—SPICE: Offering teacher institutes since 1973—

In 1973, the roots of the Stanford Program on International and Cross-Cultural Education (SPICE) were established with the creation of the Bay Area China Education Program, which focused on the development of K–12 curriculum materials and teacher professional development. Only a year prior, President Richard Nixon had made his historic trip to China and many American students were able to view contemporary images of China on television for the first time in their lifetimes. Teachers who attended SPICE institutes on China in the 1970s often commented that they were at a loss about how to teach about China.

Forty-four years later, a new generation of educators expressed similar sentiments at a SPICE institute. However, the challenge wasn’t so much about the teaching of China but rather the teaching of North Korea. Thus, when Pulitzer Prize-winning author Adam Johnson spoke about his book, The Orphan Master’s Son, a New York Times bestselling novel about North Korea, teachers were riveted by his comments. Teachers were interested not only in ways that his novel could help them better understand contemporary North Korea but also in ways they could use the book to help their students gain a more balanced view of North Korea. The 22 teacher participants received copies of The Orphan Master’s Son to use in their teaching and were offered two SPICE curriculum units titled Inter-Korean Relations: Rivalry, Reconciliation, and Reunification and Uncovering North Korea.  

Co-sponsored by the National Consortium for Teaching about Asia (NCTA), the SPICE summer institute, July 24–26, 2017, had the objectives of (1) deepening teachers’ understanding of Asia, U.S.–Asian relations, and the Asian-American experience; (2) providing teachers with teaching resources; and (3) creating a community of learners. The institute featured lectures by Stanford faculty (like Johnson), U.C. Berkeley faculty, and other experts on a range of Asia- and Asian-American-related topics closely aligned with the History-Social Science Framework for California Public Schools standards, which were recently revised. Interactive curriculum demonstrations by SPICE staff were also offered.

One such standard focuses on recent economic growth in China. Following a lecture by Thomas Fingar, Shorenstein Asia Pacific Research Center Fellow, on “Recurring Themes in U.S.–China Relations,” a curriculum demonstration on the SPICE curriculum unit, China in Transition: Economic Development, Migration, and Education, was offered by its author, Rylan Sekiguchi of SPICE. One teacher remarked, “I teach about China, and it was so helpful to hear someone with such deep expertise [Fingar] speak about U.S.–Chinese history in a way that enriches my knowledge and understanding to bring back some bigger themes to my teaching. I can’t wait to bring this content back to my students [through the SPICE curriculum].” Other scholarly lectures on Japan and Korea were also followed by curriculum demonstrations by SPICE staff. This coupling of lectures and curriculum demonstrations has been a hallmark of SPICE since its inception.

Updated History-Social Science Framework standards on the Asian-American experience were also addressed at the institute. Dr. Khatharya Um, Associate Professor of Ethnic Studies at the University of California at Berkeley, introduced the diverse cultural and historical backgrounds of the Asian-American student population which often comprises a significant percentage of students in schools in areas like the San Francisco Bay Area and Los Angeles. She emphasized the importance of acknowledging individual circumstances in minority student populations and breaking down commonly cited stereotypes of Asian Americans as being a critical element of effective teaching. One of the topics that she addressed was stereotypes of Japanese Americans that arose following the Japanese attack of Pearl Harbor. Her lecture was coupled with the sharing of first-hand experiences by Dr. Joseph Yasutake, who was interned at the age of nine. Dr. Yasutake’s talk stimulated discussions on civil liberties, race relations, discrimination, and American identity among the teachers. “Hearing history from one who has experienced it as well as studied and taught the history is really wonderful,” said one institute participant. “This combination brings a great amount of authority and well as authenticity to the narrative he [Yasutake] provides.” The SPICE curriculum unit, Civil Rights and Japanese-American Internment, was recommended as a resource for teachers.

The institute brought together both experienced mentor teachers and those new to the field. Naomi Funahashi, who organized and facilitated the institute, remains in communication with many of the teachers and has noticed that a community of learners, who are committed to a long-term exploration of Asian and Asian-American studies, has grown from the institute. She reflected, “One of the unexpected outcomes of the institute was the recommendations that many of the teachers have written in support of their students’ applications to my online class on Japan called the Reischauer Scholar Program. My hope is that some of my students will someday attend SPICE institutes as teachers and that SPICE institutes will continue to serve teachers as they have since 1973 for many decades to come.”

SPICE is currently recruiting teachers to attend its 2018 summer institute for middle school teachers (June 20–22, 2018) and summer institute for high school teachers (July 23–25, 2018).

To stay informed of SPICE-related news, follow SPICE on Facebook and Twitter.

This is an excerpt. You can read the whole article in National Geographic here.

A 2016 McKinsey & Company study found that nearly three-quarters of Chinese customers worry that the food they eat is harmful to their health. The vast number of small farms makes China’s food system “almost completely unmanageable in terms of food safety,” says Scott Rozelle, an expert on rural China at Stanford University.

Maya Rossin-Slater uses her PhD in economics to analyze large-scale data on population health and socioeconomic outcomes to help inform policies targeting families with children, especially those who are disadvantaged or poor.

Rossin-Slater, an assistant professor at the Department of Health Research and Policy at Stanford Medicine, is the newest core faculty member at Stanford Health Policy. Prior to coming to Stanford this summer, she was an assistant professor of economics at the University of California, Santa Barbara for four years after receiving her PhD at Columbia University. Her research centers on public policies and their impacts on the health and well-being of families.She asks complex questions, often finding the answers in large administrative databases. Specializing in using “natural experiment” methods, Rossin-Slater tries to separate causation from correlation.

How do child-support mandates impact the relationship between parents and children? Does high-quality preschool compensate for early life health disadvantages? What are the long-term impacts of early childhood exposure to air pollution once they become adults?

“To me, it’s important to do this kind of research that can inform real-world policies, particularly for less advantaged families,” said Rossin-Slater, who is also a faculty fellow at the Stanford Institute for Economic and Policy Research (SIEPR) and a faculty research fellow at the National Bureau of Economic Research.

“We live in a world with limited resources and we need to understand how to best allocate them,” she said. “So I think there is value in providing rigorous causal evidence on the effectiveness of various tools and policies that impact the less advantaged so that we can get the highest return on public spending as well as the highest potential for improving the outcomes of those at the very bottom.”

In a paper published in the Journal of Public Economics, Rossin-Slater talks about the growing body of evidence that suggests in-utero conditions and health at birth make a difference in later-life well-being. She found that the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC) is one of the most cost-effective and successful programs to improve health at birth for children of disadvantaged mothers.

“The estimated effects are the strongest for mothers with a high school education or less, who are most likely eligible for WIC services,” she wrote in the paper, which was cited by the White House blog under President Barack Obama.

Paid Family Leave

When Mark Zuckerberg announced he would take a two-month paternity leave when his daughter was born in 2015, the Facebook co-founder was taking advantage of his own company’s policy, which grants employees up to four months leave for all new parents.

“Studies show that when working parents take time to be with their newborns, outcomes are better for the children and families,” Zuckerberg wrote on his Facebook page.

This prompted many media outlets to turn to a co-authored study with Rossin-Slater, which found that 46 percent more men have taken time off to help take care of their newborns since California made paid family leave (PFL) law in 2004.

“The increase in paternal leave-taking may also have important implications for addressing the gender wage gap,” the authors wrote. “Our results suggest that a gender-neutral PFL policy can increase the amount of time fathers of newborns spend at home—including the time they spend at home while the mothers work—and may therefore be seen as one way to promote gender equality.”

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Here at Stanford, Rossin-Slater is using databases in the United States, Denmark and Sweden to continue her research on public policies (including paid family leave), as well as looking at how prenatal and early childhood factors impact lifelong outcomes. Does inequality and the stress of poverty in pregnancy, for example, get transmitted across generations?

In a forthcoming paper in the American Economic Review Rossin-Slater and her co-author, Stanford economist Petra Persson, found that prenatal exposure to maternal stress due to deaths in the family could have lasting consequences for the mental health of the children.

They examined nearly 300,000 births in Sweden between 1973 and 2011, in which a relative of the mother died either before her due date or in her child’s first year of life. They found that children who were in the womb when a relative died were 25 percent more likely to take medication for ADHD than those who were infants when the relative died. And those children were 13 percent more likely to take prescription drugs for anxiety once they became adults.

Take those results and one can imagine that the stress of living in poverty during pregnancy might be compounded over generations in that same disadvantaged family.

“This would imply that policies aiming to alleviate stress associated with economic disadvantage may help break the cycle of poverty,” Rossin-Slater and Persson told The Washington Post for a story on their research.

In new projects, Rossin-Slater is now studying the effects of reforms in the WIC program in California on maternal and child health, as well as the impacts of paternity leave on maternal mental health and child outcomes in Sweden. She continues using research designs that pay careful attention to establishing causality and working with large administrative databases.

“I believe in and enjoy working with data because it provides an opportunity to learn about how real-world policies actually work,” she said. “I have the privilege of being able to set my own research questions and to use my economic training and newly available data to try to find at least some answers. My hope is that these answers can be useful for creating better and more effective policies.”

A new book published by the Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (APARC) explores the future of China’s urbanization. Addressing the complex challenges facing Chinese cities will require updated institutions and unparalleled innovation, researchers say.

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Japanese and American scholars and practitioners gathered at Stanford recently for “Womenomics, the Workplace, and Women,” a full-day conference seeking to find pathways to advance opportunity for women in society and the workplace.

Nearly 75 people attended the public conference, which included 20 speakers and was co-sponsored by Stanford’s Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center and the Clayman Institute for Gender Research, as well as the United States-Japan Foundation and the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science.

Takeo Hoshi, director of the Japan Program at Shorenstein APARC, noted that women in Japan and the United States have long encountered obstacles related to gender. Currently, the United States and Japan rank 45^th and 111^th, respectively, on the Global Gender Gap Index.

“The conference is a unique opportunity for experts from Japan and Silicon Valley to learn from each other and their countries’ recent attempts to tackle gender diversity, particularly in the areas of business and technology,” Hoshi said.

The Japanese government’s inclusion of women’s advancement in its economic growth strategy 'Abenomics,' named after Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, is “one of the few good policies,” Hoshi said, yet complex cultural constraints and workplace policies need to change in order for it to work. Similarly, in Silicon Valley, while strides have been made, gender diversity still lags in corporate leadership and boards of directors especially in the areas of STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics).

Panelists shared perspectives on women’s status, leadership and work-life balance in both countries throughout four panel discussions led by Hoshi, and Shelley Correll, director of the Clayman Institute and professor of sociology; Kenji Kushida, Japan Program research scholar; and Mariko Yoshihara Yang, a visiting scholar at Shorenstein APARC.

One broad theme that emerged in the discussions: gender equity progress takes time. Closing the gender gap will come incrementally and a multidisciplinary approach could help the process. 

Areas highlighted by the panelists included a need to address unconscious bias and to improve programs that support women in the workplace as well as those seeking to re-enter the labor force after taking time off, such as increased access to childcare and elimination of “evening work” for those who hold full-time jobs.

Panelists suggested expanding educational opportunities, mentorship and peer-to-peer networks among women, as well as training centered on gender equity for all employees. Quotas and government incentives for organizations that adopt equity practices were also proposed to achieve greater female representation.

Additional discussions took place between the panelists in a closed-door workshop the following day. A report that details outcomes and a set of policy recommendations is expected in 2017; the full list of panelists, topics addressed and conference agenda can be viewed here.

As a new U.S. administration assumes office next year, it will face numerous policy challenges in the Asia-Pacific, a region that accounts for nearly 60 percent of the world’s population and two-thirds of global output.

Despite tremendous gains over the past two decades, the Asia-Pacific region is now grappling with varied effects of globalization, chief among them, inequities of growth, migration and development and their implications for societies as some Asian economies slow alongside the United States and security challenges remain at the fore.

Seven scholars from Stanford’s Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center (APARC) offered views on policy challenges in Asia and some possible directions for U.S.-Asia relations during the next administration.

View the scholars' commentary by scrolling down the page or click on the individual links below to jump to a certain topic.

U.S.-China relations

U.S.-Japan relations

North Korea

Southeast Asia and the South China Sea

Global governance

Population aging .

Trade

U.S.-China relations

By Thomas Fingar

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Alarmist predictions about China’s rise and America’s decline mischaracterize and overstate tensions in the relationship. There is little likelihood that the next U.S. administration will depart from the “hedged engagement” policies pursued by the last eight U.S. administrations. America’s domestic problems cannot be solved by blaming China or any other country. Indeed, they can best be addressed through policies that have contributed to peace, stability and prosperity.

Strains in U.S.-China relations require attention, not radical shifts in policy. China is not an enemy and the United States does not wish to make it one. Nor will or should the next administration resist changes to the status quo if change can better the rules-based international order that has served both countries well. Washington’s objective will be to improve the liberal international system, not to contain or constrain China’s role in that system.

The United States and China have too much at stake to allow relations to become dangerously adversarial, although that is unlikely to happen. But this is not a reason to be sanguine. In the years ahead, managing the relationship will be difficult because key pillars of the relationship are changing. For decades, the strongest source of support for stability in U.S.-China relations has been the U.S. business community, but Chinese actions have alienated this key group and it is now more likely to press for changes than for stability. A second change is occurring in China. As growth slows, Chinese citizens are pressing their government to make additional reforms and respond to perceived challenges to China’s sovereignty.

The next U.S. administration is more likely to continue and adapt current policies toward China and Asia more broadly than to pursue a significantly different approach. Those hoping for or fearing radical changes in U.S. policy will be disappointed..

Thomas Fingar is a Shorenstein Distinguished Fellow and former chairman of the U.S. National Intelligence Council. He leads a research project on China and the World that explores China’s relations with other countries.

U.S.-Japan relations

By Daniel Sneider

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Three consecutive terms held by the same party would certainly preserve the momentum behind the ‘pivot to Asia’ strategy of the last few years, especially on the security front. Still there are some dangers ahead. If Japan moves ahead to make a peace treaty with Russia, resolving the territorial issue and opening a flow of Japanese investment into Russia, that could be a source of tension. The new administration may also want to mend fences early with China, seeking cooperation on North Korea and avoiding tensions in Southeast Asia.

The big challenge, however, will be guiding the TPP through Congress. While there is a strong sentiment within policy circles in favor of rescuing the deal, perhaps through some kind of adjustment of the agreement, insiders believe that is highly unlikely. The Sanders-Warren wing of the Democratic party has been greatly strengthened by this election and they will be looking for any sign of retreat on TPP. Mrs. Clinton has an ambitious agenda of domestic policy initiatives – from college tuition and the minimum wage to immigration reform – on which she will need their support. One idea now circulating quietly in policy circles is to ‘save’ the TPP, especially its strategic importance, by separating off a bilateral Japan-U.S. Free Trade Agreement. Tokyo is said to be opposed to this but Washington may put pressure on for this option, leaving the door open to a full TPP down the road. .

Daniel Sneider is the associate director for research and a former foreign correspondent. He is the co-author of Divergent Memories: Opinion Leaders and the Asia-Pacific Wars (Stanford University Press, 2016) and is currently writing about U.S.-Japan security issues.

North Korea

By Kathleen Stephens

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From an American foreign policy perspective, North Korea policy challenges will be inherited by the next president as “unfinished business,” unresolved despite a range of approaches spanning previous Republican and Democratic administrations. The first months in a new U.S. president’s term may create a small window to explore potential new openings. The new president should demonstrate at the outset that North Korea is high on the new administration’s priority list, with early, substantive exchanges with allies and key partners like China to affirm U.S. commitment to defense of its allies, a denuclearized Korean Peninsula and the vision agreed to at the Six-Party Talks in the September 2005 Joint Statement of Principles. Early messaging to Pyongyang is also key – clearly communicating the consequences of further testing or provocations, but at the same time signaling the readiness of the new administration to explore new diplomatic approaches. The appointment of a senior envoy, close to the president, could underscore the administration’s seriousness as well as help manage the difficult policy and political process in Washington itself.

2017 is a presidential election year in South Korea, and looks poised to be a particularly difficult one. This will influence Pyongyang’s calculus, as will the still-unknown impact of continued international sanctions. The challenges posed by North Korea have grown greater with time, but there are few new, untried options acceptable to any new administration in Washington. Nonetheless, the new administration must explore what is possible diplomatically and take further steps to defend and deter as necessary. .

Kathleen Stephens is the William J. Perry Distinguished Fellow and former U.S. ambassador to the Republic of Korea. She is currently writing and researching on U.S. diplomacy in Korea.

Southeast Asia and the South China Sea

By Donald K. Emmerson

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A new U.S. administration will be inaugurated in January 2017. Unless it wishes to adapt to such outcomes, it should:

(1) renew its predecessor’s refusal to endorse any claim to sovereignty over all, most, or some of the South China Sea and/or its land features made by any of the six contending parties—Brunei, China, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan, Vietnam—pending the validation of such a claim under international law.

(2) strongly encourage all countries, including the contenders, to endorse and implement the authoritative interpretation of the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) issued on July 12, 2016, by an UNCLOS-authorized court. Washington should also emphasize that it, too, will abide by the judgment, and will strive to ensure American ratification of UNCLOS.

(3) maintain its commitment to engage in publicly acknowledged freedom of navigation operations (FONOPs) in the South China Sea on a regular basis. Previous such FONOPs were conducted in October 2015 by the USS Lassen, in January 2016 by the USS Wilbur, in May 2016 by the USS Lawrence, and in October 2016 by the USS Decatur. The increasingly lengthy intervals between these trips, despite a defense official’s promise to conduct them twice every quarter, has encouraged doubts about precisely the commitment to freedom of navigation that they were meant to convey.

(4) announce what has hitherto been largely implicit: The FONOPs are not being done merely to brandish American naval prowess. Their purpose is to affirm a core geopolitical position, namely, that no single country, not the United States, nor China, nor anyone else, should exercise exclusive or exclusionary control over the South China Sea.

(5) brainstorm with Asian-Pacific and European counterparts a range of innovative ways of multilateralizing the South China Sea as a shared heritage of, and a resource for, its claimants and users alike. .

Donald K. Emmerson is a senior fellow emeritus and director of the Southeast Asia Program. He is currently editing a Stanford University Press book that examines China’s relations with Southeast Asia.

Global governance

By Phillip Y. Lipscy

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Global economic activity is increasingly shifting toward Asia – most forecasts suggest the region will account for about half of the global economy by the midpoint of the 21^st century. This shift is creating important incongruities within the global architecture of international organizations, such as the United Nations, International Monetary Fund and World Bank, which are a central element of the U.S.-based international order and remain heavily tilted toward the West in their formal structures, headquarter locations and personnel compositions. This status quo is a constant source of frustration for policymakers in the region, who seek greater voice consummate with their newfound international status. 

The next U.S. administration should prioritize reinvigoration of the global architecture.  One practical step is to move major international organizations toward multiple headquarter arrangements, which are now common in the private sector – this will mitigate the challenges of recruiting talented individuals willing to spend their careers in distant headquarters in the West. The United States should join the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, created by China, to tie the institution more closely into the existing architecture, contribute to its success and send a signal that Asian contributions to international governance are welcome. The Asian rebalance should be continued and deepened, with an emphasis on institution-building that reassures our Asian counterparts that the United States will remain a Pacific power. .

Philip Y. Lipscy is an assistant professor of political science and the Thomas Rohlen Center Fellow. He is the author of the forthcoming book Renegotiating the World Order: Institutional Change in International Relations (Cambridge University Press, 2017).

Population aging

By Karen Eggleston

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China’s recent announcement of a universal two-child policy restored an important dimension of choice, but it will not fundamentally change the trajectory of a shrinking working-age population and burgeoning share of elderly. China’s population aged 60 and older is projected to grow from nearly 15 percent today to 33 percent in 2050, at which time China’s population aged 80 and older will be larger than the current population of France. This triumph of longevity in China and other Asian countries, left unaddressed, will strain the fiscal integrity of public and private pension systems, while urbanization, technological change and income inequality interact with population aging by threatening the sustainability and perceived fairness of conventional financing for many social programs.

Investment in human capital and innovation in social and economic institutions will be central to addressing the demographic realities ahead. The next administration needs to support those investments as well as help to strengthen public health systems and primary care to control chronic disease and prepare for the next infectious disease pandemic, many of which historically have risen in Asia. .

Karen Eggleston is a senior fellow and director of the Asia Health Policy Program. She is the editor of the recently published book Policy Challenges from Demographic Change in China and India (Brookings Institution Press/Shorenstein APARC, 2016).

Trade

By Yong Suk Lee

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Anti-globalization sentiment has ballooned in the past two years, particularly in regions affected by the import competition from and outsourcing to Asia. However, some firms and workers have benefited from increasing trade openness. The U.S.-Korea Free Trade Agreement of 2012, for example, led to substantial growth in exports in the agricultural, automotive and pharmaceutical sectors. Yet, there are winners and losers from trade agreements. Using an economist’s hypothetical perspective, one would assume firms and workers in the losing industry move to the exporting sector and take advantage of the gains from trade. In reality, adjustment across industries and regions from such movements are slow. Put simply, a furniture worker in North Carolina who lost a job due to import competition cannot easily assume a new job in the booming high-tech industry in California. They would require high-income mobility and a different skill set.

Trade policy needs to focus on facilitating the transition of workers to different industries and better train students to prepare for potential mobility in the future. Trade policy will also be vital in determining how international commerce is shaped. As cross-border e-commerce increases, it will be in the interest of the United States to participate in and lead negotiations that determine future trade rules. The Trans-Pacific Partnership should not simply be abandoned. The next administration should educate both policymakers and the public about the effects of trade openness and the economic and strategic importance of trade agreements for the U.S. economy.

Yong Suk Lee is the SK Center Fellow and deputy director of Korea Program. He leads a research project focused on Korean education, entrepreneurship and economic development.