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1 – 10 of 50Although China has instituted compulsory education through Grade 9, it is still unclear whether students are, in fact, staying in school. In this paper, the authors use a…
Abstract
Purpose
Although China has instituted compulsory education through Grade 9, it is still unclear whether students are, in fact, staying in school. In this paper, the authors use a multi-year (2003–2011) longitudinal survey data set on rural households in 102–130 villages across 30 provinces in China to examine the extent to which students still drop out of school prior to finishing compulsory education.
Design/methodology/approach
To examine the correlates of dropping out, the study uses ordinary least squares and multivariate probit models.
Findings
Dropout rate from junior high school was still high (14%) in 2011, even though it fell across the study period. There was heterogeneity in the measured dropout rate. There was great variation among different regions, and especially among different villages. In all, 10% of the sample villages showed extremely high rates during the study period and actually rose over time. Household characteristics associated with poverty and the opportunity cost of staying in school were significantly and negatively correlated with the completion of nine years of schooling.
Research limitations/implications
The findings of this study suggest that China needs to take additional steps to overcome the barriers keeping children from completing nine years of schooling if they hope to either achieve their goal of having all children complete nine years of school or extend compulsory schooling to the end of twelfth grade.
Originality/value
The authors seek to measure the prevalence of both compulsory education rates of dropouts and rates of completion in China. The study examines the correlates of dropping out at the lower secondary schooling level as a way of understanding what types of students (from what types of villages) are not complying with national schooling regulations. To overcome the methodological shortcomings of previous research on dropout in China, the study uses a nationally representative, longitudinal data set based on household surveys collected between 2003 and 2011.
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Xiaoyun Liu, Xiuqing Wang and Xian Xin
China's agricultural sector has developed very rapidly in the past 30 years and agricultural technological progress is deemed one of the most substantial factors leading to its…
Abstract
Purpose
China's agricultural sector has developed very rapidly in the past 30 years and agricultural technological progress is deemed one of the most substantial factors leading to its rapid agricultural GDP growth. The purpose of this paper is to assess the impacts of China's agricultural technological changes on its regional disparity.
Design/methodology/approach
The study uses a computable general equilibrium (CGE) model of multiple regions and multiple sectors to investigate the impacts of agricultural technological changes on regional disparity. The CGE model structure includes production side, demand side, and market clearing conditions.
Findings
The results suggest that agricultural technological changes significantly reduced China's agricultural regional disparity and accounted for 40 percent reduction in agricultural regional disparity in terms of agricultural GDP per capita. Agricultural technological changes, however, led to an increase in China's overall regional disparity and accounted for 6 percent increase in its overall regional disparity in terms of per capita GDP.
Practical implications
China's GDP has been growing very rapidly since 1978 and agricultural GDP has been playing a decreasing role in China's overall GDP. Regional disparity in non‐agricultural GDP per capita overweighted the equalization of agricultural GDP per capita. The results imply that the Chinese government should resort more to non‐agricultural development to fight against the enlarging regional disparity.
Originality/value
China's agricultural technological changes have led to an increase in China's overall regional disparity while the changes have significantly reduced China's agricultural regional disparity.
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Xian Xin, Tun Lin, Xiaoyun Liu, Guanghua Wan and Yongsheng Zhang
The impacts of climate change on agricultural production in the People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) are significant, and differ across regions and crops. The substantial regional…
Abstract
Purpose
The impacts of climate change on agricultural production in the People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) are significant, and differ across regions and crops. The substantial regional differences will induce changes in agricultural interregional trade pattern. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the climate change impacts on China’s agricultural interregional trade pattern.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper will use the computable general equilibrium (CGE) model to assess the impacts of climate change on the PRC’s agricultural interregional trade flows. The CGE model consists of seven Chinese regions and the rest of the world and six commodities.
Findings
The results indicate that northwest, south, central, and northeast PRC will see increases in the outflows of agricultural products in 2030 and 2050. Conversely, outflows from east, north, and southwest PRC will decrease. Agricultural products handling and transportation facilities need to be repositioned to address the changes in agricultural trade flows.
Originality/value
Studies on the impacts of climate change on the PRC’s agriculture have been increasing. To the best of our knowledge, however, no previous studies have assessed the impacts of climate change on the PRC’s agricultural interregional trade flows. This paper aims to fill this gap in the literature.
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Xian Xin, Tun Lin, Xiaoyun Liu, Guanghua Wan and Yongsheng Zhang
This paper aims to investigate the impacts of climate change on the People's Republic of China's (PRC) grain output using rural household survey data. The paper highlights the…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to investigate the impacts of climate change on the People's Republic of China's (PRC) grain output using rural household survey data. The paper highlights the regional differences of impacts by estimating output elasticities (with respect to climate change) for different grain crops and different regions.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper uses production function to investigate the responses of grain output to climate variables as well as other traditional input variables. The use of production function approach allows us to do away with the competitive land market assumption as required in the Ricardian approach. The paper will use interaction terms of climate variables and regional dummies to capture the regional differences of climate change impact on grain crops.
Findings
The results indicate that the overall negative climate impacts on the PRC's grain output range from −0.31 to −2.69 percent in 2030 and from −1.93 to −3.07 percent in 2050, under different emission scenarios. The impacts, however, differ substantially for different grain crops and different regions.
Originality/value
This paper addresses the limitations of existing literature by highlighting regional differences and crop varieties using the most recent nationwide rural household survey data. The results indicate pronounced regional differences and crop differences in the impacts of climate changes on PRC's grain output.
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Wei Jia and Xiaoyun Liu
– What this paper aims to tackle is how much did the return of rural migrant labor during the financial crisis affect China's GDP and the growth rate of the national economy.
Abstract
Purpose
What this paper aims to tackle is how much did the return of rural migrant labor during the financial crisis affect China's GDP and the growth rate of the national economy.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper constructs a computable general equilibrium (CGE) model and uses data of China's 2007 Input-Output Table to analyze the impact of the return of rural migrant labor on China's economy during the financial crisis.
Findings
The results show that the return of rural migrant labor during the financial crisis had substantial impacts on China's economy. The national GDP decreased by about 0.499-1.463 percent, mainly due to the number of rural labor who migrated from the non-agricultural sector to agriculture. Of the major sectors of economy, the manufacturing, construction and other services sectors were the most affected.
Originality/value
This paper assesses the impacts of return of rural migrant labor during the financial crisis on China's GDP and the growth rate of the national economy.
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Xiaoyun Liu, Wanchun Luo, Xuefeng Mao, Xiuqing Wang and Xian Xin
The paper aims to assess the impact of agricultural output changes on the general price level over time with China as an example.
Abstract
Purpose
The paper aims to assess the impact of agricultural output changes on the general price level over time with China as an example.
Design/methodology/approach
A simple numerical global general equilibrium (GE) model of two regions (China and the rest of the world) and three commodities (agriculture, manufacturing goods, and services) is used to assess the impacts of agricultural output changes on the overall economy price changes. The numerical GE model of this paper consists of production, final consumption, and market clear conditions. The results are generated with the GE model calibrated to aggregated China's input‐output tables of 1987, 1997, and 2005.
Findings
The results suggest that China witnessed a declining influence of agricultural output changes on general price changes. The contribution of given agricultural output change on the general price change in 2005 was merely less than 60 percent of that in 1987, which in turn implies that macro policies targeting to curb general inflation via boosting agricultural output will be less effective as those of 20 years ago.
Practical implications
China's policy makers should rely less and less on promoting agricultural output policies to fight against general inflation and should resort to non‐agricultural policies.
Originality/value
The paper argues that the influence of agriculture on the China's general price indices has been weakening along with China's economic development with a numerical GE model calibrated to aggregated China's input‐output tables of 1987, 1997, and 2005.
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Li Yan, Matthew Tingchi Liu, Xiaoyun Chen and Guicheng Shi
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effects of pre-existing mood valence, mood arousal and ad-evoked arousal on response to television and print advertising. It…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effects of pre-existing mood valence, mood arousal and ad-evoked arousal on response to television and print advertising. It combined the arousal-as-information and arousal regulation approaches into a single arousal congruence theory. It sought an extended application of arousal congruence theory in the persuasion domain with several novel findings.
Design/methodology/approach
Four experiments were conducted to test the hypotheses. Analysis of variance, multivariate analysis of variance and pairwise comparison were used for data analysis.
Findings
Consumer judgment is a joint function of mood valence, mood arousal and ad-evoked arousal. Positive mood does not always generate more positive evaluations and vice versa. Ad-evoked arousal can more strongly influence consumers’ judgments when they are in a negative rather than a positive mood. Furthermore, consumers in a positive mood rate a target more favorably when the ad-evoked arousal level is congruent with their current arousal state, while those in a negative mood rate a target more favorably when the ad-evoked arousal level is incongruent with their current state of arousal. Arousal polarization intensifies such congruence (and incongruence) effects.
Practical implications
The findings reveal a mood-lifting opportunity based on ad-evoked arousal. This has implications for the design of advertisements, promotional materials, marketing campaigns and retailing environments.
Originality/value
This paper’s findings highlight unexpected effects of stimulus-evoked arousal in persuasion when consumers are exposed to multiple emotional cues from the environment. The paper demonstrates the utility of an integrated model, explaining the relative importance of valence and arousal in influencing consumer judgments. It has been the first to examine arousal congruence, arousal polarization and arousal regulation mechanisms jointly.
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Qianqian Ju, Yan Wang, Hui Liu, Xiaoyun Du and Yifei Li
Stakeholders in complex capital projects are characterized by complicated interactions, adversarial short-term relationships and cooperative demand for deliverables. Unhealthy…
Abstract
Purpose
Stakeholders in complex capital projects are characterized by complicated interactions, adversarial short-term relationships and cooperative demand for deliverables. Unhealthy interfaces between stakeholders often lead to significant interface conflicts, which gradually become apparent in the construction stage. However, stakeholder interface health (SIH) has not been well understood and measured in the construction industry by either scholars or practitioners. It is essential to identify unhealthy interface relationships between stakeholders by comprehensively assessing SIH for enhancing project performance.
Design/methodology/approach
The study provided a comprehensive framework to assess SIH. The assessment was based on Wuli-Shili-Renli theory. Moreover, the CRITIC and Grey-TOPSIS methodologies were applied to precisely evaluate the SIH level. Besides, graph-based interface networks were developed to visualize SIH. At last, the framework was applied to a mass rapid transit project in China to test the validity of the study.
Findings
The result showed that stakeholder interfaces with strict contract constraints are healthier. On the other hand, IM behaviors make up for the soft coordination mechanism without contract constraints to a certain extent. The results of the case study were consistent with the actual project practices. The proposed framework provided a useful IM tool for assessing and visualizing SIH.
Research limitations/implications
The limitation of this study is that only the mass rapid transit project was selected for empirical analysis to validate the effectiveness of the proposed framework. It is recommended that the proposed framework be applied to other types of complex capital projects to further discussions in IM.
Practical implications
Theoretically, this study introduces a comprehensive framework to measure the health of stakeholder interfaces in complex capital projects, which helps to provide a theoretical basis and methodological support for stakeholder interface management.
Social implications
Practically, applying SIH assessment to existing interface management procedures can help the project manager identify interface conflicts between stakeholders in time and eventually contribute to the improvement of PM performance. At the same time, the interface management team tracks the responsibilities of unhealthy interface stakeholders and requires them to take measures to improve the SIH level. Stakeholder interfaces with lower health scores should be given more attention. The proposed framework can serve as a novel IM approach to identify weaknesses in IM and take targeted management measures to alleviate unhealthy stakeholder interface relationships.
Originality/value
The study provides an innovative method for scientifically and accurately assessing SIH. This research can help scholars and practitioners in the project management field facilitate the diagnosis of unhealthy interface relationships and provide decision support for the project management theoretical foundation.
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Wei Yang, Xiaoyun Lao, Qing Zhou and Jian Liu
This study aims to examine how participation in the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) affects province-level regional economic resilience. In the context of dual circulation – the…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to examine how participation in the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) affects province-level regional economic resilience. In the context of dual circulation – the new development paradigm proposed by the Chinese Government – participating in the BRI is an important means of connecting both international and domestic circulations and achieving high economic resilience. The complex causal relationship between participation in the BRI and province-level regional economic resilience is investigated.
Design/methodology/approach
Based on the complex system view, this study uses fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) to examine the impact on regional economic resilience when provinces participate in the BRI through unimpeded trade, infrastructure connectivity, financial integration and people-to-people bonds under the two conditions of attention allocation and buffering capacity. Qualitative textual analysis is applied to analyse provincial work reports, and relevant statistical data are used to measure the economic resilience from 2013 to 2020.
Findings
The authors identified three condition configurations that lead to a high regional economic resilience at province-level and one condition configuration that lead to no high-level regional economic resilience.
Research limitations/implications
In-depth analyses of qualitative materials should be conducted to explain the systematic relationships among the conditions.
Originality/value
This research is of practical significance to the development of the theoretical framework and practices of the BRI in the context of dual circulation.
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