Articles in East Asia
Xinjiang, China: Ethnicity and Economic Development
An impressive map of China’s per capita GDP by prefecture, reposted here, appeared in late 2012 on the website Skyscraper City, posted by user “Chrissib” Cicerone. According to the map, the two poorest parts of China are in southern Gansu province, an area demographically dominated by Han Chinese, and in southwestern Xinjiang, an area demographically dominated by Uighurs, a Turkic-speaking, …
Regional Trends in Chinese Economic Development
A widely distributed China Briefing map shows per capita GDP gains by province* for 2011. As can be seen, all parts of China experienced rapid economic expansion in that year, but the more prosperous and productive coastal zone did not fare as well as many interior areas. The mineral-driven boom in Inner Mongolia is well known, but the rapid recent …
The New York Times’ Flubbed China Cartograms
An interesting story in today’s (April 9) New York Times—“Hello, Cambodia: Wary of Events in China, Foreign Investors Head to the South”—is illustrated in the print edition with two striking cartograms of eastern Asia, one of which shows population and the other economic output. The cartogram legends claims that “countries and Chinese provinces are sized according to population” and, respectively …
Intense Regionalism in the South Korean Presidential Election of 2012
South Korea is usually considered to be one of the world’s most homogenous countries. Regional differences in dialect are relatively minor, with only that of Jeju island being distinctive enough to merit designation as a separate language by linguistic splitters. A pronounced sense of Korean nationalism, moreover, is found across the country. But despite these commonalities, South Korea is still …
Medvedev Could Care Less About Japan’s Reaction to His Visit to Kuril Islands
Tensions remain high between Russia and Japan over the legal status of the four Southern Kuril islands.
The On-Going Japan Sea/East Sea Naming Controversy
The South Korean government was severely disappointed by the April 2012 meeting of the International Hydrographic Organization (IHO), as the global body responsible for standardizing the world’s maritime place-names declined to change the name of the sea sandwiched between Korea and Japan. The IHO will continue to refer to this stretch of the ocean as the “Sea of Japan,” a …
Japan to Encourage Deer Hunting and Venison Eating?
The sika deer (Cervus nippon), once widespread across eastern Asia, has been eliminated from virtually its entire range. The animal is extinct in Korea and barely hangs on in China and far eastern Russia. In Japan, however, the deer population is exploding, resulting in major agricultural and forestry losses.
Japan to Seek Only Two Russian-held Kuril Islands
The Japanese government offers to negotiate the return of two rather than all four Russian-held islands off Hokkaido, in hopes that the proposed compromise might finally lead to a breakthrough in the decades-old territorial dispute.
Border Disputes over Damansky Island and the Troubled Relations between Russia and China
In March 1969 Damansky/Zhenbao island became the site of a bloodbath which left several hundred Soviet and Chinese military and border guards dead. And even today this speck of land, together with two bigger islands near Khabarovsk, remains the focal point of simmering Russian-Chinese tensions.
Concerns over Timber Processing in the Russian Far East
Siberia has a wealth of forest resources, which if handled properly, could be a major renewable strategic resource. But are Siberia’s forests handled properly?
Concerns over international bride flow into Korea
International marriages are on the rise worldwide, and one of the countries that “imports” many brides is South Korea. This influx of foreign brides arouses concerns as to the fate of these women who search for new opportunities outside of their home countries, both within Korea and in the “bride-exporting” countries.
Japan: An Egalitarian Society?
My previous blog entry explored three distinct layers of geographic inequality, focused on China, which all apply to Japan: regional disparities, the rural/urban divide, and the existence of an urban underclass. The map posted here shows the percentage of the population defined as living on welfare. The prefecture with the greatest proportion of
Global Inequality: Where is it Found?
Poverty and inequality are contentious topics whose geography is often oversimplified. When many people think of extreme poverty and aid, they often focus on Sub-Saharan Africa, but global inequality and poverty are much more complex issues. Overall, it is increasingly apparent that a country-based framework that generalizes levels of income over entire national territories
Mapping Economic Disparities in Coastal China
As we saw in Wednesday’s post, China’s coastal belt is far more economically productive than the rest of the country. But even in this prosperous zone of China, a vast gap separates richer and poorer areas. Hong Kong is seven times more productive that Hebei. Take out the extremes, and Shanghai is still two
Mapping Regional Economic Disparities in China
In mid August 2010, global news outlets reported that China had just surpassed Japan to become the world’s second largest economy. The comparison was in nominal terms, based on the relative values of the two country’s currencies. If measured by PPP (purchasing power parity), which ignores exchange-rate values to focus on what can
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