Stanford University

Peace in Afghanistan: “Nothing is agreed until everything is agreed”

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ABSTRACT:
Despite major international conferences and milestones fast approaching, the peace process in Afghanistan is unlikely to end soon. Referring to the many interdependent and intractable issues to negotiate, the lead U.S. negotiator conceded that “nothing is agreed until everything is agreed.” Even if ongoing diplomatic efforts yield agreements, such deals – like the February 2020 U.S.-Taliban agreement – will likely be difficult to implement, verify, and enforce. Underlying core concerns, like the presence of transnational terrorist networks and Kabul’s weak institutional capacity, will persist regardless of the diplomatic process. This event will explore the status and prospects of the current peace process and its implications for U.S. policy. It will consider the long-term political competition between the Taliban and the Kabul government, the role of U.S. forces, and the constructive and disruptive roles that regional actors may play.

SPEAKERS:
Asfandyar Mir
Dr. Asfandyar Mir is a postdoctoral fellow at the Center for International Security and Cooperation at Stanford University. His research is on the international security of South Asia, US counterterrorism policy, and al-Qaeda, with a regional focus on Afghanistan, Pakistan, and India. Some of his research has appeared in peer-reviewed journals, such as International Security, International Studies Quarterly, and Security Studies, and his commentary has appeared in Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, H-Diplo, Lawfare, and the Washington Post Monkey Cage. He holds a Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Chicago and a BA and MA from Stanford University.
Dipali Mukhopadhyav
Dr. Dipali Mukhopadhyay is an associate professor at the Humphrey School of Public Affairs at the University of Minnesota. Her research focuses on the relationships between political violence, state building, and governance during and after war. She is currently serving as senior expert on the Afghanistan peace process for the U.S. Institute of Peace. She is the author of Good Rebel Governance: Revolutionary Politics and Western Intervention in Syria (Cambridge University Press, forthcoming) with Kimberly Howe, and Warlords, Strongman Governors and State Building in Afghanistan(Cambridge University Press, 2014). Prior to joining the Humphrey School, Mukhopadhyay was on the faculty at Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs from 2012 to 2020. She holds a PhD from Tufts University and a BA from Yale University.
 
MODERATOR:
Arzan Tarapore
Dr. Arzan Tarapore is the South Asia research scholar at the Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center at Stanford University, where he leads the newly-restarted South Asia research initiative. He is also a senior nonresident fellow at the National Bureau of Asian Research. His research focuses on Indian military strategy and contemporary Indo-Pacific security issues. He previously held research positions at the RAND Corporation, the Observer Research Foundation, and the East-West Center in Washington. Prior to his scholarly career, he served as an analyst in the Australian Defence Department, which included an operational deployments to Afghanistan. Arzan holds a PhD in war studies from King’s College London.

This event is co-sponsored by: The Center for South Asia
Via Zoom webinar. Please register at:  https://bit.ly/3cOcabZ
Seminars

No Credible Military Defense of Taiwan: Oriana Skylar Mastro on the Munk Debates Podcast

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Can China’s aggression towards Taiwan be stopped? Oriana Skylar Mastro joins the Munk Debate podcast to argue affirmatively that Chinese military capability has advanced too far for the United States to credibly deter the PRC through military means alone. Michael Beckley, an associate professor of political science at Tufts University and visiting scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, offers the rebuttal. The full debate is available below.

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Many of China’s military development goals were set with a target date of 2020, which means the PRC is currently in a strong place with its offensive and defensive capabilities. By Mastro’s measure, China now has the most advanced ballistic missile program in the world, including the United States. For Taiwan, this means the reality of an aggressive neighbor who possesses offensive weapons that are very difficult to defend against.

China also has geographic benefits when it comes to offensive maneuvering. If a hot conflict began, neither Taiwan nor the United States has a comparable network of sole-sovereign military bases in the area such as China’s. Not only does this mean China can utilize its air defense capabilities — again, now one of the strongest in the world, by Mastro’s account — but it can also support a robust blockade against Taiwan across the strait and devastate the island both militarily and economically.

As Mastro points out, “Taiwan’s economy completely depends on China, so if China decided to use economic coercion, which is defined as a type of aggression, the United States has absolutely no way of protecting Taiwan from any economic harm coming from the PRC.”

Because of this potential for combined military and economic aggression, Mastro pushed for urgency on deterrence in Taiwan. “The United States and international community do not have forever. The Chinese are not happy with maintaining the status quo, and they will soon believe they have the military capability to [take Taiwan].”

Rather than continuing to act alone, Mastro hopes the United States will lead out in organizing an international coalition that includes other regional partners such as Australia, Japan, and India as actively contributing participants. With the United States no longer seen as a monolith in Beijing, only broad, coordinated cooperation will provide effective deterrence and security for Taiwan.

On another podcast, Conversation Six, Mastro joins Abraham Denmark to discuss China's Taiwan strategy and what the United States can do to deter China from invading Taiwan. The threat of non-military intervention by the United States and its allies is the way forward, she says. "The US needs to do more in non-military realms," she argues.

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Oriana Skylar Mastro testifies to the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission on Taiwan deterrence.
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Oriana Skylar Mastro Testifies on Deterring PRC Aggression Toward Taiwan to Congressional Review Commission

China may now be able to prevail in cross-strait contingencies even if the United States intervenes in Taiwan’s defense, Chinese security expert Oriana Skylar Mastro tells the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission. Changes must be made to U.S. military capabilities, not U.S. policy, she argues.
Oriana Skylar Mastro Testifies on Deterring PRC Aggression Toward Taiwan to Congressional Review Commission
Photograph of Xi Jinping and Vladmir Putin walking in front of two lines of armed Chinese soldiers
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Military Competition with China: Harder to Win Than During the Cold War?

On February 10th, the APARC China Program hosted Professor Oriana Mastro to discuss military relations between the US and China, and why deterrence might be even more difficult than during the Cold War.
Military Competition with China: Harder to Win Than During the Cold War?
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[Left] Graphic of missile, Taiwan flag, and China flag; [Right] Oriana Skylar Mastro Munk Debates
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The United States can no longer rely solely on its own military capability or influence to deter Chinese aggression against Taiwan, argues Oriana Skylar Mastro on a new episode of the Munk Debates podcast. Credible pushback can now only be achieved through international coalitions.

This Is How They Tell Me The World Ends: A Conversation with Andrew Grotto and Nicole Perlroth

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this is how they tell me the world ends event at cyber policy center

On Wednesday, May 26 at 10 am pacific time, please join Andrew Grotto, Director of Stanford’s Program on Geopolitics, Technology and Governance, for a conversation with Nicole Perlroth, New York Times Cybersecurity Reporter, about the underground market for cyber-attack capabilities.

In her book “This Is How They Tell Me the World Ends: The Cyberweapons Arms Race,” Perlroth argues that the United States government became the world's dominant hoarder of one of the most coveted tools in a spy's arsenal, the zero-day vulnerability. After briefly cornering the market, in her account, the United States then lost control of its hoard and the market.

Perlroth and Grotto, a former Senior Director for Cybersecurity Policy at the White House in both the Obama and Trump Administrations, will talk about the development and evolution of this market, and what it portends about the future of conflict in cyberspace and beyond.

This event is co-sponsored by the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and the Cyber Policy Center.

Praise for “This Is How They Tell Me the World Ends”: “Perlroth's terrifying revelation of how vulnerable American institutions and individuals are to clandestine cyberattacks by malicious hackers is possibly the most important book of the year . . . Perlroth's precise, lucid, and compelling presentation of mind-blowing disclosures about the underground arms race a must-read exposé.” —Booklist, starred review

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Andrew Grotto

CISAC
Stanford University
Encina Hall, C428

Stanford, CA 94305-6165

(650) 723-9866
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Andrew Grotto

Andrew J. Grotto is a research scholar at the Center for International Security and Cooperation at Stanford University.

Grotto’s research interests center on the national security and international economic dimensions of America’s global leadership in information technology innovation, and its growing reliance on this innovation for its economic and social life. He is particularly interested in the allocation of responsibility between the government and the private sector for defending against cyber threats, especially as it pertains to critical infrastructure; cyber-enabled information operations as both a threat to, and a tool of statecraft for, liberal democracies; opportunities and constraints facing offensive cyber operations as a tool of statecraft, especially those relating to norms of sovereignty in a digitally connected world; and governance of global trade in information technologies.

Before coming to Stanford, Grotto was the Senior Director for Cybersecurity Policy at the White House in both the Obama and Trump Administrations. His portfolio spanned a range of cyber policy issues, including defense of the financial services, energy, communications, transportation, health care, electoral infrastructure, and other vital critical infrastructure sectors; cybersecurity risk management policies for federal networks; consumer cybersecurity; and cyber incident response policy and incident management. He also coordinated development and execution of technology policy topics with a nexus to cyber policy, such as encryption, surveillance, privacy, and the national security dimensions of artificial intelligence and machine learning. 

At the White House, he played a key role in shaping President Obama’s Cybersecurity National Action Plan and driving its implementation. He was also the principal architect of President Trump’s cybersecurity executive order, “Strengthening the Cybersecurity of Federal Networks and Critical Infrastructure.”

Grotto joined the White House after serving as Senior Advisor for Technology Policy to Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker, advising Pritzker on all aspects of technology policy, including Internet of Things, net neutrality, privacy, national security reviews of foreign investment in the U.S. technology sector, and international developments affecting the competitiveness of the U.S. technology sector.

Grotto worked on Capitol Hill prior to the Executive Branch, as a member of the professional staff of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. He served as then-Chairman Dianne Feinstein’s lead staff overseeing cyber-related activities of the intelligence community and all aspects of NSA’s mission. He led the negotiation and drafting of the information sharing title of the Cybersecurity Act of 2012, which later served as the foundation for the Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act that President Obama signed in 2015. He also served as committee designee first for Senator Sheldon Whitehouse and later for Senator Kent Conrad, advising the senators on oversight of the intelligence community, including of covert action programs, and was a contributing author of the “Committee Study of the Central Intelligence Agency’s Detention and Interrogation Program.”

Before his time on Capitol Hill, Grotto was a Senior National Security Analyst at the Center for American Progress, where his research and writing focused on U.S. policy towards nuclear weapons - how to prevent their spread, and their role in U.S. national security strategy.

Grotto received his JD from the University of California at Berkeley, his MPA from Harvard University, and his BA from the University of Kentucky.

Research Scholar, Center for International Security and Cooperation
Director, Program on Geopolitics, Technology, and Governance
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Nicole Perlroth

The Crisis in Myanmar: Repression, Resistance, Repercussions

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Co-sponsored by the Southeast Asia Program, Shorenstein Asia Pacific Research Center, Stanford University, with the Center for Southeast Asian Studies, University of Michigan

Shocking events obliterate context.  The coup in Myanmar on 1 February 2021 is a case in point.  Who could imagine the cruelty of the Burmese generals who on February 1st 2021 grabbed power and proceeded to retain it by arresting thousands and murdering hundreds of its local opponents?  Who expected that on February 2nd the country’s youth would launch a nonviolent Civil Disobedience Movement (CDM) and keep it going and growing against such massively intimidating odds?  In this webinar, two experts will provide the essential but all too often missing contexts—current and historical, domestic and foreign, political and socioeconomic—within which the crisis can be understood, its future projected, and its implications assessed.  To those ends, the on-the-ground knowledge, personal experience, and close observer’s insights of Burmese scholar Moe Thuzar will interact with the insights of American professor David Steinberg based on his Burmese experiences and scholarship dating back into the 20th century.

The webinar will consider in particular what the coup and its aftermath may imply for Southeast Asia and its relations with China.  Relevant in that regard is the involvement of all four panel members in a recent collection, The Deer and the Dragon: Southeast Asia and China in the 21st Century—Steinberg and Ciorciari as authors, Emmerson as editor, and ­­Thuzar as an analyst who is using the book in her own research. 

David I Steinberg 4X4
David I. Steinberg is Distinguished Professor of Asian Studies Emeritus, Georgetown University, where he directed its Asian studies program (1997-2007). Other positions he has held include the presidency of the Mansfield Center for Pacific Affairs and Southeast Asia-related US foreign-policy posts as a member of the Senior Foreign Service. He has also represented The Asia Foundation in South Korea, Burma, Hong Kong, and Washington, D.C.  His 15 books and monographs include one translation, more than 150 articles, and several hundred op-eds.. Among these books are: Myanmar: The Dynamics of an Evolving Polity (ed., 2015); Burma/Myanmar: What Everyone Needs to Know (2013, 2nd edition); Modern China-Myanmar Relations: Dilemmas of Mutual Dependence (with Fan Hongwei, 2012); Turmoil in Burma: Contested Legitimacies in Myanmar (2006); Burma: The State of Myanmar (2001); and Burma’s Road to Development (1981). His expertise includes the two Koreas, about which he has written widely. Professor Steinberg was educated at the University of London’s School of Oriental and African Studies, Harvard University, Darmouth College, and Lingnan University in Canton (now Guangzhou), China.

Moe Thuzar 4X4
Moe Thuzar joined the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies in Singapore in 2008. Her responsibilities there have included managing or co-managing its Myanmar Studies Programme, serving as a lead researcher in its ASEAN Studies Centre, and helping the Centre engage with Myanmar regarding its turn to chair ASEAN in 2014. She spent the 2019-2020 academic year as a Fox International Fellow at Yale University's MacMillan Center researching the socio-cultural underpinnings of Burma’s Cold War foreign policy for her National University of Singapore PhD. Earlier she worked for a decade at the ASEAN Secretariat, where she headed its Human Development Unit. Her many publications include, as co-author, the 2020 and 2019 editions of ISEAS’s widely read State of Southeast Asia: Survey Report. Other recent writing includes chapters and articles in ASEAN-EU Partnerships: The Untold Story (ed., 2020); the Journal of Southeast Asian Economies (2019); Southeast Asian Affairs (ed., 2019); Human Security Norms in East Asia (ed., 2019); and, as co-author, ASEAN’s Myanmar Dilemma (with Lex Rieffel, 2018). Earlier works include Myanmar: Life After Nargis (with Pavin Chachavalpongpun, 2009).

Co-moderated by John Ciorciari, Director, Weiser Diplomacy Center, University of Michigan, and Donald K. Emmerson, Director, Southeast Asia Program, Stanford University

Via Zoom Webinar
Register: https://bit.ly/3mdiwEY

David I. Steinberg Distinguished Professor of Asian Studies Emeritus, Georgetown University, Washington, DC
Moe Thuzar Fellow and Co-coordinator, Myanmar Studies Programme, ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute, Singapore
John Ciorciari Moderator Director, Weiser Diplomacy Center, University of Michigan

Donald K. Emmerson

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Senior Fellow Emeritus at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies
Affiliated Faculty, CDDRL
Affiliated Scholar, Abbasi Program in Islamic Studies
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At Stanford, in addition to his work for the Southeast Asia Program and his affiliations with CDDRL and the Abbasi Program in Islamic Studies, Donald Emmerson has taught courses on Southeast Asia in East Asian Studies, International Policy Studies, and Political Science. He is active as an analyst of current policy issues involving Asia. In 2010 the National Bureau of Asian Research and the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars awarded him a two-year Research Associateship given to “top scholars from across the United States” who “have successfully bridged the gap between the academy and policy.”

Emmerson’s research interests include Southeast Asia-China-US relations, the South China Sea, and the future of ASEAN. His publications, authored or edited, span more than a dozen books and monographs and some 200 articles, chapters, and shorter pieces.  Recent writings include The Deer and the Dragon: Southeast Asia and China in the 21st Century (ed., 2020); “‘No Sole Control’ in the South China Sea,” in Asia Policy  (2019); ASEAN @ 50, Southeast Asia @ Risk: What Should Be Done? (ed., 2018); “Singapore and Goliath?,” in Journal of Democracy (2018); “Mapping ASEAN’s Futures,” in Contemporary Southeast Asia (2017); and “ASEAN Between China and America: Is It Time to Try Horsing the Cow?,” in Trans-Regional and –National Studies of Southeast Asia (2017).

Earlier work includes “Sunnylands or Rancho Mirage? ASEAN and the South China Sea,” in YaleGlobal (2016); “The Spectrum of Comparisons: A Discussion,” in Pacific Affairs (2014); “Facts, Minds, and Formats: Scholarship and Political Change in Indonesia” in Indonesian Studies: The State of the Field (2013); “Is Indonesia Rising? It Depends” in Indonesia Rising (2012); “Southeast Asia: Minding the Gap between Democracy and Governance,” in Journal of Democracy (April 2012); “The Problem and Promise of Focality in World Affairs,” in Strategic Review (August 2011); An American Place at an Asian Table? Regionalism and Its Reasons (2011); Asian Regionalism and US Policy: The Case for Creative Adaptation (2010); “The Useful Diversity of ‘Islamism’” and “Islamism: Pros, Cons, and Contexts” in Islamism: Conflicting Perspectives on Political Islam (2009); “Crisis and Consensus: America and ASEAN in a New Global Context” in Refreshing U.S.-Thai Relations (2009); and Hard Choices: Security, Democracy, and Regionalism in Southeast Asia (edited, 2008).

Prior to moving to Stanford in 1999, Emmerson was a professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he won a campus-wide teaching award. That same year he helped monitor voting in Indonesia and East Timor for the National Democratic Institute and the Carter Center. In the course of his career, he has taken part in numerous policy-related working groups focused on topics related to Southeast Asia; has testified before House and Senate committees on Asian affairs; and been a regular at gatherings such as the Asia Pacific Roundtable (Kuala Lumpur), the Bali Democracy Forum (Nusa Dua), and the Shangri-La Dialogue (Singapore). Places where he has held various visiting fellowships, including the Institute for Advanced Study and the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. 



Emmerson has a Ph.D. in political science from Yale and a BA in international affairs from Princeton. He is fluent in Indonesian, was fluent in French, and has lectured and written in both languages. He has lesser competence in Dutch, Javanese, and Russian. A former slam poet in English, he enjoys the spoken word and reads occasionally under a nom de plume with the Not Yet Dead Poets Society in Redwood City, CA. He and his wife Carolyn met in high school in Lebanon. They have two children. He was born in Tokyo, the son of U.S. Foreign Service Officer John K. Emmerson, who wrote the Japanese Thread among other books.

China and the World

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Seminars

Health, Healthcare, and Cooperation to “Build Back Better” in China and the US: Views from China

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Co-sponsored with the Bush China Foundation

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This event is part of Shorenstein APARC's spring webinar series "The United States in the Biden Era: Views from Asia."

The coronavirus pandemic has reinforced the importance of investing in population health domestically and globally, and of public-private collaboration in innovation for health goals--from technology for healthy aging to poverty alleviation and addressing other social determinants of health disparities. China, as the first health system to experience the devastation of COVID-19 and to rebound from pandemic control, offers lessons relevant beyond its borders. What can we draw from China's progress on healthcare development and its aims for innovation and public-private collaboration? In this webinar, Chinese practitioners and experts from academia and government will share their views on post-pandemic health policy and draw lessons for cooperation in global health. Scholars who have worked in and studied both the PRC and US health systems will discuss the challenges facing both—from strengthening risk protection and aligning incentives for quality improvement, to promoting goals articulated in the US’ 5th iteration of population health ‘ten-year plans’ (“Healthy People 2030”) and the PRC’s more recent “Healthy China 2030” and broader 14th Five Year Plan. What will it take to implement these ambitious goals? What is the linkage between health and China's foreign policy objectives and its place in the world? PRC experts share their views in this webinar co-hosted by Stanford’s Asia Health Policy Program and the George H. W. Bush Foundation for U.S.-China Relations.

Panelists:

Cao Ying 4X4
Ying Cao is the China country director at Vital Strategies, where she leads the team to strengthen local public health systems through Vital Strategies’ Resolve to Save Lives’ global cardiovascular health initiative, tobacco control program, road safety program and evidence-based communication and policy advocacy. Dr. Cao brings over 15 years of experience in designing, leading, implementing and monitoring projects in the field of health and nutrition. She has extensive experience managing complex programs in China, with a specific focus on government and community-based programs to address unbalanced resource allocations to underprivileged areas.  Prior to joining Vital Strategies, Dr. Cao served as the director of Program Operations in Save the Children in China. Prior to Save the Children, she spent six years working in health and development within the non-profit sector and five years as a senior physician specializing in diagnostic ultrasound at Shanghai Ruijin Hospital.  Dr. Cao holds a master’s degree in public health nutrition from Wageningen University in the Netherlands and a bachelor’s degree in medicine from Shanghai Second Medical University.

Gordon Liu 4X4
Gordon Liu is a leading expert on health and development economics, health policy reform, and pharmaceutical economics in China. He is a key figure in Chinese health care reform efforts and sits on the China State Council Health Reform Advisory Commission. Dr. Liu currently serves as an associate editor for Health Economics and China Economic Quarterly (CEQ) journals and was a coeditor of Value in Health, the official journal of ISPOR, and the editor-in-chief of the China Journal of Pharmaceutical Economics. He is president of the Chinese Society for Pharmacoeconomics and Outcomes Research and served as president of the Chinese Economists Society (CES). Prior to joining Peking University, Dr. Liu was a tenured associate professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and an assistant professor at the University of Southern California.

Liang Xiaofeng 4X4
 Dr. Xiaofeng Liang received his medical degree at Shanxi Medical University in 1984 and a Master's degree in Public Health from the College of Public Health of Peking University of Medicine in 1995. From 1996 to 1998, he worked as a visiting scholar at the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, College of Medicine, University of Miami, Florida, USA.  After his return to China, he held the positions of Vice-Director of Epidemic Prevention Station of Gansu Province (1999-2000), Vice-Director of Institute of Epidemiology and Microbiology, CAPM (2000-2001), and the Director of Immunization Program (NIP) of China CDC (2001-2011), and deputy director of China CDC.  He is the winner of the 2013 Wu Jieping-Paul Janson Medicine and Pharmacy award and has been recognized as an outstanding contribution expert of the Ministry of Health China 2011-2012. He received the special allowance subsided by the State Council of China in 2010.  Since 2008, he has been a member of the Global Strategy Advisory Group of Experts (SAGE) on Immunization of the WHO. He served as the Vice Secretary-general of the Chinese Foundation of Hepatitis Prevention (2005). He was a member of the Chinese Committee Advisory of Immunization Practice, the Chinese Association of Community Health and the Branch of Biological Products, and the Chinese Association of Prevention Medicine. He was a member of the National Polio Eradication Certification Committee and a member of the National Measles Elimination Verification Committee.  His research in public health led to advances in immunization and vaccine-preventable disease control in China. As the principal investigator on the Key Programs for Science and Technology Development of China since 2004, his main scientific research has focused on the epidemiology regularity and prevention and control countermeasures of Hepatitis B. His current research is focused on non-communicable disease control and nutrition and tobacco control. He is the author of more than 30 articles in national and international journals, such as The Lancet and, The New England Journal of Medicine.

Via Zoom Webinar.
Register: https://bit.ly/3wed6hA

Ying Cao China country director, Vital Strategies’ Resolve to Save Lives global health initiatives
Gordon Liu Professor, Peking University
Liang Xiaofeng Executive Vice President and Secretary General of the Chinese Preventive Medicine Association
Seminars

Public-Private Collaborations in Palliative Care in Asia

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This event is part of the Asia Health Policy Program (AHPP) 2020-21 Colloquium series "Health, medicine, and longevity: Exploring public and private roles"

We will hear from distinguished speakers on public-private collaborations in accelerating improvements in palliative care in Singapore and parts of South Asia, as well as informal care and technology-enabled self-management of chronic illness among Asian-Americans. Joining us from Singapore is Mr. Laurence Lian, Chairman of the Lien Foundation, sharing evidence about the impact of the Foundation’s work on end of life care, collaborating with the public sector in palliative care training, improving access to pain medication, and other initiatives. Dr. Ranak Trivedi of Stanford will discuss her work to address the stress management needs of patients and their families and to improve culturally concordant care for South Asian women with breast cancer and their caregivers.

Speakers:

Laurence Lien 4X4
Laurence Lien is Co-Chair and CEO of the Asia Philanthropy Circle (APC), a membership-based platform for Asian philanthropists to exchange, learn and collaborate.  Laurence is also the Chairman of Lien Foundation, a family foundation that has become well-regarded for its forward-thinking and radical approach in the fields of education, eldercare and the environment, as well as the Chairman of Lien AID, the foundation humanitarian arm for enabling sustainable access to clean water and sanitation for Asia’s rural poor.

Laurence was the CEO of the National Volunteer & Philanthropy Centre in Singapore from 2008-2014, and was the Chairman of the Community Foundation of Singapore from 2013-2019.  Prior to his work in the non-profit sector, Laurence served in the Singapore Government.  Laurence holds degrees from Oxford University, the National University of Singapore, and Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government.  He was also a Nominated Member of Parliament in Singapore from 2012-2014. 

Ranak Trivedi 4X4
Dr. Ranak Trivedi is a clinical health psychologist, assistant professor in the Dept. of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Stanford University and an investigator at the Center for Innovation to Implementation at the VA Palo Alto Health Care System. She completed her PhD in clinical health psychology at Duke University. Her NIH, VA and foundation-funded studies are focused on improving outcomes for Veterans with mental health conditions, and improving the self-management of serious illnesses by enhancing the collaboration and coping of patients and their caregivers. Her studies have provided insights into how caregivers and chronically and seriously patients collaborate around their mutual health, understanding the impact of their interpersonal relationship on chronic illness self-management, and the individual, dyadic, and systems-level barriers that they encounter. These insights have been used to develop two technology-enabled dyadic self-management programs to address the stress management needs of both patients and their framily. Dr. Trivedi is a Sojourns Scholars Leader, and she is using this platform to improving culturally concordant care for South Asian women with breast cancer and their caregivers. Dr. Trivedi was selected for the year long Leadership Institute for Women in Psychology hosted by American Psychological Association in 2020. Dr. Trivedi serves as the Director of Training and Education at the Center for Innovation to Implementation at the VA Palo Alto Health Care System, site PI and Training Director for the Elizabeth Dole National Center of Excellence for Veteran and Caregiver Research, and the Director of Caregiving and Family Systems at the Stanford Center for Asian Health Research and Education (CARE).

Via Zoom Webinar.
Register https: https://bit.ly/3slcunI

Laurence Lien Co-Chair & CEO, Asia Philanthropy Circle
Ranak Trivedi Assistant Professor, Stanford University, and Director of Caregiving and Family Systems, Stanford Center for Asian Health Research and Education
Seminars
Asia Health Policy Program (AHPP) 2020-21 Colloquium series "Health, Medicine, and Longevity: Exploring Public and Private Roles"

Gandhi's Gift: How Nonviolent Protests Fail and Succeed

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About this Event: In this book project, we walk in the footsteps of the pioneers of the nonviolent approach to provide a reinterpretation of the histories of the great movements of the twentieth century from a game theoretic perspective, bringing to bear a host of new quantitative analyses to understand the challenges they faced, when they were successful at overcoming them and why. We develop a simple conceptual framework for understanding the strategies available to both the leaders and the followers of political movements, the media and outside audiences, as well as the regimes that they seek to influence, and how these decisions interact. We use this framework to highlight the presence of three key tensions that exist in many political movements.

These tensions include: those between the allure of violence and the seeming pedestrianism of nonviolence, between the need for numbers and the need for focus, and between organizations that depend on grassroots mobilization versus hierarchies and leadership. 

In light of the framework and new quantitative evidence, we then retrace and re-examine the decisions of the participants of the Indian Independence Movement in each of their three great nonviolent drives for change---the Non-Cooperation Movement of the 1920s, the Civil Disobedience Movement of the 1930s and the Quit India Movement of the 1940s---and how they succeeded or failed in addressing these tensions. At each step, we also discuss both grand strategy and the effectiveness of local tactics. We next compare the Indian experience with the movements that came after, including the Civil Rights Movement in the United States, the Arab Spring and recent protests around the world. Finally, we draw on what we have learned to suggest ideas for better implement nonviolent protests today.

 

About the Speaker:

Saumitra Jha
Along with being a Senior Fellow at FSI, Saumitra Jha is an associate professor of political economy at Stanford’s Graduate School of Business, and, by courtesy, of economics and of political science, and convenes the Stanford Conflict and Polarization Lab. He is also a senior fellow at the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research. In 2020–21, he is a fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences.

Jha’s research has been published in leading journals in economics and political science, including Econometrica, the Quarterly Journal of Economics, the American Political Science Review and the Journal of Development Economics, and he serves on a number of editorial boards. His research on ethnic tolerance has been recognized with the Michael Wallerstein Award for best published article in Political Economy from the American Political Science Association in 2014 and his co-authored research on heroes with the Oliver Williamson Award for best paper by the Society for Institutional and Organizational Economics in 2020. Jha was honored to receive the Teacher of the Year Award, voted by the students of the Stanford MSx Program in 2020.

 

 

Online, via Zoom: REGISTER

Saumitra Jha

Graduate School of Business 655 Knight Way Stanford, CA 94305
(650) 721 1298
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Associate Professor of Political Economy, GSB
Associate Professor, by courtesy, of Economics and of Political Science
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Along with being a Senior Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, Saumitra Jha is an associate professor of political economy at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, and convenes the Stanford Conflict and Polarization Lab. 

Jha’s research has been published in leading journals in economics and political science, including Econometrica, the Quarterly Journal of Economics, the American Political Science Review and the Journal of Development Economics, and he serves on a number of editorial boards. His research on ethnic tolerance has been recognized with the Michael Wallerstein Award for best published article in Political Economy from the American Political Science Association in 2014 and his co-authored research on heroes with the Oliver Williamson Award for best paper by the Society for Institutional and Organizational Economics in 2020. Jha was honored to receive the Teacher of the Year Award, voted by the students of the Stanford MSx Program in 2020.

Saum holds a BA from Williams College, master’s degrees in economics and mathematics from the University of Cambridge, and a PhD in economics from Stanford University. Prior to rejoining Stanford as a faculty member, he was an Academy Scholar at Harvard University. He has been a fellow of the Niehaus Center for Globalization and Governance and the Center for the Study of Democratic Politics at Princeton University, and at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford. Jha has consulted on economic and political risk issues for the United Nations/WTO, the World Bank, government agencies, and for private firms.

 

Senior Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies
Dan C. Chung Faculty Scholar at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies
Senior Fellow at the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research
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Senior Fellow, Center for Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law, FSI
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APARC Names 2021-22 Shorenstein Postdoctoral Fellows

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APARC is pleased to announce the appointment of political scientist Dr. Diana Stanescu and doctoral candidate in sociology Mary-Collier Wilks as our 2021-22 Shorenstein postdoctoral fellows on contemporary Asia. They will begin their appointments at Stanford in autumn 2021.

The Shorenstein Postdoctoral Fellowship on Contemporary Asia supports recent doctoral graduates dedicated to research and writing on contemporary Asia, primarily in the areas of political, economic, or social change in the Asia-Pacific, or international relations in the region.

Fellows develop their dissertations and other projects for publication, present their research, and participate in the intellectual life of APARC and Stanford at large. Our postdoctoral fellows often continue their careers at top universities and research organizations around the world and remain involved with research and publication activities at APARC.

Meet our new postdoctoral scholars:

Diana Stanescu

Research Project: Do Bureaucratic Networks Matter for Market Access? The Effect of Informal Connections on Trade and FDI of Japanese Firms.

Portrait of Diana Stanescu
Diana Stanescu is a postdoctoral fellow with the Program on U.S.-Japan Relations at Harvard University’s Weatherhead Center for International Affairs. She holds a B.A. in International Relations and Asian Studies from Mount Holyoke College and an M.A. and Ph.D. in Political Science from Princeton University. She is a former pre-doctoral exchange scholar in the Department of Government at Harvard.

Dr. Stanescu’s research interests include international trade, regulation, and lobbying with a focus on Japan. Using formal and quantitative methods, her research addresses the overarching question of how bureaucracies shape global economic governance, from a structural and agent-driven perspective. Her dissertation, “The Bureaucratic Politics of Foreign Economic Policymaking,” explains the mechanisms by which stakeholders shape international economic policy through bureaucratic channels of influence. Additional work looks at the micro-foundations of bureaucratic structure and its consequences for policy, examines the role of individual bureaucrats within domestic and international institutions, and develops micro-level data on bureaucratic careers and appointments.

At APARC, Stanescu will further assess how politicians and interest group representatives maneuver within bureaucratic channels to have influence over foreign economic policy. In particular, she will examine how bureaucratic-interest group networks help firms obtain market access abroad, with evidence from trade and foreign direct investment in Japan.

Mary-Collier Wilks

Research project: How do conceptions of gender, sexuality, and women’s advancement shape the construction of development knowledge and foreign aid?

Portrait of Mary-Collier Wilks
Mary-Collier Wilks is currently a doctoral candidate in Sociology at the University of Virginia. Her research agenda centers on meaning-making and power dynamics in international organizations, with a particular focus on the ways in which people encounter international development in everyday lives and the gendered meanings, divisions, and struggles that arise from such encounters.

It was Wilk’s work as a grant writer at a local NGO, Social Services of Cambodia, that first sparked her interests in globalization, gender, and the politics of international development. Having seen how resources and ideas from all over the world flow through NGOs to affect the lives of people in Cambodia, she began thinking about the complicated process of foreign aid and international development. She also gained experience as a consultant in the development sector, performing a gender analysis for a USAID health project and serving as a trainer for a USAID Women’s Leadership Conference.

For her dissertation, which is funded by the National Science Foundation and the Fulbright IIE, Wilks conducted a multi-sited ethnography comparing U.S. and Japanese international NGOs that advance women's health in Cambodia. Her work contributes to scholarly theories of global civil society and international development, contending that to adequately analyze and improve development outcomes, we must attend to national variation in international NGO programs and practices.

At APARC, Wilks will transform her dissertation manuscript into a book and extend her comparative research agenda to investigate how NGO practices are shaped by the business cultures in which their donors are embedded.

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Oriana Skylar Mastro testifies to the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission on Taiwan deterrence.
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Oriana Skylar Mastro Testifies on Deterring PRC Aggression Toward Taiwan to Congressional Review Commission

China may now be able to prevail in cross-strait contingencies even if the United States intervenes in Taiwan’s defense, Chinese security expert Oriana Skylar Mastro tells the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission. Changes must be made to U.S. military capabilities, not U.S. policy, she argues.
Oriana Skylar Mastro Testifies on Deterring PRC Aggression Toward Taiwan to Congressional Review Commission
[Left] Postdoc Spotlight, Jeffrey Weng, Shorenstein Postdoctoral Fellow in Contemporary Asia, [Right] Jeffrey Weng
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Postdoc Spotlight: Jeffrey Weng on Language and Society

Shorenstein Postdoctoral Fellow in Contemporary Asia Jeffrey Weng shares insights from his research into how language and society shape one another, particularly how the historical use of Mandarin affects contemporary Chinese society and linguistics.
Postdoc Spotlight: Jeffrey Weng on Language and Society
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Spring blooms in the courtyard near History Corner, Stanford University. L.A. Cicero
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Political scientist Dr. Diana Stanescu and sociologist Mary-Collier Wilks will join APARC as Shorenstein postdoctoral fellows on contemporary Asia for the 2021-22 academic year.

New Book Reveals How China and the United States Engage the Private Sector to Deliver Public Goods

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Noa Ronkin
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China and the United States are usually cast as fierce rivals, but there are broad areas of society where the two nations share profound similarities. As they confront growing demands to provide their citizens with goods and services such as healthcare, education, housing, and transportation, both the Chinese and U.S. governments engage the private sector in the pursuit of public value, although they do so in different ways.

This type of engagement, in which the government calls on the private sector to meet public goals, is known as collaborative governance and it is becoming an increasing share of the economy in both China and the United States. A new book, The Dragon, the Eagle, and the Private Sector (Cambridge University Press), analyzes the application of collaborative governance in a wide range of policy arenas in China and the United States.

The book itself is the result of collaborative research by three co-authors: APARC Deputy Director Karen Eggleston, Harvard Kennedy School Raymond Vernon Senior Lecturer in Public Policy John Donahue, and Harvard Kennedy School’s Frank P. Ramsey Professor of Political Economy Richard Zeckhauser. On March 5, 2021, the three co-authors gathered for a virtual book launch, an event co-sponsored by Shorenstein APARC and the Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government at the Harvard Kennedy School.

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Introducing the new book, Lawrence H. Summers, president emeritus of Harvard University and the Charles W. Eliot University Professor at the Kennedy School, called the co-authors’ analysis of collaborative governance “micro microeconomics” that shows how particular tasks and particular commitments of resources, once decided on, are going to be best accomplished. This work, Summers noted, sheds light on situations involving both cooperation and competition — aspects that affect almost any complex problem yet are rarely considered by economists.

A key element of collaborative governance, noted Zeckhauser, is the sharing of discretion. Rather than contracting at one pole and complete laissez-faire at the opposite pole, in a collaborative governance process, the two parties involved play a role in determining what is produced and how it is produced. It is a process that calls on the best capabilities of both the private and public sectors and that grants each of them an element of control. Sometimes that process results in triumphs, sometimes in tragedies, and other times in outcomes that are “in-between.” The book analyses cases of this entire gamut. “We hope that this volume provides guidance on how the triumphs can become more common, the tragedies more scarce, and the in-between outcomes improved,” said Zeckhauser.

This book provides a key to understanding how to achieve [...] quality-public-private collaboration, done right. Delving deep into two very different societies, the US and China, the authors provide lessons that illuminate and should inform scholars and policymakers alike.
Fareed Zakaria
Journalist and Author

Collaborative Governance in the Time of COVID-19

The unfolding of the COVID-19 pandemic provides dramatic current illustrations of collaborative governance. The urgent need for an effective vaccine created the conditions for a successful partnership between the U.S. government and the pharmaceutical sector, with the former offering both regulatory processes and significant financing, the latter its innovation. Consider the Moderna vaccine, which, based on evidence from clinical trials, is over 90% effective at preventing laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 illness. The vaccine was created within less than a year using a new approach, based on Messenger RNA technology, by a company that had never before produced a commercial product. “This is a triumph of collaborative governance,” said Zeckhauser.

The vaccine distribution process in the United States, however, has proved to be challenging and chaotic. Zeckhauser contrasted this experience with China’s activation of technology giant Tencent, which is using its ubiquitous WeChat application to allow individuals to easily find where the vaccine is distributed and sign up for vaccination appointments. “There is probably a lesson here in the way these two outcomes came about. We hope that individuals in both China and the United States will examine the lessons in this volume to see how they can achieve outcomes for their citizens that produce public benefits more effectively.”

A Spectrum of Policy Domains

The book details how China and the United States grapple with the complexity of producing the goods and services they need to meet a broad array of public goals. Eggleston surveyed the five broad policy domains she and her co-authors examine in the book through detailed historical legacies and case studies of the application of collaborative governance in both countries.

These domains include the railroads that build the nation historically in both countries and China’s high-speed rail network; real estate's intricate tangle of public and private partnerships; hosting the Olympic Games and the experience of the public and private sectors in that endeavor in both countries; education provision; and state and market in population health and health care in both countries. The book spotlights the different ways in which both countries produce public goods and services in these broad policy domains.

It is crucial for China to embrace the transparency imperative because the evil twin of collaborative governance is cronyism or corruption.
John Donahue
Harvard University

East and West

Professor Yijia Jing of Fudan University, an expert on privatization, governance, and collaborative service delivery, participated in the discussion with the book co-authors and shared insights on public-private relationships in China. Collaborative governance in the country, he said, has undergone a gradual process of institutionalization. He observed that Chinese local governments apply different strategies in collaborating with private companies. For example, local governments like Guangdong and Shanghai partner in different ways with digital giants Tencent and Alibaba to build up their digital capacities — collaborations through which they have been learning how to balance their multiple roles as partners, policymakers, and market regulators.

Jing noted that China uses collaborative governance not only in domestic arenas but also in areas of international development, through entities such as the BRICS Development Bank and the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank. China is also promoting collaborative governance as part of its Belt and Road initiative.

A Call for Transparency

The Dragon, the Eagle, and the Private Sector helps decision-makers apply the principles of collaborative governance to effectively serve the public. The book's overarching conclusion is that transparency is the key to the legitimate growth of collaborative governance. In the United States, said Donahue, the principle of governmental transparency is widely accepted as a broad-spectrum accountability device. He recognized that he and his co-authors do not expect China to adopt the U.S. approach to transparency, but expressed their hope to see more transparency “with Chinese characteristics.” “It is crucial for China to embrace the transparency imperative because the evil twin of collaborative governance is cronyism or corruption,” Donahue argued.

In many countries and policy arenas, collaborative governance could effectively increase innovation but is not available because the populace is convinced that any interaction between the public and private sectors amounts to corruption on the part of elites against the public interest. The potential in China to create public value through interaction between its public and private sectors is enormous, concluded Donahue. ”It would be a shame to squander that.”

Related research: Public and private roles in East Asia

Led by Dr. Karen Eggleston, the 'Innovation for Healthy Aging' research project is a collaborative effort that seeks to identify and analyze different dimensions of productive public-private collaborations tackling innovation for healthy aging in East Asia.
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Demographics and Innovation in the Asia-Pacific
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New Book Explores the Intersection of Demographic Shifts and Innovation, Offering Lessons from Asian Nations

Contributing authors to the new volume 'Demographics and Innovation in the Asia-Pacific' convened for a virtual book launch and discussion of the challenges facing aging societies in East Asia and the roles technology and innovation may play in rebalancing them.
New Book Explores the Intersection of Demographic Shifts and Innovation, Offering Lessons from Asian Nations
A Japanese robot prototype lifts a dummy patient
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Robot Adoption Brings Benefits to Japan’s Aging Society

In one of the first studies of service sector robotics, APARC scholars examine the impacts of robots on nursing homes in Japan. They find that robot adoption may not be detrimental to labor and may help address the challenges of rapidly aging societies.
Robot Adoption Brings Benefits to Japan’s Aging Society
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In their new book, APARC Deputy Director Karen Eggleston and co-authors John Donahue and Richard Zeckhauser of Harvard University seek to empower decision-makers to more wisely engage the private sector in the pursuit of public value by analyzing how China and the United States use collaborative governance strategies to meet growing demands for public services.

Power to the Parents? Decentralization and Representation

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About the Event:  Decentralization and community-driven development programs have become increasingly common policies to attempt to improve the distribution of public goods across low- and middle-income countries. We study a series of reforms in the city of Delhi that decentralized the administration of discretionary school-level budgets to elected bodies of parents. We find that parents have preferences for representatives that are substantially more educated than them and discriminate against Muslims. Parents act on these preferences when given the opportunity to elect SMC members. They elect parents that are wealthier and more educated and are also of higher status. The paper provides empirical evidence to the question of under what conditions decentralization leads to elite capture. When bureaucrats have a stronger say in the selection of representatives, budgets are captured to reflect the preferences of state representatives, rather than constituents.

 

Emmerich Davies
About the Speaker:  Emmerich Davies is an Assistant Professor of Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, a Faculty Associate at the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs and Center for International Development, and a co-convener of the Brown-Harvard-M.I.T. Joint Seminar on South Asian Politics. He studies the political economy of education with a regional focus on South Asia. His work has been published in Comparative Political Studies and Governance. He received his Ph.D. and M.A. in political science from the University of Pennsylvania, and his B.A. in political science and economics from Stanford University.

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Emmerich Davies Assistant Professor of Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education
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