383 pages, 6 x 9
Hardcover
Release Date:15 Nov 1997
ISBN:9780774806466
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Asia Pacific

New Geographies of the Pacific Rim

UBC Press

The great processes reshaping our world today can be summed up bythe term "globalisation". Together with the communicationsrevolution and massive urbanisation, it is reshaping theorganisation ofglobal space. It is illustrated by technological change, pronouncedeconomic growth, the dominance of giant corporations, ever more openmarkets and universal consumption. Dramatic developments have occurredin Asia-Pacific trade, investment, labour movements and politicalcooperation, marked for example by APEC, a giant free-trade areadesigned to encompass about 60% of the world's population and halfthe world's economy.

But the processes also create social tension, political reaction andlocal resistance as a result of regional restructuring, wideningregional disparities, the neglect of backward areas or imposedmodernisation.

Asia Pacific: New Geographies of the Pacific Rim, writtenby leading scholars from the region, examines the extent to whichPacific Rim economies -- especially East Asia and Southeast Asia -- areincreasingly integrated, and considers the economic, political andcultural forces at work. In the process, many "newgeographies" are being created or reconstructed. At the same time,"the local-global dialectic" whereby local forces react to,negotiate with, resist or capitulate to global forces is examined.

Part I analyses globalisation and the emergence of sub-globalregions, Part II the processes of change in Asia-Pacific, and Part IIIthe national responses to globalisation. Part IV addresses localreactions to global forces: resistance, negotiatons or capitulation.Finally the editors enumerate the challenges to the region which centreon the crucial need to manage this era of globalisation so thatsustainable societies can continue. This vast region needs carefulmanagement of globalisation, in which the forces of free trade andeconomic growth are the central determinants. For the time being, theseforces seem to be in the ascendant.

T.G. McGee (editor) is Director, Institute of AsianResearch, and Professor, Department of Geography, University of BritishColumbia. He has carried out extensive research on urbanisation in Asiaover the last 40 years. He is the author of The Southeast AsianCity (1967), Third World Urbanization (1971), andtogether with Warwick Armstrong Theatres of Accumulation(1985). More recently, he has co-edited the Extended Metropolis in Asia(1991) and Mega-Urban Regions in Southeast Asia (1995). RayWatters (editor) was Professor of Geography, VictoriaUniversity of Wellington, and specialised in development and socialchange in peasant and tribal societies in Latin America and the SouthPacific. He recently worked in Guizhou, southwest China. Among hisbooks are Poverty and Peasantry in the Peruvian Andes (1994),Shifting Cultivation in Latin America (1971) and Abemama:Social Change in Kiribati and Tuvalu (1983).

Acknowledgments and Dedication

Abbreviations

The Contributors

1. Introduction / T.G. McGee and R.F. Watters

Part I. Globalisation and the Emergence of Sub-GlobalRegions: The Case of the Asia-Pacific

2. Regional Integration, Internationalisation and the NewGeographies of the Pacific Rim / Dean Forbes

3. Globalisation, Urbanisation and the Emergence of Sub-GlobalRegions: A Case Study of the Asia-Pacific Region / T.G.McGee

4. Pacific Rim Trade and APEC / Ron Sandrey

5. Asia-Pacific Regional Integration and Human Rights /Christopher Tremewan

Part II. Processes of Change in the Asia-Pacific Region

6. Imitating the Rich: The Imperatives of Consumption / HarveyFranklin

7. An Agricultural Transition on the Pacific Rim: ExplorationsToward a Model / R.D. Hill

8. Japan's Foreign Direct Investment in the Pacific Rim,1985-1993 / Peter J. Rimmer

9. Effectiveness and Replicability of East Asian Industrial Policies/ Robert Wade

10. Facing the Urban Environmental Challenge / Yok-shiu F.Lee

Part III. National Responses to Globalisation in theAsia-Pacific Region

11. The East Asian Growth Model: South Korean Experience / R.M.Auty

12. The Rise of the Yen, 'Hollowing Out' and Japan'sTroubled Industries / David W. Edgington

13. China in the Year 2000: Prospects for the Late Reform Era /David S.G. Goodman

14. Taiwan's Economic Growth and Its Southward Policy in Asia /Gerald Chan

15. Population Change and Development in Indonesia / GraemeHugo

Part IV. Sites of Resistance, Negotiation andCapitulation

16. Intrusion of Global Forces and Transformation of a LocalChineses Economy: The Experience of Dongguan / George Chu-shengLin

17. Ideological Abstractions, Bureaucratic Imperatives and HumanCreativity: A Philippines Narrative / Warwick Armstrong

18. Ethnicity, Geography, History and Nationalism: A Future ofEthnic Strife for the Inland Border Peoples of Mainland Southeast Asia?/ John McKinnon

19. Transforming the Periphery: The Case of Sarawak, Malaysia /Philip S. Morrison

20. Resource Extraction and the Postcolonial State in SolomonIslands / Ian Frazer

21. Conclusion / T.G. McGee and R.F. Watters

Selected Readings on the Asia-Pacific Index

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