About the talk
Many have seen in the election of Ma Ying-jeou, the pan-Blue candidate, as president of the Republic of China on Taiwan in March 2008 the first step in the present warming of Sino-Taiwanese ties that culminated on Friday June 13 when formal talks in Beijing between the two sides ended on historic agreements to establish regular direct flights and allow more mainland tourists to visit the island. Can these signs along with many others be construed as ground-breaking in the perspective of the resumption of fuller negotiations regarding the status of what was once the “renegade island”? Is this process merely contextual, just two months before the opening of the Olympic Games in Beijing? And what will it take for strong symbols to translate into a normalization of cross-strait relations?



About the speaker
Jean-Pierre Cabestan is Professor and Head, Department of Government and International Studies at Hong Kong Baptist University. He is also associate researcher at the Asia Centre, Paris. From 2003 to 2007 he was Senior Researcher at the French National Centre for Scientific Research (Centre national de la recherche scientifique), attached to the Institute of Comparative Law of the University of Paris 1. From 1998 to 2003, he was Director of the French Centre for Research on Contemporary China (Centre d'Études Français sur la Chine Contemporaine, CEFC) in Hong Kong and Chief Editor of Perspectives Chinoises  and China Perspectives. His most recent publications include Le système politique de Taiwan  (Paris, PUF, 1999); Chine-Taiwan: la guerre est-elle concevable? La sécurité extérieure de Taiwan face à la menace de la Chine populaire (Paris, Economica, 2003); with Benoît Vermander, La Chine et ses frontières. La confrontation Chine-Taiwan (Paris, Presses des Sciences Po, 2005). He has also published numerous articles and contributions in English on China's political system and reform, Chinese law, the relations across the Taiwan Strait and Taiwanese politics. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Paris 1 (Panthéon-Sorbonne).


 

 

 
Rua de Londres 16, Macau
澳門 倫敦街 16 號

Refreshments will be provided

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