China begins 2015 as the world’s largest economy, in terms of purchasing power parity, a key milestone in the country’s rise. And one that likely will herald a change in how China engages with the rest…
China’s Ministry of Education has announced a major reform of the National College Entrance Examination, known as Gaokao. Under the proposed changes, the entry of new students to higher education will…
Wayne Swan couldn’t do it. Joe Hockey has tried and failed. Getting the budget back in black is proving to be mission impossible. But it could be a whole lot worse. The Commonwealth Government’s bottom…
2015 marks the 70th anniversary of the founding of the United Nations. Like all anniversaries, this is an occasion for profound reflection. To put it politely, the list of global challenges that the UN…
One of the more noteworthy features of Xi Jinping’s presidency has been his apparently genuine and effective efforts to crack down on corruption. Like everything else in China, the scale of the problem…
The Hawke government in the 1980s is widely considered to be the most competent and effective of recent years. Some may say this is not setting the bar terribly high, but the cabinet papers of 1988-89…
China may not be poised for world domination in wine, but it’s industry has grown wildly in recent years, and it’s now producing some well-regarded vintages.
As the last remaining protesters were being cleared from Hong Kong’s streets, many Westerners lamented the silencing of what they saw as China’s only pro-democracy voice. To them, the umbrella movement…
Conventional wisdom holds that China - the world’s most populous country - is an inveterate polluter, that it puts economic goals above conservation in every instance. So China’s recent moves toward an…
Mining is the fourth-largest energy consumer in Australia, using roughly 10% of Australia’s total. Some of this comes from the electricity grid — but much is supplied offgrid in the form of diesel and…
The number of university students in China, including those in part-time higher adult education, expanded from 12.3m students in 2000 to 34.6m in 2013. China has become an exceptional example of increasing…
The world is a step closer to a new climate agreement that will see all countries, not just developed ones, take action on greenhouse emissions after 2020. The two-week Lima climate summit, which ran two…
It is a name that most will have heard of, but few, perhaps, actually know much about. But Marco Polo, an epic ten-episode programme hosted by Netflix, may change that. The show has already been dubbed…
Could the preoccupation with legally binding targets sink the next climate deal in Paris in 2015? In the run-up to this week’s Lima talks, widely seen as a precursor to the Paris summit, the Abbott government…
At the UN Climate Negotiations underway in Lima, Peru, foreign minister Julie Bishop has called on China and India to do more to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. In her address to the conference on Wednesday…
Since Shanghai, China, emerged at the top of international league tables of educational performance such as the OECD’s Program for International Student Assessment (PISA), there have been repeated calls…
Pop quiz: in 2014 the quantity of Australian iron ore demanded by China has: a) fallen sharply, b) fallen modestly, c) remained the same, d) increased modestly, e) increased sharply? The answer in just…
If something can’t go on for ever, it won’t. – Herb Stein, chief economic adviser to former US president Richard Nixon. China’s economic rise has been a good news story for Australia. According to most…
The haunting image of a masked protester defiantly hoisting two black umbrellas amid a cloud of tear gas flickered across global social media platforms in the seconds and minutes after the Umbrella uprising…
The federal government has missed an opportunity to give serious thought to housing affordability in Australia. The House Standing Committee on Economics recently released its report on individual foreign…