The vital importance to UK and European interests of understanding and engaging with an emerging super power is the inspiration behind an ambitious plan by the University of Bristol to establish a new Centre for East Asian Studies (CEAS) by 2005.
Focusing on postgraduate teaching and research, the interdisciplinary centre will be led by a new Professor of East Asian Studies. The search for a scholar with an international reputation in this field is under way.
Professor Ray Forrest, head of the University’s School for Policy Studies and a prime mover behind the project, said: “East Asia will become a leading global player this century. At present growth rates – more than nine per cent a year – China’s economy will overtake America’s in 2038.
“We in the UK and Europe can simply watch and react to this phenomenon, or we can actively deepen our understanding of it and make sure we are prepared for its implications.”
Professor Forrest explained that CEAS will make its presence felt at several levels. To its full- and part-time postgraduates, the centre will offer a world-class opportunity to develop the knowledge and skills necessary for a successful career with an East Asian dimension. As well as economic, social, cultural and political issues, the centre’s Masters programmes will cover Mandarin and Japanese languages and offer the chance to work or study in East Asia as part of the course.
Agreements with universities in East Asia will generate opportunities for research collaborations, language training and staff and student exchanges. Bristol is currently finalising one such agreement that will bring complementary benefits to CEAS and to Nanjing University’s Centre for European Union Studies.
Companies in the South West also stand to gain from Bristol’s initiative. They will have a new source of research and consultancy and a flow of graduates equipped to deal with emerging East Asian markets. Given that China alone has a population of 1.3 billion, including 300 million middle-class consumers, the impact on the regional economy could be substantial.
Professor Forrest said: “For the UK as a whole and for Europe, CEAS will not only produce people who can help construct the new relationship with East Asia but will also generate research and scholarship that will support international understanding and policy development.”
The centre is co-directed by experts from the University’s School for Policy Studies, Department of Historical Studies, Language Centre and Faculty of Social Sciences and Law. This means CEAS will be able to tailor its Masters programmes to specialist interests and respond quickly to emerging priorities. Globalisation and the future of East Asia, Anglo-Chinese jurisprudence, post-Mao Shanghai and contemporary Japanese culture are among the many topics likely to be available to the first intake of students in October 2005.
While key beneficiaries of CEAS’s work will be individuals and companies that want to engage with the East Asian economies, the cultural sector is set to gain as well. One subject of interest to the centre is the wealth of photographic images of old China that exists in previously undiscovered archives.
Dr Robert Bickers of the Department of Historical Studies, a co-director of the centre, said: “We want to tap into these resources and establish the world’s leading digital library of such pictures. The general public as well as scholars will enjoy and benefit from the insights these images give into a world that has largely vanished but that helps explain the way things are now.”
It is planned to launch CEAS with an international conference in spring 2005.