EVENTS

Special Theme: Regionalism and Sub-Regional Multilateralism

5-7 November 2015

The Annual All India Conference of China Studies (AICCS) is a flagship event of the Institute of Chinese Studies, organized in collaboration with an Indian academic institution where research and training in China Studies is conducted. Its principal objective is to spread interest and strengthen research in China Studies in India. The 8th All India Conference of China Studies is being organized by the Institute of Chinese Studies, Delhi in collaboration with the Department of Chinese, School of Languages and Literature, Sikkim University in Gangtok. 

Sikkim lies nestled in the great Himalayan range and is at the same time a frontier state of India abutting China. For years together, the people of these border regions carried on trade, barter, pilgrimage, familial and cultural relations across the Nathu La and Jelep La passes. (Sikkim, together with Nepal, Bhutan, and the Tibet Autonomous Region of the PRC, also carries a rich history of acculturation/cultural assimilation, which has over several centuries created a common cultural sphere amongst these regions, which today are otherwise placed under different geo-political units.  Sikkim is also strategically located vis-à-vis China, the other countries of BCIM and SAARC. Issues of development, environmental sustainability, security, and economic and cultural interactions are not only relevant for Sikkim but also the adjoining areas/states and hence need to be looked at from a multilateral perspective.

These two aspects of Sikkim, its position in an area of global ecological sensitivity as well as its position as a crucial border region between two giant Asian States, give rise to the questions that serve as the themes for this Conference.

Themes of the conference

1. Border Trade and Economic Interactions

2. Sustainable Development: Water, Energy, Environment, Tourism

3. Human Development: Education, Poverty Alleviation, Health

4. Border People and Cultural Practices: Buddhism, Ethnography, Linguistic Mapping

Special Panel

A special panel will be formed on the theme of 'Security and Border Management'.