Talks from the Hoover Institution

Impacts Of Government-Sponsored Programs

Thursday, December 3, 2020
Hoover Institution

The Hoover Institution presents an online virtual speaker series based on the scholarly research and commentary written by Hoover fellows participating in the Human Prosperity Project on Socialism and Free-Market Capitalism. This project objectively investigates the historical record to assess the consequences for human welfare, individual liberty, and interactions between nations of various economic systems ranging from pure socialism to free-market capitalism. Each session will include thoughtful and informed analysis from our top scholars.

FEATURING
John F. Cogan is the Leonard and Shirley Ely Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution and a faculty member in the Public Policy Program at Stanford University.

Joshua D. Rauh is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution and the Ormond Family Professor of Finance at Stanford’s Graduate School of Business. 

For more information on this initiative, click here - https://www.hoover.org/research-teams/human-prosperity-project-socialism-and-free-market-capitalism 

To view the upcoming events, click here - https://www.hoover.org/research/human-prosperity-project-socialism-and-free-market-capitalism-speaker-series 

 

Broken Promises: Historical Lessons on How Not to Govern the Uyghur Homeland

Thursday, December 3, 2020
Hoover Institution, Stanford University

Xinjiang is a Muslim-majority region in northwest China, and its autochthonous Uyghur people are very different from China’s Han majority in terms of culture, language, and religion. Since 2016, China’s leadership has shifted its governing strategy in Xinjiang from economic development to cultural assimilation, citing the threat allegedly posed by Islam. A new system of reeducation camps, disappearances, and political imprisonment has now been widely reported in global media. This new policy is reminiscent of the last campaign of cultural assimilation undertaken in the region. From 1877 to 1907, Neo-Confucian activists from Hunan province attempted to turn 'Muslims into Confucians' and transform this alien border region into a familiar province of China proper. The result, however, was neither stability nor assimilation, but greater resentment, violence, and alienation. This talk explores the ramifications of that historical 'civilizing project' in terms of its effects on economy, sexual relations, and the creation of a deeper and more hostile ethnic consciousness. It reflects on the remarkable parallels with the program undertaken today in terms of its underlying logics and its social effects, and on the persistent idea of the 'broken promises' in the Uyghur relationship with China-based states.

Eric Schluessel is an assistant professor at the George Washington University in Washington, DC. His research concerns the social history of Xinjiang and China in the nineteenth through mid-twentieth centuries. Prof. Schluessel previously taught at the University of Montana, was recently a Mellon Fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, and spent the 2019-2020 academic year on a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Humanities. His publications include Land of Strangers (Columbia, 2020), An Introduction to Chaghatay (2018), and several articles on Uyghur and Chinese affairs past and present. He received his PhD in History and East Asian Languages from Harvard University.

ABOUT THE HOOVER HISTORY WORKING GROUP

https://www.hoover.org/research-teams/history-working-group  

This interview is part of the History Working Group Seminar Series. A central piece of the History Working Group is the seminar series, which is hosted in partnership with the Hoover Library & Archives. The seminar series was launched in the fall of 2019, and thus far has included six talks from Hoover research fellows, visiting scholars, and Stanford faculty. The seminars provide outside experts with an opportunity to present their research and receive feedback on their work. While the lunch seminars have grown in reputation, they have been purposefully kept small in order to ensure that the discussion retains a good seminar atmosphere.

Hoover Institution senior fellow Lee Ohanian answers frequently asked questions from his video "Sweden's Experiment with Socialism." Is Sweden socialist? Is "democratic socialism" different from "socialism?" Listen to find out.

One Belt One Road: Chinese Power Meets the World

Tuesday, November 24, 2020
Hoover Institution, Stanford University

Most discussion of China’s One Belt One Road initiative (OBOR) focuses on overseas infrastructure projects. But the initiative is also a campaign of ideas to buttress Xi Jinping’s personality cult and entrench his domestic control. Discussing a chapter from his new book, Eyck Freymann of the University of Oxford shows how Chinese-language propaganda use historical analogies to explain and justify the OBOR scheme. Their subtext is that Xi Jinping is the spiritual heir to Han Wudi, one of the most glorious emperors in Chinese history. OBOR’s true objective is to restore a model of world order from centuries past, when foreign emissaries would travel to Beijing and prostrate themselves at the feet of the Chinese emperor, offering gifts in exchange for political protection.

Eyck Freymann is the author of One Belt One Road: Chinese Power Meets the World (Harvard University Press 2020) and a doctoral candidate in Area Studies at the University of Oxford. He previously worked as a research assistant at Harvard University and at the Carnegie-Tsinghua Global Center in Beijing. He holds an MPhil from the University of Cambridge, where he was a Henry Scholar, and an AM and AB cum laude from Harvard.

ABOUT THE HOOVER HISTORY WORKING GROUP
https://www.hoover.org/research-teams/history-working-group 

This interview is part of the History Working Group Seminar Series. A central piece of the History Working Group is the seminar series, which is hosted in partnership with the Hoover Library & Archives. The seminar series was launched in the fall of 2019, and thus far has included six talks from Hoover research fellows, visiting scholars, and Stanford faculty. The seminars provide outside experts with an opportunity to present their research and receive feedback on their work. While the lunch seminars have grown in reputation, they have been purposefully kept small in order to ensure that the discussion retains a good seminar atmosphere.

Lessons Learned: European Values Vs  Islamism

Thursday, November 19, 2020
Hoover Institution, Stanford University

Assita Kanko, MEP and Ayaan Hirsi Ali discussed Lessons Learned: European Values vs. Islamism on Thursday, November 19, 2020.

ABOUT THE SPEAKERS
Ayaan Hirsi Ali is a Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University and founder of the AHA Foundation. She served as a Member of the Dutch Parliament from 2003 to 2006. While in Parliament, she focused on furthering the integration of non-Western immigrants into Dutch society, and on defending the rights of Muslim women.

Assita Kanko is an elected member of the European Parliament, a published author, columnist and human rights activist. In 2019 she was elected to represent the New Flemish Alliance as a Belgian MEP. She is a member of the Parliament’s delegation for EU-US relations, and its committees on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs; Foreign Affairs; Human Rights; Security and Defence. As a politician her work has led to the adoption of the Parliament’s first ever resolution entirely focused on ending the practice of FGM; something she herself survived as a child at age 5 in Burkina Faso.

For more information go to: https://www.hoover.org/publications/capital-conversations 

Great Decisions: America in the World: Session 2: Strategic Stability

Wednesday, November 18, 2020

The Hoover Institution is hosting Great Decisions: America in the World on November 16, November 18, and December 11, 2020. The topic on November 18 for Session 2 is Strategic Stability.

This session features Larry Diamond, Niall Ferguson, and Victor Davis Hanson. Michael Auslin moderates the discussion.

The End Of "One Country, Two Systems" And The Future Of Freedom In Hong Kong

Wednesday, November 18, 2020

Hoover Institution, Stanford University

 

The Hoover Project on China’s Global Sharp Power hosted an event on The End of "One Country, Two Systems" and The Future of Freedom in Hong Kong with Victoria Tin-bor Hu, University of Notre Dame, and Nathan Law, Democracy Activist, on Wednesday, November 18, 2020 at 4:00 PM PT. 

ABOUT THE SPEAKERS

Victoria Tin-bor Hui is Associate Professor of Political Science and a Fellow of the Liu Institute for Asia and Asian Studies at the University of Notre Dame. Her essay, "Crackdown: Hong Kong Faces Tiananmen 2.0," was published in the October 2020 Journal of Democracy. Her writings have also appeared in numerous academic journals and in Foreign Affairs.

Nathan Law is a democracy activist who was one of the student leaders of the 2014 Umbrella Movement in Hong Kong. In 2016 he became the youngest person ever elected to Hong Kong's Legislative Council, but his election was nullified under pressure from Beijing the following year. He recently obtained an M.A. degree in East Asian Studies from Yale University.

Great Decisions: America in the World: Session 1: Critical Countries

Monday, November 16, 2020

The Hoover Institution is hosting Great Decisions: America in the World on November 16, November 18, and December 11, 2020. The topic for Session 1 on November 16 is Critical Countries.

The session will feature Russell Berman, Elizabeth Economy, and H.R. McMaster. Michael Auslin will moderate the discussion.

 

How Racist Rhetoric Increases Chinese Overseas Students' Support for Authoritarian Rule

Friday, November 13, 2020

Hoover Institution, Stanford University

The Hoover Project on China’s Global Sharp Power held an event on How Racist Rhetoric Increases Chinese Overseas Students' Support for Authoritarian Rule with Jennifer Pan, Assistant Professor of Communication and Yiqing Xu, Assistant Professor of Political Science, Stanford University on Friday, November 13, 2020 at 10:00 AM PT.

The cross-border flow of people for educational exchange in Western democracies is seen as a way to transfer democratic values to non-democratic regions of the world. What happens when students studying in the West encounter racism? Based on an experiment among hundreds of Chinese first-year undergraduates in the United States, we show that seeing racist, anti-Chinese rhetoric interferes with the transfer of democratic values. Chinese students who study in the United States are more predisposed to favor liberal democracy than their peers in China. However, anti-Chinese racism significantly reduces their belief that political reform is desirable for China and increases their support for authoritarian rule. These effects are most pronounced among students who are more likely to reject Chinese nationalism. Encountering non-racist criticisms of the Chinese government does not increase support for authoritarianism. Our results are not explained by relative evaluations of the handling of Covid-19 by the US and Chinese governments.

ABOUT THE SPEAKERS
Jennifer Pan is an Assistant Professor of Communication at Stanford University. Her research resides at the intersection of political communication and authoritarian politics, showing how authoritarian governments try to control society, how the public responds, and when and why each is successful. Her book, Welfare for Autocrats: How Social Assistance in China Cares for its Rulers (Oxford, 2020), shows how China’s pursuit of political order transformed the country’s main social assistance program for repressive purposes.

Yiqing Xu is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Stanford University. His primary research covers political methodology, Chinese politics, and their intersection. He received a PhD in Political Science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (2016), an MA in Economics from the China Center for Economic Research at Peking University (2010) and a BA in Economics (2007) from Fudan University. He has won several professional awards, including the best article award from the American Journal of Political Science in 2016 and the Miller Prize for the best work appearing in Political Analysis in 2017.

Democracy and Authoritarianism

Thursday, November 12, 2020
Hoover Institution

The Hoover Institution presents an online virtual speaker series based on the scholarly research and commentary written by Hoover fellows participating in the Human Prosperity Project on Socialism and Free-Market Capitalism. This project objectively investigates the historical record to assess the consequences for human welfare, individual liberty, and interactions between nations of various economic systems ranging from pure socialism to free-market capitalism. Each session will include thoughtful and informed analysis from our top scholars.

FEATURING
Elizabeth Economy is a senior fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution and the Senior Fellow for China Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations.

Larry Diamond is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution and at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI) and a Bass University Fellow in Undergraduate Education at Stanford University.

For more information on this initiative, click here - https://www.hoover.org/research-teams/human-prosperity-project-socialism-and-free-market-capitalism 

To view the upcoming events, click here - https://www.hoover.org/research/human-prosperity-project-socialism-and-free-market-capitalism-speaker-series.