The Urgency of Continuing with Reform
on May 6, 2015
The best way to side step the much-discussed middle-income trap is to forge ahead with changes to the growth model.
Meet Me in Venice
on May 5, 2015
When Ye Pei dreamed of Venice as a girl, she imagined a magical floating city of canals and gondola rides. And she imagined her mother, successful in her new life and eager to embrace the daughter she had never forgotten. But when Ye Pei arrives in Italy, she learns her mother works on a farm far from the city. Her only connection, a mean-spirited Chinese auntie, puts Ye Pei to work in a small-town café. Rather than giving up and returning to China, a determined Ye Pei takes on a grueling schedule, resolving to save enough money to provide her family with a better future.
A groundbreaking work of journalism, Meet Me in Venice provides a personal, intimate account of Chinese individuals in the very act of migration. Suzanne Ma spent years in China and Europe to understand why Chinese people choose to immigrate to nations where they endure hardship, suspicion, manual labor, and separation from their loved ones. Today, all eyes are on China and its explosive economic growth. With the rise of the Chinese middle class, Chinese communities around the world are growing in size and prosperity, a development many westerners find unsettling and even threatening. Following Ye Pei’s undaunted path, this inspiring book is an engrossing read for those eager to understand contemporary China and the enormous impact of Chinese emigrants around the world. —Rowman & Littlefield
Book Review:
Bernice Chan, South China Morning Post (February 24, 2015)
Alice Stephens, Washington Independent Review of Books (February 18, 2015)
Sarah Mellors, Los Angeles Review of Books (February 15, 2015)
Kirkus Reviews (December 6, 2014)
Calls to Punish China Grow
on May 5, 2015
Some in Washington are calling for President Obama to cancel China’s invitation to the largest maritime military exercise in the world.
A Byronic Hero for China’s Supremo
A 14th Century Classic Could Clarify Xi Jinping’s Leadership Style
on May 5, 2015
A little known vignette about Xi Jinping’s fondness for Song Jiang, a fictional hero in the 14th century classic novel The Water Margin, gives a peek into the private thoughts of China’s most powerful man. For someone born with a red spoon in his mouth, his identification with a rebel leader is not out of character, but Song’s flawed personality and self-destructive behavior raise questions about where China is going under Xi’s leadership.
China’s Xi Highlights “Big Picture” in Reform Drive
on May 5, 2015
Authorities must place scientific and technological innovation at the heart of the drive to reform.
Pan Jinlian (Golden Lotus) Humiliated for Being Intimate with a Servant
on May 5, 2015
‘Pan Jinlian (Golden Lotus) Humiliated for Being Intimate with a Servant,’ illustration from ‘Jin Ping Mei,’ or ‘The Plum in the Golden Vase,’ seventeenth century.
HRIC Law Note: Draft Law on Foreign NGOs Undermines Chinese Civil Society and China’s International Engagement
on May 5, 2015
China’s ‘Migrant Miracle’ Nears an End as Cheap Labor Dwindles
on May 4, 2015
China's working-age population peaks at 72% and will start to fall even more rapidly than 1990s Japan.
The Furor and the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank
A Sinica Podcast
on May 4, 2015
A total of 57 countries have now joined the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, China’s newly-launched competitor to the Asian Development Bank (AIIB) that has sparked a flurry of objections from the United States, even culminating in a failed diplomatic campaign by the superpower to lobby allies including the United Kingdom and Australia to abandon the organization, whose stated mission is funding infrastructure projects in underdeveloped parts of Asia.
China Becomes Top Source of U.S. Immigrants
on May 4, 2015
China sent 147,000 immigrants to the U.S. in 2013. India sent 129,000 and Mexico 125,000, a Census Bureau study showed.