Search

Outlaw Motorcycle Gangs are receiving increased attention by academics around the world. However, the field is in need of global data on how, when, where and why clubs form before any generalised conclusions can be drawn. This paper begins this process by attempting to identify every club that has formed in the world by location and date. 18 months of searching online through websites and social media identified 5072 separate clubs, which were then grouped by region and date. This data shows different trends of club formation in different regions. The data shows Western Nations formed clubs much earlier than other regions, but that Scandinavia, South America and East Asia are continuing to form new clubs at an increasing rate. Despite the USA being the country of origin of the culture, it only has 18% of all clubs. This paper concludes with suggestions for future research questions illuminated by the data, that try to explain the popularity of the culture and the environmental circumstances that lead to club formation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the end of World War II, US alliances have been at the core of the regional orders in both East Asia and Western Europe. However, doubts about the US-hegemonic order have arisen due to great power competition and uncertainty about US leadership. This introductory paper sets out the research questions which the papers for this Special Issue address, and discusses key implications of their findings. It suggests the divergent worldviews held by the United States and its allies/partners could create political tensions between them, and also motivate US allies/partners to review the role of these alliances and partnerships within their individual state strategies. If an international order's quality rests on how stable, peaceful, and consensual it is, the choices and actions made by US allies and partners can significantly impact regional dynamics and order-building. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, I present a framework for GVC‐oriented industrial policy that merges the so‐called GVC perspective and the so‐called developmentalist perspective—the latter of which is a perspective that industrial policy is most often analysed through, but has been somewhat neglected by the GVC perspective. I argue that the GVC perspective too quickly dismisses the relevance of industrial policy in the East Asian development experience, particularly those in South Korea and Taiwan between roughly 1960 and 1990. By drawing on the industrialisation experiences of these two countries, my framework for industrial policy suggests that the GVC perspective's ideas for industrial policy would be strengthened by more clearly acknowledging the continued importance of three observations by the developmentalist perspective: (a) the need for governments in developing countries to bargain with foreign investors for the purpose of domestic industrialisation; (b) policy design should not only focus on increasing exports, but also focus on replacing some imports with domestic production; and (c) linking up to the value chains of transnational corporations based in high‐income countries can bring about some benefits, but ultimately, successful industrialisation necessitates a degree of competing with transnational corporations. State‐owned enterprises have historically played an important role in this respect. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal of Estonian & Finno-Ugric Linguistics / Eesti ja Soome-ugri Keeleteaduse Ajakiri is the property of University of Tartu Press and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Since the 1997 Asian financial crisis, bond market development has been one of the central pillars of financial cooperation in East Asia, with concerted efforts made by the East Asian economies to integrate regional bond markets. As a result, aggregate intra‐regional bond investment expanded from US$49.56 billion in 2003 to US$352.18 billion in 2017. This paper examines the pattern and determinants of intra‐regional bond investment in East Asia. We analyse regional foreign holdings of long‐term and short‐term bonds in eight East Asian economies. Bond market size turns out to be the main concern of regional foreign investors participating in East Asian long‐term bond markets. This analysis also highlights the importance of bond issuance and bond yield volatility in attracting regional foreign short‐term bond investment. Therefore, initiatives to improve regional bond market development may be crucial to stimulating intra‐regional bond investment and in turn enhance East Asian financial stability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One of the most globally serious in the recent decades is the reshaping, even reversing, of the basic directions of people's imagination of the future, which were mainly established within the intellectual frame of historic progress and strongly motivated by the real social struggles from the late nineteenth century to the 1980s, saying, which have seemingly proved the progress. The most important of the social functions of this reshaping/reversing is to make people including the youth more poor-spirited, nearsighted, self-centred and conservative. Is the judgment outlined above tenable? Is there something very different, which shows the bright side of today's public imagination of the future? How is the complexity and diversity of the imagination in the different areas as well as in the different cultural and social positions of a same society? And more important, how is the situation of the youth in thinking and imaging the future when it's still commonly today to think the youth as a symbol of the future? ... The questions are too big perhaps and the answers will certainly diverse, especially when looking into various social activities to trace the imagination. People always need positive imagination of the future when walking forward, and they are not only shaped by the current but also directed by the past, that's why it's worthy to develop the careful contrast of how people imagine the future today with how they did it before. Urged by what said above, seven authors, from Seoul, Tokyo, HK, Shanghai and Guangzhou, have worked with us to make a collection aiming at the imagination of future in East Asia. The collection composed by two parts: the first has five papers focusing on the current situations of the imagination of the future in different social contexts, and the other has two ones introducing very interesting historical cases of how the 'Chinese revolution' was seen from perspectives out of the mainland China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we explore the possible policy responses to the COVID‐19 pandemic shock as well as the related economic (financial crisis) shocks on trade and global value chains (GVC) in East Asia. We find that regional policy coordination is critical to mitigate and isolate the pandemic shock. It is important to identify the pandemic events early to flatten the pandemic curve at the national and regional level. This supports a recent study by the World Bank (2020), which highlights the importance of early mitigation policies during the pandemic shock. The cost of the pandemic and economic shocks will increase significantly when several countries in the region experience the pandemic shock concurrently. In this case, flattening the regional pandemic curve becomes important. The results also indicate the need for greater coordination in East Asia to mitigate the pending economic shock in terms of unemployment, corporate bankruptcy and financial market fragility. The paper also highlights that the stability of the GVC network is critical during the pandemic in terms of hedging the risk of disruptions to the procurement of critical medical and health products as well as maintaining service linkages to manufacturing, such as the logistics sector. Regional policy coordination and the stability of GVC will be valuable in the post‐pandemic recovery of the region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

East Asia (here consisting of China, Japan, North and South Korea, and the ten states of the ASEAN) is increasingly being considered as a region which is a potential crucible for conflict. Even the most optimistic authors recognise that there is the potential for security tensions to develop into more comprehensive kinetic actions. In the context of the growing trade tensions between China and the United States, which is drawing in other regional actors, the potential for economic interdependence to mitigate these tensions is reducing. Despite the context in this region we do, however, see evidence of cooperation and coordination emerging within the arena of (so-called) non-traditional security challenges. These papers explore different aspects of the cooperation that we see, and collectively they present the conditions under which there are positive cooperation outcomes in the areas of humanitarian assistance (HA) and disaster relief (DR) and/or peacekeeping operations (PKO). Collectively, they identify that mid-range theories have great explanatory power in exploring and researching this region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this paper is to improve service quality of international freight forwarders and explore practical business solutions to enhance customer service level. Freight forwarder usually acts as an agent to source logistics service for shipper and work closely with carriers such as shipping line and airline companies. This business is characterized by lower capital investment and entry barrier comparing with carriers, and most of their major customers are small or medium size manufactures or traders. Providing high quality service to enhance customer satisfaction is the key mission since competition is extremely severe. This paper empirically investigates the leading freight forwarders to find important customer requirements in East Asian region such as Japan, Korea and Taiwan. Furthermore, the feature of the study by using quality function deployment approach would not only identify key technical measures but also explore meaningful business solutions as direction of quality improvement. The finding reveals key customer requirements are cheaper agency fees, door to door ability and instant response, and the key technical measures are customer relationship management, overall information system, service point and network. We would further discuss the empirical result and conclude managerial meaning for decision makers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scholars generally agree that regionalization and regionalism are different phenomena; however, unresolved arguments remain as to whether there is a causal relationship between the two. In particular, whether or not regionalization promotes regionalism is a subject of debate. This paper aims to comprehensively clarify and explain the relationship between regionalization as embodied in trade and foreign direct investment (FDI) and regionalism as characterized by preferential trade agreements (PTAs) using event history analyses of East Asian economic data from 1985 to 2018. The paper concludes that although a positive and significant relationship exists between FDI and some types of PTAs, trade has no relationship with the latter. This conclusion challenges extant literature, which has argued that an increase in PTAs in East Asia (the outcome of regionalism) is the consequence of economic interdependence (regionalization). Moreover, these findings indicate that political factors such as territorial disputes and joint democracy negatively affect certain types of PTAs. This result is contrary to the conventional wisdom that predicts increased cooperation and lower tariffs between democracies and therefore suggests further investigations of the determinants of PTAs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Risk, Hazards & Crisis in Public Policy is the property of Wiley-Blackwell and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This paper examines the rise of anti-Korean sentiment in contemporary Taiwan particularly at the turn of the 2010s. It moves beyond conceptualizing emotion as psychological status to conceive anti-Korean sentiment as a cultural text that debunks the complexity of emotion as an active agent of collective (un)consciousness. Specifically, the paper considers anti-Korean sentiment in Taiwan as an affective space where young Taiwanese demonstrate their active engagement in (re)locating Taiwan in the global imaginative map and their struggle for national identity in the midst of increasing geopolitical tensions in East Asia. Instead of seeing anti-Korean sentiment from an international relations perspective, this paper studies anti-Korean sentiment from a bottom-up perspective through in-depth interviews with young Taiwanese who are actively engaging with anti-Korean discussions and explore various ways that anti-Korean sentiment mediates and transforms imaginative relations between Taiwan and Korea and beyond. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examine potential slowdown growth in international production networks in East Asia. Topics discussed include comprehensive analysis of trade patterns using data disaggregation; decline in trade in primary goods and sluggish growth of trade in chemicals and resource based producers as the cause of slow growth of international trade; and incorporation of the price-lowering effect of global production sharing in the analysis of balance of trade.

Since the 1980s, East Asian regions have gradually grown into the biggest importers and producers of animal products in the world. Among them, Taiwan has become the world's biggest pork exporter since 1990 but the export market suddenly crashed owing to the outbreak of Foot and Mouth Disease in 1997. Since then, biosecurity has been increasingly deemed necessary to manage animal lives. While food regime theory has been steadily employed by critical scholars to examine this rapid 'meatification' process in East Asia, it has suffered from 'inclusionary bias', paying less attention to the consequences of market failure. Informed by social studies of economisation and marketisation and work on multispecies, I contend that the studies of global agri-food production need to be more attentive to the issue of disarticulations: the 'dark sides' of network incorporation. With a specific focus on the Taiwanese pork sector after 1997, this paper argues that 'politics of domestication' emerged as markets broke down. I outline three characteristics which have shaped the politics of domestication: disentanglement, marginalisation, and co-becoming. While biosecurity seeks to manage life by separating hog bodies from other species, this paper points out that this enclosure strategy is always subject to threats from within. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Postponement of first births is a key cause of declining fertility rates, especially in East Asia where recovery from delayed childbearing has been weak. This paper investigates achievement of ideal ages at marriage and first birth in Singapore using survey data on 657 married women aged 25–34. Almost 50 per cent marry within one year of their ideal age, but less than 30 per cent have their first child within six months of their ideal interval to first birth, with around 50 per cent waiting longer than ideal. The high proportion of women experiencing a longer-than-ideal first birth interval was observed across all age and educational groups. Regression results show that co-residence with a foreign domestic worker and paid leave entitlements are associated with higher probability of achieving their ideal first birth interval, whereas availability of parents/in-laws, husband's help and unpaid leave do not reduce time to childbearing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the relationship between workforce competence, migration, and quality improvement in the Asia-Pacific through analysis of Early Childhood Education (ECE) policy texts from three East Asia Summit countries. Content (word level) analysis of salient policy texts was undertaken to address two questions: How are culture and diversity conceptualized in these texts? How are diverse educators positioned in these texts? We show that, despite differing historical trajectories of ECE, policy frameworks in all three countries fail to sufficiently acknowledge the potential contribution of migrant educators to quality improvement initiatives. We conclude by calling for greater attention to workforce mobility and diversity in ECE policies, and for further research into the untapped competence of migrant educators. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Societal Impact Statement Summary The discovery of a new genus within the family Thismiaceae, known as fairy lanterns, marks a significant scientific milestone in Japan, a country renowned for its botanical research. The unearthing of a new genus, especially in a well‐documented flora like Japan, is both rare and monumental. Unlike other fairy lanterns that bloom under leaf litter and can be easily overlooked, the new genus and species, Relictithismia kimotsukiensis, often does not even emerge above the surface of the soil when flowering. This captivating characteristic not only enriches our knowledge of botanical diversity but also emphasizes the importance of preserving natural habitats that harbor such rare species.The family Thismiaceae, known as “fairy lanterns”, is distinguished by its urn‐ or bell‐shaped, glasswork‐like flowers with basally fused tepals and its dependence on specific fungi for carbon. A new genus and species, Relictithismia kimotsukiensis, has been discovered in southern Japan. This species is notable for its unique anther‐stigma contact, hitherto unreported in the other Thismiaceae. Unlike typical fairy lanterns that bloom just above the leaf litter, Relictithismia often flowers beneath it. The underground habit is potentially associated with self‐pollination. The discovery of Relictithismia enhances our understanding of evolutionary pathways within the Thismiaceae, as it possesses characteristics previously thought to be unique to Thismia (the annulus with drooping stamens) as well as traits found in other genera (free stamens without expanded connectives). This paper reviews the morphology, ecology, and evolutionary history of Relictithismia, offering insights into the peculiarities of these enigmatic plants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A strong cooling event refers to a sharp change in the average temperature over a short period. The rapid change of temperature has important effect on human health and is highly concerned recent years. Based on the observed temperature data set from stations in Southwest China (SWC) from 1979 to 2017, this paper analyses the characteristics of the strong cooling event (SCE). The result shows that SCE occurs with the highest frequency during the time from February to May. Among them, the frequency of SCE in February exhibits an abrupt change before and after 2005 with a significant increase. Further study reveals that the change of SCE frequency in February is associated with the large‐scale background circulation patterns. After 2005, there is a cyclonic circulation anomaly in Northeast Asia and an anticyclonic circulation anomaly in the Tibet Plateau (TP). This pattern provides a favourable condition for the southward movement of cold air mass, thereby increasing the frequency of SCE in SWC. Furthermore, it is revealed that there is a strong correlation between the variation of SCE frequency in February and sea surface temperatures (SST) in the Northwest Pacific in January before 2005. The cold SST anomaly could favour the occurrence of extreme TD events in SWC through vertical circulation. After 2005, the correlation between SCE and Northwest Pacific SST is not significant. The sea ice in the northern Barents Sea and Kara Sea becomes the dominant impact factor. The abnormally low sea ice concentration is conducive to strengthen the meridional circulation over East Asia, leading to an increasing frequency of SCE in SWC. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article explores the importance of developing decarbonization technology in East Asia to address energy security and environmental concerns. It discusses the current energy crisis caused by conflicts and climate change and emphasizes the need for decarbonization in the region. The article provides examples of developed decarbonization technologies in Japan, China, South Korea, and Taiwan, with a focus on hydrogen development. It discusses the progress and challenges of decarbonization efforts in these countries, highlighting the need for collaboration and application of decarbonization technologies. The article suggests that these nations should work together to achieve decarbonized industrialization and proposes the creation of an East Asia Decarbonization Community to strengthen alliances and promote trade in decarbonized industries. [Extracted from the article]

This paper aims to contribute to global social theory by contextualizing modernity/coloniality in East Asia. It begins with a reconstruction and evaluation of three sociological accounts of East Asian modernity, namely Kazuko Tsurumi's theory of endogenous development, Sun Liping's theory of communist civilization, and Chang Kyung Sup's theory of compressed modernity. Despite their insights, these theorists fail to transcend the Eurocentrism and methodological nationalism implicit in the paradigm of latecomer modernization. These problems can be better addressed by anti‐colonial perspectives, including Tani Barlow's colonial modernity, Chen Kuan‐Hsing's inter‐Asia, Xie Lizhong's post‐Western sociology, and Wang Mingming's civilizational anthropology. Yet European hegemony continues to define the spatiotemporal frame of these perspectives. To overcome the lingering problem of Eurocentrism, Laura Doyle's notion of inter‐imperiality is employed to highlight the power‐laden interaction and interdependence among imperial powers in the global and regional history of East Asia. This alternative approach, I argue, can shed new light on East Asian modernity and delineate its dialectical formation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gifts are important instruments for forming bonds in interpersonal relationships. Our study analyzes the phenomenon of gift contagion in online groups. Gift contagion encourages social bonds by prompting further gifts; it may also promote group interaction and solidarity. Using data on 36 million online red packet gifts on a large social site in East Asia, we leverage a natural experimental design to identify the social contagion of gift giving in online groups. Our natural experiment is enabled by the randomization of the gift amount allocation algorithm on the platform, which addresses the common challenge of causal identification in observational data. Our study provides evidence of gift contagion: On average, receiving one additional dollar causes a recipient to send 18 cents back to the group within the subsequent 24 hours. Decomposing this effect, we find that it is mainly driven by the extensive margin: more recipients are triggered to send red packets. Moreover, we find that this effect is stronger for "luckiest draw" recipients, suggesting the presence of a group norm regarding the next red packet sender. Finally, we investigate the moderating effects of group- and individual-level social network characteristics on gift contagion as well as the causal impact of receiving gifts on group network structure. Our study has implications for promoting group dynamics and designing marketing strategies for product adoption. This paper was accepted by Axel Ockenfels, behavioral economics and decision analysis. Funding: T. Liu was supported by Natural Science Foundation of China [Grant 72222005] and Tsinghua University [Grant 2022Z04W01032]. J. Tang was supported by Natural Science Foundation of China for Distinguished Young Scholar [Grant 61825602]. Supplemental Material: The data files and online appendices are available at https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.2023.4906. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Studii de Ştiintă şi Cultură is the property of Studii de Stiinta si Cultura and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Northeast China played an irreplaceable role in population migrations and cultural exchanges in East Asia during the Paleolithic. This paper collected 182 archaeological sites to analyse the characteristics of spatial-temporal variations of Paleolithic human activities in Northeast China, and explored the driving mechanisms behind these variations in combination with the paleoenvironmental and archaeological studies. During the Lower Paleolithic, constrained by the relatively cold-dry climate and blocked by the Songnen paleo-lake basin, the population was sparse and distributed only near 40° N at the southern end of Northeast China. Upon entering the Middle Paleolithic, as humans developed greater tolerance to cold climates and adopted more sophisticated survival strategies with the application of small lithic tools, their numbers increased and geographical distribution expanded northward to 45° N at the central region of Northeast China. The Upper Paleolithic saw a considerable increase in population and expansion across almost all of Northeast China except for the eastern Inner Mongolia Plateau. We speculated that 50 ka and 30 ka BP were two key points, both of which may be associated with a significant increase in the frequency of migrations and communications among humans, and the widespread popularity of highly mobile microblade technology, respectively. In addition, the environmental analysis of archaeological sites revealed a continuous spread of Paleolithic humans to areas with higher elevations, steeper slopes, and lower temperatures. Meanwhile, they were becoming less reliant on water resources and were more widely conducting activities in open-air areas, showing that the environmental adaptability had been continuously improving over time. This study can provide a reference for the reconstruction of the migration history of early humans in East Asia, and is also of great significance for a comprehensive understanding of the evolutionary process of early human-environment interactions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper focuses on three Far East cabinets that have ended up in Sweden for various reasons and on various routes. Some specific characteristics have been analysed using various scientific methods: sectional microscopy, wood taxonomy, X–ray fluorescence microscopy, pyrolysis-gas chromatography-mass spectrometry, strontium isotope ratio measurement, and radiocarbon dating. The results show that the cabinets contain wood from species endemic to Japan, namely asunaro (Thujopsis dolabrata) and hinoki (Chamaecyparis obtuse). They are coated with urushi sap derived from Toxicodendron vernicifluum trees, in two cases confirmed to be harvested in China, and one case probably blended with sap exuded from Toxicodendron succedanea harvested in North Vietnam. Their black appearance is due to a soot pigment typical of many products from the early Edo period or older. The data obtained with scientific methods, unavailable in the past, improve knowledge about these cabinets. Such new information should be made available to scholars and the general public. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The onset of the South China Sea summer monsoon (SCSSM) implies the transition of East Asian monsoon circulation from winter to summer, which affects not only the local weather and climate near the South China Sea (SCS) but also other regions through remote teleconnection. In this paper, the interdecadal variability characteristics of the SCSSM onset are analyzed by using various datasets as well as its possible mechanisms. The results show that there is a significant interdecadal delay in the onset date of the SCSSM after 2010. The onset is early around May 13th during 1994–2009. However, the onset is significantly later during 2010–2020 with an average of May 30th. Besides, the air and ocean conditions in SCS in May also took a significant decadal shift around 2010 and manifested itself in atmospheric forcing on the ocean, thus the SCSSM onset is mainly remotely influenced by the tropical Ocean instead of local SST. It is found that the interdecadal variation of the SCSSM onset is mainly caused by the decadal warming/cooling of the tropical central Pacific SST. The SCSSM onset's relationship with the tropical central Pacific SST seems more binding and stable relative to that with the tropical eastern Pacific SST. Their correlation is stable and still reaches the significant test in recent years. Therefore, the warming of the tropical central Pacific SST during 2010–2020 tends to postpone the SCSSM onset by means of related anomalous anticyclones and weakened activity of low-frequency Oscillation and tropical cyclones. On the contrary, its cooling led to early SCSSM onset during 1994–2009. Therefore, more and special attention should be paid to the tropical central Pacific SST anomaly, it will help us to monitor and predict the SCSSM onset effectively, and improve the seasonal prediction of East Asia summer monsoon greatly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Glasnik Zastite Bilja is the property of Zadruzna Stampa D.D. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

How do Taiwanese officials view democracy and culture and how do they plan to utilise these two soft power resources as part of advancing the island's international position? Based primarily on interviews conducted with state officials in Taiwan, this paper analyses Taiwan's soft power repositioning in the regional and global soft power competition and examines its advantages and disadvantages. It discusses the institutional and geopolitical constraints Taiwan faces when trying to implement its soft power policy and addresses the internal disagreements over utilising its cultural and democratic achievements. It concludes that despite the utility of soft power in pursuing its foreign policy agenda, Taiwan faces a few major institutional and conceptual obstacles, keeping Taiwanese diplomacy in a transitional period from old thinking about culture and diplomacy while hesitantly evaluating its soft power resources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim. The aim of the article is to understand how Chinese parents draw on their learning beliefs and experiences within the Chinese educational context to make decisions about their children's overseas education, as well as analysing how their learning beliefs are similar or different from East Asian or Western learning beliefs. Methods. The study is based on more than 100 in-depth separate interviews with 22 Chinese families conducted over serval years between 2016 and 2019. Based on interpretative phenomenological analysis and discourse analysis, the results are coded according to the theory of values proposed by Clyde Kluckhohn (1951). These learning values are further coded according to whether they are reflective of the American learning model (EALM), Confucian learning model (CLM), and Confucian learning philosophies. Results. The analysis shows that Chinese parents have displayed similar learning beliefs in socialising their children in the family domain, in their disapproval of the Chinese education system, and in their pursuit of a Western overseas education. The Chinese families' pursuit of a Western education for their children are driven by their cultural leaning beliefs, which are rooted in Confucian heritage culture, and which also echo European American heritage cultures. Conclusion. Many researchers tend to emphasise cultural differences in learning, particularly between Confucian heritage and European American heritage cultures. This paper shows the possibilities of cultural learning values shaping educational choices, expands upon the understanding of Confucian heritage culture, and suggests the similarities between the learning cultures of East Asia and the West. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Concerns of equity with respect to the community college model in East Asia persist in educational research. In this study, we described and analysed students' "lived experience" in community colleges in Hong Kong in terms of the "warming up" or "cooling out" of their educational desire. Semistructured interviews with 14 graduates of community colleges in Hong Kong were conducted to determine how their experiences at community colleges affected their educational expectations and the extent to which community colleges help students reconsider their educational disadvantages in a competitive, meritocratic and massified higher education system. The qualitative interview data were inductively thematised into four aspects of college experience in relation to their educational expectations. The data revealed that Hong Kong's community colleges help some students develop their capabilities and change their educational expectations through democratic admissions, liberal pedagogic environments, learner-centred formative assessment and student services for strategic university articulation. Rather than cooling-out students' educational desire (characterised by gradual disengagement, objective denial, alternative achievement), community colleges in Hong Kong provide a second chance for failing and disadvantaged students to pursue a university education, but this warming-up function applies only to students who benefitted from the liberal mode of assessment and discovered and developed their academic capabilities in their college experience. The paper ends with a critical analysis of the problem of such warming up of educational desire and the extent to which community colleges can empower disadvantaged students for a good life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Urban Studies (Sage Publications, Ltd.) is the property of Sage Publications, Ltd. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

An analysis is made of the variability of the acidity index of precipitation and fluxes of wet sulfur and nitrogen deposition on the territory of the Far Eastern Federal District of the Russian Federation (FEFD). The analysis uses data of Roshydromet (Hydrometeorological Service of Russia). It is found that alkaline precipitation is characteristic for most of the FEFD (Yakutia and Transbaikalia). However, an increase in the acidity of precipitation is observed in the southeast of the region during the period under consideration. The average annual pH values of precipitation in Primorskii krai dropped below 5.6 in the first decade of the 21st century to reach 4.6–4.7 in particular years at some of the monitoring stations. It is pointed out that the ever-increasing use of nitrogen fertilizers in East Asian countries leads to an increase in the flux of atmospheric nitrogen deposition, which negatively affects forest vegetation. The annual flux of wet deposition at the EANET Primorskaya international monitoring station between 2006 and 2015 was 6.37 kg/ha per year for S deposition and 6.3 kg/ha per year for N (nitrate + ammonium). Similar values were obtained by averaging data from all stations in Primorskii krai. In 2018, this flux exceeded a critical value of 10 kg/ha per year. The Ternei monitoring station located in the Sikhote-Alin Biosphere Reserve observed twice as few nitrogen fluxes as that at the Primorskaya station, but an order of magnitude higher than the values recorded in the western part of FEFD. The determining factor for an increase in the acidity of precipitation and for the high levels of nitrogen depositions in the south-east of FEFD is the transboundary atmospheric transport of pollutants from the centers of anthropogenic emissions in East Asia. The analysis of data made in this paper is in agreement with reports of Roshydromet on the state and pollution of the environment of the Russian Federation and supplements and details them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The geological and hydrogeological conditions of 19 occurrences of thermal waters in the southern Russian Far East are considered in this paper. Radon concentrations were measured in waters, and uranium and thorium concentrations were determined in host rocks and secondary minerals. The results were compared with the chemical composition of waters and gases in the mineral springs. It is established that water-bearing rocks are classified into rocks of low and normal radioactivity. The contents of uranium (<0.56 μg/L) and thorium (<0.1 μg/L) in the waters are low. Measurements of radon concentrations in mineral water springs in Primorye indicate that most of them are weakly radioactive (0.2–1.5 kBq/L), whereas two are moderately radioactive (1.5–7.5 kBq/L). From a medical-balneological point of view, waters in 7 of 19 springs were defined as radon waters, with 4 of them classified as nitrogen thermal water and 3 as CO2-rich mineral waters. The CO2-rich mineral waters of the Shetukha Group exhibit the highest level of radioactivity. Such natural objects reflect the state of the geological environment and can be utilized both for medical purposes and for monitoring a wide range of hydrogeochemical parameters. Based on the analysis of geological conditions and geochemical features of thermal water occurrences, the factors that determine the radioactivity level were identified and general schemes for the radon transport to the surface in different geological and hydrogeological conditions were proposed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Measuring the plasma motion vector field accurately is beneficial to understanding the physical processes in the ionosphere. As a newly built advanced modular phase array Incoherent Scatter Radar in Sanya (SYISR), SYISR can measure the line‐of‐sight (LOS) velocity of ion drift in multiple directions, potentially yielding the spatial distribution of ionospheric plasma drift at low latitudes in East Asia. Compared to the traditional ISR, it can operate continuously for a long‐time and perform with fast and flexible scanning. This paper evaluates different beam configurations and inversion methods for vector ion velocity detection by comparing the vector ion velocities input in the forward modeling and derived by inversion. For the mono‐static SYISR, the all‐sky scan mode is suitable for observing the distribution of vector ion velocity with height, and the fine scan mode is suitable for observing the spatial distribution of two components of vector ion drift perpendicular to the magnetic field in the northern region of SYISR's non‐grating lobe. For the future tri‐static SYISR, it could simultaneously observe the spatial distribution of all three components of the vector ion velocity. Besides, the inversion method based on Bayesian estimation shows good accuracy and stability in deriving the vector ion velocity, especially when the LOS ion velocity has a large error. These results will benefit the design and optimization of the actual experiments for the vector ion velocity measurement and inversion using the SYISR system. Key Points: A procedure is constructed to guide and evaluate the detection of the vector ion velocity by the Incoherent Scatter Radar in Sanya (SYISR) systemThe ion velocity inversion method based on Bayesian estimation shows good accuracy and stability in deriving the vector ion velocityMono‐static and tri‐static SYISR can be used to detect the height profile of vector ion velocity and spatial distribution, respectively [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents the latest analyses and integrates results of many past studies on the spatial and temporal variations of the annual frequency and intensity of tropical cyclones (TCs) making landfall along different areas of the East Asian (EA) coast. Future projections of such variations based on the past investigations are also presented. No statistically significant trend in the number of landfalling TCs could be identified in most of the EA coastal regions, except for an increasing one in Vietnam and a decreasing one in South China. Multi-decadal as well as interannual variations in the frequency of landfalling TCs are prevalent in almost all the EA coastal regions. Only TCs making landfall in Vietnam and the Korean Peninsula showed an increase in landfall intensity, with no trend in the other regions. Nevertheless, more intense landfalling TCs were evident in most regions during the past two decades. Multidecadal variations were not observed in some regions although interannual variations remained large. Various oscillations in the atmospheric circulation and the ocean conditions can largely explain the observed changes in the frequency and intensity of landfalling TCs in different regions of the EA coast. In the future, most climate models project a decrease in the number of TCs making landfall but an increase in the intensity of these TCs in all the EA coastal regions, especially for the most intense ones. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on the author's fieldwork in China and Japan, literature research and the study of specimen materials and video data on weddings of ROK, Japan and China, which are collected by the Japan National Museum of Ethnology (or Minpaku), this paper attempts to explore the cultural symbolic significance that humans bestow on food, and to further reveal the cultural diversity in East Asia and the common structure of human mind by comparing the flow of food and the ways and scopes in which the wedding foods are consumed in East Asia. In East Asia wedding customs, expectations through food for the bride's fertility and her belonging to her husband's patrilineal family are very common. However, the food and eating behaviors that express expectations for the groom are rare, only slightly visible in the dry bonito at the time of engagement in Japan and the 12 bowls of rice that the groom will eat on the day of the Yao wedding in China. Dried bonito signifies virility and victory of men, reflecting the features of Japanese maritime culture and the influence of samurai culture in history. East Asian wedding rituals are diverse in form, but the commonality among them can also be seen, that is, human beings find cultural meanings in different natural environments that correspond to human society, and then internalize the natural attributes through homophonic pun, imitation and other ways. Food is used in weddings to express people's best wishes for the happiness of the newlyweds' families, to have descendants and longevity of their marriage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The massive explosive eruption of the Hunga volcano on 15 January 2022 generated atmospheric waves that were recorded around the globe and affected the ionosphere. The paper focuses on observations of atmospheric waves in the troposphere and ionosphere in Europe, however, a comparison with observations in East Asia, South Africa and South America is also provided. Unlike most recent studies of waves in the ionosphere based on the detection of changes in the total electron content, this study builds on detection of ionospheric motions at specific altitudes using continuous Doppler sounding. In addition, much attention is paid to long-period infrasound (periods longer than ∼50 s), which in Europe is observed simultaneously in the troposphere and ionosphere about an hour after the arrival of the first horizontally propagating pressure pulse (Lamb wave). It is shown that the long-period infrasound propagated approximately along the shorter great circle path, similar to the previously detected pressure pulse in the troposphere. It is suggested that the infrasound propagated in the ionosphere probably due to imperfect refraction in the lower thermosphere. The observation of infrasound in the ionosphere at such large distances from the source (over 16 000 km) is rare and differs from ionospheric infrasound detected at large distances from the epicenters of strong earthquakes, because in the latter case the infrasound is generated locally by seismic waves. An unusually large traveling ionospheric disturbance (TID) observed in Europe and associated with the pressure pulse from the Hunga eruption is also discussed. Doppler sounders in East Asia, South Africa and South America did not record such a significant TID. However, TIDs were observed in East Asia around times when Lamb waves passed the magnetically conjugate points. A probable observation of wave in the mesopause region in Europe approximately 25 min after the arrival of pressure pulse in the troposphere using a 23.4 kHz signal from a transmitter 557 km away and a coincident pulse in electric field data are also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We review the status of the distinctive ichnogenus Minisauripus based on more than 80 well-preserved tracks comprising a minimum of 50 trackways from two localities in China and five in Korea. The tracks, attributed to theropod dinosaurs, have been assigned to two ichnospecies, M. chuanzhuensis and M. zhenshounani, based on Chinese specimens. Until recently, the known range of foot lengths was 1.5–6.0 cm, indicating a diminutive track-making species. However, newly discovered Minisauripus tracks from the Haman Formation in the Changseon region of Korea are as short as 1.0 cm. Most remarkably, a few, provisionally also labeled cf. Minisauripus, are reported as large as 16–20 cm, potentially adding unprecedented new data to the previous record. The larger tracks suggest that all the small tracks pertain to juveniles and not a small, distinct species as previously inferred. Tracks with foot lengths of only ∼1 cm suggest that individuals hatched from very small eggs. The fact that such tracks are abundant in fine-grained, lake-margin facies argues for the importance of suitable preservational conditions in recording the activity of small trackmakers. Thus, inferences about dinosaur population structure, growth rates, and other biological and ecological phenomena, based on the absence of small dinosaur tracks, should be made with caution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction Asia Pacific has more than 20 countries which are different in terms of size, population, gross domestic product (GDP), and technological development. This paper highlights certain common obstacles faced by the workers' compensation and occupational rehabilitation systems in the region. Methods A review was conducted of the 9 papers contained in this supplementary issue of the Journal of Occupational Rehabilitation. Important items discussed in each paper were extracted and collated. The suggestions for the way forward are also summarized. Results In general, there is an obvious mismatch between the current theoretical and service models in occupational rehabilitation and the provision of the workers' compensation systems in the majority of Asia Pacific countries. Legislation and policy awareness of stakeholders, and coordination and synergy of services, in addition to competence building of professionals, were the common obstacles identified. Conclusion The Asia Pacific countries could fill the policy-and-service gaps by using available knowledge on occupational rehabilitation and return to work. Any effective model and services should be culturally relevant to be responsive to healthcare services, employers and the health and work needs of injured workers in Asia Pacific countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Inspired by Japanese faith groups, organic food production has witnessed surprising growth in East Asian countries, such as Japan, Taiwan, and South Korea, over the past two decades. The rapid expansion of East Asian trans‐national organic food production networks is closely linked with religious practices and beliefs, such as ahimsa (non‐killing). The complexities of transnational organic production networks in East Asia cannot be adequately captured by the existing literature on "conventionalisation of organic agriculture," which repeatedly debates the extent to which capitalism intrudes on the social and biophysical dimensions of farming. I argue that this simplified and binary debate tends to treat the organic market as an unquestioned, stabilised, and universalised artefact. Less attention has been paid to questions such as, how do alternative food markets come into being, stabilise or get crushed? Inspired by the social studies of economisation and marketisation (SSEM) approach, this paper urges scholars to move beyond the conventionalisation debate and draws attention to the organic food market‐making practices. Taking inspiration from SSEM thinking, I propose that more emphasis needs to be placed on the performation struggles, which refers to the confrontations between different economic programmes and actors. By drawing attention to the organic market performation struggles in Japan and Taiwan, this paper argues that organic food market‐making is a global heterogeneous assemblage, in which all human and non‐human actants across multi‐scalar geographies, such as trans‐local religious/scientific knowledge, believers, and so on, can contribute to the making and remaking of markets. With reference to qualitative interviews with organic distributors and practitioners, this paper deepens the knowledge of the geographies of marketisation in a global‐relational context. The rapid expansion of East Asian transnational organic food production networks is closely linked with religious practices and beliefs, such as ahimsa (non‐killing). The complexities of transnational organic production networks in East Asia cannot be adequately captured by the existing literature on "conventionalisation of organic agriculture," which repeatedly debates the extent to which capitalism intrudes on the social and biophysical dimensions of farming. Inspired by the social studies of economisation and marketisation (SSEM) approach, this paper urges scholars to move beyond the conventionalisation debate and draws attention to the organic food market‐making practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Republic of Korea (ROK) is one of the non-major powers most closely interested in the nature of the hierarchical security order in East Asia and its transition, but little academic attention has been drawn to examining its diplomatic positions or policy directions as it responds to and shapes the regional security order. Drawing on realist insights into order transition and their implications for security relations between major and non-major powers, this paper examines the nature of the security order in East Asia and critically discusses how the ROK's approach to order management has been of only limited success in addressing the structural risks growing out of the changing natures of the regional order. It also discusses the collective order management of its Southeast Asian neighbors as a comparable case that tackles similar risks differently. The paper concludes with a discussion of how a stronger partnership with Southeast Asia could complement the limitations of the ROK's approach to regional security order management, particularly in this time of a rapid transition to a bipolar East Asia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The current paper first time describes a small Beremendia from the late Pleistocene deposits in the Koridornaya Cave locality (Russian Far East), which associated with the extinct Beremendia minor. The paper is the first attempt to use a comparative analytical method to evaluate a possible case of redeposition of fossil remains of this shrew. In this case, the 'comparative' part of the method corresponds to the 'faunistic approach' of Jelle Reumer, and the 'analytical' part of the method corresponds to his extended 'morphological approach. ' The analytic method uses morphospace size estimation (MSE) based on principal component analysis and estimation of the variance to evaluate redeposition of Beremendia minor from the late Pleistocene deposits in the Koridornaya Cave. This result allows us to suggest the significant environmental contribution to the East Asian beremendiin extinction, such as climatic fluctuation, landscape changes and shrew community changes between the late Pliocene and early Pleistocene. We discuss the last remains of East Asian Beremendia (Peisorex) described from the Chinese early Pleistocene localities (Chiachiashan, Haimao, Renzidong) and the last remains of Lunanosorex described from the Chinese late Pliocene localities (Qipanshan Hill and Houxushan Hill). MSE was performed for soricine tribes with the 'elongated' condylar process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cold surge (CS) is considered a favorable weather process to improve air quality and is widely recognized. However, there is no detailed study on the differences in the dispersion ability of different types of CSs in relation to haze days in eastern China (HD EC). This paper uses the hierarchical clustering algorithm to classify the cool-season (November to February of the following year) CSs across eastern China into blocking CSs and wave-train CSs and compares their influences on the number of HD EC from 1980 to 2017. Results show that the wave-train CSs can significantly improve the visibility in eastern China and generally improve air quality for about 2 d longer than the blocking CSs, which indicates that the blocking CSs have a weaker ability to dissipate HD EC compared with the wave-train CSs. The CSs affect the HD EC by changing meteorological elements like thermal inversion potential, horizontal surface wind, sea level pressure (SLP), and surface air temperature (SAT). A period of 4 d after the outbreak of CSs, the variations of thermal inversion potential and horizontal surface wind of two types of CSs tend to be consistent. However, the negative SAT anomalies and the positive SLP anomalies caused by the blocking CSs lasted shorter than those caused by the wave-train CSs, forming favorable conditions for the rapid growth of HD EC. Furthermore, results show that in recent years, especially after the 1990s, the frequency of wave-train CSs has decreased significantly, while the frequency of blocking CSs has slightly increased, indicating that the overall ability of CSs to dissipate HD EC has weakened in general. This work may provide reference for the future formulation of haze control policies in East Asia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

By developing an elementary theory of power transmission by HVDC submarine cable this paper quantifies the material, thermal and mechanical requirements for long-distance energy transmission by cable. The cable material, the volume of which increases with power, length, and efficiency and decreases with voltage, becomes a large system cost in long, high power cable systems. Theory shows that, while transmission in short, high power cable systems is thermally constrained, transmission in long, high power cable systems is constrained by the cable rigidity due to high insulation thickness. Both constraints can be relieved by increasing the number of cables. Adding storage to accommodate solar intermittency reduces the cost of delivered energy due to the higher system capacity provided. The theory is applied to identify cable designs relevant to current proposals for renewable energy transfer from Australia to East Asia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we studied the response of the lower and upper ionosphere to the passage of Typhoon Faxai 2019 using the regional network of ultralong-wave radio translucence stations in the Far East region of Russia and measurements of electron density perturbations using the SWARM mission satellites. The presented experimental data clearly demonstrate wave perturbations of the amplitude and phase of the ULW signal, as well as the electron density during the active stage of the typhoon. The parameters of wave perturbations correspond to atmospheric internal gravity waves. The maximum spectral density of wave perturbations in the lower ionosphere corresponds to 16–20 min. A mechanism for the impact of internal waves on the ionosphere, which is due to polarization fields arising from the wave motion of plasma in the lower part of the F-region, is proposed. These fields projected along the geomagnetic field lines make it possible to interpret the observed variations in the phase of the ULW signal and variations in the electron density in the upper ionosphere. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Metal artifacts from the Paleometal Epoch (ca. 1100 BC–400 AD) of the Primorye (Russian Far East) have shed new light on the introduction of the earliest bronzes into the Pacific coastal areas of prehistoric Eurasia. However, little is known about raw material circulation and the role of metal in the context of inter-regional exchange. This paper investigates 12 copper artifacts from major Paleometal settlements using alloy composition, trace elements, and lead isotopes to explore the metal sources and distribution networks. The results suggest that most objects are made of a copper-tin alloy, but some have arsenic as a significant minor element. Geologically, copper is unlikely to have come from local ore sources, but rather from the Liaoxi corridor and Liaodong Peninsula in Northeast China. This may indicate an inland route of metal trade across Northeast China or alternately, a coastal route via the northern Korean Peninsula. Archaeologically, the combined study of artifact typology and chemistry indicates two possible origins for the metal: the Upper Xiajiadian culture in Northeast China and Slab Grave culture in Mongolia/Transbaikal. Remarkably, the connection with Upper Xiajiadian communities parallels the transport route along which millet agriculture spread from Northeast China to the Primorye during the Neolithic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the effects of trade regionalism in East Asia from 1995 to 2018, by applying a series of gravity models. An initial, basic gravity model is repeatedly augmented to account for a range of economic, geographical, cultural, and above all institutional factors representing free trade agreements in effect. Unlike previous studies, this investigation distinguishes between the bilateral and multilateral measures of regional trading arrangements. Two interesting findings are reported. First, the results confirm the impact of trade regionalism on the export flows between the economies of East Asia in the period under study. Second, the effects of multilateral trading agreements vary greatly depending on the agreement and on the particular country's range of influence, in particular cases showing no sufficient economic benefits. Overall, the results point to the complementarity of bilateral and multilateral trading arrangements in the region and to the emergence of a certain distinctive model of cooperation and integration in East Asia – which has been underpinned during the COVID-19 pandemic by the conclusion of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), and which will be further verified in the post-COVID character of global trade and regional trading arrangements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We consider the prehistorical development that at the time of the great Greek thinkers preceded the present definition of “science”. The present well-known paradoxes of theoretical physics (relativity and quantum mechanics) can be overcome if one assumes that “absolute” reality is represented by a “timeless” world, while “time” and “antitime” are occasional additional features that characterize “world” and “antiworld”. “World” and “antiworld” are, respectively, the realm of “matter” and “antimatter” etc. A set of five previous papers deals with the devoted full discussion of the improved axiomatic formulation of theoretical physics. The present paper illustrates a prehistorical background of the crucial concept of “time”, in the Western, Eastern (Hindu), and Far Eastern worlds. The main pertinent focus is on a prehistorical strong debate, which preceded the classic Greek world at the time when unknown and astute thinkers debated and wrote the Bible and the ancient books of Hinduism. The impressive result is that the concept of a timeless world was a concern that survived at least until the III century AD. Conversely, the present generally agreed feeling about “absolute” time finally prevailed - and became accepted like an unconscious and innate concept. The ancient “timeless” concept later survived in some ascetic thinkers, theologians, and in some popular beliefs – that were originally proposed as a simple way to explain some subtle concepts to the man-of-the-street. The whole discussion has some profound implication on the same meaning of “science”, including crucial ethical constraints. For comparison purpose, also the Far East concept of “time” is considered according to Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Agricultural Archaeology is the property of Agricultural Archaeology Editorial Office and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)