Dru C. Gladney

on February 5, 2015

Dru Gladney is Professor of Anthropology at Pomona College in Claremont, California. A Ph.D. in Social Anthropology from the University of Washington, Seattle, he has been a Fulbright Research Scholar twice, to China and Turkey. He has served as President of the Pacific Basin Institute, Dean of the Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies in Honolulu, Senior Research Fellow at the East-West Center, and Senior Scholar at the Max Planck Institute. He has authored over 50 academic articles and chapters, as well as the following books: Dislocating China: Muslims, Minorities, and Other Subaltern Subjects (Chicago: University of Chicago Press), Muslim Chinese: Ethnic Nationalism in the People's Republic (Harvard University Press, 1996, 1st edition 1991); Ethnic Identity in China: The Making of a Muslim Minority Nationality (Wadsworth, 1998); and Making Majorities: Constituting the Nation in Japan, China, Korea, Malaysia, Fiji, Turkey, and the U.S. (Editor, Stanford University Press, 1998). A consultant to the Soros Foundation, Ford Foundation, World Bank, UNHCR, National Academy of Sciences, the European Center for Conflict Prevention, and UNESCO, Gladney has been regularly featured on CNN, BBC, National Public Radio, Al-Jazeera, and in Newsweek, Time, The Washington Post, The Honolulu Advertiser, The International Herald Tribune, The Los Angeles Times, and The New York Times.

Flash of Anti-Chinese Xenophobia in the DR Congo

A China in Africa Podcast

By Eric Olander, Cobus van Staden & more on February 5, 2015

Anti-government protestors filled the streets of the Democratic Republic of the Congo capital Kinshasa on January 19 and 20 to protest against a new election law making its way through the National Assembly. The new law calls for a national census before another presidential election is held which could lead to an unconstitutional extension in office by incumbent president Joseph Kabila. Rioters turned their anger against Chinese merchants in the capital, razing stores and attacking migrants.

James Schneider

on February 4, 2015

James Schneider is the Editorial Director of New African magazine and was formerly the Editor-in-Chief of Think Africa Press. He read Theology at the University of Oxford and has a particular interest in the study of political economy, capital flows, and equitable development. He is also a frequent commentator on African affairs for Monocle24 radio and other media.

Why China Is Banning Islamic Veils

And Why It Won’t Work

By Timothy Grose & James Leibold on February 4, 2015

This week, regional authorities outlawed Islamic veils from all public spaces in the regional capital of China’s Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region (XUAR). The Urumqi ban, which went into effect on Sunday February 1 (coincidentally the third annual* World Hijab Day), empowers Chinese police to punish violators and dole out fines of up to U.S.$800 for those who fail to enforce the prohibition.

The City of Urumqi Prohibition on Wearing Items That Mask the Face or Robe the Body

A ChinaFile Translation

on February 4, 2015

A Proclamation from the Standing Committee of the Urumqi People’s Congress

The “Regulation banning the wearing of items that mask the face or robe the body in public places in the city of Urumqi,” which was passed at the 21st Meeting of the 15th Standing Committee of the Urumqi People’s Congress on December 10, 2014 and ratified by the 12th Standing Committee of the People’s Congress of the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region on January 1, 2015, is now officially promulgated and will go into effect

Francesco Sisci

on February 4, 2015

Francesco Sisci is a Beijing-based Senior Research Associate at China Renmin University. His column “Sinograph” runs in Asia Times, and he is a frequent commentator on international affairs on China Central Television. He is also a contributor to the Italian Encyclopedia Treccani, and to the Italian Journal of Geopolitics, Limes.

In 1988, Sisci was the first foreigner ever admitted to the Graduate School of China’s Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS). At CASS, his work in Chinese Classical Philology and Philosophy led to a thesis on “Rationalization of Thought and Political Discourse in Early Mohism” at the University of London, School of Oriental and African Studies. A journalist, from 1994-2000, Sisci contributed to ANSA, Asia Times, and Il sole 24Ore and Corriere della Sera, for which outlets he conducted exclusive interviews with top Chinese leaders such as President Jiang Zemin, Prime Minister Zhu Rongji, and State Councilor Dai Bingguo. Since 1999, Sisci has been a Senior Consultant for the Italian Ministry of Environment in China. He designed the framework and established the network of local contacts for the Italian-Sino Environmental Cooperation. In the period 2000-2003, Sisci wrote for Singapore’s Straits Times, and La Stampa. From 2003-2005, he was the the Chiara Fama Director of the Italian institute of Culture in China. Since 2004, Sisci has coordinated the exchange program between the Central Party School and Italy. The program was the first the Party School started overseas and it remains by far the largest run by China’s top ideological institution, headed by China’s Vice President. In 2006, Sisci was awarded an honorary Professorship by CASS in Classical Chinese Studies. From 2005-2010, he was Asia Editor for La Stampa, and from 2010 to 2013, he was a regular commentator for Il Sole 24ore.

Sisci is the author of the books La Differenza fra la Cina e il Mondo (1994), on China's reforms and the Tiananmen movement in the 1980s; La Piovra Gialla (1994), on Chinese organized crime; Another China (2001), on the structural changes in China and their global impact, serialized in Asia Times; Made in China (2005), on food, sex, women, money, family, and changes in Chinese Society; Chi ha Paura della Cina (2006); Ponte alle Grazie, on the West’s fear of China; Santa Sede - Cina (2008), with Father Francesco Strazzari, on the recent history of contact between the Vatican and China; Cina Tibet, Tibet Cina (2008), on the recent history of and cultural problems between China and Tibet; and A Brave New China, 2014.

The Bro Code

Booze, Sex, and the Dark Art of Dealmaking in China

By James Palmer on February 4, 2015

Turning down an after-dinner invite to a brothel is always a social minefield. But the city’s Party Secretary, a 50-something man with baby-soft hands, had been gently fondling my thigh underneath the banquet table for the past 45 minutes, making me even more eager than usual to make my excuses and leave.

‘This is not that China Story’

A Q&A With Michael Meyer, Author of ‘In Manchuria’

By James Carter & Michael Meyer on February 4, 2015

James Carter spent much of the 1990s researching the modern history of Harbin, China’s northernmost major city, in the region that is today known as dongbei, the northeast. That region is the subject of Michael Meyer’s forthcoming book, In Manchuria: A Village Called Wasteland and the Transformation of Rural China. We invited Carter and Meyer to discuss the book, the region, and how to survive its ferocious winters.