Publication |
2014.
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Summary/Abstract |
Taiwan's president, Ma Ying-jeou, sat in a low leather chair looking out over the vast presidential conference room of his Taipei office. On the wall behind him hung a portrait of Sun Yat-sen, the Chinese icon who is credited with the revolution a century ago that ended two thousand years of imperial rule. Under Ma's feet lay a light blue carpet festooned with white representations of ocean waves. Overhead, white cloth, styled like ship sails, covered the ceiling lights-all of it intended to represent Taiwan's journey away from mainland China. Asian conference rooms are unlike those in the West. There's no mahogany conference table. Instead, plush chairs are arranged in a U shape. And the conference leader, in this case President Ma, sits at the center with his conferees to his left and right-university professors, think tank leaders, and government officials from Asia and the West who were there for a conference on the East China Sea debate between Taiwan, China, and Japan.
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