Think Tank Development in Hong Kong

2012 ◽  
Vol 04 (03) ◽  
pp. 97-106
Author(s):  
Kin-ming KWONG ◽  
Litao ZHAO
Keyword(s):  
Hong Kong ◽  
Public Opinion ◽  
Think Tanks ◽  
Policy Decisions ◽  
Think Tank ◽  
Social Actors ◽  
Important Policy ◽  
The Government ◽  
Over Time

Hong Kong's society has become more politicised after 2003. Policy decisions have been driven by public opinion. With a growing "war of ideas", more social actors choose to do policy advocacies by research rather than slogans through setting up think tanks. Think tanks have seen their influence rising over time. The government has started to invite think tank representatives to give suggestions during the drafting of some important policy papers, like Policy Address.

Think Tanks and Foreign Policy

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stuti Bhatnagar
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
Think Tanks ◽  
Think Tank ◽  
Political Issues ◽  
Social Actors ◽  
Policy Frames ◽  
Policy Actors ◽  
The Media ◽  
Intellectual Elites

The role of think tanks as policy actors has developed over time and created significant global scholarship. Widely understood as non-state policy actors, think tanks established either with or without the support of government have evolved in various political contexts with varied characteristics. They are avenues for the discussion of new policy ideas as well as used for the consolidation of existing understandings of global and national political issues. As ideational actors think tanks interact with policy frameworks at different levels, either in the framing stage or at the stage of consensus building towards certain policies. Intellectual elites at think tanks allow for the introduction of think tank ideas into the policy frames as well as the creation of public opinion towards foreign policy decisions. Think tank deliberations involve an interaction with policymakers, academic experts, business and social actors, as well as the media to disseminate ideas. Institutionally, think tanks in a wide variety of political contexts play a critical role in the making of foreign policy and bring closer attention to processes of state–society interactions in different political environments.

scholarly journals Ideological Polarization as a Deception Strategy in the Discourse of American Think Tanks: A Critical Discourse Analysis

2022 ◽  
Vol 0 (45) ◽  
pp. 1-25
Author(s):  
Ali Hamzah Lafta ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Public Opinion ◽  
Discourse Analysis ◽  
Critical Discourse Analysis ◽  
Policy Making ◽  
Political Discourse ◽  
Think Tanks ◽  
Critical Discourse ◽  
Think Tank ◽  
Ideological Polarization ◽  
Political Realities

Deception is an inseparable facet of political discourse in attaining strategic political gains though compromising public opinion. However, the employment of discursive deception strategies by the policy-making institutions of think tanks has not received due attention in the literature. The current study aims at exploring how the ideologizing deception strategies are utilized by the conservative American think tank of the Washington Institute to reproduce socio-political realities and re-shape public opinion. To fulfill this task, van Dijk’s (2000) notion of ideological polarization which shows positive self-representation and negative other representation is adopted to conduct a critical discourse analysis of four Arabic texts released with the main focus on four different political topics. Results reveal the centrality of employing deception strategies for the sake of realizing political wins for establishing an ideological hegemony while simultaneously polarizing an Us against Them extreme.

Unofficial Officials

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dayna L. Barnes
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Policy ◽  
American Foreign Policy ◽  
Think Tanks ◽  
Personal Networks ◽  
Think Tank ◽  
Accessible Information ◽  
Research Organizations ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Long Range Planning ◽  
The Government

This chapter looks at the think tanks of policymaking. In the early wartime period, official long-range planning was stunted by a lack of government resources and interest in the subject. The bureaucrats in charge of American foreign policy came to rely on information and expertise from outside the government as they formed their views. Specialist research organizations, later known as “think tanks,” leaped to fill gaps in official expertise. Eventually, think tank staffs became unofficial officials, taking full part in the development of policy. They provided reports, recommendations, and accessible information, informed by their specific institutional viewpoints. They also maintained personal networks between members and policymakers and created space for officials and private experts from the business and scholarly communities to discuss ideas.

Media portrayals of the Hong Kong Occupy Central Movement’s social actors

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Janet Ho ◽  
Ming Ming Chiu
Keyword(s):  
Hong Kong ◽  
Critical Discourse Analysis ◽  
English Language ◽  
Emotional Valence ◽  
Media Portrayals ◽  
Social Actors ◽  
South China Morning ◽  
The Government ◽  
Occupy Central ◽  
Rhetorical Questions

Abstract We investigated how two English-language newspapers – Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post (SCMP) and the mainland China Daily (CD) – portrayed key social actors (police, students, protesters, and governments) during the Occupy Central/Yellow Umbrella movement. We examined emotional valence, arousal, and dominance characterizations in 1,180 news articles via a multilevel, multivariate outcome regression and critical discourse analysis. The findings reveal that emotional sentiments associated with students and protesters in SCMP were generally more positive than in CD but that this was reversed for the police and the government. Whereas SCMP deployed personal stories to construct a humanized image of protesters and students, CD relied on expert authority, rhetorical questions, and imagined scenarios to convey empathy towards Hong Kong residents, creating a villainized image of protesters. Our mixed-methods approach reveals how SCMP and CD portrayed students differently via the discursive frames of “optimistic dreamers” and “powerless scapegoats,” respectively.

scholarly journals The operation of Russian “think tanks” in an information society

2019 ◽  
Vol 30 (3) ◽  
pp. 151-164
Author(s):  
Maria S. Ivchenkova
Keyword(s):  
Information Society ◽  
Communication Technologies ◽  
Think Tanks ◽  
Political Institution ◽  
Modern World ◽  
Main Function ◽  
International Affairs ◽  
Think Tank ◽  
The Government ◽  
Analytical Centers

An information society sets new vectors for the development of all socio-political and socio-economic institutions. The efficiency and professionalism with which these institutions implement communication technologies into their practices and adapt to challenges of the modern world determine its potential and further development. This article examines the operation of such a socio-political institution as a “think tank”, given conditions of the internet’s ever growing importance and the expansion of social media. Traditionally “think tanks”, or “analytical centers”, are considered by political experts and specialists in international affairs to be components of political systems, however, the expansion and development of such organizations all around the world, together with their increasing functional capacity, leads to the need for interpreting the place and role in society of such think tanks from a sociological standpoint. This article examines them as a socio-political institution, which simultaneously generates and conveys information which is of importance to both the government and society. The main function of such an institution is designated as “communicative”, which encompasses the social potential of think tanks as a crucial component to developing social awareness and democracy. In order to evaluate the operation of Russia’s analytical centers, the author refers to the “Global Go To Think Tank Index” global ranking. Russian analytical centers are generally held in high regard by foreign experts, despite them possessing a few peculiar traits. Most of these Russian think tanks are affiliated with branches of the government, or exist within scientific institutions under the Russian Academy of Sciences or certain higher educational facilities, while being funded by the government. Their scope of research-analytical activity primarily includes issues such as foreign policy, international affairs, and global economy. As for sociological analysis of the processes occurring within society, only fragments of the former are present in the agenda of Russian think tanks. Analytical centers have an inconsequential presence in media space. They barely use modern communication technologies, which affects the isolation of the expert community from society.

Government Advisors or Public Advocates? Roles of Think Tanks in China from the Perspective of Regional Variations

2011 ◽  
Vol 207 ◽  
pp. 668-686 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xufeng Zhu
Keyword(s):  
Survey Data ◽  
Empirical Data ◽  
Policy Process ◽  
Analytical Framework ◽  
Think Tanks ◽  
Knowledge Development ◽  
Think Tank ◽  
Specific Activities ◽  
The Government ◽  
The Individual

AbstractThink tanks in China simultaneously play advisory, academic and advocacy roles in the policy process. In this article, I recommend an analytical framework that evaluates think tanks by studying their specific activities in addition to their nature. Empirical data involving 301 think tanks in 25 provinces were collected through the China Think Tank Survey 2004. The 1998 regional Integrated Knowledge Development Index database was also used for the analysis. Based on these two independent sets of survey data, the article concludes that connections with the government and knowledge capacity in regions where think tanks are located are the two differing forces that drive China's think tanks to operate as either advisors or advocates. Moreover, these two determinants differentially influence the individual roles of the two types of think tanks.

The soft power and paradiplomacy of Hong Kong

2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 161-172
Author(s):  
Wai Yin Chan
Keyword(s):  
Hong Kong ◽  
Soft Power ◽  
Policy Instruments ◽  
Research Approach ◽  
Government Officials ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Social Actors ◽  
Global Context ◽  
One Country Two Systems ◽  
The Government

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to map out the connection between paradiplomacy, policy instruments and soft power and propose a theoretical framework for consideration. Design/methodology/approach This research adopted a qualitative research approach involving in-depth interviews with government officials from the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Offices and two Hong Kong film directors. Findings The research has discovered that the government of Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) lacks a holistic strategy and policy to boost Hong Kong’s visibility in the global context. The HKSAR Government exhibits an incomplete understanding of the concept of soft power and ignores the values cherished in the civil society. Practical implications This investigation provides a background against which Hong Kong’s policymakers could devise a paradiplomatic strategy. This study suggests that political and social actors in Hong Kong must help to strengthen the city’s global position through strategic investments and the deployment of its soft power at home and aboard. The paradiplomacy of Hong Kong can serve as one of the effective tools to improve the legitimacy of “One Country, Two Systems.” Originality/value There is no study on the application of soft power under the framework of paradiplomacy. This paper represents a new direction of research in the area of Hong Kong, international status and its external affairs.

The Dynamics of Public Opinion

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mary Layton Atkinson ◽  
K. Elizabeth Coggins ◽  
James A. Stimson ◽  
Frank R. Baumgartner
Keyword(s):  
Public Opinion ◽  
Political Representation ◽  
Slight Variation ◽  
Important Class ◽  
Central Question ◽  
The Public ◽  
The People ◽  
The Government ◽  
Cultural Shifts ◽  
Over Time

A central question in political representation is whether government responds to the people. To understand that, we need to know what the government is doing, and what the people think of it. We seek to understand a key question necessary to answer those bigger questions: How does American public opinion move over time? We posit three patterns of change over time in public opinion, depending on the type of issue. Issues on which the two parties regularly disagree provide clear partisan cues to the public. For these party-cue issues we present a slight variation on the thermostatic theory from (Soroka and Wlezien (2010); Wlezien (1995)); our “implied thermostatic model.” A smaller number of issues divide the public along lines unrelated to partisanship, and so partisan control of government provides no relevant clue. Finally, we note a small but important class of issues which capture response to cultural shifts.

Congress and the Budget; a Planner's Criticism

1949 ◽  
Vol 43 (6) ◽  
pp. 1217-1228 ◽  
Author(s):  
Edward C. Banfield
Keyword(s):  
Public Opinion ◽  
Executive Branch ◽  
Budget Process ◽  
Managerial Control ◽  
Value Judgments ◽  
Total Cost ◽  
Political Conflicts ◽  
The Government ◽  
Over Time

A criticism of the procedure which results in appropriations acts must proceed from some premises regarding the function of Congress and the nature and use of the budget process. This criticism is based on the assumption that it is not the function of Congress to govern, but instead: (1) to indicate wants, (2) to institutionalize the giving or withholding of consent, (3) to bring political conflicts toward resolution, (4) to provide a forum for the formation and expression of public opinion, and (5) to act as a court of final review in which the actions of the government may be scrutinized, controlled, and checked. All of these functions are thought of as being performed in the broadest policy sphere, the application of policy to particular matters being left to the executive branch. The whole function of Congress, so conceived, is to make value judgments in matters of widest concern.Budgeting is commonly regarded as a method of setting down, item by item, the estimated component costs of an undertaking in order to arrive at an estimated total cost. At the same time, budgeting is also used as a technique for securing managerial control over expenditures; by requiring that funds be spent according to a budget, it is possible, if the budget is sufficiently itemized, to control the spender in minutest detail. While these uses of budgetary procedure are by no means excluded, it is the premise of this paper that the primary purpose of budgeting ought to be to achieve the most desirable allocation of funds among alternative uses, and over time.

The Charter and the Academe

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jürgen Rüland
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Regional Governance ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Think Tanks ◽  
Policy Decisions ◽  
China And India ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Government

The chapter details how in the last two decades the participation of academics in Indonesian foreign policymaking broadened. While in the past only a few think tanks provided input on the government’s foreign policy decisions, in the Era Reformasi many university scholars also became foreign policy stakeholders. The chapter examines how the academe localized European ideas on regionalism during the ASEAN Charter debate. While most academics strongly opted for a democratization of regional governance and the establishment of a regional human rights mechanism, the motivations differed. One group supported such reforms from a strictly normative point of view, others saw in them a leverage to increase ASEAN efficiency in the wake of the challenges posed by rising regional giants China and India. Academics localized European ideas of regionalism to a lesser extent than the government and legislators. Yet they too fused them with extant local ideas of security.

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