Publication |
2009.
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Summary/Abstract |
The success of coastal China in mobilizing resources from the overseas Chinese community has been well documented, and is deemed to have played an important role in the expansion of the Chinese economy. This article adopts a new approach by looking at the issue from the point of view of an ethnic minority border region. It explores the mobilization of the Korean minority's transnational ties in the service of local economic development in the Yanbian Korean Autonomous Prefecture, located in Jilin Province at the North Korean border. These pursuits are conceptualized as "transnationalism from above," whereby the local government focused on mobilizing, institutionalizing, steering and controlling transnational activities in support of its own specific goals. How were these linkages built up and how did the government balance between the positive and negative, or the "sweet and sour" aspects of transnational ethnic capital transfers? The study points to a new mechanism for economic development that is emerging along China's borders.
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