Chinese Policy Research Articles

A news-based climate policy uncertainty index for China

Climate policies can have a significant impact on the economy. However, these policies have often been associated with uncertainty. Quantitative assessment of the socioeconomic impact of climate policy uncertainty is equally or perhaps more important than looking at the policies themselves. Using a deep learning algorithm—the MacBERT model—this study constructed indices of Chinese climate policy uncertainty (CCPU) at the national, provincial and city levels for the first time. The CCPU indices are based on the text mining of news published by a set of major newspapers in China. A clear upward trend was found in the indices, demonstrating increasing policy uncertainties in China in addressing climate change. There is also evidence of clear regional heterogeneity in subnational indices. The CCPU dataset can provide a useful source of information for government actors, academics and investors in understanding the dynamics of climate policies in China. These indices can also be used to investigate the empirical relationship between climate policy uncertainty and other socioeconomic factors in China.

Monetary policy surprises and corporate investment growth in China

This paper analyzes the impact of unexpected changes in Chinese monetary policy on the investment growth of public firms. Previous research on the Chinese economy has not effectively linked firm-level investment determination in corporate finance with monetary policy transmission in macroeconomics, thus limiting our understanding of the characteristics and mechanisms of this effect. We proxy the unexpected monetary policy changes by the M2 growth shocks identified from monetary policy rules. Our results indicate that the change in money growth significantly affects investment growth at the firm level. Positive shocks increase corporate investment growth, whereas negative ones do the opposite. However, the extent of this effect varies over time and gets more substantial under restrictive shocks. Such an effect also differs in magnitude across firms due to firm-level heterogeneous characteristics, highlighting the importance of corporate financial constraints and credit channels of monetary policy transmission.

Spatiotemporal disturbances and attribution analysis of mangrove in southern China from 1986 to 2020 based on time-series Landsat imagery

As one of the most productive ecosystems in the world, mangrove has a critical role to play in both the natural ecosystem and the human economic and social society. However, two thirds of the world's mangrove have been irreversibly damaged over the past 100 years, as a result of ongoing human activities and climate change. In this paper, adopting Landsat for the past 36 years as the data source, the detection of spatiotemporal changes of mangrove in southern China was carried out based on the Google Earth Engine (GEE) cloud platform using the LandTrendr algorithm. In addition, the attribution of mangrove disturbances was analyzed by a random forest algorithm. The results indicated the area of mangrove recovery (5174.64 hm2) was much larger than the area of mangrove disturbances (1625.40 hm2) over the 35-year period in the study area. The disturbances of mangrove in southern China were dominated by low and low-to-medium-level disturbances, with an area of 1009.89 hm2, accounting for 57.50 % of the total disturbances. The mangrove recovery was also dominated by low and low-to-medium-level recovery, with an area of 3239.19 hm2, accounting for 62.61 % of the total recovery area. Both human and natural factors interacted and influenced each other, together causing spatiotemporal disturbances of mangrove in southern China during 1986–2020. The mangrove disturbances in the Phase I (1986–2000) and Phase III (2011–2020) were characterized by human-induced (50.74 % and 58.86 %), such as construction of roads and aquaculture ponds. The mangrove disturbances in the Phase II (2001–2010) were dominated by natural factors (55.73 %), such as tides, flooding, and species invasions. It was also observed that the area of mangrove recovery in southern China increased dramatically from 1986 to 2020 due to the promulgation and implementation of the Chinese government's policy on mangrove protection, as well as increased human awareness of mangrove wetland protection.

Analysis of Interest Rate Hikes and Exchange Rate Between U.S. and China

Recently, the rates between Chinese RMB and the USD have been on the rise with the deflation of Chinese RMB. This paper looked into the relationship of interest rate hikes and exchange rates between the U.S. and China. The interest rate in the U.S. is closely related to the strength of U.S. dollar and capital flow between the two largest economies in the world, therefore, the research into the topic could help understand how the interest rate hike in the U.S. currently would affect the exchange rate between the two countries. In this paper, methods like theoretical analysis are used to understand the historical background of interest rate hikes, the deciding mechanism, and used a case study to understand the impact of U.S interest hike on CNY-USD exchange rate. The result showed that the U.S. interest rate hike would lead to a depreciation of CNY. Meanwhile, as the Chinese monetary policy focuses more on independence, the correlation becomes lower.

Reconciling Development and Decarbonization: An Examination of China's Policy Options for Curbing Emissions While Sustaining Supply Chains

China faces the challenge of balancing economic growth while meeting carbon emission reduction targets. This essay analyzes current Chinese government policies aimed at reducing emissions, including supply-side reforms, renewable energy subsidies, and awareness campaigns. It argues these policies have limitations, such as only temporary emissions reductions from supply cuts, high costs of subsidies, and lack of infrastructure to support consumer adoption of electric vehicles. To improve outcomes, the essay recommends implementing a carbon tax or cap-and-trade system, choosing the optimal policy based on demand elasticities. It also suggests subsidizing a transition from coal to electricity for heating in rural areas. In conclusion, modifying existing policies and implementing new market-based and technological solutions can help China achieve its twin goals of reducing emissions while maintaining economic growth. The essay provides a thoughtful analysis of the issues and policy trade-offs China faces in balancing environmental sustainability and development.

Propaganda of Mainland China and Taiwan Toward Overseas Chinese in Southeast Asia During 1950s

In the early stage of the People’s Republic of China, both the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and retreat of Kuomintang (KMT) tried their efforts to win the overseas Chinese immigrants’ support through a series of foreign policies and legislation activities. Since its establishment, the PRC had constantly increased its efforts to promote its political influence and emotional connections among Chinese immigrants overseas. To this end, the PRC government had adjusted its political policies during the land reformation. On the other side, KMT government tried to contain its counterpart’s political influence among these immigrants and to restrict the monetary funding flowing back to Chinese mainland. In fact, the relevant KMT policies not only were impractical in action but also had caused a series of tension and concerns in major countries at Southeast Asian. In this paper, we analyze documentary records kept from British Foreign Office and conduct a comparative assessment between the PRC and KMT’ s foreign policies targeting those Chinese immigrants in Southeast Asian and propose political options and diplomatic strategies to deal with such situation. Our study intends to explore foreign policy options available in Chinese and British foreign policies toward Chinese oversea immigrants residing in Southeast Asia.

The Impact of the Deregulation of Covid-19 on the Pharmaceutical Industry

The current COVID-19 has lasted for a long time, and the Chinese government has relaxed the control of the pandemic after many considerations. Numerous researches about the COVID-19's effects on the economy and business are currently available. But few studies are on the pharmaceutical industry and the Deregulation. Therefore, this paper selects the Pharmaceutical and Biological Full Benefit as the research object. And then uses the ARIMA model to perform time series fitting and prediction of the closing price series in the past period. By comparing the predicted and real values, how the Deregulation affected the stock price of the biopharmaceutical sector could be determined. After modeling analysis, it is concluded that a positive effect has been produced by the Deregulation on the stock price of the pharmaceutical industry. Further study shows that there is a short-term lag in the impact, and the relative growth rate is not large. And the impact has been observed with certain short-term nature through the prediction results. This paper innovatively uses stock price fluctuations as an insertion point to explore the impact of the Deregulation on the pharmaceutical industry, which has profound practical guiding significance. For Chinese policy makers, it is suggested that the country should cooperate with the improvement and upgrading of the pharmaceutical industry. For investors, it is suggested that they should maintain a more stable and positive wait-and-see attitude towards the pharmaceutical industry.

중국산 모바일 게임에 내재된 온라인 검열정책

중국산 모바일 게임에 내재된 온라인 검열정책

Reflecting Social Reproduction in Chinese Policy: Learning from Sweden Successful Practices to Promote Gender Equality in Social Reproduction

With the development of society, women have become more involved in paid work in the production sphere, but they still mainly perform unpaid domestic work in social reproduction. Women spend much more time on domestic work than men. This results in a double burden on women from work and family and creates the problem of unequal gender division of la-bour in social reproduction. In this case, the improvement of the paternity leave system can effectively promote the sharing of responsibilities between the two sexes in childcare activities, thus breaking the gender division of la-bour in social reproduction and alleviating the double pressure on women. Using the research method of comparative policy analysis, the article focuses on the desirability of the Swedish paternity leave system and compares it with the Chinese paternity leave system. The article then puts forward feasi-ble policy recommendations in light of Chinas actual situation. The article finds that compared to Sweden, Chinas paternity leave system has three ob-vious shortcomings: there is no national legislation providing for male-only paternity leave, paternity leave is often short and rigid, and the cost-burden model is unreasonable. After identifying these three problems, the article suggests that China should improve its paternity leave system in these three aspects: specifying a male quota in the national law, extending the length of paternity leave and increasing the flexibility of the leave method, and estab-lishing a cost-sharing model for society.

Effect of Ursodeoxycholic Acid for Sars-Cov-2 Prevention in Hematological Malignancies: An Observational Real-World Study

Introduction: Disease-2019 (COVID-19) pandemic is caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2).After the adjustments and optimizations of Chinese control strategies and policies for COVID-19 on December of 2022, clinical exposure increased rapidly.There are greater concerns for patients with hematological malignancies, particularly those who have undergone hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT). One promising preventive measure that has recently gained attention is ursodeoxycholic acid (UDCA). This drug is mainly used to treat biliary tract disease and other hepatobiliary disorders, particularly primary biliary cholangitis (Hirschfield GM, et al. Gut 2018); and also has been widely used at a higher dosage to prevent sinusoidal obstruction syndrome/veno-occlusive disease (SOS/VOD) after HSCT in the clinical setting. Recently, Brevini et al. demonstrated that UDCA downregulated ACE2 expression by reducing farnesoid X receptor signaling, resulting in reduced SARS-Cov-2 infection (Brevini T, et al. Nature 2022), indicating that pharmacological prophylaxis using UDCA against COVID-19 in vulnerable groups was feasible, but the clinical data to support this practice is limited. Therefore, we aim to present epidemiological data for Chinese patients with hematological malignancies during this epidemic wave, and investigate the protection effects offered by UDCA against COVID-19 in these patients. Methods: This investigation was a single-center, observational real-world study, and was granted by the ethics committee of the Institute of Hematology & Blood Diseases [No. QTJ2023012-EC-1]. The transplant patients were included in the “NICHE-SKIRT” project (Cao Y, et al. Am J Hematol 2023). Informed consent for the acquisition and the use of patient samples was obtained. Data for hospitalized patients at the Institute of Hematology & Blood Diseases Hospital (Tianjin, China) was reviewed between December 2022 and January 2023. COVID 19 status was assessed using hospital-reported PCR and/or antigen tests for twice a week. We analyzed follow-up records up to 14th February 2023. The primary end-point was the rate of COVID -19 infection. Results: We enrolled 393 patients with a median age of 38 years old. At the cutoff date, 297 patients (75.6%) had confirmed COVID-19 infection (72.5% in the allo-HSCT cohort). Among the 273 evaluable patients, the majority (64.8%) had asymptomatic/mild disease. The severe/critical patients accounted for only 15.8%. Seven hospitalized patients had died from COVID-19 by the last follow-up date. The median period between COVID-19 diagnosis and death was 15 days (range: 2-32 days). Lower proportion of CD3+CD4+T cells associated with more severe COVID-19 clinical spectrum (Asymptomatic/mild [n = 97] moderate [n = 46], adjusted P = 0.001; Asymptomatic/mild vs. severe/critical [n = 25], adjusted P = 0.036). Among these patients, 163 received UDCA (UDCA group) while 230 did not (non-UDCA group). The COVID-19 infection rate was lower in the UDCA group (69.9% vs. 79.6%; P= 0.039). However, patients in the UDCA group had a higher ECOG score and Charlson Comorbidity Index (Table 1), suggesting that they were more likely to have underlying health conditions. To account for this potential bias, we performed PSM, which confirmed that the UDCA group had a significantly lower rate of COVID-19 infection compared to the non-UDCA group (69.0% vs. 81.0%; P = 0.049) in the validated cohort. Univariate logistic regression analysis showed that only UDCA administration was associated with COVID-19 infection (OR: 0.598; P = 0.029). To further investigate the effect of UDCA in specific populations, we carried out an exploratory analysis. Our results suggest that males, patients with a CCI ≥ 2, a history of smoking, and those with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) may benefit the most from the protective effect of UDCA against COVID-19. Conclusion: This study aimed to investigate the prevalence and clinical outcomes of SARS-CoV-2 infections in Chinese patients with hematologic disorders during the COVID-19 epidemic that began at the end of 2022. Our findings provide support for preclinical studies suggesting that UDCA may have marginal benefit in protecting against COVID-19. However, prospective studies with a higher dose of UDCA need to be performed.

Effect of the characteristic town policy on sewage treatment in mountainous areas: Evidence from Chongqing

The report to the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China highlighted the necessity of advancing a new type of urbanization with people at the core. Characteristic towns as an essential link between new urbanization and rural revitalization attach great importance to creating a beautiful environment. Sewage treatment is an indispensable foundation for a town's high-quality economic and social development; however, it may be hard to achieve through urban construction. Therefore, using data from 584 organic towns in Chongqing, a typical mountainous city in western China, this study empirically analyzes the effect of the characteristic town policy in China on mountainous sewage treatment and its mechanisms from 2014 to 2020. The results indicate that (1) the characteristic town policy helps enhance sewage treatment in small towns, which remains valid after a series of robustness tests. (2) Investment and human resource effects are mediators for the characteristic town policy to boost sewage treatment in small towns. Further analyses reveal that the boosting effect of the characteristic town policy on small-town sewage treatment is more significant for small towns with higher economic development levels suffering ecological and environmental pressures. These findings provide a basis for a broad recognition of the effect of the characteristic town policy and its impact. They also theoretically enrich the awareness of the Chinese government's urbanization policy concerning the economy and society.

Cultural worldviews and support for governmental management of COVID-19

This article addresses public attitudes towards government measures to contain preventable diseases in China in light of personal privacy and social safety controversies. Using a nationwide Internet survey of 776 Chinese adults and an online worldview database, we seek to explain the reason for causing differing public opinions on prevention policies and related governance issues. As Cultural Theory suggests, cultural biases impact public attitudes toward social policies. However, to our knowledge, culture theory has rarely been used to explain public differences in policies in China. So, study 1 conducted an exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis and found that the four-factor model of cultural worldviews: egalitarianism, hierarchy, individualism, and fatalism is still a feasible assessment tool for worldviews. Then, in studies 2–4, we explored how cultural worldviews influence Chinese public policy support. Study 2 involved an online worldview database and found that by trusting the government, hierarchists trust the policies proposed by the government. Study 3 and Study 4, based on the revised cultural scale in Study 1 and surveys during the epidemic period, found that compared to hierarchists and egalitarians, fatalists and individualists were less likely to support COVID-19 responses. In study 3, we further found that along with the risk perception levels growing, fatalists’ resistance towards epidemic prevention policies will disappear under high-risk perception conditions. Study 4 also found that hierarchists and egalitarians with higher trust in government tend to support COVID-19 responses. Hierarchists will be more supportive of the government with the increased public’s perceived threats. In conclusion, cultural worldviews have different impacts on policy support, and the relationship between cultural worldviews and policy support is influenced by public attitudes toward authorities and the perceived threats they face. Lastly, risk management and communication implications are discussed, such as establishing trust between individuals and authorities.

Navigating dilemmas: Chinas environmental policies and their implications for climate change, resource management, and future generations

This research paper critically examines Chinas role as the worlds largest emitter of carbon dioxide and its pivotal position in global climate change mitigation efforts. The analysis encompasses Chinas environmental policies initiated since 1979, formally approved by the legislative body, the NPC, in 1989. Though significant economic developments were made since the countrys reform and opening in 1979, it is acknowledged that this progress has been accompanied by substantial environmental degradation. In response, the government amended environmental laws in 2014, reflecting a commitment to address these challenges. However, this paper contends that substantial efforts are still required to achieve meaningful environmental improvement. The research further delves into the anticipated impacts of Chinese policies on crucial aspects, namely Climate Change, Resource Management, and the well-being of Future Generations, providing comprehensive insights into the multifaceted implications of Chinas environmental trajectory.

Connectedness and economic policy uncertainty spillovers to the ASEAN stock markets

Uncertainty regarding Chinese and American economic policies impacts major investable asset classes in politically contestable geographic regions such as Southeast Asia. Our objective is to examine the dependence structure of Chinese and American Economic Policy Uncertainty (EPU) and returns on six Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) stock indices and to assess the impact of a significant statecraft consideration, the One Belt One Road (OBOR) Initiative, and an exogenous shock, the COVID-19 crisis, on the connectedness between EPU and ASEAN stock returns. We do so by employing novel connectedness and copula approaches. We find that American and Chinese EPU influence ASEAN equity indices differently across countries, with the connectedness of US EPU and ASEAN stock markets exceeding that of Chinese EPU post-2002. Further, we find that the introduction of the OBOR Initiative by China in 2013 coincided with a slight change in the dependence structure for several individual ASEAN stock indices, and show that the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the relationship between American and Chinese EPU and individual ASEAN stock index returns was not homogenous across countries. In doing so, we shed new light on the vulnerability of ASEAN member capital markets to statecraft considerations and exogenous shocks, as well as to economic policy decision-making in China and the United States.

К вопросу о дипломатическом дискурсе современного Китая

The country’s top leaders not only directly influence the internal political process, but also influence the percep-tion and decision-making of leaders of other countries, and play an important role in diplomacy and interna-tional relations. The article is devoted to the characteristics of modern diplomatic discourse in China. The sub-ject of the study is the foreign policy discourse of the PRC, the object is the ideas and concepts of Xi Jinping’s diplomatic speeches. The main views of modern Chinese researchers of political discourse are presented; the speeches of Chinese leader Xi Jinping in 2023 are analyzed. The author concludes that in the practice of inter-national relations, General Secretary Xi Jinping attaches great importance to the use of traditional philosophical principles in regulating relations with neighboring countries and other countries of the world. The context of the Chinese leader's foreign policy speeches demonstrates their significant role in promoting national diplomacy and shaping the international strategy of China’s interaction with other actors of global development through participation in international programs and the creation of global institutions.

Environmental Protection Tax, Environmental Monitoring Agency Behavior and Green Technology Innovation of Resource-Based Enterprises: Empirical Evidence from China

ABSTRACT This paper explores the impact of environmental protection tax on green technology innovation of Chinese resource-based enterprises and behavior of third-party environmental monitoring institutions. It uses game theory to analyze participants’ strategy selections, and uses the triple difference method to empirically test the promotion effect. Our robust results find that (1) Chinese environmental tax policy effectively promotes the green innovation of resource-based enterprises and standardizes the behavior of third-party monitoring institutions; (2) local governments’ actions such as increasing environmental protection tax, penalizing third-party monitoring agencies for violations, and promoting public preference for green consumption, all contribute to accelerating enterprises’ green innovation; (3) the central government’s increased regulation of local governments has a positive impact on enterprises and third-party monitoring institutions.

Research topic identification and trend prediction of China's energy policy: A combined LDA-ARIMA approach

Identifying the research topics of China's energy transition policy and predicting future research trends are crucial for policymakers to make informed decisions and advance the energy transition. This study applied the Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) to extract 26 major research topics from the 13,976 abstracts of Chinese policy research papers in web of science (WOS), conceptualized the five most popular topics and used the ARIMA model to predict trends over the next 36 months. The results show that except for Economic and Environmental Impact of Renewable Energy Consumption (Topic13), which will first experience unanticipated fluctuations and then show strong growth capacity, all other topics will continue to remain positive growth trend. Research and Development (Topic3) is driven by the urgency of China's energy transformation. Economic and Environmental Impact of Renewable Energy Consumption (Topic13) is driven by the potential for the development of renewable energy. Economic Impact of Climate Change (Topic26) is driven by the climate change debate. Economic Growth, Urbanization, and Energy Consumption (Topic7) is driven by a discussion of their relationship and the mechanisms influencing them. Regional Efficiency and Productivity Analysis (Topic19) is driven by regional differences in China's energy policies.

Exploring the experiences of college students in Chinese campus lockdown policy during the COVID-19 outbreak: A qualitative study

Campus lockdown policy is one of the most effective non-pharmaceutical intervention strategies used to prevent and control the coronavirus disease 2019epidemic worldwide. College students were greatly affected by this policy. Related studies center on English-speaking countries; few have highlighted discussion of the Chinese context. This study, therefore, aimed to broadly elicit the real experiences and unique insights of college students on Chinese campus lockdown policy. Through qualitative research, we identified four key themes with ten contributory subthemes: physiological experiences, safety experiences, love and belonging experiences, and self-esteem experiences. The unique contribution of this study relates to experiences relating to love and belonging and to self-esteem, which are little discussed in the existing literature. Our findings can provide enlightenment on how to improve college students’ health.

Toward a High-Quality System: A Critique of Chinese Special Education Policy Development and the Guidelines for the Evaluation of the Quality of Special Education Schools

Purpose This study reviews the development of special education policies in China and analyzes the major characteristics of policy changes from a critical perspective within specific sociocultural contexts in China. Design/Approach/Methods Interpretations of the newly published Guidelines for the Evaluation of the Quality of Special Education Schools are highlighted to reveal the recent manifestations of policy mandates for special education in China. Findings China accelerated its policy formulation on special education after the 1980s, moving away from a focus on universalization to quality enhancement and a holistic high-quality “special education system” under the mandate of legislation rather than non-binding regulatory recommendations. This policy aims to develop a high-quality system with accountability that responds to global trends toward inclusive education and fulfills local needs in a pragmatic manner. The mandatory approach to appropriate student development indicates that the goals of equitable and high-quality inclusive education have been taken as core evaluation indicators of the provision of special education in China. Originality/Value The paper's findings indicate that future policies need to be more concrete and operational for special education to be implemented effectively.

Going out and going green: NGOs in the environmental governance of Global China

ABSTRACT While the roles of actors such as the state and state-owned enterprises within “Global China” elicit significant scholarly attention, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are relatively less critiqued. These members of Chinese civil society are playing an increasingly important role in the environmental governance of the country’s overseas activities. By analyzing firsthand observations and interviews and secondhand materials produced by NGOs and the Chinese government, this article traces how and why Chinese NGOs seek to “green” China’s engagement beyond its borders. First, we identify four types of Chinese NGOs with a variety of state- and non-state founders. Then, we examine how NGOs’ objectives and state policies jointly shape the way they “go out.” As both knowledge and political actors, Chinese NGOs accumulate, produce, and disseminate knowledge related to Global China’s environmental issues, across domestic and international spaces. Though the specific strategies pursued by NGOs depend on their type, overall, their alignment with Chinese state policies and interests constitutes a crucial condition for their success. This research offers new insights into Chinese non-state actors’ expanding participation in international activities. As the country’s civil organizations endeavor to exert influence both within and beyond China’s borders, the effects of their interventions on global governance may grow.