Winner Take All: China’s Race for Resources

When: Back to Calendar » June 14, 2012 @ 6:00 PM - 8:30 PM
Where: Swedish Cultural Center, Vasa Room (Reception); Stockholm Room (Lecture)
1920 Dexter Ave N
Seattle,WA 98109
USA
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Cost: Member/Student: $10; Non-Member: $15
Community Programs
Tags: Africa China Dambisa Moyo
Registration: Register

Speaker: Dambisa Moyo, International Economist and Bestselling Author
Moderator: Anand Yang, Golub Professor of International Studies, University of Washington

For more background information and resources on this topic, click here!

Chinese firms, many state-owned, are going global for some of the same reasons other companies do – to acquire raw minerals, improve technology skills, and gain access to foreign markets. This, by itself, is not unusual. But because these firms are in large part run by the state, is there reason to be worried about this acquisition of resources? China has become one of the top investors in Africa, South America, and Eastern Europe, buying resources such as oil, land, and copper and investing heavily in infrastructure. How will this impact these regions in the long term? Closer to home for us, China has purchased government bonds from the United States and shale technology in Canada, and there is speculation that China’s central bank is in a gold-buying push. What does China’s effort to purchase commodities mean for the rest of the world? Check out our blog post “China in Africa” for more on this topic.

The World Affairs Council presents a conversation with Dambisa Moyo, international economist and author. Ms. Moyo will discuss how China has realized the importance of controlling crucial assets such as arable land, water, and fossil fuels, and what this implies for the rest of the world.

Speaker:
Dambisa Moyo is an international economist who comments on the macroeconomy and global affairs. She is the author of the New York Times Bestseller Dead Aid: Why Aid is Not Working and How there is a Better Way for Africa and How the West Was Lost: Fifty Years of Economic Folly and the Stark Choices Ahead. In 2009 Ms. Moyo was named by Time Magazine as one of the “100 Most Influential People in the World”, and was named to the World Economic Forum’s Young Global Leaders Forum. Her writing regularly appears in economic and finance-related publications such as the Financial Times, the Economist Magazine and the Wall Street Journal. She completed a PhD in Economics at Oxford University and holds a Masters degree from Harvard University. She completed an undergraduate degree in Chemistry and an MBA in Finance at the American University in Washington D.C.

Moderator:

Anand A. Yang is Professor of International Studies and History at the University of Washington, Seattle. Between 2002 and 2010, he was Director of the Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies and the Golub Chair of International Studies. Prior to joining UW in 2002, Yang taught at Sweet Briar College and the University of Utah, where he was chair of the History Department and, subsequently, Director of its Asian Studies Program.

Yang received his BA from Swarthmore College and his PhD in History from the University of Virginia. His publications include books and numerous articles in journals in Asian Studies, History, and the Social Sciences. His most recent publications are a co-edited volume on Interactions: Transregional Perspectives on World History (2005), articles in the Journal of Asian Studies (2007), Education About Asia (2006), Asia Policy (2010), and a chapter in an edited collection on The Boxers, China, and the World (2007). Currently, he is working on two book projects: coerced Indian labor in Southeast Asia; and Chinese and South Asian labor migrations across the globe in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

Anand was born in Shantineketan, India, of Chinese parents; grew up and attended school in New Delhi; and then finished high school in Mexico City, Mexico, before moving to the United States to attend college.

 

NOTE: Reception, included in the cost of the event, will take place 6:00-6:50 p.m. Lecture with Q&A will take place 7:00-8:30 p.m. Also, books will be on sale by Elliott Bay Book Company before and after the event. Ms. Moyo will be available to sign books after the event.

 

Sponsor:

 

Co-presenters:

Greater Seattle Chinese Chamber of Commerce

Seattle University Asian Studies Program

Seattle University Global African Studies Program

University of Washington African Studies Program

 

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The World Affairs Council is a non-partisan, non-profit organization which provides a forum for speakers representing diverse points of view. The opinions expressed by any and all speakers, presenters and/or guests at Council events are those of the speaker alone, and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the World Affairs Council members, staff, Board of Trustees, or Advisory Council.