The Belt and Road Initiative: Environmental Implications and Prospects for Change

BRI corridors cross key hotspots of biological and cultural diversity. It is therefore no surprise if the initiative is causing concern among a large community of scholars, activists, and sustainability practitioners. This issue of EURICS Brief Analyses aims at sharing these concerns with a wider audience interested in knowing more about the impacts of the BRI, while providing tools to interpret its significance for global sustainability

Area Studies for Urban Sustainability Research. Current Practice and Untapped Potential

This paper discusses the potential of Area Studies to inform scientific inquiry for urban sustainability. It draws from two strains of scholarship: the systemic and place-based research on sustainability and the post-1989 reflection on the conceptual foundations of Area Studies. The author starts from the assumption that Area Studies and sustainability research share a similar concern over place(s), shaped over time by human-to-nature and human-to-human relations. He then lays down two pathways for the contribution of Area Studies to urban sustainability research. The first reflects the role of Area Studies in overcoming disciplinary and sectorial barriers, fostering holistic understandings of sustainability. The second relates to the capacity for self-reflexivity inherent in Area Studies, which nurtures critical approaches to the study of sustainability. Once its epistemological and ethical potential is unearthed, Area Studies can become a thriving trans-disciplinary field informing socio-ecological transformations

Urbanizzazione e sostenibilità in Cina. Verso un cambiamento trasformativo?

Since the 1990s China has witnessed an urbanization process with no parallel in history. It is no overestimation to say that the country’s future will be largely shaped by it. To many respects, Chinese urbanization is stretching to the very limit the capacities of the environment and society to sustain development. On the other hand, it is portrayed as a crucial driver for innovation. This paper aims at shedding light over China’s urbanization potential to bring about transformative changes for sustainability. It does so by analyzing the political discourse and official objectives of urbanization. Results show that sustainability has taken roots in Beijing’s approach to urbanization. However, its narrative and objectives remains anchored to the same convential ideas of incremenetal development, which to this day has inspired post-reform China’s path to modernization. The potential for transformative change in China’s urbanization appears therefore limited

La politicizzazione della ricerca orientata alle politiche pubbliche

Questo contributo intende presentare i risultati di una ricerca sul campo relativa ai processi di formazione e comunicazione delle evidenze scientifiche finalizzate ad indirizzare le politiche pubbliche e sociali nella Repubblica Popolare Cinese (RPC) nell’ultimo decennio. In modo particolare si cercherà di illustrare fenomeni di politicizzazione della produzione scientifica, ovvero di distorsione e uso strumentale del dato scientifico sulla base di considerazioni di natura politica, come anche in virtù di interessi privati di singoli individui ed istituzioni operanti in seno al sistema burocratico cinese. I materiali presentati sono stati raccolti nel corso di un lavoro sul campo svolto fra il 2008 e il 2013 dall’autore, nel corso di progetti di cooperazione allo sviluppo e di ricerca che lo hanno visto collaborare con il Ministero della Sanità e il Ministero dell’Ambiente della RPC. Le modalità di raccolta dei materiali includono osservazione partecipante ed interviste approfondite semi-strutturate

Health Care System Reform in Contemporary P.R.China: Public Agenda, Private Interests and Global Interactions

Contemporary China observers tend to agree over the positive role played by post-maoist market-oriented reforms in shaping a political system increasingly open to interactions between private interests and state authorities. Recent works exploring these interactions describe a context where “pursuit of economic expansion has led to the emergence of an interest-based social order” (Zheng 2002: 64) and a polity where “largest and most active interest groups are economically driven and have a great impact on . . . political and social affairs” (Yang 2007: 2). In the last thirty years, Chinese public health care system has experienced a pervasive restructuring process, whose trajectory has been defined by the State coherently with national development priorities. As reforms in the health sector deepens, private interests are emerging. Despite the deep influence of market-oriented reforms in the sector, however, scarce attention has been devoted in investigating policy inputs conveyed by economically driven interests—in particular those of medical providers and pharmaceutical producers—to the political power, either in the form of resistance to regulatory pressures or through the articulation of specific demands. This paper will attempt to investigate the processes which lead to the constitution of economically driven interests in post-Mao China’s health care sector, how they exerted their influence on the commitments taken by the Hu-Wen leadership towards a more “harmonious” pattern of socio-economic development and which avenues they might follow in articulating demands upon the political system. Finally, recent developments in health policies and the relevant debate involving major stakeholders will be introduced

Institutional Determinants and Quality of Policy-Oriented Research in P.R. China

Since the early 1980s, there has been a consistent effort by Chinese authorities to make use of well grounded policy-oriented research to pursue the strategic development goals of the country. This tendency has been strengthened by the Hu-Wen administration in the last decade: The concept of ‘Scientific development’—in itself describing a model of development balancing economic with social and environmental concerns, aiming at the realization of a so-called ‘harmonious society’—can indeed be understood through the lens of an increasing reliance on scientific research as a tool to guide definition, implementation and evaluation of national policies. Despite the increased reliance on scientific work to address issues of public concern and the growing amount of pertinent literature, quality of policy-oriented research is often questioned in epistemological terms, by both domestic and foreign trained scholars. Indeed, recent research on the issue shows how in transitional China avenues to produce and construct knowledge can be influenced by institutional determinants—cultural, social, political—or, in other terms, how research, especially when implying the collection of first-hand data through on-field activities, can still be considered a sensitive activity in itself, potentially constricted and biased by institutional factors. Drawing largely from observations made during a four year appointment as policy analyst, researcher and health program officer of the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs in China, this presentation intends to introduce a preliminary assessment of institutional factors potentially impacting on the quality of policy-oriented research, introducing methodological considerations which hopefully will provide useful in bridging the broader epistemological debate to the every- day practice of policy research in China