- Language: English
- May 12, 2023, 9:00 – 10:00 am (HKT)
- May 11, 2023, 9:00 – 10:00 pm (EDT)
ABSTRACT
A managed foreign exchange regime has been integral to the Chinese economy since 1949, but how did it come about? In this talk, I discuss its gradual formation from the Communist victory in 1948 – 49 to the first Canton Fair in 1957. While influenced by Soviet institutional models, the foreign exchange regime in early PRC era was built on an export- and remittance-oriented economy that only partially aligns with the new government’s geo-economic orientations. I trace the confluence of Yan’an-era and Nationalist techniques of reserve margin management on this era, and stress two previously under-discussed features — one, the impact of US-led embargo on official thinking on foreign exchange; and two, that we need to view and compare the Chinese experience as part of a global management of “hard” currency in the post-war era.
ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Dong Yan is an assistant professor at School of Economics, Shanghai University of Finance and Economics. He received his PhD from University of California, Los Angeles, and was Postdoctoral Fellow at Center for Chinese Studies, University of California Berkeley. His research interests include histories of economic ideas, economic history and fiscal-financial history, with a focus in late nineteenth and twentieth century Chinese ideas on public finance and political economy. Dr. Yan is preparing his book manuscript “Sinews of Paper: Public Debt and Chinese political Economy, 1850 – 1937”, examining the adaptation of modern public debt in late 19th and early 20th Century China.
