Bulletin Autumn‧Winter 2006

Chinese University Bulletin Autumn · Winter 2006 18 professor has also been arranged to stay at CUHK for eight months to conduct joint research, while a series of visiting scholars have been lined up to give seminars. Postdoctoral researchers and fellows will be hired to work on basic research with the centre’s experts either from their home location or at the University. Through these new synergies, the centre aims to produce high quality research related to China and East Asia, and disseminate its findings to the local and the world academic community through publications and word of mouth. In doing so, it hopes to secure even greater international recognition. ‘Busier traffic will not only benefit our research; it will also promote the centre and its work in the mainstream academic community of North America. Being in Hong Kong, it is our role to bring together the east and the west. Our research should have both local and global relevance,’ observes Prof. Fan. Recruiting Professors The centre coordinates with the Finance and Economics Departments to recruit professors from the world market. One of those recruited is Dr. Bang Nguyen-Dang, a Ph.D. graduate from the HEC School of Management in Paris, a leading business school in Europe. His dissertation on social elite networks in corporate governance won the Best Paper Award of the European Finance Association. Prof. Fan has also been to Chicago where he interviewed candidates from top American business schools such as Wharton, Chicago, and Vanderbilt, for assistant professorships in corporate finance. Some of the candidates have been invited to pay a visit to CUHK later this year, after which one or two will be selected to join the centre. Similarly, the economics side of the major area will hire professors specializing in the Chinese economy. Visiting Scholars To encourage formal and informal interaction among academics, the centre will devote resources to increase scholarly traffic at all levels. Distinguished visiting professors will be invited to deliver lectures and mentor research. These will be the world’s top figures in the area, who are either editors or associate editors of high-impact economic and financial journals, and chair professors in their own institutions. Prof. Franklin Allen, Nippon Life Professor of Finance and professor of economics at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, has committed to visit the University for a month every year for the next few years as a distinguished visiting professor. The centre is in the process of appointing two more distinguished visiting professors. A visiting