I'm attending the Beijing Forum 2011 this week, and it's a superb international conference. Much of the conference took place at Peking University. Over three hundred international scholars were invited to participate, and there are dozens of interesting conversations going on at any one time. The goal is to stimulate productive dialog among scholars from …
Notes from Xi’an
People here in Xi'an say: "The Chinese city of the present is Beijing. The city of the future is Shanghai. The city of China's past is Xi'an." This seems to be more than a slogan. People in Xian seem deeply proud of the history and heritage that Xian represents -- the thirteen dynasties that made …
The safety net in Michigan
Poverty in the United States has increased measurably in the past ten years, and this is particularly visible in the state of Michigan. (Here is a webpage provided by the Michigan Department of Human Services with some basic information on poverty in the state.) State departments of human services and non-profit organizations alike are being stretched by …
France 1848
The revolutions of 1848 have gotten renewed attention in light of this year's "Arab Spring" uprisings. (The amazing photo above depicts the barricades in Paris, 1848.) The parallels are obvious -- uprisings in a number of countries, similar grievances across countries, and a degree of cross-communication among the movements and leaders. And, of course, widespread …
Taxes on business
What is a fair level of taxation for businesses in a state? How much should businesses pay relative to individuals in supporting the services provided by government? How should we even begin to answer this question? The question is easier for individual taxation, since there are only a few possible alternatives: a flat rate income …
New thinking about the Red Guards
https://youtu.be/gaz8sVaK8s4 Andrew Walder has spent almost all of his academic life, on and off, studying the Chinese Cultural Revolution. In Fractured Rebellion: The Beijing Red Guard Movement (2009) he offers some genuinely new insights into this crucial and chaotic period of China's revolutionary history. Some historians have focused on the political motivations of Mao and other top leaders …
New thinking about taxes in France
The structure of the tax code in France is getting new attention these days. President Sarkozy has made fiscal reform a key issue in the run-up to the presidential elections in 2012. The Nouvel Obs has a very good section this week on a recent book by Camille Landais, Thomas Piketty, and Emmanuel Saez, economists …
Deciphering French society
Louis Maurin recently published a valuable book on contemporary French society, Déchiffrer la société française, which is intended to shed light on the social realities of France in a way that is genuinely accessible to the public. There are chapters on population, the family, schooling, immigration, unemployment, consumption, and social values, among other important topics (link). …
Historical GDP estimates for early modern China
Li Bozhong is one of China's most influential economic historians, and he is undoubtedly the most internationally connected. Much of his work in the past several decades has been devoted to constructing a detailed economic history of the lower Yangzi Delta (for example, Agricultural Development in Jiangnan, 1620-1850). His findings have been crucial empirical contributions to …
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France as Theodore Zeldin saw it
Histories of France have been written from many points of view. Emmanuel Todd's The Making of Modern France: Ideology, Politics and Culture (1988), Eugen Weber's Peasants into Frenchmen: The Modernization of Rural France, 1870-1914 (1976), and Robert Darnton's Mesmerism and the End of the Enlightenment in France (1968) have all brought a distinctive perspective to their interpretations of …
Understanding Society 