The June issue of Pacific Affairs is a special issue focusing on Chinese overseas investment and consists of seven articles. In the introductory article, co-authored by Graeme Smith and Paul D’Arcy and titled “Global Perspectives on Chinese Investment”, the authors introduce some of the more influential academic studies on Chinese investment abroad and suggest frameworks developed in the study of China’s domestic political economy that may be useful in analyzing the behavior of Chinese state and non-state actors abroad.

The following article, by Merriden Varrall, is titled “Chinese Views on China’s Role in International Development Assistance.” Varrall’s paper, based on a year’s fieldwork in China, examines some of the values, goals and motivations behind Chinese overseas aid projects. She finds that Chinese elites in the international development sphere do not share the views prevalent in Western international relations discourse about the international system and China’s role within it.

In “Crude ‘Oil-Mercantilism’? Chinese Oil-Engagement in Kazakhstan” author Joseph McCarthy analyses whether accusations of “mercantilism” can adequately capture the complexities and dynamics that drive investment by Chinese national oil companies (NOC) in developing nations through an examination of Chinese oil-engagement in Kazakhstan. He argues that analyses of Chinese oil engagement need to recognize the important influence that China’s institutional reforms have had on Chinese NOCs’ increasingly commercial approach to foreign investment, in addition to the unique host-country contexts China encounters through its various oil investments.

In “Going Global Responsibly? China’s Strategies Towards ‘Sustainable’ Overseas Investments,” authors Cristelle Maurin and Pichamon Yeophantong trace the evolution of China’s ODI regulatory regime and assesses to what extent it has influenced Chinese investment strategies across the developing world, specifically in Africa and the Mekong region, to accord more with the concepts of sustainability and corporate social responsibility.

Colin Filer, in his paper “Asian Investment in the Rural Industries of Papua New Guinea: What’s New and What’s Not?”, examines the way in which changing political and economic conditions have affected the pattern of Asian investment in Papua New Guinea’s (PNG) forestry and agriculture sectors, and the way in which different stakeholders have responded to this changing pattern of investment. He argues that Asian investment in these two sectors has taken several different forms, and there is no simple sense in which PNG’s national economy and political system are subject to a concerted takeover by Asian business interests.

In “Beijing’s Orphans? New Chinese Investors in Papua New Guinea”, author Graeme Smith investigates three economic sectors that are the destination for new Chinese investment in Papua New Guinea: retail, mining, and construction. The vast majority of new Chinese private investors in the PNG retail sector hail from Fuqing, a coastal community in Fujian province with a long history of transnational migration. Larger state-owned mining ventures and construction companies draw on a more disparate workforce, even though they are headquartered in Beijing. All three sets of investors face stigmatization from their competitors, the media, and other Chinese and local actors. Based on interviews with Chinese investors in PNG and China, this paper explores the interaction of these investors with Chinese state and non-state actors, and evaluates how this shapes the process of “localization.” It also looks at how relations with state and non-state actors in PNG are evolving, as investors develop new ways to “get things done” in a country where mainland Chinese firms have a short history of engagement.

Finally, in “China’s Rise in Oceania: Issues and Perspectives”, Terence Wesley-Smith identifies a broad context for assessing China’s increased interest in the Pacific Islands, and examines some of the major implications for regional security, regional politics, Western influence, and self determination in the region. It argues that China’s activities in the region are best understood as part of a much larger outreach to the developing world, and that China’s rise offers island states economic and political opportunities not available under established structures of power and influence.

For additional details we invite you to visit our Current Issue Page.

For abstracts in Chinese translation – 摘要

Mission Statement

Pacific Affairs is an interdisciplinary journal committed to advancing empirical and conceptual knowledge in the field of Asia Pacific-focussed area studies. We view area studies as combining serious commitment to original research on specific regions and countries in Asia and the Pacific with insights and analytical rigour derived from multiple disciplines and various theoretical perspectives.

2011 Journal Citation Report Impact Factor

Impact Factor 0.548 (15 out of 66 Area Studies journals) – cites in 2011 to articles published in 2009 and 2010.

5-Year Impact Factor 0.639 (17 out of 66 Area Studies journals) – cites in 2011 to articles published from 2006 to 2010

Immediacy Index 0.400 (5 out of 66 Area Studies journals) – cites in 2011 of articles published in 2011

© 2012 Thomson Reuters, Social Science Citation Index (SSCI), Journal Citation Reports

Note: We maintain a sustained and in-depth intellectual and administrative interest in the various debates concerning the uses, meanings, and limits of bibliometric indexes such as the annual JCR reports. We list the information above not as an unthinking endorsement of the use of these indexes to define notions of “quality,” but as information that forms part of a larger set of ongoing attempts to map the patterns and understand the meanings of scholarly communications in the digital age. The view of Pacific Affairs is that the 5-Year Impact Factor (regardless of our absolute and relative numbers) is the most significant measure, given that we aspire to publish articles that based on the depth of empirical research and the clarity of the arguments will ideally retain their relevance for at least five years after their publication.

About Us

Pacific Affairs is a peer-reviewed, independent, and interdisciplinary scholarly journal focussing on important current political, economic and social issues throughout Asia and the Pacific. Each issue contains approximately five new articles and 40-45 book reviews. Published continuously since 1928 under the same name, Pacific Affairs has been located on the beautiful campus of the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada, since 1961. The journal is committed to providing to the scholarly community and the world at large high quality research on Asia and the Pacific that takes readers beyond the headlines and across multiple disciplines.

Indexing

Pacific Affairs is indexed in the Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI), MasterFILE Premier, Public Affairs Information Service and PAIS ARCHIVE, International Bibliography of the Social Sciences, World Affairs Online and Bibliography of Asian Studies. We are both indexed and have abstracts of articles appear in Web of Science, GEOBASE, Canadian Periodical Index, Academic Search Complete, CBCA Complete, Historical Abstracts, International Political Science Abstracts, America: History and Life, Public Administration and CSA Worldwide Political Science Abstracts. Ingenta is the electronic provider for our online subscriptions. Pacific Affairs was selected as one of the first journals to join the JSTOR archives at their inception and has a four year moving wall.