A Dialogue on a Common Future: Social, Demographic, and Political Changes in East Asia

Description

The unprecedented social, demographic and political changes in East Asia since the 1990s have had profound impacts on families, economies, and social policies in the region. This panel brings together East Asian experts to discuss impacts of the changes, policy responses, and future research agenda, focusing on Japan, South Korea and Taiwan. The panel is designed to promote interdisciplinary dialogue on social, economic and policy issues in East Asia. We welcome all who have an interest to attend.

Speaker bios:

Yoonkyung Lee is Associate Professor in Sociology at the University of Toronto, St. George. She is a political sociologist studying labor politics, social movements, and political representation. She is the author of Militants or Partisans: Labor Unions and Democratic Politics in Korea and Taiwan (Stanford University Press 2011) and numerous journal articles on labor, class, social movements, and inequality in East Asia.

Ito Peng is a Professor and Canada Research Chair in Global Social Policy at the Department of Sociology, and the School of Public Policy and Governance, University of Toronto. She is also the Director of the Centre for Global Social Policy at the University of Toronto. She teaches political sociology and comparative social policy, specializing in family, gender, demographic issues, and migration, and she has written extensively on family, gender and social policies in East Asia. She is currently leading a large SSHRC funded international partnership research project entitled Gender, Migration, and the Work of Care that brings together over 50 researchers and non-academic partners to examine how the reorganization of care influences the global migration of care workers, and how this migration in turn impacts family and gender relations, gender equality, government policies, and global governance.

Wei-hsin Yu is Professor in the Department of Sociology at the University of Maryland, College Park. Her research generally focuses on how macrolevel forces affect individuals, paying special attention to their labor market trajectories, economic outcomes, family behaviors and psychological health. She is currently pursuing projects examining relationship formation, marriage and demographic changes in Japan and Taiwan.