In The News

Fashion Magazines Rush to Mold China's Sense of Style

Howard W. French October 4, 2005
China has come a long way from the privations of the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution. Today's Chinese have more economic freedom and money than ever before, and they are using those resources to enjoy the bourgeois tastes of Western fashion and lifestyle. Western magazines like Vogue, Cosmopolitan, and FHM offer Chinese consumers advice on everything from shopping to sex....

Emergency Measures Set on Dengue Fever

Wayne Arnold September 29, 2005
Avian influenza might claim more headlines, but dengue fever is claiming more victims, killing at least 990 people across Southeast Asia this year alone. First identified three centuries ago, dengue fever spread throughout Asia during World War II – one of the more insidious forms of globalization to stem from that conflict. The prohibition of DDT for use against mosquitoes in the New World...

Undue Fears of China Inc?

Paul Mooney September 29, 2005
Nearly two decades after fears of a Japanese industrial takeover reached fever pitch in the United States, expansionist moves by Chinese corporations have triggered alarms around the world. Last summer, when Chinese companies CNOOC and Haier attempted to buy Unocal and Maytag, respectively, American critics imagined the sinister hand of the Chinese state wrenching control of US assets and markets...

Now You See It, Now You Don't

Shim Jae Hoon September 22, 2005
On September 20 – one day after committing to halt its nuclear weapons program and rejoin the Nonproliferation Treaty – the North Korean foreign ministry issued a statement essentially rescinding its position. By refusing to abandon its weapons program until it receives a civilian light-water reactor for generating electricity, writes journalist Shim Jae Hoon, the North is essentially trying to...

Yahoo’s Mess of Pottage

Philip Bowring September 21, 2005
That Yahoo helped the Chinese government track down a reporter now imprisoned for leaking information to pro-democracy groups is shameful, say many critics. That the company did so at a time when it seeks to expand its own journalism, writes Philip Browning, is intolerable. "[T]he spreading of this virus of unprincipled greed into the heart of the Internet is deeply disturbing," he...

Murdoch Says News Corp. Has Hit a "Brick Wall" in China

Ron Rhodes September 20, 2005
Media tycoons have long salivated over China's huge market potential. But a government investigation into Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. underscores the challenges of operating a media business in China. "A year ago I would have said there's a lot of opening up going on," Murdoch said. "The present trend is the reverse," he continued, referring to the government...

Muslim Malaysian Sailors Denied Jobs over Terror Fears

September 19, 2005
Though the years after the 9/11 attacks have already witnessed incidents of racial profiling against Muslims in the West, fears of terrorism are now making targets out of Muslims elsewhere in the world. The Malaysian Seafarers Association claimed recently that international shipping companies are not recruiting Muslim sailors and officers from Malaysia. Muslim Malays do not have last names, but...