Workshop On China Brings Top Experts To Duke University
09 October 2013 10:45AM
Leading experts on China interacted with Duke faculty and students last week during a one-day workshop titled “China and International Trade.” The event was jointly sponsored by the Asian Pacific Studies Institute (APSI) and the Economic Research Initiative at Duke (ERID).
“This is really one of the first workshops to bring well-known and distinguished experts on China together,” said one of the organizers, Professor Daniel Xu of the Department of Economics. “It was of value even for the presenters themselves, who rarely get to interact face to face with each other.”
Seven scholars from the U.S., Canada, and China presented their research, giving the more than 30 participants a chance to catch up on the latest academic literature.
Invited speakers included:
• Nick Bloom (Stanford University)
• Loren Brandt (University of Toronto)
• Ann Harrison (University of Pennsylvania)
• Tom Holmes (University of Minnesota)
• Edwin Lai (Hong Kong University of Science and Technology)
• Shang-jin Wei (Columbia University)
• Zhongxiu Zhao (University of International Business and Economics, China).
The papers covered industrial policy and development, multinational firms, the impact of trade on technological change, and the relationship between labor regulation and productivity, among other topics.
The workshop was made possible in part by a Mellon Grant awarded to the APSI, which sponsored three international visitors. Additional presenters and discussants were sponsored by ERID.
While there are currently no plans for making the “China and International Trade” workshop an annual event, Xu and others hope that conferences like it will be held in the future.
“We were able to use China as an experimental ground for exploring topics of trade, productivity, and growth,” explained Xu. “I would like to see future conferences like this, where we give our attention not only to China, but to other emerging economies as well.”