China Turns to Online Courses, and Mao, for Soft-Power Mission

JAVIER C. HERNÁNDEZ
New York Times
“It was like watching propaganda.”

Feminism With Chinese Characteristics

David Volodzko
Diplomat
China is making progress on women’s issues, but anyone trying to publicize remaining issues faces a serious backlash.

In a Region Disturbed by Ethnic Tensions, China Keeps Tight Lid on a Massacre

ANDREW JACOBS
New York Times
Armed with only knives, the assailants struck at the coal mine in the dead of night.

Conversation

10.16.15

Is There a China Model?

Daniel A. Bell, Timothy Garton Ash & more
The most recent public event in our ChinaFile Presents series, which we held October 15 in New York, was a discussion of the philosopher Daniel A. Bell’s controversial book, The China Model: Political Meritocracy and the Limits of Democracy, co-...

Taiwan Prepares For Turmoil As China Watches Its Elections From Afar

Martin Woollacott
Guardian
The basic question before voters in next year’s poll is whether they will still exist as a country.

Ai Weiwei Memoir Coming in Spring 2017

STAV ZIV
Newsweek
Crown Publishing Group announced that it will publish a memoir by the artist in the spring of 2017.

China Tightens TV Censorship after Cleavage Controversies

Patrick Brzeski
Hollywood Reporter
New rules may require some Chinese shows to delay broadcasts by as much as six months.

In China’s State News Media, What Is Said May Not Be What’s Printed

JAVIER C. HERNÁNDEZ
New York Times
An Australian journalist was misquoted as saying the people of Tibet had a “wonderful life.”

Survivors Tell the Camera the Hidden Tale of China's Great Famine

Jonathan Kaiman
Los Angeles Times
When Li Yaqin was 16, she ate what her family could scavenge.

A Land China Loves and Hates

Murong Xuecun
New York Times
The Chinese hostility to America is first and foremost the result of government propaganda.

China Opens Communist Party Theme Park

Shen Lu and Maggie Hiufu Wong
CNN
Who needs Disneyland when you can have a theme park for youngsters to declare their loyalty to China's Communist Party?

Dalai Lama: China More Concerned About Future Dalai Lamas Than I Am

Mick Krever
CNN
"I have no concern," he told Amanpour in London, adding that it is "possible" he would be the last Dalai Lama.

The Chinese Government Is Cranking Up the Nationalism After Its Nobel Win

Gwynn Guilford
Quartz
In a way, the Nobel honor is a double-whammy for the Chinese government’s nationalist agenda.

China’s Xi Jinping Changes the Odds in Macau

Andrew Browne
Wall Street Journal
If there’s one skill that the U.S. gambling moguls who staked their futures here have mastered it’s calculating the odds.

At U.N., China Uses Intimidation Tactics to Silence Its Critics

Sui-Lee Wee and Stephanie Nebehay
Reuters
“When I was hiding in the mountains, the Chinese government announced a cash reward of 200,000 yuan (about $31,000) for whoever finds me.”

Artist Ai Weiwei Discovers Hidden 'Listening Devices' in Beijing Studio

Tiffany Ap
CNN
"When I found these bugs, I had a strange feeling," he said.

Troubles for the ‘China Model’

DANIEL A. BELL
Wall Street Journal
Meritocracy has worked for Beijing, but to survive, the system needs more openness.

On China’s National Day, Hong Kong Protesters Say That They Are Not Part of China

Rishi Iyengar
Time
Small groups of protesters waved the blue colonial flag.

China’s Latest Ally in Its Crackdown on Religion: The Pope

Zheping Huang
Quartz
This week, Chinese president Xi Jinping and Pope Francis missed each other on their back-to-back visits to the United States.

China Says Arrests Two Japanese for Spying

Linda Sieg and Kaori Kaneko
Reuters
Japan's Asahi newspaper said one man was taken into custody in China's northeast province of Liaoning near the border with North Korea and the other in the eastern province of Zhejiang near a military facility.

Asia's Richest Man Li Voices Support For China's Leadership

Farah Master
Reuters
Li said he resolutely supported China's path to reform and opening up.

Top Hong Kong Judges Defend Rule of Law in Face of China Pressure

STELLA TSANG AND CLARE BALDWIN
Reuters
Two top Hong Kong judges on Friday defended the rule of law in an apparent rebuke of China's top official.

Hybrid Warfare With Chinese Characteristics

Benjamin David Baker
Diplomat
From Sun Tzu to Xi Jinping: Russia isn’t the only one who knows hybrid warfare.

Two Very Different Men Visit D.C.: China’s Leader And His Teenage Nemesis

Emily Rauhala
Washington Post
Xi Jinping will get a state dinner and a 21-gun salute while Joshua Wong is in town to talk about Hong Kong’s fight for self-determination.

China Dissident's Wife Rejects Invite to State Department

MATTHEW PENNINGTON
Associated Press
The United States has warned that the toughest crackdown in years on Chinese activists threatens to cloud the high-profile visit by Xi.

Why Tibet Could Be the Best Opportunity for Xi Jinping

Matteo Mecacci and Bhuchung Tsering
Huffington Post
The state visit is a growing alarm about China's less than peaceful rise, and provides a rare opportunity for Obama to give an important message on Tibet.

China's Xi Tells Foreign NGOs to Obey the Law

Agence France-Presse
Foreign organisations in China should "obey Chinese law".

Working for A Chinese Boss Is Great, Ordinary Americans Explain in This Slick New Pro-China Video

Zheping Huang
Quartz
The video is called “When China met Carolina”.

China Seeks 'New Model' for Relations with U.S.

Carrie Gracie
BBC
Despite the enormous range and complexity of the US-China relationship, it is becoming ever harder to manage. 

This Explains Why China Is Taking So Long to Reform Its Economic System

Yang Jiang
Washington Post
The new leadership is turning back to old measures to stimulate growth.

China Hails U.S. Repatriation of Corruption Fugitive

SUI-LEE WEE AND BEN BLANCHARD
Reuters
The repatriation of Yang Jinjun marked the first time that China has succeeded in getting a wanted corruption suspectback from the U.S.

The Chinese Government Is Censoring A Documentary About Mothers Who Love Their Gay Kids

Josh Horwitz
Quartz
The upcoming court case of a filmmaker from Beijing, stands out.

Chinese Society 'Very Fragile,' Warns Dissident Artist Ai Weiwei

Mick Krever
CNN
Suffocated by censorship, Chinese society is "very fragile," warned dissident artist Ai Weiwei on Thursday.

For the First Time Ever, China’s Communist Party Is Openly Questioning Its Legitimacy

Zheping Huang
Quartz
China’s Communist Party invited political figures and academics to attend a meeting in Beijing. 

Caixin Media

09.08.15

Amnesty As a Stepping Stone to Rule of Law

A recent amnesty declaration affecting convicted criminals deemed no threat to society was a poignant reminder of China’s tradition of prudent punishment, support for human rights, and progress toward of rule of law.The recent decision by the...

South Africa’s Inexplicable Love Affair with China

Eric Olander, Cobus van Staden & more
While the recent economic turmoil in China is prompting a number of African countries to reconsider their growing economic dependence on the People’s Republic of China, not so in South Africa. Both the government and the ruling African National...

Media

09.03.15

Who Is Xi Jinping? Introducing the Asia Society Podcast

Eric Fish from Asia Blog
Three years after Xi Jinping took control of China’s Communist Party and assumed the country’s leadership, he has emerged as one of the world’s most powerful people. But his tenure has also raised uncomfortable questions. Is he a reformer bent on...

For China, a Plunge and a Reckoning

Orville Schell
Wall Street Journal
Anyone trying to design an event to bring Xi Jinping’s China back to Earth couldn’t have engineered something much more elegant than the turmoil in China’s financial markets and the resulting global aftershocks. The upheaval is traumatic for China’s...

Reports

08.18.15

The Politburo’s Predicament

Freedom House
Drawing on an analysis of hundreds of official documents, censorship directives, and human rights reports, as well as some 30 expert interviews, the study finds that the overall degree of repression has increased under the new leadership. Of 17...

China: The Superpower of Mr. Xi

Roderick MacFarquhar from New York Review of Books
In the almost one-hundred-year existence of the Chinese Communist Party (C.C.P.), its current general secretary, Xi Jinping, is only the second leader clearly chosen by his peers. The first was Mao Zedong. Both men beat out the competition, and thus...

China’s Un-separation of Powers

Christopher K. Johnson and Scott Kennedy
Foreign Affairs
U.S. industry has figured out how to pull the levers of power in China but also points to a substantial change in how China is governed. In the past, there was at least some separation between party and government roles, but it seems that the line...

Confucius Says, Xi Does

Economist
Since he came to power in 2012, Mr Xi has sought to elevate Confucius—whom Mao vilified—as the grand progenitor of Chinese culture.

China Probes Senior Xinjiang Security Official For Graft

Ben Blanchard
Reuters
A deputy regional security chief and former head of the prison system, Xie Hui, in Xinjiang has been put under investigation for suspected corruption.

Conversation

07.21.15

Is China’s Reform Era Over and, If So, What’s Next?

Carl Minzner, Jeremy L. Wallace & more
Fordham Law School professor and regular ChinaFile contributor Carl Minzner says we've arrived at “China After the Reform Era,” a development that’s “not entirely bad” but also has a “dark side.” Minzner’s conclusions, excerpted below, come...

Understanding Xi Jinping’s ‘Key Minority’

Lu Yiyi
Wall Street Journal
Xi’s renewed attention to the performance of county leaders shows that he is relying on local officials to play a pivotal role in implementing his program.

One-Time Aide to China’s Ex-President Accused of Corruption

CNN
Party investigators accuse Ling Jihua, 58, once aide to former President Hu Jintao, of accepting bribes and illegally obtaining party and state secrets.

Features

06.16.15

Does Xi Jinping Represent a Return to the Mao Era?

Andrew G. Walder, Roderick MacFarquhar & more
Following is an edited transcript of a live event hosted at Asia Society New York on May 21, 2015, “ChinaFile Presents: Does Xi Jinping Represent a Return to the Politics of the Mao Era?” The evening convened the scholars Roderick MacFarquhar and...

Breaking Beijing?

Lynette H. Ong
Foreign Affairs
The government's harsh crackdown could crack the regime.

Caixin Media

05.05.15

A Byronic Hero for China’s Supremo

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...

Q. and A.: Francis Fukuyama on China's Political Development

New York Times
Stanford historian argues an effective political system has to balance state capacity against rule of law and democracy.

Why Do the Chinese Hack? Fear

Enrique Oti
War on the Rocks
To ensure its survival, the Chinese Communist Party has decided that it must control the Internet. 

Viewpoint

04.10.15

Bury Zhao Ziyang, and Praise Him

Julian B. Gewirtz
Zhao Ziyang, the premier and general secretary of the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in the 1980s, died on January 17, 2005. At a tightly controlled ceremony designed to avoid the kind of instability that the deaths of other controversial...

Books

04.09.15

Revolutionary Cycles in Chinese Cinema, 1951-1979

Zhuoyi Wang
A comprehensive history of how the conflicts and balances of power in the Maoist revolutionary campaigns from 1951 to 1979 complicated and diversified the meanings of films, this book offers a discursive study of the development of early PRC cinema. Wang closely investigates how film artists, Communist Party authorities, cultural bureaucrats, critics, and audiences negotiated, competed, and struggled with each other for the power to decide how to use films and how their extensively different, agonistic, and antagonistic power strategies created an ever-changing discursive network of meaning in cinema. —Palgrave Macmillan{chop}

Born Red

New Yorker
How Xi Jinping, an unremarkable provincial administrator, became China’s most authoritarian leader since Mao.

Xi Jinping Forever

Willy Lam
Foreign Policy
Is China’s increasingly powerful president angling to break tradition and extend his rule indefinitely?

Viewpoint

04.01.15

China’s Government Is Serious About Fundamentally Reshaping Itself

Rebecca Liao
Respected China scholar David Shambaugh recently set off a firestorm among other China specialists when he predicted the collapse of China’s ruling Communist Party in an op-ed for The Wall Street Journal. Beneath many of the arguments in his defense...

The Devil, or Mr Wang

Economist
China’s second most powerful leader is admired and feared. 

Is the Chinese Dragon Losing its Puff?

Peter Hartcher
Sydney Morning Herald

Q. and A.: David Shambaugh on the Risks to Chinese Communist Rule

Chris Buckley
New York Times
Shambaugh’s recent essay argued that the “endgame of Chinese communist rule has now begun.”