East Asia

About: East Asia is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 17591 publications have been published within this topic receiving 274073 citations. The topic is also known as: Eastern Asia.

Large-Scale Psychological Differences Within China Explained by Rice Versus Wheat Agriculture

Abstract: Cross-cultural psychologists have mostly contrasted East Asia with the West. However, this study shows that there are major psychological differences within China. We propose that a history of farming rice makes cultures more interdependent, whereas farming wheat makes cultures more independent, and these agricultural legacies continue to affect people in the modern world. We tested 1162 Han Chinese participants in six sites and found that rice-growing southern China is more interdependent and holistic-thinking than the wheat-growing north. To control for confounds like climate, we tested people from neighboring counties along the rice-wheat border and found differences that were just as large. We also find that modernization and pathogen prevalence theories do not fit the data.

Inward technology transfer and competitiveness: the role of national innovation systems

Abstract: This paper examines the role of national innovation systems in the inward transfer of technology that has underpinned the transformation of Japan and other East Asian economies since 1945. The economies that have benefited most from inward technology transfer have national innovation systems that have strengthened their 'national absorptive capacity'. This capacity relies primarily on investments in scientific and technical training, and on economic policies that enforce competition among domestic firms. The particular channels for inward technology transfer, the identity of any 'strategic industries' targeted for public intervention, and the overall level of a nation's trade restrictions are ail of secondary importance. A central theme of global economic change during the postwar period has been the application in less developed countries of technologies developed within economically advanced regions. This phenomenon underpinned the post-1945 transformation of Japan and other East Asian economies, and influenced the reconstruction of Western European economies after World War II. The application of externally developed technologies within 'latecomer' economies is hardly unique to the postwar period, however. Samuel Slater's introduction of British textile manufacturing is but one example of inward technology transfer in the nineteenth century US economy, and David (1992) traces the origins of patent monopolies to efforts by medieval European city-states and nations to attract experts in industrial arts to practice their craft within these jurisdictions. Both international technology flows and government efforts to influence them for national competitive advantage thus have ample historical precedent. Several characteristics nevertheless distinguish the post-1945 era from earlier historical periods. The influence of international technology transfer on national economic development has increased, as the postwar development of such economies as Taiwan and South Korea has relied much less on natural resource endowments than nineteenth

The Sources of Economic Growth of the East Asian Newly Industrialized Countries

Abstract: The sources of economic growth of the East Asian newly industrialized countries are analyzed empirically using the aggregate meta-production function framework. The sample consists of nine countries—the four East Asian newly industrialized countries (Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, and Taiwan) and the Group-of-Five industrialized countries (France, West Germany, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States). The results reaffirm the Boskin and Lau (Technical Paper 217, Stanford University, 1990) finding that technical progress can be represented as purely capital-augmenting in all countries. However, the hypothesis that there has been no technical progress during the postwar period cannot be rejected for the four East Asian newly industrialized countries. By far the most important source of economic growth of the East Asian newly industrialized countries is capital accumulation, accounting for between 48 and 72% of their economic growth, in contrast to the case of the Group-of-Five industrialized countries, in which technical progress has played the most important role, accounting for between 46 and 71% of their economic growth. An international comparison of the productive efficiencies of the Group-of-Five countries and the East Asian newly industrialized countries indicates no apparent convergence between the technologies of the two groups of countries. J. Japan. Int. Econ., September 1994, 8 (3), pp. 235-271. Department of Economics, Stanford University, Stanford, California 94305-6072.

The Emergence of Agriculture

Abstract: In search of origins creating new plants and animals new technology and the search for agricultural origins the fertile crescent Europe and Africa East Asia Middle and South America Eastern North America and the Southwest the search for explanations.