Harry F Lee
Biographic Data
| ID | 630062 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Harry F Lee |
| GIVEN NAMES | Harry F |
| FAMILY NAME | Lee |
| SIGNATURE | LEE H F |
| AFFILIATIONS | Chinese University of Hong Kong |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-5415-7845 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 54 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 134 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 54 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2006 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 7 |
Work, worth, and whose culture? Occupational status change and acculturation after Hong Kong migration
This study investigates how employment-related changes—specifically occupational status and household income—shape acculturation orientations among recent Hong Kong migrants in the United Kingdom. It examines whether English proficiency, negative occupational status change, and income shifts influence migrants’ sense of belonging, cultural preferences, and diasporic engagement. An online survey of 1155 Hong Kong migrants in the UK (October–Decemb…
Household investment behavior and environmental impact
Associations between economic crises and childhood vaccination coverage
Childhood vaccination is among the most effective public health interventions, preventing millions of deaths each year. However, global vaccination coverage remains uneven, and economic crises may challenge immunization efforts by disrupting healthcare systems and straining household resources. This study examines the negative association between economic crises, specifically banking collapses, currency devaluations, and sovereign debt crises. Us…
Sowing resilience
Previous large-N quantitative research on the historical human-environment nexus has primarily emphasized the negative impacts of climate change on social stability, economic development, and the collapse of civilizations. In contrast, this study seeks to provide a statistical analysis of the resilience mechanisms that human societies have historically employed to adapt to and mitigate adverse environmental conditions. Agricultural development, a…
When firms merge, do carbon emissions fall? Insights from China’s manufacturing sector
Manufacturing mergers and acquisitions (M&A) represent a market-driven mechanism for corporate restructuring that facilitates technology transfer, resource reallocation, and the exchange of management knowledge between heterogeneous corporate owners. Unlike complex multi-departmental carbon policies, M&A networks may offer a more manageable pathway for diffusing cleaner production methods across urban systems. This study examines how manufacturin…
Commuting flow patterns across a triad of Chinese megacities
Subsistence strategies and climate change as key factors in the vicinity of the Great Wall in northern China from 500 BCE
Whether, and in what ways, the association between changes in climate and the shifting of imperial frontiers (i.e. the Great Wall) could be mediated by the social responses of major ethnic groups is a question that remains unanswered. Ulanqab is a region in Inner Mongolia associated with a long history of Great Wall construction from the Warring States to the Ming dynasties (~500 BCE–1644 CE) and the Great Wall is often regarded as the boundary o…
Unraveling the determinants of intra-city commuting flows with a spatially weighted interaction model
Can tourism development and economic growth mutually reinforce in small countries? Evidence from Singapore
This study investigates the causal relationships between international tourism development and the economic growth of a global city–state – Singapore – drilling into the temporal details of the tourism-economy nexus in small countries. Many studies have examined whether the tourism-led growth hypothesis or the economy driven-tourism growth hypothesis holds in large developed and emerging countries. Still, relatively few studies examine small coun…
Barriers to child vaccination
International sanctions are often imposed with the aim of influencing the political behavior of target states, but they may have unintended consequences on public health. This study empirically examines the impact of international sanctions on child immunization rates in developing countries. Utilizing panel data from 76 developing countries between 2000 and 2019, the analysis explores how different types of sanctions, including those from the US…
Pollution acceleration before braking
This research employs China’s steel restriction policy as a backdrop to investigate environmental policies’ unintended and counterproductive effects. Using high-resolution satellite-derived data and panel Difference-in-Differences regression, we found that the air pollution concentration in cities implementing the steel restriction policy is 5.688 μ g/m 3 higher than in control group cities. Additionally, the growth rate of air pollution in these…
An analysis of roadside particulate matter pollution and population exposure over the Pearl River Delta region of China under clear-sky condition using new ultra-high-resolution PM 2.5 satellite-retri…
Roadside air pollution is one of the serious air pollution problems in urban areas. Even though roadside air pollution has been reported to cause adverse human health impacts, the spatial distribution of roadside air pollution in a large urban agglomeration has yet to be fully assessed. This study aimed to analyse roadside fine particulate matter (PM 2.5 ) pollution and the population exposure in 11 cities in the Pearl River Delta (PRD) region of…
Green finance and grey air
In 2017, China introduced the Pilot Zones for Green Finance Reform and Innovations to achieve sustainable and high-quality economic growth. While this policy aims to promote the green transition of businesses and has drawn significant attention, its micro-operational mechanism and firm-level impact remain largely unexplored. This study addresses this research gap by employing a quasi-experimental approach to examine the policy’s effects on compan…
Does a more compact urban center layout matter in reducing household carbon emissions? Evidence from Chinese cities
International Monetary Fund Conditionalities May Weaken the Recipient States’ Readiness to Adapt to Climate Change! Evidence from 1995 to 2020
Climatic extremes, violent conflicts, and population change in China in 1741-1910
Did Hydro-climatic Extremes, Positive Checks, and Economic Fluctuations Modulate the Epidemics Outbreaks in Late Imperial China
Poverty Stories of rural households in China
Social capital, built environment and mental health
In rapidly urbanising China, a high number of elderly people, the so-called ‘ laopiao ’, float to cities where their sons or daughters live to look after their children and grandchildren. Laopiao in urban China are thought to suffer poor mental health owing to their floating status. This study explores the inter-relationship among social capital, the built environment and mental health in urban China. Using a recent survey conducted in Nanjing (N…
Epidemics in pre-industrial Europe
Air transport, economic growth, and regional inequality across three Chinese macro-regions
This research considers the effects of air transport on economic growth and asks how airport development affects regional convergence across three Chinese macro-regions. A growing body of research has examined national aviation-growth relationships in developing countries over the last decade. Yet few studies have sought to determine whether air transport boosts regional development, especially in developing and emerging economies. Using a datase…
Charcoal evidence for environmental change ca. 3.5 ka and its influence on ancient people in the West Liao River Basin of northeastern China
Fossil charcoals from archaeological sites provide direct evidence for the relationship between environmental change and ancient peoples’ livelihoods in the past. Our identification of 5811 fossil charcoal fragments from 84 samples suggested temperate deciduous and mixed conifer-broadleaved forests as the dominant vegetation at the Erdaojingzi site in northeastern China ca. 3500 cal yr BP; the major representative taxa were Quercus , Pinus , and …
Agricultural adaptations to topography and climate changes in Central China during the mid- to late-Holocene
The development of pre-historic agriculture and its determining factors have been extensively investigated in recent years. Based on the identification of charred seeds and radiocarbon dating, we found that foxtail millet-based agriculture dominated Neixiang County in Central China during the mid-late-Holocene. There were three different farming patterns in the Nanyang Basin, including rice cultivation in the plains, foxtail millet cultivation in…
Historical climate-war nexus in the eyes of geographers
Did climate change cause wars in history? While a growing number of quantitative studies (particularly in the field of geography) illustrate the climate-war nexus in pre-industrial societies, there are opposing opinions on the subject. Such conflicting views invite us to reconsider whether the climate-war nexus can be conceptualized as a yes/no dichotomy. This paper seeks to address this issue. I will first recapitulate the key findings of those …
Region-specific determinants of the foreign direct investment in China
This study revisits region-specific determinants of foreign direct investment (FDI) in Eastern, Central, and Western China using econometric and spatial analyses. It uses a data set covering 31 Chinese provinces and autonomous regions spanning the period 2005-15, together with panel data regression. Our statistical results show that in Eastern China, FDI is significantly associated with bilateral trade, orientation towards the service industry, i…
Male Team Sport Hazing Initiations in a Culture of Decreasing Homohysteria
In this longitudinal ethnographic research, we report on 7 years of hazing rituals on two separate men’s sports teams at one university in the United Kingdom. Using 38 in-depth interviews alongside naturalistic observations of the initiation rituals, we demonstrate that hazing activities have changed from being centered around homophobic same-sex activities to focusing on extreme levels of alcohol consumption. We show that whereas same-sex activi…
Climate Change and War Frequency in Eastern China over the Last Millennium
Epidemics in Ming and Qing China
The transition of human subsistence strategies in relation to climate change during the Bronze Age in the West Liao River Basin, Northeast China
Despite the proposed climate–human connection in the West Liao River Basin during the Bronze Age, the question of how climate change could have affected the subsistence strategies, and consequently, the cultural transformation from the Lower Xiajiadian to the Upper Xiajiadian periods, has never been systematically explored. Based on radiocarbon dating and the analysis of plant remains recovered by flotation, as well as the spatial distribution of…
Internal wars in history
Chaotic events that might be regarded as proximate causes in triggering war have rarely been considered in the large- N quantitative studies of historical warfare. Furthermore, it has not been fully determined which types of chaotic events, natural disasters or socio-ecological catastrophes, are more influential in modulating the likelihood of wars. This study is based on the incidents of 5368 natural disasters, 1478 famines, 5700 epidemics, 456 …
Long-term association between climate change and agriculturalists’ migration in historical China
Based on 1686 records of agriculturalists’ migration and 4417 events of social crisis (wars, famines, and epidemics) together with various statistical methods, we constructed a conceptual model that includes both climatic and social factors to explain the long-term dynamics of agriculturalists’ migration in historical China over the last two millennia. Also, we framed our research under the paradigm of environmental humanities to help reinterpret…
Climate change and epidemics in Chinese history
Does a more compact urban center layout matter in reducing household carbon emissions? Evidence from Chinese cities
Climate change, population pressure, and wars in European history
Recent studies show that wars were more prevalent during colder periods in human history. Nevertheless, the temporal consistency of the climate-war correlation in Europe over extended period has rarely been examined systematically. In this study, we extended the European violent conflict record in the Conflict Catalog [Brecke 1999. “Violent conflicts 1400 A.D. to the present in different regions of the world.” Paper presented at the 1999 Meeting …
Poverty Stories of rural households in China
Agricultural adaptations to topography and climate changes in Central China during the mid- to late-Holocene
The development of pre-historic agriculture and its determining factors have been extensively investigated in recent years. Based on the identification of charred seeds and radiocarbon dating, we found that foxtail millet-based agriculture dominated Neixiang County in Central China during the mid-late-Holocene. There were three different farming patterns in the Nanyang Basin, including rice cultivation in the plains, foxtail millet cultivation in…
Evaluating the effectiveness of agricultural adaptation to climate change in preindustrial society
The effectiveness of agricultural adaptation determines the vulnerability of this sector to climate change, particularly during the preindustrial era. However, this effectiveness has rarely been quantitatively evaluated, specifically at a large spatial and long-term scale. The present study covers this case of preindustrial society in AD 1500–1800. Given the absence of technological innovations in this time frame, agricultural production was chie…
Unraveling the determinants of intra-city commuting flows with a spatially weighted interaction model
International Monetary Fund Conditionalities May Weaken the Recipient States’ Readiness to Adapt to Climate Change! Evidence from 1995 to 2020
Region-specific determinants of the foreign direct investment in China
This study revisits region-specific determinants of foreign direct investment (FDI) in Eastern, Central, and Western China using econometric and spatial analyses. It uses a data set covering 31 Chinese provinces and autonomous regions spanning the period 2005-15, together with panel data regression. Our statistical results show that in Eastern China, FDI is significantly associated with bilateral trade, orientation towards the service industry, i…
Social capital, built environment and mental health
In rapidly urbanising China, a high number of elderly people, the so-called ‘ laopiao ’, float to cities where their sons or daughters live to look after their children and grandchildren. Laopiao in urban China are thought to suffer poor mental health owing to their floating status. This study explores the inter-relationship among social capital, the built environment and mental health in urban China. Using a recent survey conducted in Nanjing (N…
Food safety in China from North American and European perspectives
Food safety crises have constituted a persistent challenge for the Chinese government and people. Because of international trade, consumers’ concern regarding the safety of food products imported from China is increasing in many countries. Yet, no systematic investigation has examined the perception of Western respondents regarding the safety of food imports coming from China. This study, based on an online survey (n = 289) between April and May …
Reconstruction of the geographic extent of drought anomalies in northwestern China over the last 539 years and its teleconnection with the Pacific Ocean
Recent paleo-climatic/environmental studies have resulted in several high-resolution paleo-precipitation/moisture reconstructions in Northwestern (NW) China over extended periods. Nevertheless, those reconstructions are mostly about the climatic history of individual sites, while fine-grained portrayal and analysis of the geographic extent of drought anomalies across the entire NW China are still missing. We based our study on the dryness/wetness…
Subsistence strategies and climate change as key factors in the vicinity of the Great Wall in northern China from 500 BCE
Whether, and in what ways, the association between changes in climate and the shifting of imperial frontiers (i.e. the Great Wall) could be mediated by the social responses of major ethnic groups is a question that remains unanswered. Ulanqab is a region in Inner Mongolia associated with a long history of Great Wall construction from the Warring States to the Ming dynasties (~500 BCE–1644 CE) and the Great Wall is often regarded as the boundary o…
Historical climate-war nexus in the eyes of geographers
Did climate change cause wars in history? While a growing number of quantitative studies (particularly in the field of geography) illustrate the climate-war nexus in pre-industrial societies, there are opposing opinions on the subject. Such conflicting views invite us to reconsider whether the climate-war nexus can be conceptualized as a yes/no dichotomy. This paper seeks to address this issue. I will first recapitulate the key findings of those …
Effect of temperature and precipitation change on crime in the metropolitan area in Virginia, USA
Previous climate-crime studies are primarily grounded on conventional statistical methods, leaving the possible non-linear nature of the climate-crime association insufficiently explored. In the present study, we employed both multiple linear regression and wavelet analyses and compared their results to detect and verify the possible non-linear effect of temperature and precipitation change on crimes in an urban setting. Nine types of crimes in H…
Measuring the effect of climate change on wars in history
Since 2005, there have been an increasing number of large-N quantitative studies measuring the effect of climate change on wars in recent history. Those large-N studies are crucial in illuminating the close connection between the physical environment and human societies in a macro (i.e. long-temporal and large-spatial) historic perspective. Grounded on a large number of cases, those studies help evidence and generalize the societal impact of clim…
Extreme dust storm disaster in northern China in AD 1523
The dust storm disaster in northern China in AD 1523 was extremely severe. In the present study, the history of the disaster was reconstructed by using historical Chinese documents. Our results show that during the dust storms, the horizontal visibility dropped below 0.05 km, while the wind speed surpassed Scale 10 of the Beaufort Wind Force Scale (i.e., 88–103 km/h). The dust storms severely affected agriculture, resulting in crop failures and f…
An Evaluation of Hong Kong's Tropical Cyclone Warning System
Hong Kong is frequently exposed to the destructive wind threats of tropical cyclones from the Western-North Pacific, mainly in summer season. The Tropical Cyclone Warning System (TCWS) has been working in Hong Kong since 1884. Nevertheless, the effectiveness of the TCWS in Hong Kong has so far only been evaluated in limited aspects. This study is an exploratory attempt to evaluate holistically the performance of an existing TCWS in Hong Kong. Den…
Time Lag in the Climate Change, War, and Population Relationship
Wars became more frequent in a cold climate at the macro-historical scale. However, war peaks and their associated population collapses appeared 20–30 years after the commencement of a cold climate. Following Zhang et al.'s (2007a) conceptual model, this paper sought to further examine the climate-war-population time lag by using mathematical means. Result was: the relatively slow natural population adjustment to the climate-induced fluctuations …
Climatic Change, Wars and Dynastic Cycles in China Over the Last Millennium
Global climate change, war, and population decline in recent human history
Although scientists have warned of possible social perils resulting from climate change, the impacts of long-term climate change on social unrest and population collapse have not been quantitatively investigated. In this study, high-resolution paleo-climatic data have been used to explore at a macroscale the effects of climate change on the outbreak of war and population decline in the preindustrial era. We show that long-term fluctuations of war…
Climate Change and War Frequency in Eastern China over the Last Millennium
Time Lag in the Climate Change, War, and Population Relationship
Wars became more frequent in a cold climate at the macro-historical scale. However, war peaks and their associated population collapses appeared 20–30 years after the commencement of a cold climate. Following Zhang et al.'s (2007a) conceptual model, this paper sought to further examine the climate-war-population time lag by using mathematical means. Result was: the relatively slow natural population adjustment to the climate-induced fluctuations …
The causality analysis of climate change and large-scale human crisis
Recent studies have shown strong temporal correlations between past climate changes and societal crises. However, the specific causal mechanisms underlying this relation have not been addressed. We explored quantitative responses of 14 fine-grained agro-ecological, socioeconomic, and demographic variables to climate fluctuations from A.D. 1500–1800 in Europe. Results show that cooling from A.D. 1560–1660 caused successive agro-ecological, socioec…
Male Team Sport Hazing Initiations in a Culture of Decreasing Homohysteria
In this longitudinal ethnographic research, we report on 7 years of hazing rituals on two separate men’s sports teams at one university in the United Kingdom. Using 38 in-depth interviews alongside naturalistic observations of the initiation rituals, we demonstrate that hazing activities have changed from being centered around homophobic same-sex activities to focusing on extreme levels of alcohol consumption. We show that whereas same-sex activi…
Extreme dust storm disaster in northern China in AD 1523
The dust storm disaster in northern China in AD 1523 was extremely severe. In the present study, the history of the disaster was reconstructed by using historical Chinese documents. Our results show that during the dust storms, the horizontal visibility dropped below 0.05 km, while the wind speed surpassed Scale 10 of the Beaufort Wind Force Scale (i.e., 88–103 km/h). The dust storms severely affected agriculture, resulting in crop failures and f…
Special issue
Additional informationNotes on contributorsHarry F. Leeguest editor
Temperature change and natural disasters in northwestern China
It is projected that global warming will result in more natural disasters in the world. However, the global projection about the temperature-disaster association is based on instrumental records (<100 yr), which may be too short to account for the very long-term dynamics between temperature change and natural disasters. Besides, the temperature-disaster association may vary in different regions because of the influence of regional meteorology and…
An Evaluation of Hong Kong's Tropical Cyclone Warning System
Hong Kong is frequently exposed to the destructive wind threats of tropical cyclones from the Western-North Pacific, mainly in summer season. The Tropical Cyclone Warning System (TCWS) has been working in Hong Kong since 1884. Nevertheless, the effectiveness of the TCWS in Hong Kong has so far only been evaluated in limited aspects. This study is an exploratory attempt to evaluate holistically the performance of an existing TCWS in Hong Kong. Den…
The longitudinal assessment of preventive measures and policies for earthquake disasters in China
Earthquakes and their associated disasters have captured significant attention after the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake (in southwest China) and the recent 2011 Tōhoku earthquake (in northeast Japan). Given that a large part of Chinese territory lies on earthquake-prone zones, together with social development, the Chinese authorities have been paying more effort in mitigating earthquake risk over the past few decades. Yet, in academia, many earthquake …
Evaluating the effectiveness of agricultural adaptation to climate change in preindustrial society
The effectiveness of agricultural adaptation determines the vulnerability of this sector to climate change, particularly during the preindustrial era. However, this effectiveness has rarely been quantitatively evaluated, specifically at a large spatial and long-term scale. The present study covers this case of preindustrial society in AD 1500–1800. Given the absence of technological innovations in this time frame, agricultural production was chie…
Reconstruction of the geographic extent of drought anomalies in northwestern China over the last 539 years and its teleconnection with the Pacific Ocean
Recent paleo-climatic/environmental studies have resulted in several high-resolution paleo-precipitation/moisture reconstructions in Northwestern (NW) China over extended periods. Nevertheless, those reconstructions are mostly about the climatic history of individual sites, while fine-grained portrayal and analysis of the geographic extent of drought anomalies across the entire NW China are still missing. We based our study on the dryness/wetness…
Epidemics in Ming and Qing China
Temperature and precipitation effects on agrarian economy in late imperial China
Climate change has been statistically proven to substantially influence the economy of early modern Europe, particularly in the long term. However, a detailed analysis of climate change and the economy of historical China remains lacking, particularly from a large-scale and quantitative perspective. This study quantitatively analyzes the relationship between climate change and the economy in late imperial China (AD 1600-1840) at the national leve…
Human-environment interactions within the West Liao River Basin in Northeastern China during the Holocene Optimum
Demographic impact of climate change on northwestern China in the late imperial era
Contextualizing human migration in different agro-ecological zones in ancient China
How humans inhabited the Northeastern Tibetan Plateau during the Little Ice Age
The transition of human subsistence strategies in relation to climate change during the Bronze Age in the West Liao River Basin, Northeast China
Despite the proposed climate–human connection in the West Liao River Basin during the Bronze Age, the question of how climate change could have affected the subsistence strategies, and consequently, the cultural transformation from the Lower Xiajiadian to the Upper Xiajiadian periods, has never been systematically explored. Based on radiocarbon dating and the analysis of plant remains recovered by flotation, as well as the spatial distribution of…
Long-term association between climate change and agriculturalists’ migration in historical China
Based on 1686 records of agriculturalists’ migration and 4417 events of social crisis (wars, famines, and epidemics) together with various statistical methods, we constructed a conceptual model that includes both climatic and social factors to explain the long-term dynamics of agriculturalists’ migration in historical China over the last two millennia. Also, we framed our research under the paradigm of environmental humanities to help reinterpret…
Climate change and epidemics in Chinese history
Measuring the effect of climate change on wars in history
Since 2005, there have been an increasing number of large-N quantitative studies measuring the effect of climate change on wars in recent history. Those large-N studies are crucial in illuminating the close connection between the physical environment and human societies in a macro (i.e. long-temporal and large-spatial) historic perspective. Grounded on a large number of cases, those studies help evidence and generalize the societal impact of clim…
Climate change, population pressure, and wars in European history
Recent studies show that wars were more prevalent during colder periods in human history. Nevertheless, the temporal consistency of the climate-war correlation in Europe over extended period has rarely been examined systematically. In this study, we extended the European violent conflict record in the Conflict Catalog [Brecke 1999. “Violent conflicts 1400 A.D. to the present in different regions of the world.” Paper presented at the 1999 Meeting …
Food safety in China from North American and European perspectives
Food safety crises have constituted a persistent challenge for the Chinese government and people. Because of international trade, consumers’ concern regarding the safety of food products imported from China is increasing in many countries. Yet, no systematic investigation has examined the perception of Western respondents regarding the safety of food imports coming from China. This study, based on an online survey (n = 289) between April and May …
Geography (43 works) · China (34 works) · Climate change (24 works) · Sociology (19 works) · Archaeology (18 works) · Population (17 works) · Ecology (16 works) · Tree-ring climate responses (15 works) · Biology (14 works) · Demography (14 works)