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Tech and Companies

Tech and Companies

South Korean election: Vice and vanity in Seoul

SEOUL, South Korea — South Koreans assumed that Lee Kun-hee was the equivalent of royalty, an untouchable oligarch at the helm of one of the world’s largest companies, the Samsung Group.

By Geoffrey Cain
PRI’s The World

Dec 18, 2012

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The End of the Vietnamese Miracle

HO CHI MINH CITY – In what was once one of Asia’s most exciting emerging markets, Nguyen Van Nguyen sees only gloom ahead. Since 2008, his business in southern Vietnam’s economic capital has suffered through two volatile bouts of inflation, peaking in August 2011 at 23 percent — at the time, Asia’s highest inflation rate.

By Geoffrey Cain
Foreign Policy

Jul 11, 2012

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Globalizing Censorship

In April 2011, a Vietnamese dissident explained to me why he gave up blogging critically about the government. “We have jobs, motorbikes, nice coffee shops, and big luxury buildings,” he said, pointing to the then-recently opened Bitexco Financial Tower, Ho Chi Minh City’s tallest edifice, with a helicopter landing pad jutting out of its side. “The Communist Party has made this blogging unprofitable. If we go up against them, how do we get a piece of that prosperity?”

By Geoffrey Cain
CARNEGIE COUNCIL for Ethics in International Affairs

Jun 28, 2012

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Analysis: Vietnam needs to cool it

HO CHI MINH CITY, Vietnam — Four years ago, the future looked bright for Vietnam. Investors and economists proclaimed that this emerging market of 86 million people would grow into an “Asian tiger,” the next country to reach middle-income status by attracting foreign investment.

By Geoffrey Cain
PRI’s The World

Oct 19, 2011

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Can Vietnam breed innovators?

HO CHI MINH CITY, Vietnam —Vo Van Toi’s high-tech laboratory clashes against its impoverished surroundings. Outside, cattle roam swampy fields and squatters sell sugarcane from wooden huts. Inside, he shows off his near-infrared spectroscopy machine, which measures oxygen content in blood, and a CT scanner.

By Geoffrey Cain
PRI’s The World

Mar 1, 2011

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Vietnam: In the Year of the Cat, Tet brings less fanfare

HO CHI MINH CITY, Vietnam — On the surface, it seems like any other holiday. Revelers will bedeck their homes and cities with apricot blossoms, and will wedge opulent flower mosaics through the central streets of Ho Chi Minh City. Migrant workers will visit their families in the countryside, causing parts of cities to empty out.

By Geoffrey Cain
PRI’s The World

Jan 31, 2011

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