China, the Born-Again Superpower

ASIA FORUM with Adjunct Professor Klas Eklund

China, the Born-Again Superpower

Friday, October 7, 2011, 10:00 – 12:00

“China – the born-again superpower” (“Kina – den nygamla supermakten” SNS Förlag, 2011) is a broad analysis of China’s economic and political development. Klas Eklund explains the historical roots of today’s strange combination of Chinese capitalism and communist dictatorship. He describes the present growth strategy and how the Party tries to change it to a greener and more inclusive growth. Klas Eklund also analyses the Party’s power and its future challenges.

He claims that most Westerners have underestimated China’s future impact and wonders what the world at large will look like some 50 years from now, when China is #1 in many areas.

Klas Eklund is the Senior Economist of SEB and Adjunct Professor of Economics at the University of Lund, Sweden. Between 1994 and 2007 he was the bank’s Chief Economist. In the 1980s Klas Eklund worked in the Ministry of Finance (as Deputy Under-Secretary of State) and in the Cabinet office (as economic adviser to the Prime Minister). In 1990-91 he chaired the government’s Productivity Commission, analysing the poor Swedish growth performance in the 1970s and 1980s, as well as drawing economic policy conclusions. Between 2001 and 2010 he was a member of the European Commission’s Group of Economic Policy Analysis. Mr Eklund has also held a number of other positions, including member of the Board of Governors of the Swedish Central Bank and Chairman of the government’s Committee for Economic Studies of the Public Sector, etc.

Klas Eklund has published over 850 articles and columns and a number of books, including the best-selling Swedish economics text-book (also translated into Russian and Chinese), books on the budget deficit, the Swedish tax system, economic growth, climate economics and financial markets. He has also written a financial thriller about insider trade and murder in the Ministry of Finance. That book has been made into a movie, broadcast on Swedish TV. In 2010 he published a biography of former PM Olof Palme, and in 2011 a broad study of China’s political and economic development.

Location: ISDP, Västra Finnbodavägen 2, Stockholm-Nacka. For a map and directions, please go here.

To attend: RSVP to Ms. Ebba Mårtensson at emartensson@isdp.eu