Alexa Olesen is a Brooklyn-based writer who focuses mainly on China, particularly on politics, culture, and the one-child policy. She covered China for eight years as a correspondent for The Associated Press and has spent more than a decade living in Beijing, on and off, since 1993. She recently collaborated with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists on its Offshore Leaks China project.

Last Updated: April 1, 2021

Conversation

03.15.13

Is the One Child Policy Finished—And Was It a Failure?

Dorinda Elliott, Alexa Olesen & more
Dorinda Elliott:China’s recent decision to phase out the agency that oversees the one-child policy has raised questions about whether the policy itself will be dropped—and whether it was a success or a failure.Aside from the...

Sinica Podcast

07.27.12

A Torrential Rainstorm

Kaiser Kuo, Jeremy Goldkorn & more from Sinica Podcast
This week on Sinica, attention turns to the torrential flooding which plagued Beijing earlier this week and claimed the lives of at least seventy-seven residents in the Chinese capital. As tempers flare and city officials resign, questions mount...

Sinica Podcast

06.22.12

The One-Child Policy

Kaiser Kuo, Alexa Olesen & more from Sinica Podcast
While the African community in Guangzhou has taken to the streets to protest the suspicious death of a foreign national in police custody, the Chinese Internet has proven equally volatile as gruesome photos of a late-stage abortion have circulated...

Sinica Podcast

09.16.11

North Korea: Open for Business?

Jeremy Goldkorn, Edward Wong & more from Sinica Podcast
As the guillotine of debt contagion hangs over Europe, financial pressures in Asia have led an unexpected player to make a strategic shift. After months of escalating tensions with South Korea have shuttered its opportunities for expanded trade...