http://dspace.cityu.edu.hk:80/handle/2031/3807 2013-04-30T15:24:42Z 2013-04-30T15:24:42Z Gonzalez Vicente, Ruben http://dspace.cityu.edu.hk:80/handle/2031/5773 2010-03-19T05:54:07Z 2009-01-01T00:00:00Z

Title: The developmental impact of China's investment in South America's extractive industries Authors: Gonzalez Vicente, Ruben Abstract: This thesis examines the developmental impact of Chinese state-owned enterprises’ (SOEs) increasing engagement in the South American extractive sector since the 1990s. To do so, it addresses two questions: i) how much room for independent developmental planning do China’s foreign policy aims and Chinese SOEs’ on-the-ground behaviors leave at the national levels? ii) how do Chinese mining and oil SOEs impact development at the places where resources are extracted? The thesis contains two case studies of Chinese extractive firms in South America based on fieldwork carried out in Peru and Ecuador at the end of 2008. At the national level, as China’s engagement in South America increases overtime, its foreign policy approach of non-intervention in sovereign affairs may bring about changes to a region whose fate has been traditionally determined by its dependent relations with North America and Europe. I argue that China’s approach is not positive or negative per se, rather it empowers states to create indigenously tailored policies whose outcome is largely dependent on national governments’ capacities, leadership, as well as their ability and willingness to draw up long term developmental plans. Therefore, in terms of its political influence, China acts as a accommodating force that reinforces positive and negative internal trends rather than as a transformative force. Furthermore, Chinese state-owned companies’ behaviors respond to national and corporate interests, as their operations are both part of Beijing-funded “Going Out” strategy and of each company’s individual search for global competitiveness. As a result, Chinese SOEs firmly controlled (and substantially financed) by Beijing will tend to be more cooperative with host governments. Where SOEs lack economic incentives to comply with China’s foreign policy, relations with host government may be strained. Consequently, as long as China’s policy for South America remains non-interventionist, and Beijing continues to fund SOEs, cooperative attitudes are expected to persist. At the local level, Chinese SOEs’ behaviors are essentially similar to any other transnational extractive company, showing no genuine concern for the socio-economic organization or the environmental reality of the places where their operations take place. Hence, the local level conflicts in which Chinese companies have sometimes been involved can be adequately studied with mainstream theoretical approaches that address the social dynamics of resource extraction in developing countries. Two case studies are elaborated to illustrate these theoretical findings. Andes Petroleum Company Limited (a consortium formed by Sinopec and China’s National Petroleum Corporation) is an example of collaborative attitude with central government, as well as of typical conflicts between companies and indigenous populations at local level in Ecuador. Shougang Hierro Peru S.A.A. is an example of how companies with a high degree of independence from Beijing may not cooperate with governments when their business interests are at stake. At the local level, Shougang has had a significantly negative impact on development. Nonetheless, as China’s regional policy has been progressively drawn, and as Peru has increasingly democratized, Shougang’s developmental impact has began to show signs of improvement. Notes: CityU Call Number: HD9506.A2 G66 2009; 228 leaves : col. ill. 30 cm.; Thesis (M.Phil.)--City University of Hong Kong, 2009.; Includes bibliographical references (leaves 201-228)

2009-01-01T00:00:00Z Luk, Christine Yi Lai (陸伊驪) http://dspace.cityu.edu.hk:80/handle/2031/5532 2009-10-29T06:02:01Z 2008-01-01T00:00:00Z

Title: Gender, graduate education experience and career-related choices : the case of doctoral students in science and engineering in Hong Kong Authors: Luk, Christine Yi Lai (陸伊驪) Abstract: This research compares and contrasts the graduate educational experiences and the career aspirations of male and female doctoral students in Science and Engineering (S&E) disciplines in Hong Kong. The purpose is to get a better understanding of what contributes to the persistent under-representation of women in S&E, a research area of social, economic and epistemological importance, both locally and globally. Twenty doctoral students from Hong Kong and Mainland China were recruited for this study by snowball sampling. The primary data-collection method was by way of face-to-face, unstructured interviews. The bifurcated deficit/different framework devised by Sonnert is employed to conceptualize the research problem. The results indicate that doctoral education in S&E is a gendered process, where male and female doctoral students reported vastly different experiences in the relationships with academic supervisors and faculty. Essentially, women doctoral students are less likely to reap the benefits of developing close working relationships with their supervisors and faculty, who are predominantly male while male doctoral students are working shoulder to shoulder with their male teachers and junior fellows, weaving a fabric of “brotherly comradeship” in the practice of mentoring, role modeling and academic grooming exercises such as participation in study groups and conference meetings. Gender is also a mediating factor affecting the peer interaction process, by which male doctoral displayed biased attitudes to their female peers. The gender-differentiated graduate experience shapes the career aspiration of the graduating doctoral students in S&E as the majority of male respondents favor research-oriented career path over teaching-oriented path, while the reverse pattern holds true for women. The gender divergence in the aspired career path contributes to the gender disparity in career achievement in S&E as a premature specialization in teaching restricts the career possibilities of women in S&E, where much emphasis is put on research than teaching. By examining gender differences in doctoral educational experience and career preparation, the current study contributes to the literature of women in S&E by making explicit the mechanism through which gender disparity in S&E is perpetuated. A better understanding of the mechanisms of educational and occupational sex segregation in S&E is likely to shed light on the problem of under-representation of women in S&E, which in turn can also help us understand what stands in the way of achieving gender equity in high-status occupations. Notes: CityU Call Number: HD6278.C62 L85 2008; 216 leaves 30 cm.; Thesis (M.Phil.)--City University of Hong Kong, 2008.; Includes bibliographical references (leaves 196-209)

2008-01-01T00:00:00Z Huang, Jing (黃靜) http://dspace.cityu.edu.hk:80/handle/2031/5200 2008-11-12T05:11:07Z 2007-01-01T00:00:00Z

Title: Constructing an "Evolving Yinni Guiqiao Identity" : a case study of the Yinni Guiqiao in Beijing Authors: Huang, Jing (黃靜) Abstract: This study focuses on the people known as Yinni Guiqiao in Chinese. Yinni is the Chinese translation of Indonesia, and Guiqiao refer to those who are born and have been living outside of China but who migrate to their ancestors’ country of origin – a migration interpreted by Chinese government as ‘coming home’, hence the word gui. Specifically, the term Yinni Guiqiao (印尼歸僑) refers to those who were born or lived in Indonesia, migrated to the People’s Republic of China in the 1950s and 1960s, and now have all become Chinese citizens after almost 50 years living in China. As transnational migrants, the Yinni Guiqiao provide a unique opportunity to examine how an “evolving Yinni Guiqiao identity” is constructed and reconstructed. This study explores in particular the following questions: First, while ethnic differentiation is an important labeling process for migrants as minorities in foreign countries, is it important for Yinni Guiqiao after they move to their ancestors’ country of origin? Second, is Yinni Guiqiao another sub-ethnic category in China that is similar to or different from other existing sub-ethnic categories within Han majority to which the Yinni Guiqiao supposedly belong? Third, in what ways is their distinctive ethnic identity constructed and reconstructed through the politics of contemporary China by various forces, leading to situations of political control, ideological manipulation and cultural alienation? Fourth, what are the major features of this new sub-ethnicity? And what implications does this study have for understanding ethnicity in general and identity formations of diasporic Chinese in particular? This study is interdisciplinary in nature. It employs, in particular, Barth’s boundary theory and related propositions to explore the ethnicity configuration of a particular historical group of Chinese migrants. It finds that the construction process of Yinni Guiqiao identity starts with the migration process of Yinni Guiqiao to China. It is a continuum of both graded differentiation, from individual to collective levels, and increased levels of ethnic identity, from minimal identity to maximal ethnicity. The core part of the construction lies in layered dialectical syntheses resulting from interactions between different sets of internal and external factors. Two factors, “ethnic broker” and “ethnic symbol”, play significant roles in the construction of Yinni Guiqiao identity. Thus Yinni Guiqiao identity is not a fixed entity. It is subject to transformation and re-construction. A number of noticeable features are found in the Yinni Guiqiao identity. The first and the most salient one is the role of political power in the construction of ethnic identity, the second is the transnational nature of this identity, the third one is its cultural hybridity, and the last feature is the transferability of this identity. The evolving sub-ethnic identity of supposedly ‘returning’ migrants to their ancestors’ country of origin, the mechanism of identity formation and the features of this identity revealed by this study supplement the literature on diasporic Chinese in particular and contribute to a better understanding of transnational migrants in general. Notes: vii, 155 leaves : ill. 30 cm.; Thesis (M.Phil.)--City University of Hong Kong, 2007.; Includes bibliographical references (p. 139-151); CityU Call Number: DS732 .H835 2007

2007-01-01T00:00:00Z