Chinese Policy Toward International Giving in the COVID Era

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Good evening from the East Coast and good morning 

from Asia. Welcome to the UCLA Asia Pacific Center  

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Global Chinese Philanthropy Public Lecture series. 

My name is Min Zhou. I am the Distinguished  

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Professor of Sociology and Asian American 

Studies, Walter and Shirley Wang Honored  

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Chair in U.S-China Relations and Communications, 

and Director of the Asia Pacific Center at UCLA  

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today's public lecture is by Professor Mark 

Sidel of the University of Wisconsin Madison  

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on Chinese Policy towards 

International Giving in the COVID Era.  

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Before starting the program, I would like to say 

a few words about the UCLA Asia Pacific Center,  

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where I serve as Director. Our Center promotes 

greater knowledge and understanding of Asia and  

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the Pacific region on campus and in the 

community through Innovative research,  

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teaching public programs, and international 

collaborations. We focus on interaction and  

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trans-Pacific connections from historical, 

contemporary, and comparative perspectives and  

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encourage interdisciplinary work on cross-border 

and supra-national issues on language and culture,  

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politics, economy and society, and sustainability 

in the ongoing processes of globalization.

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Our Center runs the Taiwan Studies program, the 

program on Central Asia, and the Global Chinese  

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Philanthropy Research and Training Program. 

We are also a partner of the new Pacific War  

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Research Initiative on Asians in Latin America 

and Latin Americans in Asia, collaborating with  

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the UCLA Latin American Institute and UCLA Center 

for Southeast Asian studies. And we are trying to  

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fundraise to rejuvenate our Hong Kong Studies 

program. Our Center also administers a number  

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of fellowships and small grants including the U.S 

Department of Education Title VI Foreign Language  

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and Asia Area Studies Fellowships, Taiwan Studies 

Fellowships, and research and travel grants.  

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Our Center's Global Chinese Philanthropy, we call 

it GCP, research and training program is built on  

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the Global Chinese Philanthropy Initiative 

funded by the Long Family Foundation, now  

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funded by the Cyrus Tang Foundation. The current 

GCP program aims at fostering passion, interests,  

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and volunteerism stimulating innovative research 

and sharing best practices in the field of Global  

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Chinese Philanthropy. The program includes three 

main components: First is to maintain and expand  

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the Global Chinese Philanthropy Research Network. 

The second is to organize a quarterly public  

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lecture Series. So today's lecture is the second 

public lecture in the series. The first one was  

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given by Dr. Marina Tan Harper of UC Davis on 

philanthropic action of the Chinese diaspora.  

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So she focused more on family ancestry 

the identity and social norms of the  

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Chinese diaspora, and Chinese giving. Our Spring 

public lecture will be given by Professor Jima  

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of UT Austin on Wednesday, May 3rd on the Board 

Interlocking of the Chinese Non-profit sector.  

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And a third component is an annual training 

workshop. The annual training workshop is  

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designed for undergraduate and graduate students 

with the primary focus on inspiring young minds  

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fostering interests and nurturing the culture 

of philanthropy and civic engagement. We will  

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have our training workshop next quarter on 

Thursday, June 8th and it's all online. Our  

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GCP program is led by UCLA Asia Pacific 

Center with eight institutional partners  

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in mainland China, Hong Kong, Singapore, 

Malaysia, and the United States,  

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so we welcome other institutions in the U.S, 

China, Asia, and other parts of the world to  

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partner with us in promoting and developing 

the view of Global Chinese Philanthropy.  

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Now please keep yourself muted at all times if 

you have any questions or comments. Please write  

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them down briefly in the Q&A box after the 

presentation. I hope we will have some time  

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for Q&A and I will select questions for Professor 

Sidel the event will end at 6:00 pm and possibly  

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we would extend it until 6:15 pm. Now it's my 

great pleasure to introduce Professor Mark Sidel.  

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Professor Sidel is the Doyle-Bascom Professor 

of Law and Public Affairs at the University of  

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Wisconsin Madison and a long-time specialist on 

Philanthropy and Civil Society in China, India,  

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Vietnam, and Asia more generally. He served in 

program positions supporting civil society and  

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philanthropy at the Ford Foundation in Beijing, 

Hanoi, Bangkok, and New Delhi before entering  

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academic life. Professor Sidel has written 

extensively on state-society relations in Asia and  

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on policy to us and regulation of philanthropy and 

non-governmental organizations across the region,  

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including more than four decades of work in 

China. He has consulted widely with foundations,  

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NGOs, and agencies as well as 

international organizations.

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Professor Sidel, we discussed China's policy 

towards International offers to China,  

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especially the public policies adopted 

to deal with those offers of aid  

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and the overall policy and regulatory 

framework during the COVID-19 era  

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without further ado, let's welcome Professor 

Mark Sidel. Professor Sidel, please go ahead.

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Thank you, thank you, Professor 

Zhou, very much. Let me share  

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my screen and get the slides up on 

the screen and then we will begin.

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All right, Aaron and Jeannie, 

is that looking like it's up?  

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Yes, perfect. Thank you all very much. Thank you, 

Professor Zhou, thank you Aaron, and thank you,  

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Jeannie, and everyone at the center 

who has worked to arrange this talk  

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which I'm delighted to be giving. I also see 

several old friends on the participant's list.  

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I probably won't use full names but Emily Fan 

and perhaps others who I see on this list,  

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it's a pleasure to at least see your names on 

the list and perhaps as I go through the boxes  

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I might see your face and faces later 

as well. I'm delighted to be with you  

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and I'm delighted to talk about a topic 

that has a long history in modern China,  

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which is China's policies toward International 

giving and cooperation with China. This issue  

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goes back a long time as I'll talk about but 

I'm particularly talking about the offers of  

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cooperation and assistance to China during the 

COVID era which began in the early part of 2020.

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So we're talking here primarily about China as a 

recipient of cooperation, which is offered from  

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the outside but let me note at the beginning at 

the outset. I'm pleased to answer questions about  

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this as well China has not just been a recipient 

of cooperation, China has been a provider of  

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cooperation during the COVID crisis as well as a 

supplier of PPE and other equipment as a supplier  

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of Chinese-made vaccines and as a provider of 

other forms of cooperation during COVID as well.  

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Hence, it's a dual road. It's a two-way street 

what I'm calling here the dual faces of aid in  

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the covet era I'm going to focus mostly on China 

as a cooperation recipient during the coven era  

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the last roughly three years beginning 

in 2020 and China did, to some degree,  

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welcome cooperation assistance and aid during 

COVID, but with pretty strict conditions,  

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this is, as I say here, a function of the changing 

constraints on cooperation and philanthropy to  

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China in the Xi Jinping era which began in 2012. 

We have seen more constraints on the availability  

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of cooperation and assistance to China during this 

10-year era but first looking back, if we're going  

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to think about how assistance and cooperation 

were provided to China during the COVID era the  

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last three years, it's useful to compare to two 

previous eras in which major disasters, a little  

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different than COVID, but still major disasters 

occurred in China. And the question I raise is:  

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what were China's policies toward the many offers 

of international cooperation and international  

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assistance in those previous eras? We take 1976 

when the Tangshan earthquake in Northeast China  

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killed hundreds of thousands of people. I happened 

to be in China during late 1976, or early 1977  

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and I happened to be taking a train to and from 

Shenyang in the Northeast part of China and that  

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train line in, I guess it was early 1977, that 

train line ran through the industrial city of  

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Tangshan northeast of Beijing. Tangshan had been 

completely controlled, completely destroyed by an  

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earthquake in the summer of 1976, and as we rolled 

through Tangshan and this is at least six months  

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after the earthquake, maybe closer to nine months 

after the earthquake, we rolled slowly through the  

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rebuilt train tracks that went through the city 

of Tangshan without stopping at the destroyed  

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Tangshan train station. And we could see recovery 

and rebuild already underway. But this was an  

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extraordinary natural disaster for China. In 1976 

was different than in 2020. China was coming to  

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the end of the cultural revolution in 1976. There 

was sharp internal political conflict within  

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China. China was, to some degree, a separated 

walled state which in general had not brought in a  

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lot of foreign assistance or cooperation since the 

Soviet era had ended in the late 1950s, and early  

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1960s. So in 1976, when Japan, South Korea, 

Australia, and other nations offered aid to  

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China in the wake of the Tangshan earthquake. 

China's reaction was, and this is not surprising  

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for that era that China was embarking on, a role 

had embarked on a road of self-reliance and that  

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China politely, and with thanks, declined all 

foreign assistance after the Tangshan earthquake.  

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Fast forward to 2008 when the Wenchuan earthquake 

in Sichuan which some of you who are listening  

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are well aware of, also killed tens of thousands 

of people and devastated a wide area of Sichuan.  

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By then after three decades of reform and opening 

up, the situation in China was significantly  

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different than in 1976. Offers of cooperation 

and assistance poured in from around the world,  

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including pouring in from the global 

Chinese Community. Hong Kong, Taiwan,  

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and elsewhere throughout the world, and the 

decision was made in 2008 by the central  

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leadership to accept a significant portion 

of those financial and material offers of  

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assistance to Sichuan to the devastated areas 

of Sichuan after the Wenchuan earthquake.  

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This was not an uncontrolled, unlimited approval 

to accept cooperation and assistance. There were  

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rules, and international organizations, that 

wish to help provide relief after the Wenchuan  

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earthquake had to work through approved Chinese 

service providers. They had to get permission to  

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bring in their aid but China in 2008 was very 

different than the China of several decades  

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before, and China welcomed a tremendous amount 

of aid after the Wenchuan earthquake. So in 2008,  

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2009 I'm reading from some notes here, which is 

why I'm looking down. China received one-time  

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related aid from about 170 countries and more 

than 20 International and Regional organizations,  

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as well as about 8 million dollars from the 

United Nations Central Emergency Response Fund  

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in order to do this. China's Ministry of Civil 

Affairs and other governmental agencies relax  

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the rules on importing material assistance and 

importing financial assistance funds to help  

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with relief activities. They sought to speed 

up a significant portion of the international  

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assistance and cooperation that was offered to 

China so those are two previous instances. 1976,  

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the answer was no. 2008, the answer was mostly 

yes obviously with rules, with some controls.  

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Fast forward to 2020 when the crisis in China 

was different than in 2008. We have to say that  

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first 2008 and Wenchuan was a natural disaster, a 

major earthquake. 2020 was also a major disaster  

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for China as it was for many other countries, but 

it was COVID and that's a little bit different.  

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Also, the situation in China had changed 

between 2008 and 2020. Particularly after 2012,  

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the attitudes and policies toward International 

cooperation with China, and international  

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assistance with China, those attitudes and 

policies had grown more restrictive in the 12  

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years or so between the Wenchuan earthquake 

in 2008 and the outbreak of COVID in 2020.  

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Those more restrictive attitudes in which 

China still welcomed some cooperation and some  

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assistance but under significantly more enhanced 

rules that had existed before these attitudes  

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and policies were typified by the overseas 

non-governmental organization's law of the  

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People's Republic of China, which was adopted by 

the National People's Congress in 2016 and became  

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effective in January of 2017. This framework was 

in effect when COVID hit China in early 2020.  

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So we see in effect two countervailing or 

balancing or maybe conflictual policies at work  

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between 2008 and 2020. The policies toward 

assistance in cooperation with China from  

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the Chinese side had grown more restrictive. At 

the same time, there was a framework in place  

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for processing for dealing with much of the 

assistance that was offered to China in 2020.  

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That process that was in place was primarily this 

overseas NGO law which governed non-governmental  

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assistance to China beginning in 2017. That 

framework allows for two basic mechanisms  

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for foreign non-governmental organizations to 

work in China: representative offices in which  

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they have staff at an office in Beijing 

or Shanghai or other parts of China and a  

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more limited license which we call temporary 

activities which allows project activities  

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of up to a year which may be renewable that 

generally does not involve an office in China.  

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And this system came into effect in 2017. A highly 

regularized, highly regulated system involves two  

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separate sets of actors responsible for the 

work of foreign non-governmental organizations  

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foundations like the Gates Foundation or the 

Ford Foundation and other kinds of private  

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non-governmental groups in China. First, they 

had to establish a partnership with what we  

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call professional partners or professional 

supervisory units. So if you're a health NGO  

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non-governmental organization coming from the 

U.S., you would need to establish a partnership  

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with a professional health organization in China 

approved by the government. You need to have a  

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professional partner and this entire framework 

including the approval of each organization.  

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Each project is subject to overall supervision 

by the Chinese Ministry of Public Security,  

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which is a security agency in China. It's not 

a civil affairs or disaster relief agency,  

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it's a very powerful agency and it's an agency 

that can get quite a bit done. That was the  

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situation that China was in in 2020 when offers 

of aid came rolling into China beginning in  

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February and March of 2020 as COVID hit Wuhan and 

other parts of China very hard. On the one hand,  

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policies had narrowed and become more restrictive. 

It was harder to provide cooperation and  

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assistance to China. On the other hand, there 

was a framework in place that allowed the Chinese  

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government to supervise and manage that process 

without coming up with new temporary regulations,  

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new temporary frameworks as they had had to do 

in dealing with the Wenchuan earthquake in 2008.  

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So there was a body of regulation of rules in 

place to guide the cooperation process for COVID,  

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not special rules as in 2008 and not the 

isolation which we call autarky of 1976.  

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So what did that look like in 2020 in particular 

as offers of giving offers of cooperation of  

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assistance came rolling into China from around the 

world in dealing with COVID? And please note at  

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the same time especially as 2020 moves onward and 

we get into 2021, China is also at the same time  

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offering aid to other countries which have been 

struck by COVID as well. Usually, material aid,  

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personal protective gear, and vaccines as they 

become available in China. So this process is  

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a two-way street but in terms of cooperation, 

the assistance with China most of this happened  

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through what we call temporary activities. 

One-year projects under the overseas NGO law with  

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expedited approvals because it was COVID which 

allowed overseas organizations. CARE, Save the  

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Children, the Gates Foundation, and others provide 

assistance to approved Chinese organizations to  

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help deal with COVID to help deal with physical 

issues to help deal with issues. Retraining health  

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personnel, and all kinds of matters that 

foreign organizations wanted to help with  

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in addition to these one-year projects. Some 

approvals for international cooperation with  

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China came through the registered offices of 

overseas NGOs and Foundations. So for example,  

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The Gates Foundation provided tens of millions 

of dollars in assistance to China to deal with  

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COVID, usually relating to training capacity, 

building policy issues, and things like that.  

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A Boston-based organization that some of you may 

have heard of. Certainly, the friends that I have  

00:24:06.900 --> 00:24:11.160

on this call have heard of it, called the China 

Medical Board which is a sentence based in Boston,  

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based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, also provided 

millions of dollars of aid to China through their  

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partners in China. Almost all of this, whether 

it was temporary one-year projects or whether  

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it was aid provided through the registered 

offices of overseas NGOs and Foundations,  

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virtually all of this came through large 

Chinese non-governmental organizations  

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such as the charity federations or fundraising 

foundations in China that have permission to  

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work with foreign donors. They've already gotten 

permission to work with foreign donors and they  

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are responsive to government priorities in terms 

of what was needed to help deal with the code.  

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That's just because that's how the regulation, the 

increasingly restrictive regulation of assistance  

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coming into China Works. The recipients have 

to be approved and they have to stay approved.  

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That means that most of the aid that 

came in to deal with COVID and most  

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of the assistance that has gone to China 

since this framework came into place in  

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2017 does not come primarily through local 

non-governmental organizations. It doesn't  

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come through small groups for the most part. It 

comes through large groups that have experience  

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in bringing in international assistance 

and that is trusted by the government.  

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There was some direct giving from abroad, 

not through the NGOs directly, not through  

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the non-governmental organizations directly, 

but again through the large Chinese charity  

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federations and fundraising foundations. So we 

had some direct giving from abroad and we had a  

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really interesting phenomenon which is, as some 

of you know the work of intermediaries based in  

00:26:07.140 --> 00:26:13.020

the United States which gather up donations from 

individuals and from groups in the United States.  

00:26:13.020 --> 00:26:20.700

And because they are respected in China and have 

the various tax and other approvals and necessary  

00:26:20.700 --> 00:26:27.960

can gather up donations from wide groups of people 

and make those donations available to trusted  

00:26:27.960 --> 00:26:34.380

Partners in China, the most well-known of these 

are groups such as Give to Asia, which is based  

00:26:34.380 --> 00:26:41.280

in San Francisco and the Charities Age Foundation 

which has an office outside of Washington DC and  

00:26:41.280 --> 00:26:48.720

also has a base in the UK. The growth of this 

intermediary giving where people give money to  

00:26:48.720 --> 00:26:55.080

an intermediate organization like Give to Asia in 

San Francisco and then Give to Asia figures out  

00:26:55.080 --> 00:27:01.980

how to deploy that funding in China that has grown 

substantially over the past five or ten years  

00:27:02.640 --> 00:27:09.300

and then we had corporate giving. Apple, Disney, 

and a wide range of American and other companies  

00:27:09.300 --> 00:27:17.100

that were giving to non-governmental organizations 

in China but also giving to State organizations  

00:27:17.100 --> 00:27:25.740

that were providing relief in Wuhan and other 

parts of China. So we had a significant amount  

00:27:25.740 --> 00:27:30.420

of cooperation and assistance going into 

China but I wouldn't want you to forget  

00:27:30.420 --> 00:27:36.240

that we also had China offering Aid abroad and 

that was going on at times at the same time.

00:27:39.900 --> 00:27:46.320

Now I want to turn to a separate problem and 

it's a problem that is very different than  

00:27:46.320 --> 00:27:53.640

the issue of Aid to China in terms 

of material Aid or financial aid.  

00:27:53.640 --> 00:28:00.660

And it is here what I call the great complication 

of the great problem in international cooperation  

00:28:00.660 --> 00:28:10.140

with China in the COVID era and that's the problem 

of mRNA vaccines. mRNA vaccines were developed in  

00:28:10.140 --> 00:28:16.560

the United States and Germany and elsewhere. 

Almost everyone on the call, I actually bet  

00:28:16.560 --> 00:28:23.460

everyone on the call is familiar with Pfizer, is 

familiar with Moderna has had somewhere between  

00:28:23.460 --> 00:28:32.340

one and five of the MRNA vaccines that have been 

produced in the United States and elsewhere during  

00:28:32.340 --> 00:28:41.040

COVID and which were produced very rapidly in 

the United States. It has taken longer to produce  

00:28:41.040 --> 00:28:51.120

those mRNA vaccines in China China is only now 

approaching the approval of some mRNA vaccines  

00:28:51.120 --> 00:28:58.500

in China. That is not to say that China has not 

had its own vaccines. China has had what we call  

00:28:58.500 --> 00:29:06.600

inactivated vaccines, which have been given to a 

significant number of China's population and which  

00:29:06.600 --> 00:29:16.500

have a play to role in the battle against COVID 

in China. They are regarded generally, however,  

00:29:16.500 --> 00:29:25.080

as somewhat less effective than the MRNA vaccines 

which most of us have had the privilege of taking  

00:29:25.080 --> 00:29:32.220

in the United States and some other countries. 

And so the question began to arise in late 2020  

00:29:32.220 --> 00:29:40.320

and particularly in 2021 which is: Would it 

be possible for these particularly effective  

00:29:40.320 --> 00:29:47.940

mRNA vaccines to find their way into China so 

that they could be given to Chinese citizens?  

00:29:48.480 --> 00:29:56.520

And this became a problem, it became a problem for 

the Chinese government to accept cooperation in  

00:29:56.520 --> 00:30:03.300

the MRNA context when they were in the process 

of developing their own similar vaccines. It  

00:30:03.300 --> 00:30:09.780

became a problem because of significant issues 

in the Chinese-U.S. relationship and a desire  

00:30:09.780 --> 00:30:16.620

in the vaccine context in the pharmaceutical 

context for some form of self-reliance in China.  

00:30:17.400 --> 00:30:24.720

It became a problem because China was claiming a 

certain degree of success in its own, in its own  

00:30:24.720 --> 00:30:32.940

COVID-zero policies, and that made it more awkward 

that made it harder to accept American or German,  

00:30:32.940 --> 00:30:42.540

outside Western vaccines. So the result is that 

there has been almost no use of the MRNA vaccines,  

00:30:42.540 --> 00:30:48.840

the types that we have gotten in the U.S., 

the Moderna or Pfizer vaccines. There's been  

00:30:48.840 --> 00:30:55.560

almost no availability of those vaccines in 

China. This is also an aspect of cooperation  

00:30:55.560 --> 00:31:03.480

with China but it's different than the cooperation 

aspects I was discussing before the provision of  

00:31:04.380 --> 00:31:12.480

materials,the provision of money to help people on 

the ground in Wuhan to deal with COVID or to deal  

00:31:12.480 --> 00:31:20.040

with training or things like that vaccines are a 

different and a more complex process between China  

00:31:20.040 --> 00:31:27.240

and the United States. So what has China done when 

it became clear that it was going to be difficult,  

00:31:27.240 --> 00:31:37.200

mostly for internal Chinese reasons to accept and 

to negotiate for the delivery of mRNA vaccines in  

00:31:37.200 --> 00:31:45.000

China? China began quickly developing its own 

vaccines and trying to upgrade those vaccines  

00:31:45.000 --> 00:31:51.120

with the development of domestically produced mRNA 

vaccines. And for those of you who are interested,  

00:31:51.120 --> 00:31:58.740

you can go online and look at stories about the 

development of domestic mRNA vaccines in China by  

00:31:58.740 --> 00:32:06.600

companies like Sinopharm and Walvax, and others. 

Secondly, there have been long negotiations  

00:32:07.200 --> 00:32:17.340

between Pfizer and its German partner BioNtech and 

a large Shanghai pharmaceutical conglomerate about  

00:32:17.340 --> 00:32:25.980

licensing the U.S based Pfizer mRNA vaccine 

in China. Those discussions have gone on for  

00:32:25.980 --> 00:32:32.340

several years but there have been regulatory 

obstacles to doing that in China. There have  

00:32:32.340 --> 00:32:39.000

also been licensing problems, and intellectual 

property problems with requests to the other  

00:32:39.960 --> 00:32:48.960

primary mRNA vaccine provider Moderna which 

China has asked Moderna either to transfer this  

00:32:48.960 --> 00:32:56.220

technology to China or to build a manufacturing 

facility with a Chinese partner, both of which  

00:32:56.220 --> 00:33:02.100

Moderna, the company, the other company which has 

produced the vaccines and some of you have had  

00:33:02.100 --> 00:33:07.920

Moderna vaccines as well felt that they would be 

losing their intellectual property by doing this.  

00:33:07.920 --> 00:33:15.540

And so those negotiations have also dragged on 

for several years. The result of all this is that  

00:33:15.540 --> 00:33:24.480

three years into the COVID pandemic, there are 

still almost no mRNA vaccines available in China.  

00:33:25.380 --> 00:33:35.160

Third, in recent months, China has actually gone 

abroad to try to buy mRNA technology from abroad.  

00:33:35.160 --> 00:33:40.560

So if you look around the web you will see, for 

example, in a major pharmaceutical company in  

00:33:40.560 --> 00:33:48.720

China called Everest Medicines actually buying 

mRNA technology from a Canadian company that  

00:33:48.720 --> 00:33:55.680

is producing mRNA technology and vaccines 

in Canada. That's a third method for trying  

00:33:55.680 --> 00:34:03.300

to get this technology into China but it's been a 

difficult problem and it's a problem that has not  

00:34:03.300 --> 00:34:12.720

been resolved yet for elite Chinese. For Chinese 

who have the ability to travel to Hong Kong,  

00:34:13.380 --> 00:34:20.760

Singapore, Australia, to the United States, 

Canada, England, Germany, and other places as  

00:34:20.760 --> 00:34:29.160

China has gradually reopened once the COVID-zero 

policy ended several months ago. Those Chinese,  

00:34:29.160 --> 00:34:37.680

and I'm generally calling those Elite Chinese, are 

able to get if they want the foreign vaccine, the  

00:34:37.680 --> 00:34:46.320

mRNA vaccine in Hong Kong, Singapore, Melbourne, 

Toronto, Los Angeles, and other places, and some  

00:34:46.320 --> 00:34:53.280

of you who are listening tonight may be well aware 

of Chinese colleagues, friends, relatives who,  

00:34:53.280 --> 00:35:01.380

coming out of China in the wake of several years 

of lockdowns and pretty strict policies in China,  

00:35:01.380 --> 00:35:08.160

have now begun to come out gradually able to 

travel and one of the things some of these  

00:35:08.160 --> 00:35:15.600

Travelers want to do, many of these Travelers 

want to do is supplement the Chinese vaccines with  

00:35:15.600 --> 00:35:23.640

getting either the Pfizer or the Moderna vaccine 

while they are outside the mainland. Meaning when  

00:35:23.640 --> 00:35:30.360

they are in Hong Kong or Singapore or Canada or 

the US or other places. So we are seeing that,  

00:35:30.360 --> 00:35:38.880

so far, the availability of these external 

vaccines, the MRNA vaccines so far is more  

00:35:38.880 --> 00:35:45.780

available to Elite Chinese who can travel. We're 

not seeing many of these vaccines in China yet.  

00:35:46.380 --> 00:35:53.220

This is a very different aspect of international 

cooperation with China during the COVID era but  

00:35:53.220 --> 00:35:59.460

I wanted to mention it because it's an important 

aspect of difficulties in cooperation. It's been  

00:35:59.460 --> 00:36:08.520

much easier to send non-vaccine-related assistance 

or cooperation into China, there's a framework  

00:36:08.520 --> 00:36:15.000

for that. It's a pretty controlling framework but 

there is a framework for it. There really wasn't a  

00:36:15.000 --> 00:36:23.400

framework for the mRNA vaccines to come into China 

quickly and so that has been a very slow process.  

00:36:25.380 --> 00:36:31.860

So let me talk about some lessons for the 

future or I guess lessons for the future  

00:36:31.860 --> 00:36:38.520

is a pretty broad phrase, a pretty ponderous 

phrase but at least some things to think about  

00:36:38.520 --> 00:36:45.480

with respect to cooperation with China 

and what the COVID era has to tell us.  

00:36:46.560 --> 00:36:53.340

We don't see a one-size-fits-all policy on 

international cooperation with China in the  

00:36:53.340 --> 00:37:00.360

COVID era. Rather, we see a spectrum of what 

I'm calling here, constrained and regulated  

00:37:00.360 --> 00:37:07.560

welcome in terms of financial assistance, and 

material assistance to China dealing with COVID  

00:37:08.340 --> 00:37:15.900

a spectrum that ranges from that constrained and 

regulated welcome to real problems in dealing with  

00:37:15.900 --> 00:37:24.780

the mRNA vaccine process but those are different 

things. Sending specialized hospital equipment  

00:37:24.780 --> 00:37:33.000

into China, and sending money into China to deal 

with COVID is different from the very difficult  

00:37:33.000 --> 00:37:41.820

problems of the Western vaccines being brought 

into China for the first time compared with 1976,  

00:37:41.820 --> 00:37:48.360

the Tangshan earthquake or 2008, 

the Wenchuang earthquake, we have  

00:37:48.360 --> 00:37:55.380

an existing body of rules and policies in China 

to govern the cooperation process with abroad  

00:37:57.000 --> 00:38:05.100

that is not necessarily open. Regulatory and 

policy processes, it has many missteps to it.  

00:38:05.100 --> 00:38:13.980

It is not necessarily easy to cooperate with China 

but there is a system in place and many American  

00:38:13.980 --> 00:38:22.140

foundations non-government organizations other 

groups from Canada, Germany, Australia, Taiwan,  

00:38:22.140 --> 00:38:29.280

Hong Kong, and other parts of the world have 

been able to work within those bodies of rules  

00:38:29.280 --> 00:38:35.760

and policies to try to get some assistance, 

some cooperation into China during COVID,  

00:38:36.420 --> 00:38:41.700

but as I was talking about before, there 

is a piece of the cooperation process which  

00:38:41.700 --> 00:38:48.000

has proven much more difficult and that's the 

vaccines. What I say here, is a complex mixture  

00:38:48.000 --> 00:38:57.780

a complex melange of domestic policy constraints 

and commercial issues. The mRNA vaccines are a  

00:38:57.780 --> 00:39:05.460

massive commercial product and that has caused 

massive problems and difficulties in cooperation  

00:39:05.460 --> 00:39:14.040

other factors have made the transfer entry of 

the mRNA vaccines to China really problematic.  

00:39:15.000 --> 00:39:18.420

So this three-year process in China which Chinese  

00:39:18.420 --> 00:39:23.940

policymakers and Chinese Scholars and 

others in China have watched carefully  

00:39:27.060 --> 00:39:33.780

is sparking some new thinking in China about how 

international assistance and how international  

00:39:33.780 --> 00:39:42.480

cooperation with China should work in the future. 

And a variety of issues have come up regarding how  

00:39:42.480 --> 00:39:50.160

to streamline the process so that cooperation and 

assistance can come to China more easily than what  

00:39:50.160 --> 00:39:56.460

sometimes occurred during the COVID era it did 

happen during the COVID era but it wasn't always  

00:39:56.460 --> 00:40:02.040

easy and there were multiple steps. So there is 

some push in China for a more streamlined process  

00:40:03.180 --> 00:40:13.080

there is also more thinking in China about ways 

in which in future emergency or disaster contexts  

00:40:13.080 --> 00:40:21.240

to broaden the range of Chinese institutions 

that can accept cooperation, accept assistance  

00:40:21.240 --> 00:40:28.800

from abroad. In particular, most of the Chinese 

organizations that were able as I said before to  

00:40:28.800 --> 00:40:35.760

accept Assistance or cooperation were large 

government-related or government-approved  

00:40:35.760 --> 00:40:42.720

charity federations and fundraising foundations 

that had relationships with the government. One  

00:40:42.720 --> 00:40:50.100

way or another, most of the smaller NGOs around 

China were then dependent on those organizations  

00:40:50.100 --> 00:40:57.240

to receive assistance to receive cooperation. 

There is some concern in China that in future  

00:40:57.240 --> 00:41:03.600

emergencies future disasters. It should be 

possible to broaden the range of Chinese  

00:41:03.600 --> 00:41:10.080

organizations that are working with their fine 

counterparts without too much interference without  

00:41:10.080 --> 00:41:16.620

too much supervision from the government so those 

are some of the issues that arise with Chinese  

00:41:16.620 --> 00:41:24.300

policy toward International giving to China during 

the COVID era I haven't covered everything but I  

00:41:24.300 --> 00:41:31.860

think we've covered some of the main issues that 

have arisen COVID was a disaster for China as it  

00:41:31.860 --> 00:41:38.580

was a disaster for countries around the world. At 

the same time, the experience that China has had  

00:41:38.580 --> 00:41:44.880

with International cooperation both coming 

in and going out during COVID has sparked  

00:41:44.880 --> 00:41:50.580

some thinking in China about how to deal with the 

emergency and the disaster context. In the future,  

00:41:50.580 --> 00:41:57.180

we know that unfortunately there will be more 

disasters not only in our country but in China  

00:41:57.180 --> 00:42:04.740

and other countries as well. China had Tangshan in 

1976 China had Wenchuang in 2008 China had COVID  

00:42:04.740 --> 00:42:11.820

in 2020, through the end of last year, and of 

course still dramatically affecting China, there  

00:42:11.820 --> 00:42:18.420

will be other emergencies, there will be other 

disasters and so hopefully what China and the U.S  

00:42:18.420 --> 00:42:26.040

and other places have learned from this context, 

from this crisis will inform and make a policy  

00:42:26.040 --> 00:42:33.780

better as we encounter emergencies, disasters, and 

crises in the future and with that, Professor Zhou  

00:42:33.780 --> 00:42:39.180

let me end. I'd welcome any kinds of questions or 

things like that and thank you all for listening. 

00:42:40.200 --> 00:42:48.600

Thank you very much, Professor Sidel, for 

this very, very informative lecture and  

00:42:48.600 --> 00:42:58.980

track of information as well as stimulating 

questions so the audience, please write your  

00:42:59.640 --> 00:43:07.920

comments and questions in the chat, I mean in 

a Q&A box and then we could have a discussion.  

00:43:08.520 --> 00:43:19.140

But so as the moderator, I would take the 

liberty of asking some questions that I have.  

00:43:20.400 --> 00:43:27.900

So one of the questions probably the audience 

and some of our students here would be interested  

00:43:27.900 --> 00:43:36.120

in is the legal framework and the policy 

framework that you talk about in the beginning  

00:43:37.260 --> 00:43:44.520

but probably because of the time limit that 

we ask you to give a lecture you know within  

00:43:44.520 --> 00:43:53.400

like 30 minutes you didn't give much detail on 

that. Could you give us a little bit of detail on  

00:43:53.400 --> 00:44:02.880

this general policy framework and the 

conflictual part of these regulatory frameworks?

00:44:02.880 --> 00:44:09.420

Absolutely, I'm delighted to do that. I should 

also say that also delighted I always say this,  

00:44:10.680 --> 00:44:15.540

delighted to communicate with people afterward. 

I put my email address on the first slide  

00:44:15.540 --> 00:44:20.040

I'm going to repeat it now because I stopped 

sharing the email address on the first side:  

00:44:20.040 --> 00:44:26.340

is my last name Sidel that's S for Sam 

i-d-e-l it's in the bottom left of the  

00:44:26.340 --> 00:44:34.020

screen just the last name at wisc, w-i-s-c 

that's for Wisconsin. sidel@wisc.edu.  

00:44:34.680 --> 00:44:41.880

The legal framework for this sector has gotten 

more and more complex in China over the last  

00:44:41.880 --> 00:44:48.960

20 or 30 years and there is now as I said, an 

entire legal framework that's involved with  

00:44:48.960 --> 00:44:56.700

foreign organizations working in China to support 

relief and development in China. That is the  

00:44:56.700 --> 00:45:04.980

primary fine regular time mechanism that applies 

to giving assistance to China in the COVID era  

00:45:04.980 --> 00:45:13.260

and it requires organizations that want to 

work with China to establish either an office  

00:45:13.260 --> 00:45:20.820

in China or to work through what we call one-year 

projects or temporary activities. But all of that  

00:45:20.820 --> 00:45:26.400

has to have a professional partner in China 

and needs to have the approval of the Chinese  

00:45:26.400 --> 00:45:34.260

Public Security Ministry which has taken over 

control of this sector beginning in about 2014.  

00:45:34.920 --> 00:45:39.660

In addition to that, I've written a lot about 

that if people are particularly interested in  

00:45:39.660 --> 00:45:45.000

that you are welcome to get in touch with me and 

I'll send you a few things to read or you can just  

00:45:45.000 --> 00:45:52.260

Google that, there's lots of information available 

on this overseas NGO law. But in addition to that,  

00:45:52.260 --> 00:46:00.900

there are pretty firm regulatory controls on 

domestic Chinese philanthropic and non-profit  

00:46:00.900 --> 00:46:10.140

organizations as well. It is a somewhat complex 

process to establish a foundation in China. It  

00:46:10.140 --> 00:46:16.800

is a somewhat complex process to get permission 

to raise funds in China so we have regulations on  

00:46:16.800 --> 00:46:23.640

foundations, we have an overall Chinese charity 

law that was passed in 2016 which is now in the  

00:46:23.640 --> 00:46:31.800

process of being revised. It's a pretty strictly 

regulated sector in China. Why is it a strictly  

00:46:31.800 --> 00:46:38.400

regulated sector in China? It's primarily a 

strictly regulated sector in China because the  

00:46:38.400 --> 00:46:45.600

Chinese party and government want non-governmental 

organizations to be focused on providing services,  

00:46:45.600 --> 00:46:55.440

not on doing advocacy work. And so the primary 

form of regulation is intended it does a lot of  

00:46:55.440 --> 00:47:02.820

different things but it is intended at least 

in part to reduce the role of Civil Society  

00:47:02.820 --> 00:47:10.140

in political or other forms of advocacy. China 

doesn't want that kind of Civil Society. China  

00:47:10.140 --> 00:47:18.960

wants service-oriented NGOs or non-governmental 

organizations. China wants not have what we in the  

00:47:18.960 --> 00:47:26.580

West would call Civil Society, including advocacy, 

including participation in public debate. That's  

00:47:26.580 --> 00:47:32.580

not what the Chinese party and state are looking 

for. The Chinese party and state are looking for  

00:47:32.580 --> 00:47:38.820

generally service provision organizations and 

a good deal of the Chinese regulation of this  

00:47:38.820 --> 00:47:47.280

sector is intended to promote service provision 

and to make advocacy more difficult. That's the  

00:47:47.280 --> 00:47:53.400

general theme within that. There's a lot of 

regulatory activity going on and for those of  

00:47:53.400 --> 00:47:59.340

you who are interested in that so I'd be delighted 

to communicate with you by email and things like  

00:47:59.340 --> 00:48:04.920

that. There's a lot written about that as well for 

those of you who are interested in participating  

00:48:04.920 --> 00:48:11.340

in these processes in China which has been much 

more difficult in the COVID era than it was  

00:48:11.340 --> 00:48:19.260

before. Well, China is now beginning to reopen 

universities are now beginning to rethink the  

00:48:19.260 --> 00:48:25.740

possibility of students going back to China for 

study, for work, and things like that it's going  

00:48:25.740 --> 00:48:30.840

to be a slow process. It's going to be a hard 

process not only because of COVID but because  

00:48:30.840 --> 00:48:37.500

of the difficulties in Chinese-U.S relations but 

over the next several years we are likely to see  

00:48:37.500 --> 00:48:45.120

the resumption of some engagement with China and 

with that the resumption of some engagement with  

00:48:45.120 --> 00:48:52.800

Chinese non-profit or philanthropic organizations 

including the possibility that American students  

00:48:52.800 --> 00:48:57.840

and others can spend some time in Beijing or 

Shanghai or other places in China actually  

00:48:57.840 --> 00:49:05.220

working with Chinese non-profit and philanthropic 

organizations. So let me stop there and answer.

00:49:05.220 --> 00:49:13.860

Yeah, that's a great answer. Could you 

say give us a concrete example of like  

00:49:13.860 --> 00:49:20.160

to contrast like setting up a foundation 

in China versus setting up a foundation  

00:49:20.160 --> 00:49:27.540

in the U.S. and what it takes to do that 

in the U.S. versus to do that in China?

00:49:27.540 --> 00:49:37.740

Given the restrictive or liberal framework, in 

the U.S if you want to set up a foundation in  

00:49:37.740 --> 00:49:43.560

let's say California because most of you who 

are listening are in California you have to  

00:49:43.560 --> 00:49:49.860

do a couple things but quite frankly it's not 

that hard you have to establish a non-profit  

00:49:49.860 --> 00:49:56.280

in California. According to California state 

law, that is a pretty straightforward process  

00:49:57.120 --> 00:50:06.300

then you need to take that non-profit and in one 

of several ways work out tax exemption. With the  

00:50:06.300 --> 00:50:12.840

federal government, the Internal Revenue Service 

in Washington DC, you have your non-profit group  

00:50:12.840 --> 00:50:21.060

you get that non-profit group declared tax-exempt 

one way or another one of those is called the  

00:50:21.060 --> 00:50:29.460

501c3 non-profit organization. If you get that tax 

exemption certification from the Internal Revenue  

00:50:29.460 --> 00:50:37.680

Service in Washington then you don't for the most 

part pay tax on your income to your non-profit  

00:50:37.680 --> 00:50:46.080

organization and donors to your organization can 

under certain circumstances take a tax deduction  

00:50:46.080 --> 00:50:52.380

for donors for donations to your organization. 

There have been some additional requirements  

00:50:52.380 --> 00:50:59.580

if your organization becomes what we call a 

private foundation but there are something like  

00:51:01.500 --> 00:51:08.040

70,000 private foundations in the United States. 

And so the process of getting to that point,  

00:51:08.040 --> 00:51:15.420

while it does take some regulatory steps at 

the state level and at the federal level is  

00:51:15.420 --> 00:51:23.520

not that onerous, you then have to make reports 

to your state agency every year. In California,  

00:51:23.520 --> 00:51:31.680

you have to file tax returns of various kinds. 

Easy Tax Returns if you're a small group, more  

00:51:31.680 --> 00:51:36.600

complicated tax returns if you're a bigger group 

you have to file those tax returns with the IRS,  

00:51:36.600 --> 00:51:43.920

and if you are a foundation you have to comply 

with certain rules, rules that are intended to  

00:51:43.920 --> 00:51:50.580

guarantee that as a foundation you will give 

out enough income that you will not do what  

00:51:50.580 --> 00:51:57.000

we call self-dealing which is giving money 

to members of the board, things like those,  

00:51:57.000 --> 00:52:03.960

rules can be complied with. China also has 

foundations. Legally, they're a little bit  

00:52:03.960 --> 00:52:10.140

different than the American foundations but China 

does have foundations. The process of getting that  

00:52:10.140 --> 00:52:16.980

approval to establish a Chinese Foundation 

is a more complicated, more onerous process.  

00:52:17.520 --> 00:52:25.560

It does involve putting together generally, more 

capital in China to establish your foundation than  

00:52:25.560 --> 00:52:32.340

is usually required in the United States. If 

you succeed in establishing your foundation,  

00:52:32.340 --> 00:52:39.660

which often takes approvals from multiple levels 

of government in China, then the rules that are  

00:52:39.660 --> 00:52:45.480

applicable to your foundation in terms of annual 

inspections, annual reports things like that  

00:52:46.500 --> 00:52:54.960

are, I would say, more onerous than in the United 

States. Some foundations can raise money from the  

00:52:54.960 --> 00:53:01.320

outside to carry on their charitable activities. 

Some foundations are restricted and are not  

00:53:01.320 --> 00:53:07.260

permitted to do that because the thinking for 

those foundations is that they will bring in money  

00:53:07.260 --> 00:53:13.980

from a particular family, the founding family, 

or from a business to establish their Foundation,  

00:53:13.980 --> 00:53:21.000

so the process is more onerous in China. 

The requirements are more onerous and  

00:53:21.000 --> 00:53:28.260

Chinese foundations, perhaps more than American 

foundations, have to keep in mind that what the  

00:53:28.260 --> 00:53:35.220

Chinese party and state want from foundations 

is the provision of services, not engagement  

00:53:35.220 --> 00:53:43.020

with domestic policy and political questions 

for the most part. So Chinese foundations and  

00:53:43.020 --> 00:53:49.440

Chinese non-profits for the most part have 

to stay aside from policy questions. Let  

00:53:49.440 --> 00:53:55.980

me give an example of that. There was tremendous 

controversy in China about the COVID-zero policy.  

00:53:57.240 --> 00:54:03.000

We knew that from the recording. We knew that 

from watching WeChat, we knew that from lots of  

00:54:03.000 --> 00:54:09.360

different ways but Chinese non-profits and 

Foundations were not encouraged, in fact,  

00:54:09.360 --> 00:54:16.560

were discouraged, from joining any kind of public 

debate about that what the government wanted from  

00:54:16.560 --> 00:54:23.760

them was the provision of services to citizens 

in Wuhan, in Shanghai, in parts of Beijing,  

00:54:23.760 --> 00:54:29.340

things like that. They did not want the 

non-profit sector to be engaging with or  

00:54:29.340 --> 00:54:37.020

helping to strengthen a national debate about 

the COVID-zero policy so non-profits in China  

00:54:37.020 --> 00:54:45.420

have to watch that boundary, that political 

boundary, pretty carefully, and they really  

00:54:45.420 --> 00:54:52.740

can't engage in those kinds of discussions. What 

they are intended to do is to stick to the service  

00:54:52.740 --> 00:55:01.140

side of the reason they reformed to provide 

widely advanced gear for nurses, to provide  

00:55:01.140 --> 00:55:08.280

learning materials for students who can't go 

to school during COVID, to provide subsidies  

00:55:08.280 --> 00:55:15.660

for family members who are losing family members 

to COVID and who can't afford the crematorium and  

00:55:15.660 --> 00:55:23.280

burial costs things like that. Service-oriented 

activities, not political activities. Yeah, that's  

00:55:23.280 --> 00:55:33.300

very interesting when you talk about the Chinese 

NGOs, you clarify some of the myths of the Chinese  

00:55:33.300 --> 00:55:45.780

non-profit sector for us. China promotes NGOs 

for service provision rather than for advocacy.

00:55:45.780 --> 00:55:52.260

And that's a very good way of putting it 

and very clear, thank you. And we have a  

00:55:52.260 --> 00:56:02.040

couple of questions in the Q&A box let me read 

out one from Emily Viber. China has staunchly  

00:56:02.040 --> 00:56:10.800

defended its developing nation status which has 

allowed it to continue to be an aid recipient.  

00:56:11.460 --> 00:56:19.440

At the same time, they are scaling up their 

own outgoing aid channels including a formal  

00:56:19.440 --> 00:56:28.200

body to manage its International aid efforts. How 

do you see this evolving and how much longer will  

00:56:28.200 --> 00:56:35.340

they try to maintain these dual identities?

A very good question for you, Mark that is an  

00:56:35.340 --> 00:56:39.780

excellent question from someone who knows 

China well and who I know Emily Weaverand  

00:56:41.820 --> 00:56:47.880

let me say that I think that China is going to try 

to maintain this dual identity for a long time.  

00:56:48.540 --> 00:56:52.860

China doesn't want the Gates Foundation to 

leave China, China doesn't want the China  

00:56:52.860 --> 00:56:57.360

Medical Board to leave China, China doesn't 

want the Asia Foundation which is based in  

00:56:57.360 --> 00:57:03.660

San Francisco to leave China or give to Asia 

the intermediary that provides funds they are  

00:57:03.660 --> 00:57:07.620

doing good work in China, China doesn't 

want the Ford Foundation where I used to  

00:57:07.620 --> 00:57:15.600

work in Beijing leaving China they are doing 

good work and they are not perceived to be a  

00:57:15.600 --> 00:57:23.220

danger to the Chinese party and State under 

the overseas NGO law that was passed in 2016.  

00:57:23.220 --> 00:57:30.420

Their activities are constrained they have to get 

permission for their activities. And so in effect,  

00:57:30.420 --> 00:57:37.260

China has figured out a system in which it can get 

certain benefits from that process of Aid coming  

00:57:37.260 --> 00:57:44.640

into China without what it views politically as 

some of the dangers of that process at the same  

00:57:44.640 --> 00:57:51.540

time. As Emily Weaver indicates in the question 

very clearly China is scaling up its own outgoing  

00:57:51.540 --> 00:57:57.780

aid channels including a formal body within the 

government in Beijing to manage international  

00:57:57.780 --> 00:58:04.560

aid efforts that are happening across a wide 

variety of fronts in China. It's part of the  

00:58:04.560 --> 00:58:09.840

BRICs investment and trade activities with 

other parts of the world which often have an  

00:58:09.840 --> 00:58:16.560

aid component. It's direct foreign aid from China 

to a variety of countries around the world. This  

00:58:16.560 --> 00:58:23.940

has been growing particularly over the last 10 

to 15 years but China as an aid-giving country,  

00:58:23.940 --> 00:58:31.860

in fact, actually goes back to a time when China 

was much poorer than it is now with Chinese Aid  

00:58:31.860 --> 00:58:41.460

activities to Africa. For example, in the 1970s 

the famous Tanzan railroad across Tanzania and  

00:58:41.460 --> 00:58:50.040

Zambia in the 1970s. So China as an aid giver 

to the developing world has a long history but  

00:58:50.040 --> 00:58:57.420

has ramped up so actually I don't see that as 

a sort of zero-sum situation. I don't think the  

00:58:57.420 --> 00:59:03.480

questioner probably sees it that way either. I 

think that both tracks are going to proceed for  

00:59:03.480 --> 00:59:10.320

some significant time in the future. China has 

an increasing Aid and assistance and cooperation  

00:59:10.320 --> 00:59:19.800

provider and China to some degree as an assistance 

or cooperation importer as well. That is on a more  

00:59:19.800 --> 00:59:25.740

constrained basis than it was 15 or 20 years 

ago but I don't see China ending those efforts.  

00:59:26.580 --> 00:59:35.340

Thank you, Emily, thank you, and thank you, Emily. 

One of these days we should get connected. So the  

00:59:35.340 --> 00:59:45.660

next question is yeah the next question is by Mei 

Huang thank you very much for the lecture and then  

00:59:45.660 --> 00:59:53.580

I have a question: Is China's policy different 

from different for NGOs in different countries  

00:59:53.580 --> 01:00:01.320

and the assistance do they provide? And actually, 

there is another part of the question: are there  

01:00:01.320 --> 01:00:09.600

different rules for different countries or a 

uniform set of rules and processes? Thanks a lot.

01:00:09.600 --> 01:00:16.620

In general, in terms of non-governmental aid 

from NGOs, non-governmental organizations,  

01:00:16.620 --> 01:00:23.220

foundations, and groups like that coming into 

China there is now a uniform set of rules and  

01:00:23.220 --> 01:00:28.440

processes. That's the overseas NGO law 

which is overseen by the ministry of  

01:00:28.440 --> 01:00:35.340

public security and each organization has 

to have a professional partner in China.  

01:00:36.180 --> 01:00:45.300

Having said that there are certain countries 

and regions that are of more concern in China  

01:00:46.320 --> 01:00:53.040

because of the state of China-U.S. relations, 

U.S NGOs, non-governmental organizations,  

01:00:53.040 --> 01:01:02.400

and U.S foundations in some cases will encounter 

some more scrutiny in China. In some cases,  

01:01:02.400 --> 01:01:12.180

because of the complexity and sensitivity of the 

Taiwan issue, if Taiwanese NGOs seek to work in  

01:01:12.180 --> 01:01:18.600

China or Taiwanese Foundations seek to work 

in China, there may be under some conditions,  

01:01:18.600 --> 01:01:25.260

more scrutiny for those activities. The same 

goes over the last couple of years for Hong  

01:01:25.260 --> 01:01:32.700

Kong-registered non-governmental organizations and 

Foundations as well. So we have a uniform set of  

01:01:32.700 --> 01:01:39.300

rules and processes for that non-governmental 

assistance to come to China that applies not  

01:01:39.300 --> 01:01:45.960

just to foreign countries like the United States 

and Canada, it applies to Regions like Hong Kong  

01:01:45.960 --> 01:01:54.840

and Taiwan as well. That's why it's called the 

overseas NGO law, not the foreign NGO law because  

01:01:54.840 --> 01:02:02.400

it includes Hong Kong and Taiwan within that 

idea of a uniform set of rules and processes.  

01:02:02.400 --> 01:02:10.020

There are always going to be certain kinds of 

Foundations, certain kinds of ngos of from certain  

01:02:10.020 --> 01:02:17.400

places that will probably undergo more scrutiny 

either in their applications to work with China  

01:02:17.400 --> 01:02:24.240

or in the day-to-day operations of carrying 

things up. Thank you for the great question.

01:02:24.240 --> 01:02:34.320

Yeah, thank you, and great answer. We have the 

last question because of our time and so this  

01:02:34.320 --> 01:02:43.260

one is by Panli for international organizations 

who are interested in engaging Chinese foundations  

01:02:43.260 --> 01:02:54.180

and NGOs to collectively address emerging Global 

issues today. Which areas/Fields do you think are  

01:02:54.180 --> 01:03:01.440

more likely to happen? Also a great question 

by a person I know and I'll say hello to her  

01:03:01.440 --> 01:03:06.960

as well assuming it's the same person, it's 

the person I know. But it's a very important  

01:03:06.960 --> 01:03:13.440

question these days because as the United 

States and other countries have had frayed  

01:03:13.440 --> 01:03:19.680

relations with China over the past couple of 

years or even longer the question has arisen:  

01:03:19.680 --> 01:03:27.180

How do we engage effectively with China? How do 

U.S organizations,how do British organizations,  

01:03:27.180 --> 01:03:34.980

engage effectively with China, especially with 

the Chinese non-governmental non-profit sector  

01:03:34.980 --> 01:03:41.940

like the foundations and the NGOs you mentioned. 

I think there are certain fields where cooperation  

01:03:41.940 --> 01:03:50.640

on emerging what you call emerging Global issues 

is slightly easier to begin to undertake as China  

01:03:50.640 --> 01:03:59.160

comes out of hopefully the COVID era and I think 

we have a sort of general agreement on what some  

01:03:59.160 --> 01:04:08.340

of those kinds of issues could be. So for example, 

climate change. There has been a clear expression  

01:04:08.340 --> 01:04:15.360

of interest at times in China at working together 

at the governmental level, or I should say at the  

01:04:15.360 --> 01:04:22.260

international level the governmental level, and 

the non-governmental level on issues of climate  

01:04:22.260 --> 01:04:29.340

change. I should also say that within China but 

also from abroad there has been continued interest  

01:04:29.340 --> 01:04:36.300

in finding ways to work together on health, 

particularly public health-related issues.  

01:04:37.140 --> 01:04:46.860

These are two sets of issues that um are easier 

to keep separate from domestic political issues  

01:04:46.860 --> 01:04:53.160

in China. They're not unrelated to political 

issues in the United States, Australia, Canada,  

01:04:54.300 --> 01:04:58.500

Hong Kong, Taiwan, et cetera. They're 

not unrelated to political issues but  

01:04:58.500 --> 01:05:06.300

in terms of engagement and cooperation with our 

Chinese counterparts issues like those issues,  

01:05:06.300 --> 01:05:14.460

climate change, certain forms of environmental 

change, certain forms of energy-related issues  

01:05:14.460 --> 01:05:21.420

which are all sort of of a big piece and some 

health- particularly public health-issues are  

01:05:21.420 --> 01:05:28.380

the kinds of things that I would identify 

as emerging Global issues where it might be  

01:05:28.380 --> 01:05:34.860

possible to begin re-engaging with China as we 

hopefully begin to come out of the COVID era.

01:05:36.120 --> 01:05:47.760

That's great. So with that thank you Professor 

Sidel for a very engaging lecture we have learned  

01:05:47.760 --> 01:05:57.060

a lot and I'm hoping that you know China and the 

rest of the world would have greater cooperation  

01:05:57.060 --> 01:06:04.080

and partnership, especially in the area 

of philanthropy and other areas as well.  

01:06:04.080 --> 01:06:14.220

And thank you for our audience participation in 

today's event organized by the UCLA Asia Pacific  

01:06:14.220 --> 01:06:20.520

Center. And our Center organizes a range of 

public events workshops and international  

01:06:20.520 --> 01:06:29.940

conferences in This Global Chinese philanthropy 

lecture series as I said before. We will have  

01:06:29.940 --> 01:06:39.000

another public lecture on May 3rd by Professor Ji 

Ma of UT Austin and he will talk about the Chinese  

01:06:39.540 --> 01:06:48.300

profit sector as well we also will have a 

student training workshop on Thursday, June 8th,  

01:06:48.300 --> 01:06:58.680

or online and all happen at 5 PM Pacific time. So 

please watch our website for further announcements  

01:06:58.680 --> 01:07:06.840

and please join me again to thank Professor 

Mark Sidel for his insightful and informative  

01:07:06.840 --> 01:07:14.760

lecture. I also thank the Cyrus Tang Foundation 

for their support and thank our centers' Deputy  

01:07:14.760 --> 01:07:24.240

Director Aaron Miller, Program Coordinator 

Jeannie Chen, Graduate Assistant Lena Wang,  

01:07:24.240 --> 01:07:31.620

and Undergraduate Student Assistant Lillian Shen 

for their hard work and support behind the scenes.  

01:07:32.280 --> 01:07:40.380

Thank you so much and if you have any questions 

or if you want to reach out to Professor Sidel we  

01:07:40.380 --> 01:07:45.840

could be the go-between for you and you could 

shoot us an email and we could help connect.  

01:07:46.860 --> 01:07:53.640

Thank you, Mark, thank you and good 

evening and good morning in Asia. Thank you

01:07:57.960 --> 01:07:59.880

Good night, good night.