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Miriam Driessen speaks at Queen's University, Belfast

30 August 2016

On 18 August 2016 Miriam Driessen was invited to speak at the conference ‘Affective Apocalypses and Millennial Well-being’, organized by the J. Mitchell Institute for Global Peace, Security and Justice, at Queen’s University Belfast. She presented a paper on xiaokang, and the engineering of wellbeing in China.

Professor Rachel Murphy speaks at the College of Economics, Jinan University

16 August 2016

From 12th to 15th July 2016 Rachel Murphy participated in a conference supported by the British Council and the China National Science Foundation on migration and urbanisation in China and Europe, which aimed to forge links between scholars based in UK and China. The conference was held at the College of Economics, Jinan University, Guangzhou and was co-hosted by University of Leeds (Heather Zhang) and Jinan University in Guangzhou (Chunchao Wang). Rachel was a key-note speaker and senior mentor for the conference. 

Dr Jennifer Holdaway joins the School of Interdisciplinary Area Studies

16 August 2016

The School extends a warm welcome to Dr Jennifer Holdaway who has recently joined SIAS as a Senior Research Fellow.

Jennifer has come from the SSRC in New York where she worked as a Programme Officer and China Representative.  Jennifer has spent many years undertaking research and co-ordinating research networks in China, and she has written extensively about health and the environment in China. Internal and international migration and international education are other key interests.

She is based much of the year in Beijing and welcomes faculty and students from the School to get in touch with her if they plan to visit. To find out more about her profile and present research projects, please see our People pages

Jenny Chan speaks at “Critical Capacities: Media Workers, Labour and Action”

29 July 2016

The 2016 conference of the International Association for Media and Communication Research (IAMCR), hosted by the Department of Media and Communication at the University of Leicester, will be held from July 27-31 in Leicester, United Kingdom. The one-day event, “Critical Capacities: Media Workers, Labour and Action,” brought together leading media academics and activists to critically examine current trends and trajectories in global worlds of media work, and to present strategies and solutions for improving and enhancing conditions of media and cultural production.

 

Location: Curve Theatre, Leicester, UK - http://www.curveonline.co.uk/

Date and time: Tuesday 26 July 09:15 - 18:00

Contact: Mark Banks, University of Leicester

Organisers: Mark Banks, University of Leicester; Rick Maxwell, CUNY; Kate Oakley, University of Leeds

The motif of ‘critical capacity’ invites reflection on both the current inequalities, intensities and extremities of over-loaded and under-rewarded media and cultural work and the modes of redress, advocacy and action currently available to the  media worker.

Speakers included: Jenny Chan, Bridget Conor, Kirsten Forkert, Hayley Hare, Alison Harvey, David Hesmondhalgh, Sarita Malik, Lisa McLaughlin, Toby Miller, Dave O’Brien, Jonathan Corpus Ong, Anamik Saha, Stevphen Shukaitis, Tom Taylor, Charles Umney.

 

Reference:

Chan, Jenny, Ngai Pun and Mark Selden. 2016. “Chinese Labor Protest and Trade Unions.” Pp. 290-302 in The Routledge Companion to Labor and Media, edited by Richard Maxwell. New York: Routledge.

Jenny Chan presents at two public events in Leeds

4 July 2016

On 23 June 2016 ESRC (Economic & Social Research Council) Seminar Series entitled “Migrants, Workplace and Community: Learning from Innovation in Civil Society (2016-2018),” Jenny Chan spoke at the Leeds City Museum, alongside distinguished presenters Jane Wills (Queen Mary University of London), Jane McAlevey (Harvard University), Janice Fine (Rutgers University) and Carlos Saavedra (Anyi Institute). The series reflects on the interface of workplace and community, paying attention to the conditions of migrant workers. The multi-university seminar organizers are Davide Pero (University of Nottingham), Marek Korczynski (University of Nottingham), Jane Holgate (University of Leeds), Bridget Anderson (University of Oxford), Don Flynn (Migrants’ Rights Network), Stefania Marino (University of Manchester), Miguel Martinez Lucio (University of Manchester), and Cathy McIlwaine (Queen Mary University of London).

On the 66th BUIRA (British Universities Industrial Relations Association) Conference, Jenny Chan, William Brown (University of Cambridge), and Sarosh Kuruvilla (Cornell University) presented at the plenary session entitled “Current Issues of Chinese Industrial Relations,” chaired by Mark Stuart (University of Leeds), 30 June. Together they addressed the debates about the transformation of China in the world economy, the changing state-labor relations, the trade union reforms, and the growing worker protests. Overall, the BUIRA 2016 Conference (29 June to 1 July) aimed to discuss the prospects and opportunities for employment relations towards 2020.

Jenny Chan, Lecturer of Sociology and China Studies (2014-present) and Junior Research Fellow (2015-2018) of Kellogg College, acknowledges the funding support of the John Fell Fund Oxford University Press (OUP) Research Fund for her project, “Learning for Jobs: Internship, Vocational Education, and the Law in China.”

Jenny Chan publishes in Inter-Asia Cultural Studies

22 June 2016

Abstract: To enrich the discussion of global labor, between 2010 and 2016, we studied Apple’s value chain, Foxconn’s mode of labor control, and Chinese workers’ struggles. Through our fieldwork in China we also examined Apple’s and Foxconn’s responses to the spate of worker suicides, workers’ resistance, the activism of scholar and student groups, and transnational justice campaigns. We conclude with reflection on global labor studies in light of the debates between Karl Polanyi’s counter movement and Karl Marx’s class-based struggle.

To cite this article: PUN Ngai, SHEN Yuan, GUO Yuhua, LU Huilin, Jenny Chan & Mark Selden. 2016. “Apple, Foxconn, and Chinese workers’ struggles from a global labor perspective.” Inter-Asia Cultural Studies 17(2): 166-185.

To download this articlePlease click here

CONTACT: Jenny Chan at jenny.chan@area.ox.ac.uk | wlchan_cuhk@yahoo.com

SIAS Green Impact Team goes GOLD!

16 June 2016

On Wednesday 15th June, the University’s Environmental Sustainability Team invited us all to the Blavatnik School of Government for their annual Sustainability Showcase.

We are proud to announce that the School’s Green Impact Team were presented with a Gold award – the highest accolade possible within the Green Impact scheme.

The Showcase is an opportunity to distribute awards to the numerous Green Impact teams and others involved in sustainability practices for their achievements over the past year and this year’s event was described by Professor William James, Pro-Vice-Chancellor (Planning and Resources) as “the biggest celebration of social and environmental actions…at Oxford University ever” joining together the Sustainability Awards and the Social Impact Awards for the very first time.

Vice-Chancellor, Professor Louise Richardson said “There really is an extraordinary amount of work taking place in the University, both within the Departments and most particularly across them, which is really very exciting.”

The evening itself not only gave us the chance to celebrate our achievements, but also to take part in a tour of the recently opened Blavatnik School of Government at the Radcliffe Observatory Quarter. The building was designed and built with energy efficiency and sustainability targets at the fore and is expected to consume 49% less energy in comparison to existing UK buildings of the same size and usage. It has received a “BREEAM Excellent”* rating and incorporates a multitude of environmental systems in its design.

After the awards, we were all able to celebrate with a glass of sparkling wine and canapes from a local sustainable menu.

We would like to express our great thanks to the Environmental Sustainability Team for all of their support in helping us and other Green Impact teams achieve our goals over the past year and for organising such a wonderful event; we can’t wait to start again next term!

If you are a member of the School of Interdisciplinary Area Studies, staff or student, and would be interested in finding out more about the initiative or being part of the team, please contact us for details:

alexia.lewis@area.ox.ac.uk

victoria.hudson@area.ox.ac.uk

sarah.dewick@area.ox.ac.uk

sheryn.simpson@area.ox.ac.uk

 

*http://www.breeam.com

Jenny Chan contributed to openDemocracy's (Beyond Trafficking and Slavery, BTS) 2016 special issue on “Governing Global Supply Chains”

14 June 2016

Beyond Trafficking and Slavery is an editorial partnership between openDemocracy and researchers from Africa, Asia, America, Australia and Europe. It challenges both the empty sensationalism of mainstream media accounts of exploitation and domination, and the hollow, technocratic policy responses promoted by businesses and politicians.

The International Labour Conference (ILC) is the annual assembly of the International Labour Organisation (ILO). The ILO is the ‘labour arm’ of the United Nations and its job is to set the rules governing the world’s working conditions. Why is ILC 2016 so important? Because for the first time since much of the world economy was re-organised into global supply chains, the ILO will feature a discussion about how that economy should or shouldn’t be regulated in the interests of decent work and social justice.

For more details about the International Labour Conference 2016, “Governing Global Supply Chains?”, please click here.

 

Jenny Chan publishes a chapter in Achieving Workers’ Rights in the Global Economy

31 May 2016

Jenny Chan has published a co-authored chapter in Achieving Workers’ Rights in the Global Economy, edited by Richard P. Appelbaum and Nelson Lichtenstein (2016, Cornell University Press). Details are available here.

About the book

The world was shocked in April 2013 when more than 1,100 garment workers lost their lives in the collapse of the Rana Plaza factory complex in Dhaka. It was the worst industrial tragedy in the two-hundred-year history of mass apparel manufacture. This so-called accident was, in fact, just waiting to happen, and not merely because of the corruption and exploitation of workers so common in the garment industry. In Achieving Workers' Rights in the Global Economy, Richard P. Appelbaum and Nelson Lichtenstein argue that such tragic events, as well as the low wages, poor working conditions, and voicelessness endemic to the vast majority of workers who labor in the export industries of the global South arise from the very nature of world trade and production.

Given their enormous power to squeeze prices and wages, northern brands and retailers today occupy the commanding heights of global capitalism. Retail-dominated supply chains—such as those with Walmart, Apple, and Nike at their heads—generate at least half of all world trade and include hundreds of millions of workers at thousands of contract manufacturers from Shenzhen and Shanghai to Sao Paulo and San Pedro Sula. This book offers an incisive analysis of this pernicious system along with essays that outline a set of practical guides to its radical reform.

Contributors

Mark Anner, Penn State University;

Richard P. Appelbaum, University of California, Santa Barbara;

Jennifer Bair, University of Colorado Boulder;

Renato Bignami, labor inspector, Brazil;

Jeremy Blasi, UNITE HERE Local 11, Los Angeles;

Anita Chan, Australian National University;

Jenny Chan, University of Oxford;

Jill Esbenshade, San Diego State University;

Gary Gereffi, Duke University;

Jeff Hermanson, International Union League for Brand Responsibility;

Jason Kibbey, Sustainable Apparel Coalition;

Nelson Lichtenstein, University of California, Santa Barbara;

Xubei Luo, World Bank;

Anne Caroline Posthuma, International Labour Organization;

Scott Nova, Worker Rights Consortium;

Ngai Pun, Hong Kong Polytechnic University;

Katie Quan, University of California, Berkeley;

Brishen Rogers, Temple University;

Robert J. S. Ross, Clark University;

Mark Selden, Cornell University and New York University;

Chris Wegemer, Santa Barbara, California

Patricia Thornton's debate chosen as "Pick of the Week" by BBC Radio 4

19 May 2016

Professor Patricia Thornton's debate with historian Frank Dikotter on Free Thinking was named a "Pick of the Week" by BBC Radio 4. It also features Professor Rana Mitter, Director of the China Centre at the University of Oxford, as host of the roundtable session. You can listen by clicking the Pick of the Week title, or by clicking here, and runs from 13.43-17.43.

 

 

Paul Irwin Crookes takes part in a RUSI roundtable examining East Asian security issues

18 May 2016

Paul Irwin Crookes recently took part in a roundtable discussion examining the security implications of China’s current political and military posture in the East Asia region. Held in London and organised by the Royal United Services Institute for Defence and Security Studies (RUSI), the workshop brought together academic specialists from the UK and North America with stakeholders from the military and security communities to explore the latest research thinking on this important topic. Subjects reviewed included the potential security consequences of China’s economic vulnerabilities, the political dimensions of China’s military modernisation, and a risk assessment of transnational regional relations.

Jenny Chan presents “Wage Default in China” at Middlesex University

11 May 2016

On 9 May 2016 Jenny Chan presented at the “Unpaid Britain” Typology Workshop at Middlesex University, London. She reported that each year 2 to 3 million Chinese rural migrant workers were not paid, according to the latest national survey findings. In total, 27,159 million yuan were owed to rural migrants in 2015, and the total should go up because the affected local workers were not taken into account. The aggrieved labourers have filed their claims to local arbitration committees, while the others have gone on strike, alerting the stability-obsessed officials at all levels. As China’s economy is slowing, the Guangdong government has taken the first step to freeze its local minimum wages for two years. Social protection over workers’ fundamental rights, including the payment of wages and insurance benefits, is still much wanting.

Please click here for details about the Unpaid Britain project, led by Nick Clark.

Jenny Chan interviewed on Bloomberg

5 May 2016

“The fact they let a reporter in shows that they are responding to external pressure and trying to be more transparent—at least on the surface they’re trying to fix something,” said Jenny Chan, a lecturer at Oxford’s School of Interdisciplinary Area Studies and Kellogg College. “But they’re still not telling us more about how they run the business, the whole labor system.”

Read more: “Inside One of the World’s Most Secretive iPhone Factories—An Exclusive Look into a Plant Where Apple Addressed Claims of Excess Overtime,” Bloomberg, 25 April 2016 (by Shai Oster).

Paul Irwin Crookes publishes article in ‘The RUSI Journal’ on cross-Taiwan Strait security issues

5 May 2016

Paul Irwin Crookes has just published an article in The RUSI Journal of the Royal United Services Institute for Defence and Security Studies entitled “The Political and Security Nexus of the Taiwan Strait and China’s New Military Capabilities”.

The article analyses the political and security implications for relations between Beijing and Taipei in light of the recent elections in Taiwan. Concurrent with outlining the nature of this political change and the uncertainties this introduces, Paul evaluates evidence of a shift in the balance of military power across the Taiwan Strait, potentially changing the dynamics of decision-making in the event of future conflict.

For further details please see here.

Dr Miriam Driessen publishes in the Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies

18 April 2016

Dr Driessen's article,"Pushed to Africa: Emigration and Social Change in China" has appeared in the Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies and is available online.

Professor Rachel Murphy presents research at the University of Western Australia

14 April 2016

On 13th April Rachel Murphy gave a seminar presentation on "Children Living in Multi-Local Families in Rural China: Reflections on Gender Differences" in the Department of Economics at the University of Western Australia. This was attended by faculty and students from the Economics Department and the Sociology and Anthropology Department. Rachel has been an academic visitor at UWA over the Easter break where she has benefited from talking with economists of China and with economic and anthropological demographers as she continues to work on a monograph about rural Chinese children whose parents have migrated without them.

Dr Miriam Driessen joins the Contemporary China Studies Programme

11 April 2016

SIAS extends a warm welcome to Dr Miriam Driessen who this April joined the Contemporary China Studies Programme as a Leverhulme Early Career Fellow. Further information about Miriam and her research interests can be found here.

Jenny Chan presented in the 2016 European Social Science History Conference

6 April 2016

The International Institute for Social History successfully organized the 11th European Social Science History Conference at University of Valencia, Spain, 30 March – 2 April. Jenny Chan presented her paper in the “Globalization, Work and Labor in Asia” panel, along with Nandini Gooptu (University of Oxford) and Raka Ray (University of California – Berkeley). Ratna Saptari (University of Leiden) chaired the two-hour session and facilitated the discussions.

Jenny Chan’s research entitled “Learning for Jobs: Internship, Vocational Education, and the Law in China” is supported by the John Fell Oxford University Press (OUP) Research Fund (ref no. 152/015).   

Jenny Chan awarded the John Fell OUP Research Fund

10 March 2016

Social scientists have assessed the fast expansion, and commercialization, of Chinese education under market reforms sincethe late 1970s, and have delved specifically into the quality of vocational school teaching and classroom learning. There has been, however, scant attention to student interns as temporary or contingent workers in the actual workplace setting. Whereasin a few instances the poor working conditions of teenaged interns were reported, employers had denied their responsibility. The use of interns as flexible and cheap workers is therefore a cause for concern. This research will focus on learning for jobs in China. Relying on an interdisciplinary approach combining sociology, labour studies, education, and law, I ask two main questions: (1) How is the organization of student internship programmes shared among companies, vocational schools, andlocal government departments? (2) In what ways are the occupational skills training of student interns different from those of regular workers? I will employ interviews, supplemented with public policy analysis, to investigate whether the students' studiesare directly related to their assigned job posts during the internship, and sharpen comparisons of the nature and legality of internship programs, which are institutionally organized on a massive scale. While my focus is on China's youth, internships are now a widespread practice around the world. At a time of slowing growth and ageing population, properly trained interns will play a central role in China's development and far beyond. On the specific outcomes, this field research will lead to two conference presentations and an academic article.

 

More information on the John Fell Fund can be found here.

Jenny Chan and Mark Selden publish a chapter in Handbook on Class and Social Stratification in China (2016)

9 February 2016

Jenny Chan and Mark Selden in Handbook on Class and Social Stratification in China (2016)

The authors’ chapter examines the role of local governments in drawing in businesses and investments, and the specific conditions of Chinese rural migrant workers’ production and reproduction in the contemporary political economy. Jenny Chan and Mark Selden document the ways in which, at times of labour crisis, aggrieved workers have taken legal and extra-legal actions to defend their rights and interests in the absence of leadership or mobilization by trade unions. What then are the prospects for Chinese labour to strengthen its associational power?

In addition to this, Jenny Chan also gave a seminar at the University of Cambridge on the 3rd of February 2016, titled: Dying for an iPhone: Chinese Workers and Student Interns in Apple’s Supply Chain.

Jenny Chan interviewed in French media article: 'Les poèmes de la misère'

12 January 2016

Jenny Chan was interviewed on Le Devoir on Chinese migrants' workers lives. The article was written by Jean-Frédéric Légaré-Tremblay and published on the 30th of December, 2015.

The article, written in French, is available online:  'Les poèmes de la misère'.

 

Jenny Chan speaks at British Academy-funded symposium on forced labor and is cited by DanWatch

6 November 2015

The shadow economy is believed to be growing globally. On 8-9 October, 2015, Dr Jenny Chan participated in a methods symposium on forced labor entitled “Challenges in Researching the Shadow Economy,” Sheffield Town Hall, Sheffield. Her ethnographic research focuses on the new form of constrained labor of student interns in China. Far from being freely chosen, student internships are organized by the local state working with enterprises and schools, frequently in violation of the rights of student interns and in violation of Chinese law.

Jenny Chan’s research on Chinese student “internships” is cited by DanWatch 

Copenhagen-based DanWatch released its investigative report entitled “Servants of Servers” in October 2015: 

…Statements about teachers receiving double salary for escorting interns to electronics factories are backed by the research of Jenny Chan, lecturer in China Studies and Sociology at the University of Oxford, professor Ngai Pun from Hong Kong Polytechnic University, and professor Mark Selden from New York University, who together have been studying the use of interns at electronic factories in China over the past five years.

“Some teachers are aware about harsh conditions at the factories, however they explain they are not in a position to change the situation because it would break their own employment and extra income”, Jenny Chan explains.

Journal article:

Chan, Jenny, Ngai Pun and Mark Selden. 2015. “Interns or Workers? China’s Student Labor Regime.” Asian Studies (Official Journal of the Asian Studies Association of Hong Kong) 1(1): 69-98.

News stories:

Kasztelan, Marta. 6 October 2015. The Guardian.  HP and Dell Suspend Use of Interns in Chinese Factories.”

Chen, Michelle. 12 October 2015. The Nation. This article can be found here.

Future readings:

tripleC, Vol. 13, No. 2, 329-602. “Interrogating Internships: Unpaid Work, Creative Industries, and Higher Education.” Edited by Greig de Peuter, Nicole S. Cohen, and Enda Brophy. This article can be found here.

Jenny Chan invited to talk about Chinese labor and virtual work in Estonia

2 October 2015

Conference Program, 16-18 September 2015, Dynamics of Virtual Work, Parnu College,

University of Tartu, Estonia

At the key nodes of production, the integration of large manufacturers in transnational supply chains and tight delivery schedules for consumer products potentially enhance workers’ bargaining power at the workplace level. With workers’ growing awareness of the opportunities presented by the fact that giant corporations face pressures to meet quotas for new models and holiday season purchases, they have repeatedly come together at the dormitory, workshop, or factory level to voice demands or to stage protests. Access to internet and social networking technology also enables workers to disseminate open letters and to tweet urgent appeals for support. In the twenty-first century, China’s centrality in electronics manufacturing and exports opens possibilities that workers can build on their grassroots organizing experience to expand labor rights, while the iron triangle of Foxconn, the company union, and the Chinese state sustains the unequal power structures.

See also, Jenny Chan’s recent journal article on student labor in China.

Jenny CHAN (PhD in Sociology, 2014) is a Lecturer in Contemporary China Studies at the University of Oxford and a Junior Research Fellow (2015-2018) of Kellogg College. Educated at the Chinese University of Hong Kong (B.Soc.Sc) and the University of Hong Kong (MPhil.), she was a Reid Research Scholar while pursuing her doctorate at the University of London. In 2013-2014 she received a Great Britain-China Educational Award. She is a Board Member of the International Sociological Association’s Research Committee on Labor Movements (2014-2018). Her recent articles have appeared in Current Sociology, Modern ChinaHuman Relations, Asian Studies (Official Journal of Hong Kong Asian Studies Association), Critical Asian Studies, Inter-Asia Cultural Studies, Global Labour JournalThe Asia-Pacific Journal, The South Atlantic Quarterly, New Labor Forum, and New Technology, Work and Employment.

Jenny Chan publishes new book in French

28 September 2015

Comment le système Foxconn – l’usine chinoise qui produit iPhone et PlayStation – expérimente et met en œuvre les pires formes d’exploitation.

 
Yang - Jenny Chan - Xu Lizhi
2015

"La Machine est ton seigneur et ton maître"

Traduit de l’anglais et préfacé par Celia Izoard

Les machines ressemblent à d’étranges créatures qui aspirent les matières premières, les digèrent et les recrachent sous forme de produit fini. Le processus de production automatisé simplifie les tâches des ouvriers qui n’assurent plus aucune fonction importante dans la production. Ils sont plutôt au service des machines. Nous avons perdu la valeur que nous devrions avoir en tant qu’êtres humains, et nous sommes devenus une prolongation des machines, leur appendice, leur serviteur. J’ai souvent pensé que la machine était mon seigneur et maître et que je devais lui peigner les cheveux, tel un esclave. Il fallait que je passe le peigne ni trop vite ni trop lentement. Je devais peigner soigneusement et méthodiquement, afin de ne casser aucun cheveu, et le peigne ne devait pas tomber. Si je ne faisais pas bien, j’étais élagué.

Foxconn est le plus grand fabricant du monde dans le domaine de l’électronique. Ses villes-usines, qui font travailler plus d’un million de Chinois, produisent iPhone, Kindle et autres PlayStation pour Apple, Sony, Google, Microsoft, Amazon, etc. En 2010, elles ont été le théâtre d’une série de suicides d’ouvriers qui ont rendu publiques des conditions d’exploitation fondées sur une organisation militarisée de la production, une taylorisation extrême, l’absence totale de protection sociale et une surveillance despotique jusque dans les dortoirs où vivent les ouvriers.

Ce livre propose quelques éléments d’analyse du système Foxconn à partir du portrait que fait la sociologue Jenny Chan d’une ouvrière qui a survécu à sa tentative de suicide en 2010. Complété par le témoignage de Yang, un étudiant et ouvrier de fabrication à Chongqing, il retrace également le parcours de Xu Lizhi, jeune travailleur migrant chinois à Shenzen, qui s’est suicidé en 2014 après avoir laissé des poèmes sur le travail à la chaîne, dans "L’atelier, là où ma jeunesse est restée en plan".

ISBN : 9782748902389
 

http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=dp_byline_sr_book_2?ie=UTF8&field-author=J...

WORK, POLITICS AND AUSTERITY - A one-day special event organised by Critical Labour Studies

18 August 2015

DATE: 14 November 2015 11-5pm.

VENUE: GMB Euston Office. 22 Stephenson Way Euston London NW1 
REGISTRATION: Please register by emailing critical_labour_studies @yahoo.com. Spaces are limited. 
COST: £20 waged and £10 unwaged.

FLIER HERE (PDF)

Radical left politics The continuing intensification of neoliberal policies across Europe and beyond will bring major challenges to the workers and popular classes, at home and abroad.

The re-composition of radical left politics in the UK and internationally presents both a challenge and an opportunity for activities and academics. In this context, Critical Labour Studies (CLS) in partnership with the Conference of Socialist Economics (CSE) has organised a one-day event with the intention of encouraging discussion and reflection after the political changes of the current year.

The CLS tradition is one of open debate and discussion. The day will be organised around four themed session, with maximum time for discussion from participants:

  • Crisis and austerity: trade union responses
  • Left poiltics and the labour movement
  • Alternatives to austerity in Europe
  • New worlds of work

Speakers will include activists/academics from a number of backgrounds including, Martin Smith, GMB Maurizio Atzeni, Jenny Chan, Rachel Cohen, John Kelly, Phoebe Moore, Paul Stewart, Martin Upchurch, Bob Jeffery.

Also for your diary: the annual two-day CLS Symposium and workshop will be held in Durham in November 2016.

 

Paul Irwin Crookes presents research findings on cross-Taiwan Strait relations at a book launch hosted by the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) in London

3 August 2015

Paul Irwin Crookes delivered a presentation on cross-Taiwan Strait relations based on the latest research from his just-published co-edited volume at a policy-focused book launch event hosted by the Royal United Services Institute in Whitehall, London. Paul was joined as a presenter by co-editor Dr Jan Knoerich of King’s College London and together they discussed with an invited audience of diplomats, academics and policy experts, just how technology was shaping outcomes in security, economic and cultural dimensions on both sides of the Taiwan Strait.

Cross-Taiwan Strait Relations in an Era of Technological Change: Security, Economic and Cultural Dimensions’ edited by Paul Irwin Crookes and Jan Knoerich is published by Palgrave Macmillan’s St Antony’s Series.

 

The Routledge Companion to Labor and Media: Chapter co-authored by Dr Jenny Chan

3 August 2015

A chapter Dr Jenny Chan co-authored with Ngai Pun and Mark Selden “Chinese Labor Protest and Trade Unions.”  has been included in the new publication The Routledge Companion to Labor and Media edited by Richard Maxwell. New York: Routledge. 

New article published on Parents' Migration and Children's Subjective Well-being and Health: Evidence from Rural China by Rachel Murphy, Minhui Zhou and Ran Tao

22 June 2015

Rachel Murphy and her colleagues from Renmin University, Minhui Zhou and Ran Tao have just published an article on the implications of parents' rural-urban labour migration for the subjective wellbeing and health of the children 'left behind'. The article is published in the leading demography journal Population, Space and Place http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/psp.1955/abstract  Currently, there are over 60 million 'left behind' children in China aged under 17 years, and nearly half of them have two parents working away from them in the cities.  The article by Murphy, Zhou and Tao is based on a survey and fieldwork conducted in the major labour exporting provinces of Anhui and Jiangxi. On the basis of their findings, the authors argue that parents' labour migration interacts with inadequate welfare provisioning and strong patrilineal gender norms to affect family-based nurturing environments in complex ways, with implications for children's subjective well-being and health. The research is funded by the British Academy and the John Fell Fund. 

Cross-Taiwan Strait Relations in an Era of Technological Change: Security, Economic and Cultural Dimensions

12 June 2015

A new book edited by Paul Irwin Crookes and Jan Knoerich has just been published by Palgrave Macmillan’s St Antony’s Series.
 

Technological change is one of the main contemporary challenges and sources of uncertainty facing mainland China and Taiwan. It is also a key cause of the rapid political, economic and cultural shifts that characterize contemporary relations between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait. The chapters in this edited volume are based on research by international experts originating from Taiwan, mainland China, the United States, and Europe, enabling a mosaic of perspectives to be presented from different geostrategic standpoints and in a distinctly interdisciplinary fashion. The book analyses how new technology is shaping the dimensions of national security, economics, and culture in cross-Strait terms.

 

A launch event for this new work was recently held at St Antony’s College where each of these key themes was further explored, engaging with the audience in a lively discussion about the different dimensions of technological change in contemporary East Asia.

 

Further information about the new book can be found here:

 

http://www.palgrave.com/page/detail/crosstaiwan-strait-relations-in-an-era-of-technological-change-paul-irwin-crookes/?K=9781137391414

 

GlobalPost journalist Robert Foyle Hunwick interviewed Dr. Jenny Chan on 19 May 2015 for an article entitled “Desperate Chinese are turning to mass suicide to get their government’s attention."

22 May 2015

…“When the pre-existing grievance mechanisms fail to work, some aggrieved laborers may take direct actions to protest against injustice,” said Dr. Jenny Chan, an expert on Chinese labor studies at the University of Oxford. “But suicide shouldn’t be used as a desperate means of resistance.”

 

…“Suicide is intensely personal,” Dr. Chan said. “And it is social.”

 

… “The vulnerable workers are subjected to unbearable stress and intolerable pain at times of crises,” said Dr. Chan, who compares the pressure to “a form of ‘murder.’”

 

Full story: http://www.globalpost.com/article/6552870/2015/05/18/suicide-protest-china

Rachel Murphy is interviewed for an article on Premier Li Keqiang’s recent comments about the one child policy

8 April 2015

The article is in the leading Columbian newspaper, El Tiempo, 6th April 2015,  http://www.eltiempo.com/mundo/asia/chica-cambia-su-politica-de-hijo-unico/15517015

Paul Irwin Crookes contributed to debates on cross-Taiwan Strait security at a policy-led Roundtable hosted by the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) in London

7 April 2015

Paul Irwin Crookes was invited to contribute to a policy-led Roundtable in March 2015 hosted by the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) at their headquarters in Whitehall, London. The event covered a wide-ranging series of debates that included analyses of regional historical legacies of World War Two in East Asia, the changing nature of Chinese foreign policy under Xi Jinping and the implications of deepening cross-Strait economic integration in ties between mainland China and Taiwan.

 

Invited participants included stakeholders from diplomatic and political communities as well as academics from leading universities. The discussions were chaired by policy specialists from RUSI.

 

Paul Irwin Crookes is co-editor with Jan Knoerich of a forthcoming book currently in press with Palgrave Macmillan’s St Antony’s Series entitled Cross-Taiwan Strait Relations in an Era of Technological Change: Security, Economic and Cultural Dimensions due to be published in May 2015.

Dr. Jenny Chan was interviewed by Peter Bengtsen for Le Monde diplomatique (LMD), in “The Chinese Dream is a daydream” 26 March 2015

7 April 2015

Read the news extracts:

…The president of China, Xi Jinping, also dreams. Shortly after he took office in 2012, he introduced the so-called “Chinese dream” referring to its American counterpart and the goal of success through hard work. The dream has been widely communicated to the 1.3 billion citizens through his speeches, the media, textbooks in school, etc.

The Chinese dream indicates a shift in the rhetoric of the Communist Party. Previously each loyal citizen was to sacrifice himself or herself on behalf of society. Now, individuality is allowed a slightly stronger emphasis than before.

According to Jenny Chan, lecturer in Sociology and Contemporary China Studies at Oxford University, the main subject of the Chinese dream is still the nation. The overarching goal is still economic and political-cultural growth. But the Communist Party needs a narrative to unite the nation now that the belief in Marxism is weaker in the younger generation compared to their parents. “For Chinese workers to share this dream, not only rhetoric but most of all reliable and fair institutions are needed,” she says….

 

For more of Jenny’s recent writings:

 

Chan, Jenny, Ngai Pun and Mark Selden. 2015. “Apple’s iPad City: Subcontracting Exploitation to China.” Pp. 76-97 in Handbook of the International Political Economy of Production, edited by Kees van der Pijl. Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar.

 

Cole, Nicki Lisa and Jenny Chan. 2015. “Despite Claims of Progress, Labor and Environmental Violations Continue to Plague Apple.” Truthout. 19 February.

 

Agarwala, Rina, Jenny Chan, Alexander Gallas and Ben Scully. 2015. “Editors’ Introduction.” Global Labour Journal (January) 6(1): 1-3.

 

About Peter’s investigative reports:

 

Please go to his webpage.

 

Le Monde diplomatique, originally published in French, has editions in 25 other languages.

 

Rachel Murphy gave a presentation on 'Parents' Migration and Children's Subjective Wellbeing and Health' at the British Academy

27 March 2015

Dr Rachel Murphy gave her presentation at the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences Workshop on Sustainable Urban Development. The workshop was held on 25th-26th March 2015.

Rachel Murphy in Citymetric (New Statesman)

16 March 2015

Rachel Murphy was quoted in an article in Citymetric (New Statesman) about China’s urbanisation on 20th February 2015:

http://www.citymetric.com/politics/china-strictly-controls-urbanisation-and-limits-migrant-workers-rights-all-could-be

Paul Irwin Crookes delivers an invitation lecture on EU-China economic relations at the Lau China Institute, King’s College London

16 March 2015

Paul Irwin Crookes delivered a lecture at the Lau China Institute of King’s College London on the politics of EU-China economic relations. Exploring a number of contemporary themes in this important bilateral relationship, Paul was joined as co-presenter by John Farnell of the Brussels-based EU-Asia Centre. The presentation outlined a number of reasons to be positive about the evolution and direction of EU-China relations in the economic sphere, highlighting the importance to each side of further developing mutual interests in joint research and development projects in science and technology and of reinforcing closer cooperation in fields such as sustainable urbanisation, agriculture and animal husbandry.

However, a number of important, persistent pressures that exist in relations between the two economies were also analysed. Here, both presenters counselled caution in making too optimistic an assessment of the European Union’s strategic partnership with China. The lecture presented evidence of a number of obstacles to progress in key policy areas, such as challenges in securing achievable deliverables in recently commenced bilateral investment treaty negotiations and continuing tensions surrounding the EU’s ongoing refusal to grant Market Economy Status to China. The evening concluded with a lively question and answer session in which King’s College faculty and students explored specific issues in more detail with both presenters.

Paul Irwin Crookes and John Farnell are finalising a book entitled The Politics of EU-China Economic Relations: Constraints on Cooperation in the 21st Century under contract with Palgrave Macmillan.

Rachel Murphy in Chinese Social Science News 中国社会科学报

16 March 2015

Rachel Murphy was quoted in an article on the ‘new normal’ and social development in China in Chinese Social Science News 中国社会科学报, 12th March 2015

http://ex.cssn.cn/zx/tt/201503/t20150312_1542323.shtml

Dr Jenny Chan Contributes to Global Labour Journal

4 February 2015

 

Rina Agarwala, Johns Hopkins University, USA

Jenny Chan, University of Oxford, United Kingdom

Alexander Gallas, University of Kassel, Germany

Ben Scully, University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa

 

The Global Labour Journal (GLJ) was launched five years ago as an outlet for multidisciplinary research on labour and labour movements around the world. Specifically, it aimed to understand the contemporary challenges global labour faces and the potential transition of the various labour movements around the world to a new form of global unionism. In the years since its founding, GLJ has published a diverse range of cutting-edge research on burgeoning forms of ‘new’ labour activism (from alternative unions to new social movements) in the global North and South, on the prospects of revitalising ‘traditional’ trade unionism, on the effects of outsourcing and subcontracting on labour, and on the divisions between informal and formal sector workers, employing varying units of analysis (from single case studies, to cross-national comparative studies, to global studies). GLJ has also hosted lively and much-quoted scholarly debates and showcased new books. In short, the journal has played an instrumental role in defining, expanding and enriching a new field of Global Labour Studies in the era of neoliberalism.

 

URL of the Global Labour Journal (Jan 2015): https://escarpmentpress.org/globallabour/issue/view/245

'Don't Make Yourself at Home' Uighurs and Tibetans feel left out of China's Economic Boom; Ethnic Discrimination is not Helping

19 January 2015

Dr Reza Hasmath's latest research on ethnic minorities in China is in the current Economist issue (January 17, 2015). View the article here.

Apple's iPad City: Subcontracting Exploitation to China

12 January 2015

Dr Jenny Chan's recently publised chapter entitled “Apple’s iPad City: Subcontracting Exploitation to China.” is now available.

The ebook can be accessed here or you can view the chapter as a pdf document below.

Jenny Chan, Pun Ngai and Mark Selden. 2015. “Apple’s iPad City: Subcontracting Exploitation to China.” Pp. 76-97 in Handbook of the International Political Economy of Production, edited by Kees Van Der Pijl. Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar Publishing.

Dr Paul Irwin Crookes discusses the EU’s relations with China with former President of the European Commission, Jose Manuel Barroso

12 January 2015

As part of their research for a forthcoming publication on the politics of the EU’s economic relations with China, Paul Irwin Crookes and his co-author John Farnell had the opportunity to interview Mr Barroso to gain insights into the former Commission President’s perspective on the state of relations between the European Union and China in this 40th anniversary year since the two powers established diplomatic relations.

 

Key themes explored in the interview included the evolution of the strategic partnership between the EU and China during the 10 years of Mr Barroso’s presidency of the European Commission as well as the likely future trends in the bilateral relationship.

 

Paul Irwin Crookes and John Farnell are finalising a book entitled The Politics of EU-China Economic Relations: Constraints on Cooperation in the 21st Century under contract with Palgrave Macmillan.

Research Excellence Framework: Area Studies

18 December 2014

SIAS and Oriental Studies are delighted to note that our REF2014 submission was the largest made to the Area Studies panel by a considerable margin. 

Moreover it was rated as the most impressive in terms of volume of material that was judged to be world leading (4*) - again by a considerable margin.  These results confirm the position of scholars in Oriental Studies and SIAS as being pre-eminent among those working in area studies in the UK.  They demonstrate the significance of our contribution to the understanding of the world beyond Europe and North America and to the global status of Oxford University.

Bjarke Frellesvig, Chair of the Oriental Studies Faculty Board
Ian Neary, Head of SIAS

Morir por un iPhone? Apple, Foxconn y la lucha de los trabajadores en China (Spanish Translation)

17 December 2014

Morir por un iPhone? Apple, Foxconn y la lucha de los trabajadores en China. 

PUN Ngai, Jenny CHAN, and Mark SELDEN. 2014.

Translated in Spanish by Florencia Olivera and edited by Andrés Ruggeri.

Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires: Ediciones Continente S.R.L.

This book documents the struggles of a new generation of workers who produce our smartphones and tablet computers, indeed, the entire spectrum of high-tech consumer electronics. Foxconn is a representative or archetypical case of a global labor regime in the contemporary Chinese political economy. The mystery that our investigation seeks to explore is not only the “inside story” of Foxconn; it is also the nature of global capitalism embodying with specific relationship between Foxconn and its brand-name buyers, the largest and richest being Apple, as well as that between Foxconn and the Chinese state. These are the relationships that shape conditions on the factory floor and ultimately workers’ lives. An in-depth study of the most powerful electronics contractor and the lives of its workers enable us to draw out the deep contradictions among labor, capital, and the Chinese state in global production.

About the Authors

PUN Ngai is Professor in the Department of Applied Social Sciences at Hong Kong Polytechnic University. She is the author of Made in China: Women Factory Workers in a Global Workplace (2005), for which she won the C. W. Mills Award. This book was translated into French, German, Italian, Polish, and Chinese. She produces numerous articles in Modern China, China Journal, China Quarterly, Global Labor Journal, Cultural Anthropology, Feminist Economics, Current Sociology, The Third World Quarterly, and Work, Employment and Society, among others. Recently she has co-authored and co-edited four books on construction workers, Foxconn workers, and social economy in Hong Kong and China (in Chinese).

Jenny CHAN is Departmental Lecturer in Contemporary China Studies, School of Interdisciplinary Area Studies, University of Oxford. Educated at the Chinese University of Hong Kong (BSSc in Sociology) and the University of Hong Kong (MPhil in Sociology), she was a Reid Research Scholar while pursuing her PhD at the University of London. In 2013-2014 she received the prestigious Great Britain-China Educational Award. Currently she serves as Board Member of the International Sociological Association’s Research Committee on Labor Movements (2014-2018). Her recent articles have appeared in Current Sociology, Modern China, Human Relations, Critical Asian Studies, Global Labor Journal, The Asia-Pacific Journal, The South Atlantic Quarterly, New Labor Forum, and New Technology, Work and Employment.

Mark SELDEN is Research Fellow at the Asian/Pacific/American Studies Institute at NYU,Senior Research Associate in the East Asia Program at Cornell University, and editor of The Asia-Pacific Journal: Japan Focus. A specialist on the modern and contemporary geopolitics, political economy and history of China, Japan and the Asia Pacific, his work has ranged broadly across themes of war and revolution, inequality, development, regional and world social change, social movements and historical memory. Books include China in Revolution: The Yenan Way Revisited; The Political Economy of Chinese Development; Chinese Village, Socialist State; Chinese Society: Change, Conflict and Resistance; and The Resurgence of East Asia: 500, 150 and 50 Year Perspectives.

Apple Labor: The Hidden Struggle of Chinese Workers

4 December 2014

On 4 December 2014 Dr Jenny Chan gave a talk at the North London Collegiate School, London.

During 2010, 18 workers attempted suicide at Taiwanese-owned Foxconn Technology Group’s facilities, where Apple and other branded products are produced. They ranged in age from 17 to 25 — the prime of youth. Fourteen died, while four survived with crippling injuries. These shocking events attracted world attention to Foxconn, Apple, China’s export industry, and the experience of Chinese workers. What had driven these young workers to commit such a desperate act? What relationship did these tragic events bear to the electronic products that we not only prize but many believe define our contemporary civilization?

 

A first-hand study of Apple’s biggest supplier and the lives of 1.4 million Foxconn workers unveil the contradictions among labor, capital, and the Chinese state in global IT production.

 

Media appearance

 

5 Superstar Women Sociologists You Should Know

And Why They Are a Big Deal (by Dr. Nicki Lisa Cole)

  • Juliet Schor
  • Gilda Ochoa
  • Lisa Wade
  • Jenny Chan
  • C.J. Pascoe

.

Oxford-Ko Graduate Scholarships

18 November 2014

The Oxford Graduate Scholarships have been established through a groundbreaking new matched funding initiative to enable the creation of fully-funded scholarships for graduate students of the highest calibre from across the world. 2013-14 saw the very first Oxford Graduate Scholars begin their studies.

Scholarships are awarded to applicants who have demonstrated excellent academic ability, who will contribute to the University’s groundbreaking research, and who will go on to contribute to the world as leaders in their field, pushing the frontiers of knowledge. The University contributes 40% of the funds for these scholarships, together with 60% from generous donations provided by numerous supporters of the University and its colleges.

Further information on Oxford-Ko Graduate Scholarships

China’s New Long March: Eighty years after the Long March, Professor Rana Mitter of Oxford’s China Centre considers what lies ahead for a nation Mao would barely recognise

17 October 2014

Eighty years ago Chinese communists embarked on what became known as the Long March — a 6,000-mile trek that established Mao Zedong’s leadership and laid the foundations for Communist rule in China. Now it is an economic superpower Mao would barely have recognised. What lies ahead? Where will China’s long march take it over the coming decades? This is one of the questions that Oxford’s China Centre was set up to examine. Its director Rana Mitter, Professor of the History and Politics of Modern China, considers the evidence.

He is speaking from the Dickson Poon Building, set up as a collaboration between the University and St Hugh’s College, sponsored by a Hong Kong philanthropist and opened last month by the Duke of Cambridge. Housed within, the six-year-old China Centre offers Oxford’s characteristic depth and breadth of study and a vital alternative to what is on offer in the United States and East Asia.

The full article can be read here

Oxford Sino Alliance (OXSA) is officially launched

3 October 2014

The Oxford Sino Alliance (OXSA) is the official alumni network of the Oxford China Centre, with the main purpose of fostering alumni ties. It is student and alumni-led and was created with the aim of connecting current and former MSc and MPhil Contemporary Chinese Studies students.

Please take a look at this short video about this exciting initiative!

Royal Opening of the Dickson Poon University of Oxford China Centre Building

10 September 2014

The Duke of Cambridge has formally opened the Dickson Poon University of Oxford China Centre Building in the grounds of St Hugh’s College. The University of Oxford has been regarded as Europe’s leading centre for the study of China for some time. The Centre now has a dedicated building bringing its academics with an interest in China under the same roof.

The Duke officially opened the China Centre building by joining others in a traditional Chinese ribbon-cutting ceremony in its courtyard garden. He said: 'The China Centre is an enormous achievement. It stands on the foundations of many centuries of learning in the University of Oxford about China, and it marks a significant leap forward. The strength and creativity of the partnership between the University and St Hugh's provides a solid foundation for the creation of what has the potential to become the foremost place of study about China in the world.'

http://www.ox.ac.uk/news/2014-09-08-dickson-poon-university-oxford-china-centre-building-opened

Dr Jenny Chan delivers talk at the University of Westminster: Dying for an iPhone: The Labour Struggle of China’s New Working Class

10 September 2014

On 1st October 2014, Jenny Chan delivers a talk on her PhD project (at London University) and her book, co-authored with teachers PUN Ngai and Mark SELDEN.

For more information on this event please follow the link:

Dying for an iPhone: The Labour Struggle of China’s New Working Class - CAMRI - University of Westminster, London

New home for Chinese Studies

15 July 2014

The Contemporary China Studies Programme and the Institute for Chinese Studies are moving into the new Dickson Poon University of Oxford China Centre building in mid-July.

This building will, for the first time, bring together academics drawn from across a range of disciplines, who have in common research and teaching interests related to China. The building will also provide a 100 seat lecture theatre, a dining area and a range of conference and seminar facilities. It will also contain a dedicated library which will provide a permanent home for books from the Bodleian Library's China Collection.

Rachel Murphy presents paper at a conference on Transnational Families: Multi-actor, Multi-sited and Institutional Perspective

30 June 2014

Rachel Murphy presented a paper on: ‘Rural Chinese Children’s Experiences of Care When Fathers Migrate to Africa and When Parents Migrate Internally’ at a conference on Transnational Families: Multi-actor, Multi-sited and Institutional Perspectives organised by Maastricht University held 26th -28th June 2014.

Rachel Murphy DFID-funded project

21 March 2014

Harnessing Information Communication Technologies (ICTs) for Agricultural Development and Rural Transformation in Ethiopia: Lessons from China

Rachel Murphy is one of a team of six researchers on a DFID-funded project which examines how lessons from China’s experience of using ICT systems in agriculture can be transferred to Ethiopia.  Specifically, the project examines innovative and inclusive IT experiments like farmers’ mailbox and smart phone apps in use in Zhejiang Province and Guangdong Province, and evaluates their applicability for smallholders and stakeholders in agricultural chains in Ethiopia.  The project is led by Professor Chunhui YE of Zhejiang University. The other project partners are based at the Institute for Science and Sustainable Development at Addis Ababa University, Ethiopia, and the Centre for Development Studies, Trivandrum, India.

CCTV interview - China's smog problem

4 March 2014

Professor Anna Lora Wainwright was interviewed by CCTV's World Insight programme on "China's smog problem".

MSc student, Zhongwen Zhang, publication by SSAP in Beijing

24 January 2014

Zhongwen Zhang, a current student on the MSc in Contemporary Chinese Studies, will have a paper in a forthcoming edited volume to be published by Social Sciences Academic Press in Beijing.

Liu, Guofu & Zhang, Zhongwen. (2014). ‘A Living and Development of Chinese Migrants in Africa’ in Wang, Huiyao & Liu, Guofu (eds). 'Annual Report on Chinese International Migration (2014)'. Beijing: Social Sciences Academic Press

The news has been reported by China DailyGlobal Times, and Xinhua News Agency

New Publication: Dr Ming-chin Monique Chu 'The East Asian Computer Chip War'

3 December 2013

The semiconductor industry is a vital industry for military establishments worldwide, and the control of, or loss of control of, this key industry has enormous strategic implications. This book focuses on the globalization of the strategic semiconductor industry and the security ramifications of this process. It examines in particular the migration of the Taiwanese chip industry to China as part of the globalization of production processes, and the extent to which such a globalization process poses security challenges to the United States, China and Taiwan. Transcending disciplinary boundaries between international political economy, security studies, and the history of science and technology, this multidisciplinary work provides an in-depth understanding of the globalization-security nexus, and disentangles the key policy issues connected to a potential explosive flashpoint in world politics today.

Published by Routledge

 

Dr Anna Lora-Wainwright awarded a Philip Leverhulme Prize in Geography

30 October 2013

Anna Lora-Wainwright has been awarded a Philip Leverhulme Prize in Geography. These prizes are awarded to a handful of individuals on a bi-annual basis in selected subject areas ‘to recognise and facilitate the work of outstanding young research scholars of proven achievement, who have made and are continuing to make original and significant contributions to knowledge in [their] discipline’.

MSc student, Yao Li, interviewed for BBC's China Week

15 October 2013

Yao Li, a student on the MSc in Contemporary Chinese Studies, was interviewed on BBC Oxford as part of its China Week. The show was looking at Chinese students' experiences of studying in Oxford and their reasons for choosing to come to study in the UK.

 

Dr Rachel Murphy awarded a British Academy Mid-Career Fellowship

14 October 2013

Dr Rachel Murphy has been awarded a British Academy Mid-Career Fellowship to write a monograph on 'The Children of China's Great Migration and Urbanisation'. Her work on this project commenced on 1st September with 5 weeks of fieldwork to carry out follow-up interviews with migrant children and family members that she had previously interviewed in 2010 and 2011. This September she also gave presentations about this research project at the Social Policy Department of Zhongshan University in Guangdong and at the Economics Department of Anhui Agricultural University.

SIAS twitter feed launch

3 September 2013

SIAS is on twitter (@SIASOxford). Please follow us to get notified about news and events from across the school.

Sam Geall article in the New Statesman

25 June 2013

Sam Geall writes a post called 'Would you swim in China's rivers?' on the rise in awareness of pollution and ecological problems among Chinese citizens.

Dr Paul Irwin Crookes shortlisted for Teaching Award

13 June 2013

We are delighted to announce that Dr Paul Irwin Crookes was one of only five members of staff shortlisted from the Social Sciences for the 'Most Acclaimed Lecturer' in the Oxford University Students Union Teaching Awards 2012-13. The Awards Ceremony was held on Wednesday 12 June at Rhodes House. These awards are entirely student-led and are an opportunity to recognise great teaching. Congratulations Paul!

Sam Geall on China’s Green Awakening

30 April 2013

Oxford University lecturer Sam Geall, who has edited a new book called China and the Environment: The Green Revolution, is interviewed about environmentalists and green advocates in China Bloomberg Businessweek (USA).

 

About our new website

1 December 2012

Welcome to our new-look website. Our goal is to improve user experience with a responsive design, built to work on mobile devices as well as desktop computers. We'd really like your feedback. Please use our contact page to tell us what you think.

Full Studentship for Masters through to DPhil available for entry in October 2013

15 October 2012

The School of Interdisciplinary Area Studies, is pleased to invite applications for a Masters-to-DPhil studentship starting in October 2013, in the Area Studies training pathway. Please download further details.