The China Well Being Minsheng Development Report 2012

Well-being (Minsheng in Chinese) is a major indicator of livelihood of a country. The book discusses the concepts and measurement of Minsheng in China, its gradualist model, achievements, and international contributions. This report identifies three major traps regarding the development of well-being, and suggests ways to avoid such traps. China needs to adopt a gradualist strategy which emphasizes the consistency between economic growth and the development of well-being. Olivary structure of society is required to reduce income disparity. The legal framework and institutionalization in terms of well-being development should also be enhanced. In addition, China should play a more active role in international arena to improve the well-being development. "The Report of Minsheng Development Index in China 2012" indicates that China has experienced exponential grow of well-being from 1995 to 2010. The overall trend is characterized by three main aspects. First, the ranking of Development Index concentrates highly. In accordance with the index from high to low, it shows "Eastern-Northeast-Central-Western" from strong to weak ladder-type distribution trends. Second, some provinces (autonomous regions and municipalities) show exceptional ranking trends in their areas. Third, the rankings show strong correlation between the regional economic strength and the development of well-being. Prof. Renwu Tang is the dean of the School of Management and Academy of Government of Beijing Normal University (BNU). He is an expert in administrative efficiency and history of economic thoughts. He has led the team to publish three annual reports on Minsheng research. Hongxin Wang is an associate professor at China Academy of Social Management, BNU. His expertise is institutional economics and public policy. Jia Guo is an assistant professor at the School of Management and Academy of Government, BNU. Her research focused on public policy of environmental management. Hongping Lian is an assistant professor at the School of Management and Academy of Government, BNU. Her research area is social policy focusing on land and housing.

In 2010 Ronnie Lessem and Alexander Schieffer published their seminal work on Integral Research and Innovation, whereby they identified the four R’s; relational and renewal, reason and realization based research paths that altogether encompass the major qualitative research methods and methodologies. Within each path they identified a trajectory from origination to transformation via foundation and emancipation. However these paths, underlying the research process, conventionally termed 'method', were disconnected from the integral economic and enterprise content, conventionally termed 'literature', with which they were concerned. In this book, Integral Renewal they seek to remedy such, in two major respects. As transformative masters and PhD programs are focused on the 'Global South', where the vast majority of the world’s population is based, as well as those developmental agencies focused on such, the great majority of the people with whom the authors deal select the relational research path, and the path of renewal, over and above the paths of reason and realization. The focus of this book will be on these two paths of integral research, now interconnected with integral enterprise and economics. Uniquely, the authors pursue research and innovation in a systematic way. In that respect, while their prior Integral Research book still provides the research foundation for the four southern and eastern, northern and western paths, this book will focus on the former two relational (southern) and renewal (eastern) from the combined perspectives of research process and economic and enterprise content.

In recent decades, China has undergone rapid economic growth, industrialisation and urbanisation concomitant with deep and extensive structural and social change, profoundly reshaping the country’s development landscape and urban-rural relationships. This book applies livelihoods approaches to deepen our understanding of the changes and continuities related to rural livelihoods within the wider context of political economy of development in post-socialist China, bridging the urban and rural scenarios and probing the local, national and global dynamics that have impacted on livelihood, in particular its mobility, security and sustainability. Presenting theoretically informed and empirically grounded research by leading scholars from across the world, this book offers multidisciplinary perspectives on issues central to rural livelihoods, development, welfare and well-being. It documents and analyses the processes and consequences of change, focusing on social protection of mobile livelihoods, particularly rural migrants’ citizenship rights in the city, and the environmental, social and political aspects of sustainability in the countryside. This book contributes to the current scholarly and policy debates, and is among the first attempts to critically reflect on China’s market transition and the associated pathways to change. It will be of interest to students in international development studies, China studies, social policy, public health, political science, and environmental studies at undergraduate and postgraduate levels, as well as academics, policy makers and practitioners who are concerned with China’s human and social development in general, and agriculture and rural livelihoods in particular.

In 2010 Ronnie Lessem and Alexander Schieffer published their seminal work on Integral Research and Innovation, whereby they identified the four R’s; relational and renewal, reason and realization based research paths that altogether encompass the major qualitative research methods and methodologies. Within each path they identified a trajectory from origination to transformation via foundation and emancipation. However these paths, underlying the research process, conventionally termed 'method', were disconnected from the integral economic and enterprise content, conventionally termed 'literature', with which they were concerned. In this book, Integral Renewal they seek to remedy such, in two major respects. As transformative masters and PhD programs are focused on the 'Global South', where the vast majority of the world’s population is based, as well as those developmental agencies focused on such, the great majority of the people with whom the authors deal select the relational research path, and the path of renewal, over and above the paths of reason and realization. The focus of this book will be on these two paths of integral research, now interconnected with integral enterprise and economics. Uniquely, the authors pursue research and innovation in a systematic way. In that respect, while their prior Integral Research book still provides the research foundation for the four southern and eastern, northern and western paths, this book will focus on the former two relational (southern) and renewal (eastern) from the combined perspectives of research process and economic and enterprise content.

In China’s future social development, there is likely to be an interest in “society building” with interactions between top-down and bottom-up approaches, along with a deepened level of social reform and the construction of a harmonious or “symbiotic” society. This represents one of China’s social development models, and is reflected in the Communist Party of China (CPC) and state policy. The term “society building” was proposed by Chinese thinkers nearly one century ago, and has been used by Chinese sociologists to study Chinese society since the 1930s. In the 21st century, “society building” has been approached as an interdisciplinary concept by Chinese social scientists. The main concern of China for its future social development is to enhance its people’s wellbeing and encourage them to build Chinese society in innovative and creative ways. This volume showcases the latest research of non-Chinese scholars relating to this indigenous concept and to China’s social development in the global context. It tackles the following topics: the assessment of the social impact of infrastructure projects; China’s reforms and its changing political system; whether or not the Singapore model is suitable for China to follow; soft power through education; and boundaries, cosmopolitanisms and spaces in Chinese and international cities. The book will be of interest to academics, professionals, practitioners, university students and the general public seeking a comprehensive understanding of China.

The statistics detailing the socioeconomic growth of Russia and China are impressive. On some projections, China will be the world’s largest economy by 2050, and Russia will be the sixth largest. Yet despite this impressive record of economic growth, a striking feature of both countries is the inegalitarian nature of their development – notwithstanding the (post)communist legacy. On most conventional measures, the two countries are now among the most unequal in the world, and the level of inequality has increased significantly since the 1990s. What effect does this endemic economic inequality have on political stability? From Aristotle onwards, observers have concluded that the greater the inequality within a society, the greater the likelihood of instability. This book addresses the relationship between economic inequality and political stability in Russia and China. Several chapters examine how economic performance has driven institutional reform, while others evaluate long term trends in public opinion to see how economic change has affected the public’s views of politics. The conclusion is that both regimes have proved adept at adapting to rising inequality by managing the policy agenda, guiding public opinion and co-opting or repressing political opposition. The chapters in this book originally published as a special issue in Europe-Asia Studies.

Milk is a fascinating food: it is produced by mothers of each mammalian species for consumption by nursing infants of that species, yet many humans drink the milk of another species (mostly cows) and they drink it throughout life. Thus we might expect that this dietary practice has some effects on human biology that are different from other foods. In Re-imagining Milk Wiley considers these, but also puts milk-drinking into a broader historical and cross-cultural context. In particular, she asks how dietary policies promoting milk came into being in the U.S., how they intersect with biological variation in milk digestion, how milk consumption is related to child growth, and how milk is currently undergoing globalizing processes that contribute to its status as a normative food for children (using India and China as examples). Wiley challenges the reader to re-evaluate their assumptions about cows' milk as a food for humans. Informed by both biological and social theory and data, Re-imagining Milk provides a biocultural analysis of this complex food and illustrates how a focus on a single commodity can illuminate aspects of human biology and culture.