the different types of explanation put forward by researchers to account for the incidence and persistence of this type of poverty and argues that governmental anti‐poverty programmes must take more than economic factors into account if they are to be fully effective. There is discussion of existing governmental anti‐poverty practices and of the latest proposals for reform. The paper concludes by offering further suggestions for the future in respect of both anti‐poverty action and research.

China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) has initiated as a mega project by China and Pakistan to benefit economic growth and free trade. CPEC is in the initial stage, and policymakers and government officials consider CPEC as a &ldquo ; game-changer&rdquo ; for both the countries, as, potentially, it will generate numerous business and employment opportunities for local citizens as well as international outreach. Recently, a plethora of research has discussed both the macro as well as micro level advantages of CPEC, but has only been focused theoretically due to the emerging term. How beneficial the CPEC for a local community, and how it is perceived by the local people is not yet discussed by prior studies. This research fills the gap and examines the potential benefits of CPEC for local citizens of Pakistan. A mixed method approach was adopted to collect the data, as survey through structured questionnaire was conducted with a total of 445 citizens (323 male and 122 female), and a face-to-face interview with 32 citizens (28 male and four female) from the communities living along the CPEC routes. The findings show that, through the development of CPEC, local citizens perceive significant improvement in their lives, particularly the quality of life, better employment opportunities, and poverty reduction, while they have an insignificant perception about environmental protection and quality of education. This research recommends policy makers to build new educational institutions, encourage investors to invest in the industrial sector, and formulate environmental strategies to unleash maximum benefits of CPEC. Moreover, government official and policy makers may create awareness of CPEC projects and their benefits among the communities to get their support.

Xu Q, Guan X, Yao F. Welfare program participation among rural‐to‐urban migrant workers in ChinaInt J Soc Welfare 2011: 20: 10–21 © 2010 The Author(s), Journal compilation © 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd and International Journal of Social Welfare.An estimated 225 million Chinese people have migrated to cities from China's rural areas over the past two decades. These rural‐to‐urban migrant workers have greatly challenged China's welfare system. The pre‐reform welfare system was a duel scheme with an urban–rural distinction in which rural residents were not covered by state‐run welfare programs and had to rely on their families and rural collectives. The development of employment‐based social insurance programs in 1999 made social welfare programs available for rural‐to‐urban migrant workers. Using an anonymous survey conducted in seven cities across China in 2006, we found that social insurance program participation rates were low among rural‐to‐urban migrant workers. Individual factors, including lack of knowledge of welfare programs and of a willingness to participate, and macro‐level factors, including type of employer and industry, are critical in determining migrant workers' participation in welfare programs. Implications for policies and practice are discussed.