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The past two years have witnessed escalating geopolitical tensions occurring not only in the political but also economic domains especially technology and global supply chains, infrastructure connectivity, trade and finance. With tensions between the US and China escalating on many fronts, Southeast Asia has become a focal point of strategic rivalry again as Biden's Indo-Pacific Strategy 2022 attempts to rebuild the US-led order in Asia to blunt China's growing influence in the region. A series of economic initiatives following his Indo-Pacific strategy focuses on reconfiguring the semiconductor global supply chain. In this context, the paper aims to examine how Malaysia cope with the complex patterns of cooperation, competition and conflict arising from the current shifts in the global geopolitics and geoeconomics. The paper benefits from the insights from the international political economy research which explores how the Malaysian government strives to reconcile domestic and international imperatives in navigating the changing global geopolitical economy, which can be perceived as both a threat as well as an opportunity by the state and non-state actors in the country. The question of whether hedging is tenable is undoubtedly contingent upon the extent of big power rivalry. Given the greater uncertainty over the pernicious effects of rising regional polarization and retreat from economic globalization, Malaysia will continue to maintain strategic ambiguity as long as US-China rivalry has not (yet) escalated into outright military conflict. Nevertheless, the paper concludes that the space to hedge may be squeezed since small power like Malaysia may face harsher realities as it navigates the changing geopolitical economy landscape. Hence, the ASEAN solidarity and cohesion is crucial to ensure a more unified regional response to the escalating Sino-American strategic competition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper compares the paths of development taken by China and Malaysia in their attempts to pursue catching-up. While both China and Malaysia rely to a large extent on attracting foreign direct investment, China has, since its economic liberalisation in the late 1970s, implemented a more proactive set of industrial policy to embed foreign know-how and promote domestic technological deepening. This is illustrated through a comparison of the evolution of the Chinese and Malaysian semiconductor (upstream) industry. Although their progress remains tentative at this stage, China seems to be showing more concrete signs of technological and industrial sophistication than Malaysia. Such mastery is a useful platform for Chinese firms to progressively climb the technological ladder and to capture more value from the production and sales of increasingly complex goods and services. The principles discussed in this paper provide policy lessons, or at least some initial guidance, for other developing economies aspiring to move up the value chain. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on the environmental Kuznets curve theory (EKC) and the double-dividend hypothesis of environmental tax, this paper aims to examine the relationship between environmental tax, economic growth, energy consumption, and carbon dioxide emissions in China, Finland, and Malaysia from 1985 to 2014 using panel autoregressive distribution lag (ARDL) models. This paper discovers an N-shaped relationship between the volume of carbon dioxide emissions and the value of the gross domestic product. Furthermore, this study confirms that the double-dividend effect of environmental tax exists in all three countries in the long run. Overall, this study argues that evidence from Finland and Malaysia on environmental taxes that help the country to save energy and reduce carbon dioxide emissions can provide a reference for China and other developing countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI − also known as One Belt One Road (OBOR)−is undoubtedly one of People's Republic of China's (PRC) largest yet most controversial development program of its kind worldwide. In the light of the controversy, the paper aims to study Malaysia's perception and strategy toward China's BRI expansion since the Najib's administration. Based on the political economy analysis of Malaysia's response from Najib to Mahathir 2.0 administrations, the paper focuses on the interaction between state and non-state actors such as the corporations, political parties and non-government organizations (NGOs). Particular attention will be given to the question of what accounts for the continuity or change in Malaysia's perception and strategy toward China's BRI expansion during the two different administrations. Given the institutional setting that gives rise to concentration of political and economic power in the hand of prime minister in Malaysia, its leadership plays a vital role in shaping the outcome of China's BRI expansion in the country. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How do states pursue industrial policies in the context of China's rise? Examining Indonesia and Malaysia's mineral processing sectors, we argue that these countries illustrate two different pathways that states take to bolster their industrial policies. Indonesia has followed the leading sector strategy to increase domestic nickel processing capacity and decrease reliance on resource exports. Chinese firms and the Indonesian government built the Indonesia Morowali Industrial Park to house nickel smelters, fostering a new leading sector. Chinese capital in smelting follows what Albert Hirschman has called 'intermediate investments', maximising forward and backward linkages across the Indonesian economy. In contrast, Malaysia has followed the dual economy strategy, where semi-finished goods are imported and assembled into finished ones to be exported abroad. Chinese firms and the Malaysian government established the Malaysia–China Kuantan Industrial Park to import, process and export steel products. However, due to the dual economy strategy, the industrial park impairs the activities of domestic steelmaking companies and inhibits the potential build-up of smelting capacity. In sum, through an examination of an industrial park in each country, our paper connects the literatures on industrial policy and Chinese capital. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses the experiences of the conference management team and the host (Universiti Putra Malaysia -UPM) of the Fifth Asian Conference of the Academy of Human Resource Development, held in Putrajaya, Malaysia from 2 to 5 December 2006. In reviewing the conference, the following sub-topics are used for organizing the contents of the article: HRD in Malaysia; conference theme & overview; participations/country representations and paper streams; keynote addresses; conference assessment; and conclusions. At the end, brief perspectives of the next Asian HRD conference to be held in China are also provided. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines three developmental regimes in Singapore. China and Malaysia. In these three cases, heavy state intervention was necessary because their economies required significant economic restructuring. For Singapore, state intervention was necessary for the process of industrial transformation. For Malaysia, state intervention wets necessary because the government wanted to reallocate economic resources as a means to deal with ethnic conflict. For China, state intervention was necessary in order to gradually "marketize" the socialist economy. The paper also briefly discusses the impact of the Asian Financial Crisis (1997-1999) on these developmental regimes. It finds that for all three cases, economic restructuring was successful because of long-term and heavy state intervention. It explains that, unlike the other developmental states of Asia, these developmental regimes were able to undertake such significant restructuring because of the .state's power base, which even managed to survive the Asian Financial Crisis. It concludes with some comments about the future of state intervention in a rapidly globalizing world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With trade volume registering more than US$10 billion in recent years, Malaysia has already been China's largest Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) trading partner since 2008 and its third biggest Asian trading partner after Japan and South Korea. It is expected that China-Malaysia bilateral trade with an 8% annual growth rate will continue to expand, and this strong bilateral tie is set to be strengthened in the face of Chinese president Xi Jinping's efforts to enhance regional connectivity and especially maritime linkage by proposing the "One Belt One Road" (OBOR) construction. Malaysia is well placed, probably even better than most of its ASEAN neighbors, to embrace the opportunities brought about by the surge of infrastructure development and trade deals that is going to come with the progress in constructing the ocean-based Maritime Silk Road (MSR), one of the two initiatives of OBOR, the other being the land-based Silk Road Economic Belt. With Malaysia's traditional linkage with China's southeastern provinces of Guangdong and Fujian, and as the holder of the Strait of Malacca, Malaysia is occupying a key strategic location that can serve well as China's gateway to the ASEAN Economic Community. A statement made by the Malaysian transport minister has declared that a few ports in Malaysia has been identified to be part of the MSR. The close ties between both countries have resulted in cooperation in the transportation field such as railway projects and purchasing of trains from China. Indeed, Malaysia is in the process of developing inter-port city collaboration between China's Qinzhou Port and Malaysia's Kuantan Port. In recent years, China's Guangxi Beibu Gulf International Port Group has bought a 40% stake in Malaysia's Kuantan Port Consortium from the construction group IJM Group for a total of US$102 million. It is in such context and with due consideration of such developments that this paper will explore the prospects and challenges facing China-Malaysia cooperation within the overall framework of China-ASEAN strategic relations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Chinese popular music, inspired by pre-war Shanghai music known as ‘shidai qu’ (时代曲) (songs of the era) and evolving to include Canto pop and Taiwanese Mandarin songs, has always been popular among the Chinese in Malaysia. This music is featured on radio, television, karaoke, and performed by orchestras such as the Dama Chinese Orchestra (大马) to enthusiastic reception. The songs have a broad appeal that transcends time, generation, and place. Of significance is the observation that the music has become a cultural marker and musical heritage for Chinese in Malaysia and in the region. The paper looks at factors behind this development. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper looks at the politics of the Malaysian Chinese Association, the main party representing the Chinese community, in the ruling Barisan Nasional, one year after the March 2008 general election. Recent developments over the last few months indicate that the party has lost its political legitimacy. The paper argues that the crisis of political legitimacy can be traced back to the ideology of Ketuanan Melayu and the introduction of the New Economic Policy in 1971. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article addresses the importance of network trade between Malaysia and China and assesses the extent of product upgrading in components traded. The study brings to the fore the following points. First, China is emerging as an important market for component imports relative to component exports. As such, the increase in two-way flows of parts and components for/further processing and development, implying a shift away from assembly-end operations, remains insignificant. Secondly, network trade appears to have improved the quality of exports destined to China (reflecting a "moving up of the value chain"), but the gaps between the unit values of export and imports have narrowed in the recent past, implying less product development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The spectacular economic success of the Newly Industrialising Countries (NICS) of Asia since the 1960s, has led to the quest to identify other less developed countries which may be just about to become the next NICS of Asia. This paper examines the arguments for and against the view that there is a "second tier" of less developed countries which are about to join the ranks of the Asian NICS. While Malaysia and Thailand are generally thought to be the most likely candidates, this paper argues that one hitherto unrecognised contender. China, is likely to join these countries in achieving NIC status. This paper examines the question of whether there are likely to be more Newly Industrializing Countries (NICS) emerging over time, following in the footsteps of the original four in Asia (Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan). While some writers suggest that several developing countries are about to achieve NIC status in the near future, others argue that world trading conditions have deteriorated to such an extent as to make this very unlikely. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the impact of ringgit/yuan volatility on Malaysian trade with her largest trading partner, China. The short- and long-run impacts are estimated using bounds testing approach to cointegration analysis and disaggregated bilateral trade data by industry over the period of 1985–2010. Specifically, we considered a total of 151 importing and 24 exporting industries in Malaysia that traded with China. Our finding indicates that cointegration existed in 94 Malaysian import industry models and 16 Malaysian export industry models. Among these cases, exchange rate volatility has short-run effects on majority of the models. However, the short-run effects shift into the long-run effects in 46 out of 69 industries in import models and 5 out of 10 industries in export models. Results indicate that the exchange rate uncertainty has positive effects on majority of these industries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective. Obesity prevalence is unequally distributed across gender and ethnic group in Malaysia. In this paper, we examine the role of socioeconomic inequality in explaining these disparities. Design. The body mass index (BMI) distributions of Malays and Chinese, the two largest ethnic groups in Malaysia, are estimated through the use of quantile regression. The differences in the BMI distributions are then decomposed into two parts: attributable to differences in socioeconomic endowments and attributable to differences in responses to endowments. Results. For both males and females, the BMI distribution of Malays is shifted toward the right of the distribution of Chinese, i.e., Malays exhibit higher obesity rates. In the lower 75% of the distribution, differences in socioeconomic endowments explain none of this difference. At the 90th percentile, differences in socioeconomic endowments account for no more than 30% of the difference in BMI between ethnic groups. Conclusions. Our results demonstrate that the higher levels of income and education that accrue with economic development will likely not eliminate obesity inequality. This leads us to conclude that reduction of obesity inequality, as well the overall level of obesity, requires increased efforts to alter the lifestyle behaviors of Malaysians. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper considers four different markets (China, Singapore, Malaysia and New Zealand) and compares the relative development of the supermarket industry in each to observed sales promotion use and stated managerial preference. A case-based approach to research is taken in order to better highlight key similarities and differences between the four countries and compare sales promotion preferences in light of different industry structures, levels of market development and culture. The article examines three Asian (China, Singapore and Malaysia) and one Western supermarket industry (New Zealand), each exhibiting different levels of industrialisation and contrasting multinational involvement in the industry. The research finds that as industrialisation of a market increases, along with increasing sophistication of consumers and multinationalisaition of the industry, use of passive value-added techniques (such as sampling, demonstrations and free gifts) should decrease. This has marked implications for retailing in Asia, which is made up of highly differentiated countries in regard to market sophistication and gives specific direction for application of sales promotion techniques in the Asian region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The language situation in the Malaysian Chinese community has undergone great changes in the past century. This paper aims to account for such changes in the framework of sociolinguistic realignment, which is both descriptive and predictive. The triglossic situation in the colonial period (1859-1957) is described; with the support of a language survey in Kuala Lumpur (KL) in 2008, the current triglossia in the Chinese community is presented. Furthermore, the future development of the language situation in KL is predicted based on the hypothesis of sociolinguistic realignment theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper re-examines the determinants of foreign direct investment (FDI) in Malaysia, for the period 1970-2006. The cointegration results show that market size of both Malaysia and China have major, and a statistically significant impact, on FDI inflow to Malaysia. The results seem to support the argument that foreign investors tend to be more attracted to the country with a higher growth rate of gross domestic product (GDP) because it indicates a larger potential demand for their products. In addition, the results also demonstrate that openness level of the country has a positive and statistically significant effect on FDI inflow, which supports the hypothesis that FDI can be attracted to a country with more liberalized economic reforms. Finally, the results show that literacy rate (human capital development) has significant positive effect on FDI inflow. The finding suggests the need for labor force expansion and education policy to raise the stock of human capital in the country. Using Granger causality test, we also find that there exist unidirectional causality from real GDP of both Malaysia and China, degree of openness and literacy rate to FDI inflow. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With higher shares in world merchandise trade and improvements in product quality, China is better positioned than India in the near term for influencing global trade. From the Malaysian perspective, China represents a non-negligible share in Malaysia's trade. The trends in bilateral trade with both Giants however suggest that competition has intensified. Relative to India, China appears to promulgate a more influential role on Malaysia via higher commodity overlap in external markets, greater matched trade that is of vertical differentiation, distinct quality shifts and negative adjustment pressures. Within this broad rubric of trade-induced changes, there is no evidence of skill upgrading for Malaysia in trade expansion with both Giants. This mirrors the lack of product quality improvements and the low levels of export values of high quality varieties in matched trade. Hence trade induced changes from the Giants that have been cited to be favourable from the Malaysian perspective in previous studies, may have been grossly overstated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When do countries that pursue industrialisation through the development of their manufacturing sector shift to services? Does the shift take place because manufacturing development has matured with the development of indigenous technology? What is the role of policy in this shift? Understanding this shift is crucial due to the changing nature and role of services in development and its association with deindustrialisation. This article seeks to compare Malaysia and China's shift from manufacturing to services and the challenges and prospects of such a shift. The main findings indicate that Malaysia's shift occurred earlier than China's and was prompted by the failure of its manufacturing sector to deepen as it has not produced any world-class domestic technology firms. China's more recent shift is associated with ongoing upgrading in its manufacturing sector while some global domestic technology firms have also emerged. Both countries used similar policies to drive this shift in response to domestic and external changes. The services sectors of both countries are still dominated by domestic market orientated, labour-intensive services. Developing competitive knowledge-intensive services in both countries will need a reform of their state-owned enterprises and the production of more talents that are needed for these types of services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents comments on three papers presented during the Inaugural Asia Pacific Rim International Counselling Conference held Hongkong. It points out the concept of the three articles such as the outline of the development of guidance and counselling from remedies to student in Hongkong, chronological description of initial and later development of counselling in Malaysia, and how psychological help promote counselling services in China. It also remarks the study such as the need of counsellors awareness on the influence of local and dominant culture to the practice of guidance and counselling, and consideration of cultural context of clients, counsellors in assisting models of helping, and strategies to improve treatment attitudes.

Since 2013, the Belt and Road Initiative has become China's signature foreign economic policy campaign. While there have been debates on the initiative's implementation and implications, an emerging consensus suggests that the export of capital-intensive infrastructure is a key driving factor of China's financial statecraft. For Southeast Asian countries, such Chinese efforts are useful in plugging their domestic infrastructure gaps, not least in the remote parts of their territory. Against this backdrop, this article examines arguably two of the most prominent Chinese infrastructure projects in Malaysia – the East Coast Rail Link (ECRL) and the Malaysia-China Kuantan Industrial Park (MCKIP). It posits three inter-related arguments. Firstly, unlike conventional analyses which commonly treat the Chinese state as a singular, unitary actor, both the central and provincial governments in China's multi-layer state structure have played important roles and demonstrated different characteristics in Chinese infrastructure overture towards Malaysia. Secondly, one observes contrasting patterns of well-coordinated state-business relations in the ECRL project versus loose, decentralised state-business relations driven largely by Guangxi province and market forces for the MCKIP. Thirdly, the implementation of both the ECRL and the MCKIP has been heavily constrained by the political-institutional environment of Malaysia as the host country, illustrating that Chinese financial statecraft, in the form of infrastructure provision, generates considerably less impact than what popular rhetoric suggests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The interaction between kleptocracy, strategic corruption, and defence policymaking has not yet been sufficiently explored in the existing literature. Malaysia's turn towards China amidst the 1MDB scandal, despite Chinese claims to Malaysian waters and naval intrusions, provides an opportunity to study such a phenomenon. By examining the pressures exerted by the US and the strategic corruption pull by China upon Prime Minister Najib Razak's kleptocratic interests, this analysis highlighted the kleptocrat's strategies to change Malaysia's pro-Western defence policy. Through extensive interviews and secondary data, this study analyses the manipulation of Public Service Bargains as a critical variable influencing the kleptocrat's defence policymaking. It concludes that Najib's strategies transformed the established trustee-type of bargain in Malaysia's defence decision-making process to a kleptocratic type, enabling a closer relationship with China. This analysis contributes to the debate on kleptocracy's impact on smaller powers' defence relationships amidst the global expansion of China's strategic influence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Asia-Pacific region has the highest number of active smokers in the world. Efforts to reduce tobacco use should implement evidence-based measures. The Association of Pacific Rim Universities is a non-profit network of more than 50 universities representing 18 economies. In 2017, it held a virtual global health case competition relating to the use of universities as platforms for tobacco control. This study is a content analysis of tobacco control proposals submitted by 24 teams from 10 economies. Content analysis of the 10-min videos examined (1) general tone and scope of videos; (2) contextual analysis; (3) intervention approaches; (4) theoretical framework; (5) primary versus secondary prevention; (6) individual versus structural approaches. Proposals were not comprehensive; most included some but not all elements recommended by the WHO FCTC. Smoking was often referred to as a 'habit' (instead of an addiction), which likely explains the predominance of individual-level behavior change interventions (smoking cessation) over structural interventions (tobacco ad or sales bans). The most common intervention was the enforcement of current bans on smoking (proposed in 78% of videos), perceived as a major barrier to tobacco control. While most proposals emphasized individual components (e.g. health education and peer support), some also proposed to create more supportive smoke-free environments through billboards, posters and cues to action, such as 'no smoking' reminders and signs with cessation hotline numbers. University faculty, students and campus-wide organizations are well positioned to lead tobacco control efforts. More work is needed to support the establishment of smoke-free campus environments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There have been contending views on the implications of China's economic rise and growing influence for global economic governance. Many Chinese officials and some Chinese IR scholars expect that the international order, at least the Asian regional order, is experiencing important transitions, which is characterized by more relational governance than rule-based governance. This article argues that, though relational governance explains the manner in which China unfolds the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), it does not guarantee success for China's BRI projects. Based on an in-depth case study of Malaysia's adjustment of BRI projects after the 14th general election combined with elite interviews in Malaysia, the article further suggests that China's relational management and governance has practically generated considerable problems for the Malaysian government and challenges for China's projects in Malaysia. It calls for a more cautious, rather than optimistic, attitude towards China's practice of relational governance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We conducted an epidemiological study to identify the demographics and pre-operative characteristics of patients undergoing primary anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) reconstruction in a multi-ethnic Asian population. A retrospective study was performed on 696 patients who registered in our ACL reconstruction registry from January 2013 to August 2016. Important inter-ethnic differences were found. Indian patients were significantly older compared to Malay and Chinese patients. Malay and Indian patients were more likely to be male, overweight, and obese compared to Chinese patients. Soccer was the predominant sport involved, although ethnic predominance in specific sports exists. Novel findings from this study include increased prevalence of concomitant chondral injuries in the Chinese population compared to Malays and Indians, and significantly higher rates of concomitant intra-articular injuries in soccer and basketball compared to netball. Identification of these high-risk subgroups would serve useful in guiding the formulation of prevention strategies within our multi-ethnic community. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article looks at the Malaysian perception of the contemporary rise of China by focusing more on the country's societal response rather than from a broad overall perspective of international strategic relations and diplomacy. The Malaysian society is seen as a complex multi-entity construct, constituted by often sharply differentiated fragments and sub-fragments which could exhibit vastly different responses to the implications of the rise of China. Within such a construct, perception of the rise of China and the appropriate Malaysian response are intricately entwined with domestic power politics, generational transition and governmental control over public discourse. Hence, the Malaysian perception of the contemporary rise of China is as complex as the Malaysian society itself, and what is revealed in official government policies and public discourses in the dominant mass media would fail to reflect the real depth of the issue if the intrinsic complexity of the Malaysian society is not taken into due consideration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: An Asia-Pacific regional collaboration group conducted its first multi-country research project to determine whether or not European quality indicators (QIs) for psychosocial care in dementia could be implemented as a valid tool in residential aged care across seven Asia-Pacific sites (Australia, Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, Mainland China, Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea, and Thailand). Method: Following the European QI protocol, auditing and data extraction of medical records of consenting residents with dementia were conducted by trained auditors with relevant health care backgrounds. Detailed field notes by the auditors were also obtained to describe the characteristics of the participating care facilities, as well as key issues and challenges encountered, for each of the 12 QIs. Results: Sixteen residential care facilities in the seven Asia-Pacific sites participated in this study. Data from 275 residents' records revealed each of the 12 Qis' endorsement varied widely within and between the study sites (0%-100%). Quality of the medical records, family and cultural differences, definitions and scoring of certain indicators, and time-consuming nature of the QI administration were main concerns for implementation. Conclusion: Several items in the European QIs in the current format were deemed problematic when used to measure the quality of psychosocial care in the residential aged care settings in participating Asia-Pacific countries. We propose refinements of the European QIs for the Asian-Pacific context, taking into account multiple factors identified in this study. Our findings provide crucial insights for future research and implementation of psychosocial dementia care QIs in this region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article introduces the feature collection titled Malaysia and China in a Changing Region: Essays in Honour of Professor Lee Poh Ping. As well as introducing the six articles in the collection, this article pays tribute to Professor Lee, who passed away in late 2016. The article links some of the key themes of Professor Lee's research and publications to the themes of the six articles, each of which is concerned with the rise of China and the various impacts this has for Malaysia's political economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article investigates the dynamics of the Chinese diaspora within the multiple layers of China–Malaysia relations by drawing on the five dimensions—‘ethnoscapes’, ‘mediascapes’, ‘technoscapes’, ‘financescapes’ and ‘ideoscapes’—advanced by the anthropologist Arjun Appadurai in his model of global cultural flow. Certainly, the different labels associated with the ethnic Chinese in Malaysia reflect how their identities vary over time, space and situation. In this article, two case studies—transnational education and second homes—are examined, as they involve contemporary China’s institutions as well as the Chinese diaspora, old and new. In both cases, it is clear that, while racial stereotypes still linger to some extent, economic factors are of increasing importance for all parties involved. This finding is substantiated when the diasporic relations are further considered from an historical perspective, in order to understand how China, Malaysia and the Chinese diaspora are presently positioned within the globalization era. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The article discusses various reports published within the issue, including one on the interplay of religion and ethnicity in Malaysia, and another on the intermarriage between the majority Han and ethnic minorities in China.

This article investigates the impact of real depreciation of ringgit/yuan on Malaysian bilateral trade with her largest trading partner, China, over the period of 1987 to 2013. Using disaggregated import and export data from 39 industries, the results from the bounds testing approach to co-integration and error-correction model reveal that the real bilateral exchange rate has short- and long-run effects in the majority of the industries. However, the short-run effects shift into the long run in nine out of 20 import industries and in 13 out of 20 export industries. Most of these are small industries producing intermediate goods. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Malaysia is the second largest producer of edible bird’s nest (EBN) in the world, but it has encountered problems when its main export market, China, imposed a ban on EBN products originating from the country. Edible bird’s nest products are products made of the hardened saliva secretions of swiftlet birds. Purchasing intention of edible bird’s nest products is a vital variable in determining customers’ purchasing behavior for these products. This research explores how attitude, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control can influence the buyer’s intention toward purchasing edible bird’s nest products. A total of 1,361 respondents were interviewed using a structured questionnaire from July to November 2012. Descriptive analysis, factor analysis, and multiple regression were used to analyze the data. Multiple regression analysis shows that attitude, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control are statistically significant predictors of consumer intention toward purchasing edible bird’s nest products. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We explored knowledge, attitudes, and practices associated with the menopause transition particular to women in the multi-ethnic cultural context of Singapore. Fifty-eight Chinese, Malay, and Indian Singaporean women participated in interviews that were audiorecorded, transcribed verbatim, and analyzed using thematic analysis. Women from all three ethnicities described an attitude of acceptance surrounding menopause and the changes associated with it. While they thought it was important to be informed, they did not seek out information about menopause and did not view health professionals as useful sources of information. Management practices were diverse and rarely involved accessing health professionals. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The article focuses on the nuclear safety in China as of July 2013 following the aftermath of the nuclear accident at Fukushima, Japan in 2011. Due to this nuclear accident, several countries including Germany, Switzerland and Italy abandoned their plans to extend their nuclear capacity but China is among the countries that will continue to build nuclear plants. The author states that China should exploit all usable possibilities to meet their growing electricity demand. As of the said date, there are eight East Asian countries, including Malaysia, South and North Korea and Thailand, who are having plans for civil nuclear energy.

We construct a structural system that jointly examines Purchasing Power and Interest Parity conditions for Malaysia–China during 1996Q1–2010Q4. Structural VARX, VECMX, over-identifying restrictions, bootstrapping and persistent profiles are utilized in the analyses. We find support for interaction between the goods and capital markets of Malaysia–China, when Asia crisis and sub-prime crisis are taken into accounts. The faster pace of adjustment towards price instead of interest equilibrium implies the non-appearance of sequencing problem in economic integration. Nevertheless, it is of concern that maintaining a rigid foreign exchange with major trading partner could be costly with potentially contagious price instability and financial risk. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The author examines the strategies adopted by governments in Asia to boost their national competitiveness. Information is presented on the regional education hub and transnational higher education (TNHE) projects of the governments of Malaysia, Singapore and Hong Kong, China. The development of TNHE in China is discussed. The author explains why Hong Kong is lagging behind Singapore and Malaysia in building an education hub.

With governments around the world needing to attract talented professionals, this exploratory, cross-cultural research analyzes career values of 384 MPA and MPP students at major universities in the capitals of China, Malaysia and the United States. Malayrians and Americans structured 23 goals along dimensions that contrasted sharply to those of the Chinese. Moreover, Malaysians and Americans cared more about self-actualization and less about co-worker comradeship than did the Chinese. All three groups prioritized elements of altruism and affluence. Segmentation analysis uncovered six distinct subgroups (Acheivers, Altruistic Analysts, Administrators, Altruistic Affluents, Acquiescents, and Apathetics) with their distributions varying by country. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous studies reach no consensus on the relationship between risk and return using data from one market. This study argues that the market factor should be noticed in assessing the risk-return relationship in a partially integrated emerging market. The analysis aims to provide new insight into the nature of the risk-return relationship by a conditional factor GARCH-M framework that controls for time-series effects, to investigate the banking sector in five Asian emerging markets of China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Malaysia and Taiwan during the period 1995 to 2004. Finally, the study provides evidence on these relations before and after the Asian financial crisis of 1997. The results are generally consistent across the markets and with expectations, and have implications for empirical assessments of the risk-return relationship and diversification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Under intensified pressures for improving the global competence of university graduates, national governments across different parts of the globe have to on the one hand expand higher education enrolments and on the other hand assure high quality in teaching and research in order to make sure their higher education systems can compete globally. Many Asian states have been in the forefront of this effort to improve national competitiveness by raising their higher education enrolment rate. As state financing and provision alone will not satisfy the growing demands for higher education, governments in Asia adopt more pro-competition policy instruments and increasingly look to the market/private sectors in running higher education. Therefore the private higher education sector has paid for much of the higher education sector expansion, leading to revolutionary changes and imparting a growing 'privateness' to Asian higher education systems. This article sets out in this wider socio-economic context to examine the rise of transnational higher education in three Asian societies: Hong Kong, Singapore and Malaysia. With particular reference to examining how the growing prominence of privateness in higher education has challenged the conventional education governance models, this article critically examines how these Asian states have reinvented their regulatory regimes to govern the growing complexity and highly contested public-private mix in higher education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Four new species of the genus Apsiphortica Okada, 1971 are described: A. longiciliata Cao and Chen, A. melanogaster Chen, and A. xui Chen, spp. nov. from southwest China, and A. multiclavata Chen and Toda, sp. nov. from Sabah in Malaysia. Supplementary descriptions are provided for two known species, A. holubi Máca, 2003 and A. lini (Okada, 1971), after examination of the holotype specimens. A key to all the species of the genus Apsiphortica is provided. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the factor of ethnicity in the positioning strategies of Southeast Asian Chinese entrepreneurs, in relation to the emergence of China as a land of economic potential. The small- and medium-scale entrepreneurs are focused instead of the mobile business conglomerates, where entrepreneurs in eastern Indonesia and southern Peninsula Malaysia are compared.

This article investigates whether Singapore can maintain its competitive advantage in manufacturing from a labour productivity perspective vis-àvis China and Malaysia, which are generally viewed as Singapore's competitors in manufacturing. We also investigate the extent to which China is closing the labour productivity gap with Singapore and Malaysia in technology-intensive segments of manufacturing. Our analysis reveals that China has the potential to develop a high labour-productivity and low-wage manufacturing sector. In terms of manufacturing labour productivity, China is moving towards convergence with Malaysia. Compared with Singapore, China's manufacturing labour productivity is still far behind, especially in key technology-intensive industries like electronics and chemicals, such that it is unlikely for China to catch up with Singapore within a decade. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An extension of the research on the day-of-the-week effect to the stock markets of Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong, Thailand and Taiwan is presented. These small-sized markets are still much neglected. We find that there is a day-of-the-week effect in all these markets except Taiwan. These four markets have negative mean returns on Monday or Tuesday and high positive returns on Friday. Further analysis with four subperiods of data reveals that the weekly seasonal patterns appear to be period specific. The US stock market has little contribution to the day-of-the-week effect in these four markets. Thin trading does not seem to have a significant impact on the day-of-the-week effect in the Singapore market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]