Art Meets Manufacturing

Oriental Outlook

July 19, 2012

Boosting cultural industry and upgrading the manufacturing industry recently became two economic topics attracting attention. The former has been set as a new economic growth engine and the latter faces challenges of upgrading.

In this issue, Oriental Outlook introduces a new method of combining these two industries, blending authorized artworks with manufactured products in order to increase the added value of manufacturing industry. In this way, the values of both art and manufactured products are optimized.   

However, to foster these relationships, favorable environment is important. Insiders say the environment not only refers to establishing cultural industry parks, but cultivating a social setting where the value of art work is recognized by consumers and the artists' intellectual properties are respected and protected.

Restructuring the Economy

Nanfeng Chuang

June 20, 2012

China's economy had a growth rate of 7.6 percent in the second quarter of 2012, its lowest since the first quarter of 2009, causing more anxiety about the downturn risks of its economy.

Nanfeng Chuang looks at the risks faced by China's economy and discusses possible solutions. The magazine argues that it is high time to restructure the economy and that the government should change its way of stimulating economy by ramping up spending on infrastructure.

To make stable growth a reality, China has to activate private capital to make it play a major role in boosting the economy and relieve the tax burdens for private enterprises, especially the small and medium-sized ones. Moreover, the current income distribution system should be reformed to increase people's income. In turn, the economy can be driven by domestic consumption instead of exports.

Competence, Not Diploma

Global Times

July 17, 2012

A micro blogger wrote that when recruiting teachers, Chinese universities prefer doctorates who graduated from overseas first-class institutes to those with domestic degrees, arousing a strong debate. Seemingly, this practice aimed to establish more qualified faculty, but the practice was discriminatory and reflected universities' outdated way of recruiting talent. The priority was not to hire competent candidates, but to hire overseas candidates who lent these universities a better image. 

This practice also shows that universities misunderstand and believe that having faculty members with overseas degrees makes their schools more international. What a real international university should have is a modern university system and diversified students and teachers from all over the world.

Students and Statues

South Metropolis Weekly

July 9, 2012

It seems that Chinese universities prefer to build statues to memorialize influential scholars or great figures. South Metropolis Weekly looks at universities' enthusiasm when it comes to building them and the public's reflection on the statues, including praise as well as criticism. 

Although some were well-received, the statues are almost the same, with well-known people as the theme, never considering whether they are appropriate for the university. As public memorials, statues have to be related to the spirit of a university, argued Wang Xiaoyu, a professor from Cultural Criticism Institute of Tongji University. He maintained that whether statues could be symbols of a university depended on if they could arouse shared memories or a sense of pride in the group's inner heart.

Excessive Enrollment

China Youth Daily

July 18, 2012

It is reported that about 584,000 postgraduates are enrolled this year, doubling the number in 2003. However, the job market for them is bleak, with their employment rate lower than that of undergraduates for three consecutive years since 2009.

University graduates expect higher pay, but employers are not necessarily searching for university graduates to fill positions. Thus, it is easy to see why the employment rate for university graduates has gone down. The situation is a wakeup call.