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An awareness of the growing importance of the Chinese overseas was recognized in convening the major conference Luodi-shenggen: The Legal Political and Economic Status of Chinese in Diaspora, which was held in San Francisco, California in November 1992. The organizing committee had designated five major themes around which participants could write their papers. Panels were created around these themes, with additional panels developed around topics that emerged as being of concern as planning for the conference progressed. Concern tended to center around the general issues of overseas Chinese communities and, in particular, the origin and structure of new Chinatowns. In total, over 140 papers were presented encompassing these themes during the three days of the conference. Just under half of the papers were presented in Chinese and the rest in English. The sessions on business relations devoted much attention to the strategies of Chinese entrepreneurs within both local and regional contexts. The sessions on migration covered the gamut from theoretical, global aspects of the Chinese diaspora to local dimensions of the Chinese migrant and criminal law. Particular attention was focused on two of the main destinations of migration such as Australia and Canada.