The University of Chicago is pleased to host its first China & Latin America Forum, providing a unique opportunity for renowned academics and researchers to discuss the future relations between the Chinese and Latin American regions. At this critical juncture in history, with changing American and Chinese policies towards Latin America, we are proud to count with the presence of top experts in the economic and foreign policy fields.

Free and open to the public with registration.

Sponsored by the International House Global Voices Program, the Organization of Latin American Students, the Center for East Asian Studies, the Center for Latin American Studies, the Chinese Undergraduate Student Association, the Graduate Council, the Office of Multicultural Student Affairs, Student Government.

Agenda for this year’s conference:

9:00-9:30: Registration and Breakfast

9:30-9:45: Welcome Speeches

9:45-11:00: Panel A - The Interwoven Future of the Chinese and Latin American Economies:
To understand the type of economic ties between Latin America and China during the last few decades, the benefits and costs to Latin America and China in this bilateral cooperation, the future of this bilateral economic relations as China is transforming itself from a manufacturing-based economy to a service-based economy

• Dr. Carol Wise, professor of International Relations at the University of Southern California, author of Dragonomics: The Rise of China in Latin America
• Dr. Lourdes Casanova, senior lecturer of management and the academic director of the Emerging Markets Institute at the Johnson School of Business at Cornell University
• Moderated by Dr. Dain Borges, Facutly Director for Master of Arts Programs at the University of Chicago’s Division of Social Sciences

11:00-11:15: Coffee Break

11:15-12:30: Panel B - The Politics of China in the Latin American Region – Xi’s “New Era”
To understand the political implications behind China’s increasing economic investment in Latin America and explore the changing geopolitics between the U.S. and China as champions of free trade in the region.

• Ted Picone J.D., senior fellow in the Project on International Order and Strategy and Latin America Initiative in the Foreign Policy program at Brookings Institute
• Dr. Stephen B. Kaplan, assistant Professor of Political Science and International Affairs at George Washington University
• Dr. Benjamin Creutzfeldt, resident postdoctoral fellow on Sino-Latin American-U.S. Affairs with the SAIS Foreign Policy Institute at John Hopkins University.
• Moderated by Dr. Xiaoyu Pu, Assistant Professor of Political Science at University of Nevada, Reno, focusing on Chinese foreign relations.

12:30-12:45: Ending Remarks