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China has become an impactful science superpower, but it is asserted that its influence provides it with disproportionate benefits that some national research policies have not thus far appreciated. To create context, Web of Science data are used to analyse research collaborations between the UK and China: trends in volume of output between 1981 and 2019; citation impact; and comparative performance across research fields. UK–China collaboration increased from fewer than 100 co-authored papers before 1990, to 750 per year in 2000, 3,324 in 2010, and 16,267 papers (10.9 per cent of UK output) in 2019. UK–China collaboration is concentrated in technology-based fields: in some (e.g. telecommunication), over 30 per cent of UK papers are in collaboration with Chinese-based researchers. The paper discusses the policy consequences to the UK of this indicative dependency, arguing that exiting from such collaborations is ill advised, provided the risks, perceived or real, are mapped, managed, and mitigated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper develops case studies of the UK and China to analyse divergent national financial regulatory approaches to FinTech as a novel political economy of platforms. Regulating with platforms is core to the approach taken in the UK, where start-up and early-career platforms are enrolled into an innovation-friendly financial regulation regime that promotes consumption and competition balanced with stability. In China, meanwhile, measures are being instituted to enhance rules and restrictions imposed on FinTech platforms. BigTech-led FinTech expansion was encouraged to expedite financial reforms to fuel economic growth and ensure authoritarian state control, but regulation is now shown to be working against the furtherance of platform power. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper intends to explore the impact of Information technology (IT) development on the legal concept of `signatures'. To what extent and in which way does it impact on the legal concept of `signatures'? This paper attempts to examine this issue from an international and comparative perspective. It was found that IT development has different levels of impact on the legal concept of `signatures' in different jurisdictions. In the Common Law system such as the UK and the US, it does not change the legal concept of `signatures'. However, it does put the legal concept on such an important position. On the contrary, IT development changes the legal concept of `signatures' in the Civil Law system such as Germany and China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents findings from a Department of Health-funded study into the emotional well-being of young people seeking asylum on their own in the UK. It discusses how young people accounted for only partly disclosing information about the circumstances surrounding their quest for asylum and subsequent aspects of their lives since arriving in the UK. Foucault's panoptic mechanism and its focus on the effects of power as dispersed through scrutiny are applied as a theoretical framework to contextualise these experiences. The paper shows that young people's decisions about how much of their current or past lives they share with others are more complex than indicated by earlier research. The paper argues that, for many young people, the predominant impetus for selective disclosure was a desire to retain a degree of agency as they navigated their way through immigration, asylum, social care, health and education systems and simultaneously sought to establish themselves in the social world. These findings have implications for how social care (and other) professionals engage and work with young people seeking asylum alone. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper briefly reviews the change in the political status of Hong Kong from a British colony to a Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China, sets out the international rights and obligations of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) as evidence of its international legal personality, and discusses whether the HKSAR can be treated as a subject of international law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the rivalry between Great Britain and the U.S. in colonizing China in early and midnineteenth century. According to historians, the inception of U.S. China policy occurred in the nineteenth century during the proclamation of the Open Door policy and the possession of the Philippines as means to access the China market. The federal government colonized China to improve its economy and to increase its international influence in East Asia.

The Imperial Maritime Customs under British influence accomplished and facilitated much work on the transmission of new samples and first-hand information on Chinese drugs to Britain and beyond. It also participated in the shaping of China's tariff and trade regulation, and quantified China's drug trade with Britain and others in terms of modern statistics. Its intersection with the British presence was in part characteristic of the dissemination of British and foreign materia medica in Chinese society. The matters between drugs and the Imperial Maritime Customs adds a unique perspective on the networks and activities that engaged China further in global trade and the modern world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Comparative lawyers and economists have often assumed that traditional Chinese laws and customs reinforced the economic and political dominance of elites and, therefore, were unusually "despotic" towards the poor. Such assumptions are highly questionable: one of the most striking characteristics of Qing and Republican property institutions is, in fact, that they often gave significantly greater economic protection to the poorer segments of society than comparable institutions in early modern England. In particular, Chinese property customs afforded much stronger powers of redemption to landowners who had pawned their land. In both societies, land-pawning occurred far more frequently among poorer households than richer ones, but Chinese customary law allowed debtors to indefinitely retain redemption rights over collateralized property, whereas English debtors would generally lose the property permanently if they failed to redeem it within one year. This article argues that the comparatively "egalitarian" tendencies of Qing and Republican property institutions stemmed from the different ways Chinese and English rural communities allocated social status and rank. Hierarchical "Confucian" kinship networks dominated social and economic life in most Chinese villages. Within these networks, an individual's status and rank depended, in large part, on his age and generational seniority, rather than personal wealth. This allowed many low-income households to enjoy status and rank highly disproportionate to their wealth. In comparison, substantial landed wealth was generally a prerequisite for high status in early modern England, effectively excluding lower-income households from positions of sociopolitical authority. Chinese smallholders possessed, therefore, significantly more social bargaining power, and were able to negotiate more desirable property institutions. Paradoxically, the predominance of kinship hierarchies actually enhanced macro-level political and economic equality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The United Kingdom (UK) and China have launched the London–Shanghai Stock Connect Scheme to achieve an integrated capital market. In this article, the takeover market is used as an example to examine the extent to which regulatory alignment between the UK and China is possible. The focus is on the role of financial intermediaries in the two markets and how they may influence the governance model of the transfer of corporate control by an open offer to the shareholders of the target company (a takeover bid). This article argues that without regulatory alignment such an integrated market is unlikely to be realized. There are differences between the UK and China in the economic model, ownership structure, and institutional arrangements, which have been reflected in the differences in interests served by takeover law in the two regimes. The design of the framework for takeover law in the UK empowers financial market participants, so as to attract capital to the London markets. In contrast, China's takeover law is mainly aimed at facilitating industrial restructuring and creating globally competitive national companies (national champions). Hence, the UK's shareholder-centred takeover model, with a strong focus on financial intermediaries and international investors, would not be easily replicated in China. However, the UK model could provide lessons for China to develop its takeover market—that is, further its market structure reform, develop independent financial intermediaries, and also attract an increasing number of investors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article the author discusses the results of a study by Great Britain's Royal Society of London titled "Knowledge, Networks and Nations: Global Scientific Collaboration in the 21st Century," which investigated the global progress of science. He notes that the conclusion that drew the most interest was the competition between the U.S. and China for global scientific dominance and discusses three areas in which the report fails in its analysis regarding China's scientific dominance.

We describe our experience in several settings, following a suggestion in 1983 to add questions on the smoking status of the deceased on the UK death certificate as an effective way to monitor the evolution of the smoking epidemic. In South Africa in 1997 and in Tianjin Municipality, China, in 2010, questions about the smoking habits of the deceased were inserted on the official death certificates. In both places a system now exists to routinely collect information on smoking status in relation to causes of death. Results from two million South African and 300 000 Chinese deceased individuals have been reported, and the sample size in both places continues to grow. An unsuccessful attempt was made in 2008 to insert smoking questions on the Australian death notification forms but comments and concerns from the registrars of births, marriages and deaths have international applicability. In both China and South Africa, inserting questions on smoking on the death notification forms was not a trivial task-in each it required, as a minimum, significant commitment from several government agencies. Benefits, however, include a better local understanding of the smoking epidemic and allowing for planning and monitoring of tobacco control programmes. Documenting the varied experiences of collecting information on smoking on death notification forms is useful to those wishing to introduce such questions in their own settings. This is pertinent especially at a time when vital registration systems are being improved, with an aim to monitoring sustainable development goals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pre-industrial China and Japan provide contrasting patterns in how transactions were conducted in the rural economy. Chinese peasants would exchange their products anonymously for cash at the nearest market, while transactions in rural Japan tended to be made among people who were well-acquainted through credit rather than currency. The case of early modern England, where ordinary people tended to make deferred payments by means of oral agreements, shows a similarity to the Japanese situation. This comparison suggests, in general terms, that currency and credit could combine to supply the total amount of means of payment needed in a region. However, commercial activities progressed in divergent ways: either through anonymous currency transactions or by means of chained debts among locals. Unlike currency-dominant systems, which tended to create plural units of account, credit-dominant systems made it easier to establish a monetary system based on a standard formula. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article offers global perspectives on 20th century British history from Australia, Hong Kong, Japan, and South Africa. In Australia, the author discusses migrants from Britain, the British influences within Australian media, and how British history is taught at universities. In South Africa, the author discusses British identity, culture, and politics in relation to South African historical work. In Japan, the author discusses how the economic and social history of Britain has served as model for modernization. In Hong Kong, the author discusses how British colonial influences have led to internationalization.

This article examines post-war British cultural diplomacy in Hong Kong, focusing on the British Council and Hong Kong House. Drawing on colonial office, British Council and Hong Kong government archival collections, it argues that neither the British nor Hong Kong governments placed a high priority on promoting British cultural values to the Hong Kong Chinese. Moreover, even this limited emphasis declined after the late nineteen-sixties, reflecting both Britain's retreat from what John Darwin calls the 'empire project' and the emergence of a more pronounced Hong Kong local identity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the handwritten manuscript detailing the first British diplomatic mission to China overseen by George Macartney, first earl Macartney, held by the Royal Geographical Society in London, England. It is titled "Journal of a Voyage to the East Indies and an historical narrative of Lord Macartney’s Embassy to the Court of Pekin, including a correct description of the manners and customs of the Chinese, collected from personal observation, by a member of the Embassy," with a note attributing authorship to Stephen Else, Esquire, later Captain and Paymaster of the Royal Sherwood Foresters, or North Militia. It argues that the majority of the manuscript is plagiarized by other accounts by authors including William Winterbotham, Aeneas Anderson, and Charles Caleb Colton.

The embassy to China led by Lord George Macartney in 1792–94 set off with hopes of expanding and improving trade relations between the two countries. Macartney, hoping that music would be a major tool in his effort to establish favourable diplomatic and trade ties with China, entrusted all of the necessary musical planning and arrangements to Charles Burney, who also personally supplied a range of musical instruments for the journey. Although outwardly received with grand ceremony and grace by the Qianlong Emperor in 1793, the embassy ultimately represented a cultural clash of major proportions. This is evident from many contemporary accounts of the participants, who provide detailed descriptions that include mention of music, musicians and their roles. As it turned out, no amount of negotiation was sufficient to achieve the embassy’s diplomatic ends, due to cultural misunderstandings on both sides of the encounter, which are also evident in the musical exchanges. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article examines projected climate impacts and national planning efforts in three major countries: the USA, UK and China. The three countries are in varying stages of planning for climate adaptation. Planning frameworks in all three countries suffer from a lack of specificity and urgency. To address this situation, the article recommends two measures. The first is the use of scenario planning, including consideration of high-impact scenarios, to address the downside risks of climate change. Planning in the UK has begun to make use of scenario analysis, although in a less comprehensive manner, while the USA had an earlier experiment in the use of the worst-case scenario as a planning tool. The second recommendation is to identify and prioritise impacts on vulnerable populations such as the elderly, the poor and coastal communities. This recommendation has roots in the US planning proposals, but also resonates with international human rights law. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The Great Recession has brought a structural break in international economic and political order. The geography of power is at present being dramatically transformed, notably by the rapid economic rise of China. What makes international order legitimate in a world in which political and economic foundations are rapidly shifting? This article examines analogies and lessons from a previous transition, from a world order centered on Britain, to a US dominated global order. That transition saw two moments of crisis, or turning points, the 1931 financial crisis at the height of the Great Depression, and the diplomatic and military catastrophe of Suez. The article looks at two interpretations of the transition, one by E. H. Carr focusing on the destruction in the Great Depression of a liberal economic and political order and its replacement by a world of brutal Great Power politics; the other by Charles Kindleberger, stressing the need for a benevolent hegemonic power to provide public goods for the world economy and the world political system. China is beginning to behave in the way expected of a Kindleberger hegemon, but also sees the possibilities of asserting power in a world that in the aftermath of 2008 looks much more like the chaotic and crisis-ridden interwar period as interpreted by E. H. Carr. The challenge for the management of the new international order will lie in the ability of China to embrace the universalistic vision that underpinned previous eras of stability, in the nineteenth century and in the late twentieth century. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the Houston Mount Everest Expedition of 1933, which resulted in the first successful air flights over Mount Everest. Rather than the story of the flights or their technical contributions, it focuses upon their political implications. Central to those implications was the project’s connection to Britain’s extreme right community. Several involved with the expedition were associated with Britain’s high imperialist, often pro-fascist, far right. Their participation in such a cutting edge project acts as one example of the modernist impulse of the far right tendency in the inter-war years. The expedition would provide an opportunity to use modern technology as a metaphor for national regeneration during a period when many saw Britain in steep decline. Some hoped it would make a strong statement to the indigenous people of that region. The flights were conducted in the spring of 1933 during the anxious debate over the future of India. To the far right, the idea of granting Indians even limited autonomy was abhorrent, and many hoped that such a feat of courage and technical prowess would convince Indians of British racial superiority and to abandon their struggles for independence. Others would interpret the meaning of the expedition in different ways, related to the extension of British power. The War Office was delighted with the potential for mapping any area of the earth and facilitating imperial control of contested territories. Still others on the far right were excited about the potential air survey and what air cargo would mean for the economic development of the Empire, linked to the extreme right dream of an autarchic imperial economy. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The author discusses the project called "Visible Secrets: Hong Kong's Women Filmmakers" that provides a model of practice and cooperation between academics and arts institutions that are involved in the field of cinema exhibition, such as the Chinese Film Forum UK (CCFUK). He cites two developments in Great Britain that are similar to the project, namely, the expansion of the publicly financed independent cinema industry in the 1980s and the fast institutionalization and growth of film studies in the country. He also explores the notion of curation in the academic field of art and design.

For most of its one hundred and fifty years, British rule over Hong Kong did not allow for any political participation by the local population. Prior to the territory's return to China, however, the United Kingdom and the prospective new sovereign agreed that both the legislature and executive of the future Hong Kong would be determined by elections. China further specified that, as an “ultimate aim,” these elections would be based on universal suffrage. Yet in the years since, China has intervened in the supposedly autonomous region to slow down or halt constitutional development. While these interventions contravene the constitutional provisions of the Special Administrative Region, they should not come as a surprise; nor do they represent a change in Chinese attitudes toward Hong Kong. Rather, they reflect the Chinese government's misgivings about free elections—misgivings not unlike those of the British with respect to colonial Hong Kong. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Background: The need for assessment of technical skills is well recognized and objective methods of assessment are currently under investigation in the UK. The applicability of these assessment tools to trainees with a different training background in another country was examined. Methods: Six bench-top models for basic surgical trainees (BSTs) and eight for higher surgical trainees (HSTs) (five in common) were assessed for construct validity in 70 subjects. Objective assessment methods included motion analysis using the Imperial College Surgical Assessment Device, Objective Structured Assessment of Technical Skills and Minimally Invasive Surgical Trainer in Virtual Reality. Results: All models shared between BSTs and HSTs exhibited construct validity (range P = 0.050 to P < 0.001). Of the three modules for HSTs alone, only one gave significant results (small bowel anastomosis; P = 0.005). Reasons for this were sought. Conclusion: The methods of objective technical skills assessment of trainees in the UK are applicable to those in Hong Kong. Their use should be promoted and the tracking of skills development encouraged. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article offers information regarding Hong Kong as a British colony. It discusses that Hong Kong is an administrative state although it is technically constitutionally a British colony and it acts with a good deal of de facto independence. It mentions that Hong Kong is not yet a nation, nor yet a state, nor does it have a separate language, and Cantonese is Hong Kong's primary language which is spoken mainly in China's Guandong province bordering Hong Kong. It is bureaucratic and is stratified according to race, education, and income.

The article offers information on the Memorandums of Understanding (MOU), which aims to encourage enhanced engagement and greater collaboration between research institutions in China and Great Britain.