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儿童早期发展关乎人的一生，对贫困农村儿童早期发展领域的投入，会为社会发展带来长期且高效的回报。

2018年11月17日，“养育未来，从0开始——2018年儿童早期发展国际论坛”在陕西西安举行，诺贝尔经济学奖得主詹姆斯·赫克曼等国内外学者，用来自世界各地的成功案例提示着儿童早期发展工作的重要性。

而正在秦岭山区、陕西宁陕县推进的“养育未来”项目，成为与会专家们讨论的焦点，“宁陕模式”成为中国在0-3岁儿童早期发展工作上全新的经验。

项目发起方之一阿里巴巴脱贫基金副主席彭蕾在现场称，希望携手各界，以宁陕实践为起点，共同探索可复制、宜推广的社会模式，让中国儿童早期发展的探索，从0开始，走向世界。

While Americans may be well acquainted with China’s quest for influence through the projection of power in the diplomatic, economic, and military spheres, they are less aware of the various ways in which Beijing has more recently been exerting cultural and informational influence. According to a new report, some of these ways challenge and even undermine our democratic processes, norms, and institutions.

With a growing realization that the ambition of Chinese influence operations requires far greater scrutiny than it has been getting, a group of American scholars and policy practitioners set out to document the extent of China’s influence-seeking activities in American society. The working group, co-chaired by Larry Diamond, senior fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and at the Hoover Institution, and Orville Schell, Arthur Ross director of the Asia Society’s Center on U.S.-China Relations, just released its findings and recommendations in a report that has drawn much attention, “Chinese Influence and American Interests: Promoting Constructive Vigilance.” On December 4, Diamond and Schell discussed the report’s findings and implications at a special roundtable organized by Shorenstein APARC’s U.S.-Asia Security Initiative (USASI).

Diamond and Schell described the report’s detailing of a range of assertive and opaque “sharp power” activities that China has stepped up within the United States in multiple sectors, including Congress, state and local government, universities, think tanks, media, corporations, technology and research, and the Chinese American community. These activities, they argue, penetrate deeply the social and political fabric of our democratic society and exploit its openness. Unlike legitimate “soft power” efforts within the realm of normal public diplomacy, they constitute improper interference that demands greater awareness and a calibrated response.

“The report was born out of a recognition that things have changed,” said Schell. “Our engagement with China has either failed or is teetering on the brink of failure. The report aims to put the question of our interaction and exchange with China within the context of policy.”

Diamond noted that “The question at least has to be asked whether there is a threat to U.S. national interests.” He emphasized that the members of the working group that produced the report seek a productive relationship between China and the United States. The report therefore advocates for perspective and framework that are built on three principles regarding U.S.-China relations: transparency, institutional integrity, and reciprocity.

Diamond and Schell were joined at the panel by Hwang Ji-Jen, a Taiwanese scholar in the Institute for East Asian Studies at the University of California - Berkeley, who helped situate the forms and effects of Chinese “sharp power” in the United States in comparison to its practice in and toward Taiwan. Karl Eikenberry, director of USASI, chaired the discussion.

The event was co-sponsored by the US-Asia Security Initiative in the Asia-Pacific Research Center, and FSI’s Center on Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law.

Audio from the event is available for download or streaming:

The following report was originally published by the Hoover Institution.

Scholars from the Hoover Institution, the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, and other organizations today issued a report that examines China’s efforts to influence US institutions and calls for protecting American values, norms, and laws from such interference, while also warning against “demonizing” any group of people.

According to the 192-page document, which was unveiled today (Nov. 29) at a Hoover DC press event, China is attempting on a wide scale to manipulate state and local governments, universities, think tanks, media, corporations, and the Chinese American community. (Click here to read the report, titled “Chinese Influence & American Interests: Promoting Constructive Vigilance.”)

The document was produced by researchers convened by the Hoover Institution and the Asia Society’s Center on US-China Relations, along with support from The Annenberg Foundation Trust at Sunnylands. The working group included leading China scholars who researched the issue for more than a year and a half. Project cochairs are Larry Diamond, senior fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and the Hoover Institution, and Orville Schell, the Arthur Ross Director at Asia Society Center on US-China Relations.

The objective of the Chinese entities is to promote sympathetic views of China, especially its government, policies, society and culture, the report concludes. The work is described as a “summons to greater awareness of the challenges our country faces and greater vigilance in defending our institutions,” and explicitly not intended to cause unfairness or recklessness towards any group of Americans.

On this point, Diamond and Schell wrote in the afterword, “At the same time that we fortify ourselves against harmful outside interference, we must also be mindful to do no harm. In particular, we must guard against having this report used unfairly to cast aspersions on Chinese, whether Chinese American immigrants who have become (or are becoming) United States citizens, Chinese students, Chinese businesspeople, or other kinds of Chinese visitors, whose contributions to America’s progress over the past century have been enormous.”

The report’s findings include the following:

• The Chinese Communist party-state leverages a broad range of party, state, and non-state actors to advance its influence-seeking objectives, and in recent years it has significantly accelerated both its investment and the intensity of these efforts.
• In American federal and state politics, China seeks to identify and cultivate rising politicians. Chinese entities employ prominent lobbying and public relations firms and cooperate with influential civil society groups.
• On American university campuses, Confucius Institutes provide the Chinese government access to US student bodies, and Chinese Students and Scholars Associations sometimes report on their compatriots on American campuses and put pressure on American universities that host events deemed politically offensive to China.
• At think tanks, researchers, scholars, and other staffers report regular attempts by Chinese diplomats and other intermediaries to influence their activities within the United States. China has also begun to establish its own network of US think tanks.
• In business, China is using its companies to advance strategic objectives abroad, gaining political influence and access to critical infrastructure and technology. China has made foreign companies’ continued access to its domestic market conditional on their compliance with Beijing’s stance on Taiwan and Tibet.
• In the technology sector, China is engaged in a multifaceted effort to misappropriate technologies it deems critical to its economic and military success. Beyond economic espionage, theft, and the forced technology transfers that are required of many joint venture partnerships, China also captures much valuable new technology through its investments in US high-tech companies and by exploiting the openness of the American economy.
• In the American media, China has all but eliminated independent Chinese-language media outlets that once served Chinese American communities. It has co-opted existing Chinese-language outlets and established its own new media outlets.

Policy principles

Looking to the future, the scholars offer a set of policy principles for guiding American relationships with Chinese entities. These include:

• promoting greater transparency of financial and other relationships that with Chinese entities which may be subject to improper influence;
• promoting the integrity of American institutions; and

Shorenstein APARC's annual overview of the Center's 2017-18 activities  is now available to download. 

Feature sections look at the Center's seminars, conferences, and other activities in response to the North Korean crisis, research and events related to China's past, present, and future, and several Center research initiatives focused on technology and the changing workforce.

The overview highlights recent and ongoing Center research on Japan's economic policies, innovation in Asia, population aging and chronic disease in Asia, and talent flows in the knowledge economy, plus news about Shorenstein APARC's education and policy activities, publications, and more.

A group of 8 Stanford graduate and undergraduate students entered the gates of Stanford Center at Peking University (SCPKU) on September 21st. They are participating in the inaugural fall quarter of China Studies in Beijing, an overseas, pilot program being offered by the Freeman Spogli institute for International Studies in partnership with Peking University. Jay Gonzalez, a Stanford junior, already described his experience as “life-changing” – “exactly what I dreamed of and more.”

 

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(From left to right): Lucas Hornsby (sophomore), Jenny Zhao (SCPKU’s Beijing program coordinator), Isaac Kipust (junior), Cathy Dao (sophomore), Minhchau Dinh (second year, Master’s in International Policy), Jenn Hu (sophomore), and Jay Gonzalez (junior) walking towards SCPKU for China Studies in Beijing orientation.

China Program faculty from different Stanford departments and two Peking University faculty are offering intensive courses on contemporary Chinese society, politics, international relations and economic development. And each of the students brought their energy, curiosity and long-standing interest in China to the fall program. With an array of exposure to China – from one whose Chinese begins and ends with “ni hao (hello)” to another who calls China his adoptive home -- their interests vary from a passionate interest in the Belt Road Initiative; China-Africa relations; geopolitics; technology and Chinese entrepreneurs; Chinese domestic politics; and, literally, “anything China.” Many recognize China’s central role in the world and the critical importance of acquiring a nuanced understanding of this global power.

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(Clockwise, from left to right): Isaac Kipust, Jay Gonzalez, Prof. Andrew Walder, Lucas Hornsby, Prof. Thomas Fingar, Josh Cheng (Executive Director, SCPKU), Jenny Zhao, Prof. Jean Oi, Jenn Hu, Cathy Dao, and Minchau Dinh

Each of the Stanford China Program faculty teaching in the overseas program has dedicated his or her professional life to engaging with and understanding China. These students have unparalleled access to foremost China experts like Prof. Thomas Fingar, Shorenstein APARC Fellow and former chairman of the National Intelligence Council who has devoted himself to U.S.-China relations since the “ping-pong diplomacy” days in the early 1970’s. Prof. Jean Oi, Director of the China Program and the William Haas Professor in Chinese Politics in the department of political science; and Prof. Andrew Walder, Denise O’Leary & Kent Thiry Professor in the Department of Sociology, were among the first group of U.S. scholars to conduct fieldwork in China after Deng Xiaoping’s Open Door policy was announced in 1978. Prof. Scott Rozell, Senior Fellow at FSI and Co-director of the Rural Education Action Program is the recipient of numerous awards and recognitions, including in 2008 of the Friendship Award, the highest award given to a non-Chinese by China’s Premier.

 

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(Clockwise, from left to right): Prof. Thomas Fingar, Isaac Kipust, Prof. Scott Rozelle, Prof. Andrew Walder, Jennifer Choo (Associate Director, Stanford China Program), Lucas Hornsby, Drew Hasson (second year, Master’s in International Policy), Jenn Hu, and Prof. Jean Oi on the Yalu River looking over at North Korea.

The program is simultaneously exposing students to China’s contemporary politics, society and economy in the classrooms and pairing them with lived experiences -- through real-life conversations with PKU professors and PKU classmates; ordinary citizens of Beijing; and through visits to diverse parts of China. To date, the group has traveled to historic Chengde (承德); a mining equipment factory in Jinzhou city (锦州); the China-North Korean border in Dandong (丹东); and the strategic port city of Dalian (大连). Each of these areas embed layers of history and reveal artifacts from different eras: the Manchus who ruled the Han Chinese during the Qing Dynasty (Chengde); the SOE restructuring in the 1990’s that devastated China’s Northeastern “rust belt” (Jinzhou); massive human casualty suffered by the Chinese during the Korean War (Dandong); and the Sino-Russo-Japanese tug-of-war that marked Dalian’s fate throughout the 19th and 20th century. Through these experiences, students are gaining insights into how the world might look to their counterparts in China and elsewhere.

Below are pictures and reflections from students’ own experiences at Jinshanling (金山岭) Great Wall, Chengde as well as in China’s Northeast (东北) region.

Jinshangling (金山岭) Great Wall

 

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Jenn Hu and Minchau Dinh (holding up the Stanford banner) at the Great Wall

Chengde City (承德市)

The city of Chengde in Hebei Province, located 155 miles northeast of Beijing, was an imperial summer resort during the Qing Dynasty. Emperor Kang Xi (1662-1723) discovered this rare scenic spot during a hunting trip and turned it into a “Mountain Resort.”

As one student noted, these field trips “supplement academic discussions with . . . diverse representations of China – from historical kingdom to innovation contender (Cathy Dao, Stanford sophomore).”

 

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Prof. Jean Oi and Isaac Kipust engaged in discussion at the imperial summer resort of Chengde

China’s Northeast region (东北)

Jinzhou City (锦州市), Liaoning Province
Jinzhou Mining Machinery (Group) Co., Ltd

 

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Faculty and students enter the factory at Jinzhou Mining Machinery (Group) Co., Ltd. with the company’s senior managers

Stanford students and faculty toured a mining equipment factory in Jinzhou city in Northeast China. Massive worker lay-offs and closures of state-owned enterprises devastated this “rust belt” region throughout the 1990’s and early 2000’s. The company’s senior management sat with students and faculty and described its current reincarnation as a private shareholding company. They also opened up about their difficulties in attracting talent; local tax rates and land use fees; and their inability to enforce contracts and redress payment defaults.

As Jenn Hu (Stanford sophomore) remarked, “One thing I found particularly fascinating [was that]. . . it was not unusual for [the company’s] clients to bail on contractual obligations . . . . [T]he company allowed their client to pay them back in the form of raw materials, essentially engaging in barter trade . . . The fact that an increasing number of clients are unable to pay back, a trend party leaders have dubbed the ‘new normal,’ is also indicative of China’s slowing growth.”

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Jay Gonzalez and Jenny Zhao pose in front of a giant painting of “model workers” at Jinzhou Mining Machinery (Group) Co., Ltd.

Dandong City (丹东市)
War to Resist U.S. Aggression and Aid Korea Railroad Museum (铁路抗美援朝博物馆)

 

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Group photo in front of the old railroad tracks in Dandong, Liaoning province, that helped transport Chinese troops into North Korea during the Korean War

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Jenn Hu reading the captions at the “War to Resist U.S. Aggression and Aid Korea” Railroad Museum

Dandong’s small “railroad museum” displayed images, quotes and photos from the Korean War – better known as “War to Resist U.S. Aggression and Aid Korea” in China. Nearly 3 million People’s Liberation Army troops overwhelmed the U.S. troops and allies in 1950; and China tragically lost anywhere from 149,000 to 400,000 soldiers in the war.

Students heard the Chinese perspective on the war, which focused on U.S. aggression and China’s rightful defense. The museum’s guided tour, in fact, ended with an anti-American sing-along that praised China’s bravery and denounced U.S. imperialism. As one student commented on her blog, “[f]rom the ends of the room, [the museum’s visitors’] voices rose in unison, and swelled into a chorus of song -- 抗美援朝鲜，打败美帝野心狼! (‘Resist America, help Korea, defeat the American imperialists with their wolf-like ambitions!’) (Cathy Dao, Stanford sophomore),” giving substance to the reality that history is, indeed, political.

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Prof. Scott Rozelle, Senior Fellow at FSI and faculty member for China Studies in Beijing, engaged in a heated debate with the local guide from Dandong who argued that North Korea’s decision to start the Korean War was to defend its motherland against U.S. military aggression.

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Sino-North Korean Friendship Bridge that links Shinuiju, North Korea, to Dandong, China.

Dalian (大连)

Lastly, students traveled to Dalian, the “pearl of the East” founded by the Russians in 1898 and built in the style of European cities at the turn-of-the-century. The site of intense battles during the Russo-Japanese War of 1904, the city now boasts a Sino-Soviet Friendship Monument built in 1996.

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Group photo in front of the Sino-Soviet Friendship Monument in Dalian city

Whether it be “[t]he sheer size of a small city like Jinzhou”(pop: 3.1 million) or the “‘little’ city” of Dalian (pop: 6.2 million), these cities drove home for students the sheer scale of a country like China – its significance, complexity, and import.

Students have written blog pieces posted on FSI’s Medium site in which one student also described a fascinating solo backpacking trip to Tibetan communities in western Sichuan and, another, the quotidian challenges of everyday life in Beijing. Regardless of their subject matter, however, their words echo the program’s success in enabling students to perceive the world through vastly differing lenses – lenses that often show a place and people that are deeply warm and welcoming and, at other times, reflect a world that proves decentering and unclear. Yet, the complementary experiences in the classroom and outside the curriculum are enabling students to develop an imagination that can encompass the “other” and nurture a humility that can feed a lifetime of questions. As Cathy Dao commented upon visiting the “War to Resist U.S. Aggression and Aid Korea” Railroad Museum, “I realized that such hostility is a function of history. How each country portrays conflicts [such as the Korean War] strongly influences the perceptions that its people have. [But] [s]hould we learn how one another views history, we can see the humanity in what would otherwise be an abstract and incompatible ‘other.’”

 

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(Counter clockwise): Julie Gu (second year, Masters in International Policy), Pan Xue (Beijing program assistant), Jenny Zhao, and Lucas Hornsby taking a group selfie in Dalian city

For information regarding similar opportunities, please visit FSI Student Programs or email Patrick Laboon, FSI’s Academic Program Manager, at plaboon@stanford.edu for all updates regarding the many international student opportunities offered through FSI.