Measuring China’s economic impact in the Caribbean

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
DeLisle Worrell
Keyword(s):  
Turn Of The Century ◽  
Economic Productivity ◽  
Chinese Investment ◽  
The Us ◽  
The Face ◽  
World Trading System ◽  
The Caribbean ◽  
Alternative Sources ◽  
Made In China ◽  
Near Future

The remarkable surge in Chinese economic productivity, especially since the turn of the century, has been of material benefit to every economy in the world trading system, and the Caribbean has shared in those benefits. The most substantial benefit to the Caribbean from the relationship with China has been via the purchase of more affordable products made in China or made with Chinese inputs. The Caribbean has secured additional imports that may be of the order of 5–10 per cent, compared with what the same money would have bought from alternative sources. This benefit may not increase in the future, and may well decline, if the anti-globalisation sentiment now sweeping across many Western nations is not reversed in the near future and the region’s access to Chinese products is reduced. By comparison, the benefits from Chinese investment in the Caribbean, as well as from exports to China and Chinese tourism to the Caribbean, while not insignificant, are much less substantial. Caribbean strategies for transportation upgrades and investment, renewable energy adoption, the use of digital currencies, and the universal use of the US dollar offer the promise of reaping benefits for the Caribbean from the China connection in the medium to long term, even in the face of Western isolationism.

American tourists in Cuba: Is the communist country a forbidden or a tainted fruit?

2015 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 6-18 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jackson Wilson ◽  
Pavlína Látková
Keyword(s):  
Destination Image ◽  
Communist Country ◽  
Market Place ◽  
Positive Side ◽  
The Us ◽  
Before And After ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Caribbean ◽  
Almost All ◽  
Near Future

Americans are the majority of tourists in the Caribbean, but the US embargo against Cuba prevents almost all American tourists from visiting Cuba. This study uses mixed methods to examine a group of American tourists' destination image of Cuba before and after a tour in Cuba. The American tourists in this study described Cuba as a forbidden fruit, a desirable destination that Americans are not allowed to or at least should not visit. On the positive side, travelling to Cuba was seen as a scarce opportunity that has the allure of the prohibited and the attraction of viewing communism from a previous era. Conversely, the image of Cuba was also tainted by the history of political antagonism with America and associated concerns about tourist safety, cost, and a limited market place. However, actual and potential changes in Cuba are likely to heavily impact the destination image in the near future.

scholarly journals Disaster and after: Hamlet as metaphor in Fin-de-Siècle Spain

Sederi ◽  
2012 ◽  
pp. 155-169
Author(s):  
Keith Gregor
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Production ◽  
Turn Of The Century ◽  
Political Life ◽  
National Unity ◽  
Minimal Impact ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
The Us ◽  
Subsequent Loss ◽  
The Caribbean ◽  
Philosophical Debates

The paper explores the philosophical debates raging in Spain following naval defeat by the US in 1898 and the subsequent loss of the country’s last remaining colonies in the Caribbean and the Pacific. Facing what the national press presented as a debilitating pessimism and paralysis – a result of humiliation by a vastly superior and technologically advanced power – a group of intellectuals known as the “Generation of ‘98” launched a strident campaign aimed at rebooting the nation’s social, economic and cultural identity, in which the Spanish nation was imaginatively recast as a kind of Hamlet awaiting the arrival of Fortinbras. The various implications of the Spain-as-Hamlet trope are considered, especially in the light of the play’s minimal impact on cultural production at the turn of the century. Not the least of the paradoxes surrounding the trope is the conflicting uses to which it was put: now a metaphor for the decadence of Spanish social and political life, now a source of inspiration for the call for regeneration; now a mode of emplotting the break-up of the nation-state, now a way of framing the question of national unity.

Investment Treaty Arbitration in Asia

2019 ◽  
pp. 430-443 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthew Hodgson ◽  
Adam Bryan
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Direct Investment ◽  
Direct Investment ◽  
Chinese Investment ◽  
Investment Treaty ◽  
The Us ◽  
The Face ◽  
Future Strategy ◽  
Investment Treaties ◽  
Chinese Foreign Direct Investment ◽  
Trump Administration

This chapter seeks to explore China’s approach to bilateral investment treaties and uses this to help consider its possible future strategy. In particular, the chapter considers the interaction of the growth and nature of China’s inward- and outward-bound foreign direct investment, with the protections provided in the BITs and the identity of counterparty states. As enthusiasm for investment treaties in the West stands at a crossroads—in the face of public antipathy in Europe to the draft TTIP treaty, and hostility from the Trump administration to investment treaties in general—there is maybe an opportunity for China to demonstrate leadership and cooperation to regional and global economic partners. This chapter first maps the evolution of the protections provided in China’s investment treaties, from the rudimentary protections in the early generation investment treaties to the wider-scale coverage in the more recent investment treaties. The chapter also reflects upon the extent to which China has succeeded in protecting its outbound investment, and the counter-balance of the protections granted to inbound investment. It considers (the relatively few) cases that have been brought under Chinese investment treaties and performs a statistical analysis of the protection of Chinese foreign direct investment stocks, by reference to competitor economies. Finally, this chapter looks at where China may focus its attentions next, particularly in the context of the Trump administration in the US and China’s investment priorities.

Russian Banking System under Conditions of Global Crisis

2009 ◽  
pp. 4-14 ◽  
Author(s):  
G. Gref ◽  
K. Yudaeva
Keyword(s):  
Banking System ◽  
Commodity Prices ◽  
Financial Sector ◽  
Banking Crises ◽  
Economic Recovery ◽  
Balance Sheets ◽  
Current Economic Crisis ◽  
Risk Appetite ◽  
The Us ◽  
The Face

Problems in the financial sector were at the core of the current economic crisis. Therefore, economic recovery will only become sustainable after taking care of the major weaknesses in the financial sector. This conclusion is relevant both for the US and UK - the two countries where crisis has started, and for other economies which financial institutions turned out to be fragile in the face of the swings in the risk appetite. Russia is one of the countries where the crisis has revealed serious deficiency in the financial sector. Our study of 11 banking crises during the last 25-30 years shows that sustainable economic recovery and decrease in the dependence on commodity prices will be virtually impossible without cleaning of balance sheets and capitalization of the financial sector.

The Alliance between Fundamentalist Christians and the Pro-Israel Lobby: Christian Zionism in US Middle East Policy

2004 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 163-187
Author(s):  
Donald E. Wagner
Keyword(s):  
Middle East ◽  
Political Influence ◽  
Conservative Movement ◽  
International Media ◽  
Christian Zionism ◽  
The Us ◽  
Run Up ◽  
Middle East Policy ◽  
Near Future ◽  
Political Scene

It is a common assumption in the international media that the fundamentalist Christian Right suddenly appeared on the US political scene following the 11 September 2001 tragedy, and that it became a major force in shaping US policy in the Middle East. While it is true that fundamentalist Christians have exercised considerable influence during the George W. Bush administration, their ascendance is neither new nor surprising. The movement has demonstrated political influence in the US and England intermittently for more than a hundred years, particularly in the formation of Middle East policy. This article focuses on the unique theology and historical development of Christian Zionism, noting its essential beliefs, its emergence in England during the nineteenth century, and how it grew to gain prominence in the US. The alliance of the pro-Israel lobby, the neo-conservative movement, and several Christian Zionist organizations in the US represents a formidable source of support for the more maximalist views of Israel's Likud Party. In the run-up to the 2004 US presidential elections this alliance could potentially thwart any progress on an Israeli–Palestinian peace plan in the near future. Moreover, Likud ideology is increasingly evident in US Middle East policy as a result of this alliance.

Too WEIRD, Too Fast: Preprints about COVID-19 in the Psychological Sciences

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arathy Puthillam
Keyword(s):  
Overwhelming Majority ◽  
Global Pandemic ◽  
The Us ◽  
The World ◽  
The Face ◽  
Conducting Research ◽  
Psychological Studies

That American and European participants are overrepresented in psychological studies has been previously established. In addition, researchers also often tend to be similarly homogenous. This continues to be alarming, especially given that this research is being used to inform policies across the world. In the face of a global pandemic where behavioral scientists propose solutions, we ask who is conducting research and on what samples. Forty papers on COVID-19 published in PsyArxiV were analyzed; the nationalities of the authors and the samples they recruited were assessed. Findings suggest that an overwhelming majority of the samples recruited were from the US and the authors were based in US and German institutions. Next, men constituted a large proportion of primary and sole authors. The implications of these findings are discussed.

Innovationsmotor Medientechnik – Von der Schreibmaschine zur «Mittleren Datentechnik» bei der Siemag Feinmechanische Werke (1950 bis 1969)

2021 ◽  
Vol 66 (1) ◽  
pp. 93-117
Author(s):  
Christian Henrich-Franke
Keyword(s):  
Data Processing ◽  
New Technologies ◽  
Strategic Decisions ◽  
Adverse Conditions ◽  
Family Enterprise ◽  
The Us ◽  
Innovative Products ◽  
The Face ◽  
The Media ◽  
The 1960S

Abstract The second half of the 20th century is commonly considered to be a time in which German companies lost their innovative strength, while promising new technologies presented an enormous potential for innovation in the US. The fact that German companies were quite successful in the production of medium data technology and had considerable influence on the development of electronic data processing was neglected by business and media historians alike until now. The article analyses the Siemag Feinmechanische Werke (Eiserfeld) as one of the most important producers of the predecessors to said medium data technologies in the 1950s and 1960s. Two transformation processes regarding the media – from mechanic to semiconductor and from semiconductor to all-electronic technology – are highlighted in particular. It poses the question of how and why a middling family enterprise such as Siemag was able to rise to being the leading provider for medium data processing office computers despite lacking expertise in the field of electrical engineering while also facing difficult location conditions. The article shows that Siemag successfully turned from its roots in heavy industry towards the production of innovative high technology devices. This development stems from the company’s strategic decisions. As long as their products were not mass-produced, a medium-sized family business like Siemag could hold its own on the market through clever decision-making which relied on flexible specialization, targeted license and patent cooperation as well as innovative products, even in the face of adverse conditions. Only in the second half of the 1960s, as profit margins dropped due to increasing sales figures and office machines had finally transformed into office computers, Siemag was forced to enter cooperation with Philips in order to broaden its spectrum and merge the production site in Eiserfeld into a larger business complex.

Re-municipalization of local public services: incidence, causes and prospects

2021 ◽  
pp. 002085232110064
Author(s):  
Daniel Albalate ◽  
Germà Bel ◽  
Raymond Gradus ◽  
Eoin Reeves
Keyword(s):  
Public Management ◽  
Public Services ◽  
Turn Of The Century ◽  
The Public ◽  
Local Public Services ◽  
High Profile ◽  
Global Trend ◽  
The Us ◽  
House Production ◽  
Shed Light

Since the turn of the century, a global trend of re-municipalization has emerged, with cities reversing earlier privatizations and returning infrastructure and public service delivery to the public sector. The reversal of privatization measures is not an entirely new phenomenon. In the US, for example, returning public services to in-house production has been a long-standing feature of ‘pragmatic public management’. However, many cases of re-municipalization that have occurred since the early 2000s represent a distinctive shift from earlier privatization policies. High-profile cases in cities including Paris and Hamburg have thrust re-municipalization into the limelight as they have followed public campaigns motivated by dissatisfaction with the results of privatization and a desire to restore public control of vital services, such as water and energy. Just as the reform of public services towards privatization spawned a vast body of scholarship, the current re-municipalization phenomenon is increasingly attracting the attention of scholars from a number of disciplinary perspectives. The articles contained in this symposium contribute to this emerging literature. They address some of the burning issues relating to re-municipalization, but they also point to issues yet to be resolved and shed light on a research agenda that is still taking shape.

scholarly journals Mixed Methods Research in Developing Country Contexts: Lessons From Field Research in Six Countries Across Africa and the Caribbean

2021 ◽  
pp. 155868982110328
Author(s):  
Jamelia Harris
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
Mixed Methods ◽  
Mixed Methods Research ◽  
Field Research ◽  
Research Process ◽  
Cultural Factors ◽  
Turn Of The Century ◽  
Research Experience ◽  
Design And Implementation ◽  
The Caribbean

Mixed methods research in developing countries has been increasing since the turn of the century. Given this, there is need to consolidate insights for future researchers. This article contributes to the methodological literature by exploring how cultural factors and logistical challenges in developing contexts interplay with mixed methods research design and implementation. Insights are based on the author’s research experience of using mixed methods in six projects across three African and three Caribbean countries. Three lessons are provided to aid researchers using mixed methods working in developing countries. First, cultural factors call for more reflexivity. Second, adopting a pragmatic research paradigm is necessary. And third, the research process should be iterative and adaptive.

scholarly journals An innovative method for creating and using nanoparticles for gas extraction from gas hydrates

2019 ◽  
Vol 123 ◽  
pp. 01003
Author(s):  
Volodymyr Bondarenko ◽  
Olena Svietkina ◽  
Kostiantyn Prokopenko ◽  
Baochang Liu
Keyword(s):  
Gas Hydrates ◽  
Alternative Energy ◽  
The United States ◽  
Investment Climate ◽  
Scientific Institutions ◽  
Energy Projects ◽  
The World ◽  
The Face ◽  
Legislative Support ◽  
Alternative Sources

The growth of prices for traditional energy sources prompts Ukraine to seek new approaches to solving energy problems. Today, the country has intensified its work in this direction, in particular, legislative support is being developed and improved, and the investment climate for alternative energy projects is improving. In many countries of the world, it has long been understood how serious and necessary is the development of alternative energy. At present, in the face of various gas contradictions and unstable oil prices, the need for energy carriers is constantly increasing, which makes it necessary to seek the latest solutions to the energy problem. Many leading countries in the world are engaged in the search for alternative sources of energy, one of which is natural gas hydrates. This relatively new resource offers great opportunities both for economic growth and stability of states, and for the development of scientific institutions in this field. Flagships in the study and development of gas-hydrated deposits are the United States, China, Japan and Canada. Along with them should be noted the achievements of scientists in India, EU countries, Ukraine, Russia and Bulgaria.

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