Course information for GEOG 364 Globalization, Cities & Regions have been updated for the Fall semester of 2009/2010. Contact information for instructors and course syllabus are available on the Teaching page.

Reading packet for the course will NOT be available at the UBC Bookstore. Please purchase them from the course instructors during and after the first lecture (September 10, 2009, Geography Building, Room 100).

I have two new working papers on market formation and financial centres in China that are now posted on the Globalisation and World Cities (GaWC) website:

Lai, Karen P.Y. (2009) Marketisation through contestation: reconfiguring China’s financial markets through knowledge networks, GaWC Research Bulletin 314. [Download PDF at GaWC website]

Lai, Karen P.Y. (2009) Global cities in competition? A qualitative analysis of Shanghai, Beijing and Hong Kong as financial centres, GaWC Research Bulletin 313. [Download PDF at GaWC website]

I will be giving a talk for the Canadian Chamber of Commerce in Hong Kong on July 8, 2009 (Wednesday). The talk  is scheduled for 12.30pm to 2pm at the Chamber’s office in Kinwick Centre. For more information, contact Ms. Dipal Sandhu (Tel: (852) 2110 8700, E-mail: dipal_sandhu@cancham.org).

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The Roles of Hong Kong, Shanghai and Beijing as Financial Centres in a China Banking Strategy

Based on more than 50 interviews with foreign and Chinese banks, regulatory and government officials, and chambers of commerce based in Shanghai, the talk discusses the complementary roles of Hong Kong, Shanghai and Beijing as international or regional financial centres. The talk will also highlight some problems encountered by foreign banks in China and their different strategies for the Chinese banking market.

About the speaker:

Dr Karen Lai (黎碧瑶) is a Killam postdoctoral research fellow at the Department of Geography, University of British Columbia. She is an economic geographer specialising in finance, global cities, markets, capitalism, knowledge and political economy, with particular interests in East and Southeast Asia. She received her Bachelor and Master degrees from the National University of Singapore and PhD from the University of Nottingham, UK. She has published in internationally-refereed journals and is co-author of ‘Changing Landscapes of Singapore’. Her current work examines the circulation of market ideas and practices between Hong Kong and China through the operational structures and business strategies of foreign banks.

(Click for larger image)

I am honoured to be awarded the 2009 PhD prize by the Economic Geography Research Group of the RGS-IBG (Royal Geographical Society-Institute of British Geographers). Many thanks to my supervisors, Professor Andrew Leyshon and Dr Shaun French, for their advice and guidance and the collegial support of other faculty and postgraduate students at the School of Geography, University of Nottingham.

The winners of the EGRG 2009 Postgraduate Prizes are as follows:

MA Prize
Lucie Edwards, Newcastle University
NewcastleGateshead Place Marketing and the Attraction of a Creative Class

PhD Prize
Karen Lai, University of British Columbia (formerly University of Nottingham)
Approaches to ‘Markets’: The Development of Shanghai as an International Financial Centre

Working Paper Prize (new for 2009)
Franz Huber, University of Cambridge
Social capital of economic clusters: towards a network-based conception of social resources
Downloadable from: http://www.egrg.org.uk/wps.html

I will be giving a talk at the Department of Geography, University of Hong Kong, on the 26th of February (Thursday) 2009. Seminar Venue: Room 222, Hui Oi Chow Science Building. Time: 4.15pm-5.15pm. All are welcome.

Title:
Differentiated Markets: Hong Kong, Shanghai and Beijing as Financial Centres

Abstract:
Much of the early research on global cities has been concerned with rankings and hierarchies, with the side effect of placing cities in competitive terms. More recent accounts have highlighted the importance of a relational approach that examines how cities are embedded in flows of capital, culture, policy and labour. In this presentation, I bring together processes of regulatory formation, knowledge networks and capital flows and ground them in the cities of Shanghai, Beijing and Hong Kong and analyse their roles as financial centres. The first part examines the factors contributing to
Shanghai’s success to-date, from narratives of historical success and eminence and central government policies to geographical location and cultural factors. The second part addresses the contemporary concern of competition with other Chinese cities, primarily Beijing and Hong Kong. Early research findings reveal a qualitative distinction in the roles of these cities, with Beijing as a ‘political centre’, Shanghai as a ‘business and commercial centre’ and Hong Kong as an ‘offshore financial centre’. This is reflected in the distinctive operational structures and business strategies of financial institutions that I interviewed and suggests some form of functional coordination and complementary roles played by these top Chinese cities.

Biography:
Dr Karen Lai is a Killam postdoctoral fellow at the Department Geography, University of British Columbia. Her research interests are in geographies of money and finance, global cities, markets, neoliberalism, and political economy. She has published in Environment & Planning A and Geoforum, and is a co-author of Changing Landscapes of Singapore. Her current work examines the circulation and development of market ideas and structures in the financial centres of Shanghai and Hong Kong, focusing on networks of regulatory cooperation and business linkages. She received her Bachelor and Master degrees from the National University of Singapore and PhD from the University of Nottingham.

The Publications page has been updated with a note on a forthcoming article on Geography Compass, titled “New Spatial Logics in Global Cities Research: Networks, Flows and New Political Spaces”. A link will be added to the journal website when the article is available online.

Abstract:

While world cities or global cities research has become an established interdisciplinary field over a few short decades, criticisms have been levelled at its narrow focus on selected leading cities and specific economic activities of corporate headquarters, finance and advanced producer services. This article identifies four recent strands of research from geographers and urban scholars seeking more nuanced and critical approaches to processes of globalisation and urban development. First, there has been a shift away from examining urban hierarchies to exploring networks and flows between global cities and the adoption of a relational perspective. Second, there has been a re-scaling of analysis to examine global city-regions and global city-states. Third, researchers have turned to ‘alternative’ global cities to reveal new nodes and networks that were often written off conventional accounts of the global cities map. Fourth, there has been greater emphasis on social inequality and urban politics within global cities and challenges for positive social change. The concluding section draws together some common themes than run through these research trajectories and highlights some future research agendas that capitalise on geographers’ sensitivity to place in studying global cities. This place-based perspective appreciates the very differences that enable global cities to perform particular roles in the global urban network. It also recognises global cities as inhabited by real people and communities and the impetus for positive social change in the face of intraurban and interurban inequalities.

Financialization, Space and Place

The 3rd Annual Meeting of the International Working Group on Financialization is taking place on Thursday 23rd April 2009.

Sponsored by the Economic Geography Research Group of the Royal Geographical Society.

Background and aims:
The concept of financialization seeks to account for the empowering of financial markets and their influence over the unfolding of economy, polity and society. Processes of financialization are manifest at a number of scales, ranging from higher levels of instability within the economy as a whole, through pressure exerted on corporations by capital markets, to the equity effects of the financial system on individuals and households. To date, the growing body of work on financialization has only fitfully addressed its relationship to the geographies of money and finance. The workshop aims to provide an opportunity for the connections between financialization, space and place to be explored within an inter-disciplinary context, with contributions from geographers and non-geographers alike.

Speakers and titles:
- Gordon Clark and Ashby Monk (Oxford): Sovereign Wealth Funds: a symptom of global imbalance?
- Gary Dymski (UC Riverside/Sacramento): What’s left of banking after the subprime crisis? spatial implications and policy directions. 
- Ewald Engelen (Amsterdam): Self-representations of financialization: international financial centres on the internet.
- Shaun French (Nottingham), Andrew Leyshon (Nottingham) and Nigel Thrift (Warwick): A very geographical crisis: the making and breaking of the sub-prime crisis.
- Julie Froud, Alan Harding, Sukhdev Johal, Adam Leaver, Karel Williams (CRESC/Manchester): Does the UK have a sustainable business model?
- Anastasia Nesvetailova (City): The end of a great illusion: the global credit crunch and liquidity meltdown.
- Paul Langley (Northumbria): Discussant.

The venue for the one-day workshop is the University of Nottingham’s London Office, 41-42 Berners Street, London, W1T 3NB.  (The office is a five minute walk from Goodge Street, Oxford Circus and Tottenham Court Road underground stations). There are about 20 remaining places available.  The workshop is due to start at 10.30 am and a buffet lunch is included.

To book a place at the workshop please send a cheque for £25 made out to ’University of Nottingham’ to: Louise McIntyre, Finance Administrator, School of Geography, University of Nottingham, Nottingham, NG7 2RD, UK. Email: louise.mcintyre@nottingham.ac.uk. Alternatively, if you wish to pay by card, phone Louise McIntyre on 0115 84 67349.

For enquiries, please contact:
Andrew Leyshon
Professor of Economic Geography
School of Geography
University of Nottingham
andrew.leyshon@nottingham.ac.uk

I have added a working paper on the Publications page, titled ‘
Developing regulatory frameworks and practices in China’s new financial markets’. I have also submitted this paper to the Economic Geography Research Group’ Working Paper Series. The EGRG is currently running a Postgraduate Working Paper Prize for the series. If you are a full or part-time postgraduate student or within 1 year of completing your research degree, check out the above website for more details or contact the working papers series editors, Dr James Faulconbridge (j.faulconbridge@lanc.ac.uk) and Dr John Harrison (j.harrison4@lboro.ac.uk), if you have specific queries.

In celebration of the life and travels of his daughter, Jasmin Leila, James Sidaway will be walking from the Royal Geographical Society (with the Institute of British Geographers) in Kensington, London to the coast of Norfolk. All monies raised will go to the Jasmin Leila Award, which funds critical geographical scholarship. You can support James in his fund raising effort by contributing at his Justgiving page: http://www.justgiving.com/jasminleila

I have just written a book review for the Economic Geography Research Group. A good introduction to an International Political Economy (IPE) approach to globalisation, with thought-provoking chapters on prescriptions for global redistributive justice.

Lai, Karen (2008) Globalization Theory: Approaches and Controversies. Polity edited by David Held, and Anthony McGrew. Reviewed in: Economic Geography Research Group, http://www.egrg.org.uk/bkreview2008_8.html