The First Annual Weatherhead East Asian Institute China Symposium
"China’s Economic Emergence: Progress, Pitfalls and Implications at Home and Abroad"
April 7-8, 2005
The WEAI held the first interdisciplinary symposium “China’s Economic Emergence: Progress, Pitfalls and Implications at Home and Abroad” on April 7-8, 2005.
The goal of the conference was to mobilize a diverse group of experts from both the academy and the world of business to address the real world achievements and problems of Chinese economic growth. “Our hope was that by bringing together leading authorities on sustainable development, energy conservation, water management and public health and putting them in the same room as experts on legal reform, trade policy, business and capital markets we could create a new kind of conversation about China, its development trajectory and its domestic and international impact,” said Madeleine Zelin, former Director of the Weatherhead East Asian Institute and Professor of Modern Chinese History.
Columbia has one of the oldest Chinese studies programs in the country and is noted for the depth and breadth of its China-related programs in the Arts and Sciences, and the response of its professional schools to the growing importance of China in the world. This conference was made possible by an extraordinary collaboration across the university with sessions organized by the Weatherhead East Asian Institute, Earth Institute, Graduate School of Business, Mailman School of Public Health and the School of Law. Experts from each of these units at Columbia provided a solid foundation for this interdisciplinary endeavor, and participants in the sessions included prominent Chinese economists, public health and environmental specialists and some of the leading Western economists and legal professionals working in and on China today.
The Institute plans to organize a series of similar conferences on contemporary China in the coming few years.
