Chinese Directors Call for Censorshp Reform
on December 19, 2012
Chinese filmmakers are calling for a system of classifying films according to their suitability for audiences of different ages.
Shifted by Officials
on December 19, 2012
A mysteriouys and heavily guarded suburban Beijing courtyard isn't open to public, only to the petitioners corralled there.
A Comparison of China’s and America’s Richest People
on December 19, 2012
CNPolitics, a Chinese-language news website, recently released this infographic examining the differences between China and America’s wealthiest individuals as reported by
PM 2.5 Kills Thousands, Researchers Say
on December 18, 2012
An estimated 8,572 premature deaths occurred in four major Chinese cities this year due to high levels of pollution.
College Graduates Compete for Jobs Sweeping Streets
on December 18, 2012
Tong Peng spent six months discovering his bachelor’s degree was “worthless” before deciding to apply for a job as a street sweeper.
He graduated from college in Harbin in June, 2012, not expecting to find it so tough to find work with a college degree. He tried over and over but failed, his last shred of dignity crushed.
U.S. Envoy Optimistic About Relations
on December 17, 2012
Amb. Locke said Xi Jinping seems “more casual and at ease with people” than his predecessors but that much remains unclear.
Poeple's Daily: Be Good Online, Please
on December 17, 2012
People’s Daily cautions that the Internet is as much a tool of rumor and misinformation as a platform for information sharing.
China Cracking Down on Doomsday Group
on December 17, 2012
Socialism Vanquished, Socialism Challenged
on December 17, 2012
Socialism Vanquished, Socialism Challenged examines the twenty-year aftermath of the 1989 assaults on established, state-sponsored socialism in the former Soviet bloc and in China. Editors Nina Bandelj and Dorothy J. Solinger bring together prominent experts on Eastern Europe and China to examine the respective trajectories of political, economic, and social transformations that unfolded in these two areas, while also comparing the changes that ensued within the two regions. The volume features paired comparisons, with one chapter on the countries from the former Soviet bloc and one on China for each of the following themes: the reinstitutionalization of politics, the recasting of state-society relations, the reform of economic systems, changes in economic behavior, and transformations of social institutions. Despite differences in the specific substantive focus and disciplinary grounding among individual chapters, all chapters share a concern with the fate of the state in postsocialism. They elaborate on topics such as the transformations of the old socialist state and its nature, activities and roles; civil society before and after 1989; the ways in which the state has, or has not, acted to encourage new forms of economic behavior; and the state's responsibility for societal trends, whether in family formation, in protest or in inequality. Taking a unique approach to understand twentieth-century socialism on a global scale, Socialism Vanquished, Socialism Challenged uncovers insights about political models and economic patterns that have emerged in the grand project of the transition from socialism. —Oxford University Press
Media Effort to Emphasize Newtown Tragedy Backfires in Blogosphere
on December 17, 2012
Tragedy can strike anywhere. Mere hours before the horrific shooting at an American school in Newtown, Connecticut that left twenty-eight people dead, including twenty children, a horrific school attack also happened in China.
