Values and Vision: Perspectives on Philanthropy in 21st Century China

Values and Vision: Perspectives on Philanthropy in 21st Century China is an exploratory study of philanthropic giving among China's very wealthy citizens. Recognizing the increasing number of successful entrepreneurs engaged in philanthropic activity in China, the study explores the economic and policy contexts in which this philanthropy is evolving; the philanthropic motivations, aspirations and priorities of some of the country's most engaged philanthropists; and the challenges and opportunities for increasing philanthropic engagement and impact in China

Developing Social Citizenship? A Case Study of Education and Health Services in Yantian Village, Guangdong

This paper uses a case study of the evolution of education and healthcare provision in Yantian Village, Guangdong Province to examine broader trends in China’s evolving social policies. It makes no claims that development in Yantian is typical for rural China but it may allow some tentative conclusions to be drawn about the extent of inclusiveness of social policy and the moves towards citizenship as a basis for redistribution policies and welfare provision. Yantian is not a normal village but rather is what people refer to as an “urban village” and it has been one of the major beneficiaries of economic reform. Lying close to Hong Kong and Shenzhen, it is in the hub of the Pearl River Delta that has become a key link in the global reorganization of manufacturing and production. The economic reforms, especially the opening to foreign investment, pursued since the late-1970s have replaced the water buffalo and rice paddies with China’s main export processing center. It has been a key center for foreign direct investment and, as a result, has attracted a large migrant community. The province of Guangdong is home to some 30 million migrants, 80,000 of whom lived in Yantian in 2010. The migrants work primarily in the 200 or so foreign invested enterprises vested in Yantian (there were over 400 at their peak). However, the group of migrants is not homogenous and this has consequences for how they are treated within the village. Investors are treated far better than those working in the factories. Most importantly, the migrants are not eligible for any payout from the dividends from the village collective that has provided the relative wealth for the local residents. The rapid development of Yantian with the influx of foreign investment and the large number of migrants who moved into the village put tremendous pressure on the educational services. This led to the emergence of a network of different types of schools catering to the varied needs within the community. The range of schools available did mean that all children in Yantian were able to find schooling irrespective of family background, but the quality and investment varied significantly. Most importantly, from 2008 the government budget covered the costs for migrant children helping overcome the biggest inequity of the previous years. Yet, differences remained with respect to the quality of the teachers and the infrastructure in the schools. As elsewhere in China, economic reforms had a major impact on medical insurance in Yantian. From the early-1980s, Yantian Village started to transform its healthcare system from one based on a collective, cooperative scheme to one where village clinics ran on contracts. This meant villagers no longer enjoyed any guarantees for healthcare provision. Some of the wealthier families purchased commercial medical insurance, while certain production teams set aside a partial fund from their collective revenues to subsidize members who suffered catastrophic or chronic disease and to provide a limited medical allowance. However, by 2000 Yantian Village had achieved universal coverage for its residents through a three-phase development

China, the USA, and Asia’s Future

The relationship between the US and China is at the core of both economic and geopolitical trends that will define the future of Asia in this century. China’s economic rise and its more assertive diplomacy have created a new environment for neighboring countries to react. This has necessitated other powers in Asia to work within a regional order that is no longer based on US primacy as the key guarantor of global and regional public goods. Despite relative decline, the Obama administration, first with its unwieldy phrase of a pivot to Asia and the later notion of rebalancing, has indicated clearly that it intends to retain a key role in Asia. The potential danger that this can give rise to is shown by the tension that arises periodically over territorial disputes. Most recently, there have been three unsettling trends. First, is the dispute between the Philippines and China over the Scarborough Shoal, which falls within the long tongue of the South China Seas that China claims as a “core interest.” Second, in mid-June 2012, China announced that it had set up a prefectural city, Sansha, to oversee three South China Sea islands. Third, there has been yet another escalation of sovereignty claims over the Senkaku islands between China and Japan. There have also been territorial spats between Japan and South Korea. Whether the US will be drawn into an avoidable conflict by its allies in the region or whether it will renege on its alliances to maintain a viable relationship with China heightens the insecurity. It is even more important for the US and China to find a way to cooperate in the Asia region than it is for the other countries within the region. There is no alternative leader within the region or group of countries that can provide the kind of balance that will enable the necessary public goods to be produced. This will entail modification of behavior by both the US and China, and it will not be easy. China’s strategic goals are directed to the defense of a continental power with growing maritime interests, as well as to Taiwan’s unification and other sovereignty claims and are largely conservative, not expansionist from their own perspective. China’s continued economic rise may nevertheless spawn a new security dilemma in East Asia, increasing regional instability and undermining China’s attempts at the diplomacy of reassurance. China has always shown itself willing to use force to protect what is sees as “legitimate” territorial claims. To be effective, both the US and China will have to make accommodations. China will have to define its national interest more clearly, and this will mean acknowledging that other principles of its foreign policy may be overridden under certain circumstances. China’s commercial activities have become a major issue in the domestic politics of a number of countries in the region. China needs to feel comfortable with the framework for international governance of which it is now a key member; reduce its suspicion of hostile foreign intent; and adjust its outdated notion of sovereignty to accept that some issues need transnational solutions and that international monitoring does not have to erode the Chinese Communist Party’s power

Circulating Pro- and Anti-Inflammatory Metabolites and Its Potential Role in Rheumatoid Arthritis Pathogenesis.

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is a chronic systemic autoimmune disease that affects synovial joints, leading to inflammation, joint destruction, loss of function, and disability. Although recent pharmaceutical advances have improved the treatment of RA, patients often inquire about dietary interventions to improve RA symptoms, as they perceive pain and/or swelling after the consumption or avoidance of certain foods. There is evidence that some foods have pro- or anti-inflammatory effects mediated by diet-related metabolites. In addition, recent literature has shown a link between diet-related metabolites and microbiome changes, since the gut microbiome is involved in the metabolism of some dietary ingredients. But diet and the gut microbiome are not the only factors linked to circulating pro- and anti-inflammatory metabolites. Other factors including smoking, associated comorbidities, and therapeutic drugs might also modify the circulating metabolomic profile and play a role in RA pathogenesis. This article summarizes what is known about circulating pro- and anti-inflammatory metabolites in RA. It also emphasizes factors that might be involved in their circulating concentrations and diet-related metabolites with a beneficial effect in RA

The muon content of EAS as a function of primary energy

The muon content of extensive air showers (EAS) was measured over the wide primary energy range 10 to the 16th power to 10 to the 20th power eV. It is reported that the relative muon content of EAS decreases smoothly over the energy range 10 to the 17th power to 10 to the 19th power eV and concluded that the primary cosmic ray flux has a constant mass composition over this range. It is also reported that an apparent significant change in the power index occurs below 10 to the 17th power eV rho sub c (250 m) sup 0.78. Such a change indicates a significant change in primary mass composition in this range. The earlier conclusions concerning EAS of energy 10 to the 17th power eV are confirmed. Analysis of data in the 10 to the 16th power - 10 to the 17th power eV range revealed a previously overlooked selection bias in the data set. The full analysis of the complete data set in the energy range 10 to the 16th power - 10 to the 17th power ev with the selection bias eliminated is presented

Application of Multiple Data Augmentation Techniques to Improve Training with Synthetic SAR Data in Common CNN

To address the issues of limited target data in the Synthetic Aperture Radar Automatic Target Recognition (SAR ATR) problem set, synthetic data is often used to aid in filling the gap. This paper covers an in depth look at the use of colorization, dynamic range adjustment, and target extraction as data augmentation techniques to improve the accuracy of deep learning networks trained on synthetic SAR data. The use of multiple different data augmentations combine to dramatically improve the accuracy of a common Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) over the use of standard synthetic data. A comparison of increasing fraction of measured data were used to show that the less measured data there is available the more critical these data augmentation techniques are to improve target recognition

Analysis of IL2/IL21 Gene Variants in Cholestatic Liver Diseases Reveals an Association with Primary Sclerosing Cholangitis

Background/Aims: The chromosome 4q27 region harboring IL2 and IL21 is an established risk locus for ulcerative colitis (UC) and various other autoimmune diseases. Considering the strong coincidence of primary sclerosing cholangitis (PSC) with UC and the increased frequency of other autoimmune disorders in patients with primary biliary cirrhosis (PBC), we investigated whether genetic variation in the IL2/IL21 region may also modulate the susceptibility to these two rare cholestatic liver diseases. Methods: Four strongly UC-associated single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) within the KIAA1109/TENR/IL2/IL21 linkage disequilibrium block were genotyped in 124 PBC and 41 PSC patients. Control allele frequencies from 1,487 healthy, unrelated Caucasians were available from a previous UC association study. Results: The minor alleles of all four markers were associated with a decreased susceptibility to PSC (rs13151961: p = 0.013, odds ratio (OR) 0.34; rs13119723: p = 0.023, OR 0.40; rs6822844: p = 0.031, OR 0.41; rs6840978: p = 0.043, OR 0.46). Moreover, a haplotype consisting of the four minor alleles also had a protective effect on PSC susceptibility (p = 0.0084, OR 0.28). A haplotype of the four major alleles was independently associated with PSC when excluding the patients with concomitant inflammatory bowel disease (p = 0.033, OR 4.18). Conclusion: The IL2/IL21 region may be one of the highly suggestive but so far rarely identified shared susceptibility loci for PSC and UC. Copyright (C) 2011 S. Karger AG, Base

Contextualizing the China dream: a reinforced consultative Leninist approach to government

After he took over as General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and as Chairman of the Central Military Commission in November 2012, Xi Jinping articulated for the first time ‘the China dream’ at ‘the road to revival’ exhibition at the National Museum in Beijing. As he did so he stressed that since the start of the reform period China had finally found the way to restore the greatness of the country and it was called ‘socialism with Chinese characteristics’.1 What Xi has revealed is not a new political system or even a new term to describe it. It is a confidence in the existing political system which, despite all its faults, he now believes is sufficiently strong, effective and robust to deliver the national revival encapsulated in his ‘China dream’. The nature of the system that Xi loosely refers to, in line with the long-standing usage after the end of the Mao Zedong era, as ‘socialism with Chinese characteristics’ gets clearer if it is set within the analytical framework of consultative Leninism

The Quality of Governance in China: The Citizen’s View

Are China’s citizens sufficiently satisfied to reduce potential challenges to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) rule? It is reasonable to assume that if a significant percentage of citizens are more satisfied with government performance and the provision of public goods, the government will have a greater capacity for policy experimentation and enjoy a residual trust that may help them survive policy errors. This paper asks three sets of questions. The first set asks about the general levels of satisfaction with government across different levels. Second, we ask about how citizens view the performance of local officials in dealing with the public and in implementing policy. Third, we look at the level of satisfaction with the provision of a number of specific goods and services, with a more in-depth look at dealing with corruption. In particular, we compare responses among those who live in major cities, small towns and townships, and villages. Findings are based on a survey that was conducted together with Horizon Market Research Company in the fall of 2003, 2004, 2005, 2007, 2009, and 2011. The survey is a purposive stratified survey ranging from 3,800 to 4,150 respondents selected from three administrative levels: city, town, and village. Rather than a nationwide probability sample, the survey comprises a number of sites selected on the basis of three variables: geographic location, average per capita income, and population. Survey findings reveal that the new leadership that takes power through late-2012 and 2013 is likely to inherit a mixed situation. There is clearly much dissatisfaction with the performance of local government and its officials; very few have faith that the government can deal effectively with the problem of corruption. Yet, there is still good will towards the Central government that is not identified with the problems that are seen to blight the performance of those levels of government closer to the people. The surveys confirm the view of others that Chinese citizens do “disaggregate” the state and would appear to retain faith in the central government. In addition, the satisfaction with all levels of government has risen since we began the surveys in 2003. This may give the Central leadership some cushion if it makes policy errors in the future. However, as we have seen in the recent past, seemingly stable authoritarian regimes can unravel quickly, and citizen frustration can spill out onto the streets. Our survey also suggests that citizens feel that local officials are not very effective in promoting the interests of ordinary folk, but are quite adept at pursuing their own interests. It will be a notable challenge for the new leadership to bring about significant improvement in those areas of public service citizens deem most important without increasing transparency and accountability in local government

Toxic molecules in liver failure plasma

Liver failure remains a disease with a high mortality and with the exception of transplantation therapeutic options are limited. The liver however has regenerative potential, and strategies based not only at supporting the failing liver, but promoting its recovery would be a significant evolution. Plasma from patients with liver failure contains toxic molecules that have many effects on the liver including loss of cell viability. These factors represent a significant barrier to stem cell transplantation, bioreactor function and autologous liver recovery, suggesting removal or antagonism of these factors may be appropriate therapeutic strategies. Since apoptosis has been implicated in the pathogenesis of a number of liver diseases including liver failure we proposed that it may be one of the mechanisms by which plasma is toxic to hepatocytes. We developed and validated a model using primary human hepatocytes to investigate if plasma from patients with acute and acute-on-chronic liver disease was pro-apoptotic. Compared with normal plasma, acute liver failure plasma induced apoptosis whereas plasma from patients with acutely-decompensated chronic liver disease did not. Having identified that acute-liver failure plasma was pro-apoptotic we investigated the pathway via which the apoptosis was mediated by using specific inhibitors of caspases, key components of the death receptor and mitochondrial pathways. We found that apoptosis was induced via a pathway involving caspase 8 and caspase 3, suggesting involvement of the death-receptor pathway. We investigated the effects of Caspase inhibition as a therapeutic option in acute liver failure by using an established animal model but did not find an improved outcome in treated animals. We also investigated the effects of treatment with molecular adsorbent dialysis (MARS) on the pro-apoptotic effects of plasma and found MARS dialysis improved biochemical parameters, indicating effective removal of albumin-bound molecules, but the apoptotic effects of the patients' plasma were unchanged