Caixin Media
02.17.15Prosperity, International Cooperation, Civil Rights Key to Defeating Terror
The global fight against terrorism has entered a new stage with the emergence of the Islamic State (IS), and the battle lines have never been so clearly drawn all over the world.On February 18, Washington will host the Summit on Countering Violent...
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02.17.15Is India’s Economy Really Growing Faster Than China?
Wall Street Journal
At 7.5%, India’s revised growth estimate for the fourth quarter of last year beat China’s 7.3%.
ChinaFile Recommends
02.17.15China, Russia to Mark 70th Anniversary of End of WWII in Show of Unity |
South China Morning Post
Military parades marking anniversary give two nations platform to offset U.S. influence while diplomats reassure Japan.
Conversation
02.12.15Is Mao Still Dead?
It has long been standard operating procedure for China’s leaders to pay tribute to Mao. Even as the People’s Republic he wrought has embraced capitalist behavior with ever more heated ardor, the party he founded has remained firmly in power and his...
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02.12.15China’s Internet Censorship Anthem Is Revealed, Then Deleted
New York Times
Cyberspace Administration employees Sang lines like, “An Internet power: Tell the world that the Chinese Dream is uplifting China.”
Environment
02.11.15China’s New Environment Minister Has Work Cut Out For Him
from chinadialogue
The elevation of the president of China's most prestigious university to the job of government minister was unexpected. It is rare to bring in an academic without a goverment background. But given the tarnished reputation of a ministry that is...
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02.11.15China’s Wealthy Parents Are Fed Up With State-Run Education
Foreign Policy
Forget rote memorization and pressure-packed tests—Western, alternative learning is the new rage.
ChinaFile Recommends
02.11.15In Sharp Words From Xi, Ominous Implications for China’s Legal Reforms
Wall Street Journal
A Communist saying about the role of law states “the handle of the knife is firmly in the hands of the party and the people.”
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02.11.15Exclusive: U.S., China to Discuss Repatriation of Chinese Fugitives
Reuters
The issue is a thorny one, as no extradition treaty exists between the U.S. and China.
ChinaFile Recommends
02.11.15China’s Xi to Make First State Visit to U.S. as Both Flag Problems
Reuters
The two biggest economies are trying to ease tension over trade, human rights, and accusations of hacking and Internet theft.
Books
02.10.15The People’s Republic of Chemicals
Maverick environmental writers William J. Kelly and Chip Jacobs follow up their acclaimed Smogtown with a provocative examination of China’s ecological calamity already imperiling a warming planet. Toxic smog most people figured was obsolete needlessly kills as many as died in the 9/11 attacks every day, while sometimes Grand Canyon-sized drifts of industrial particles aloft on the winds rain down ozone and waterway-poisoning mercury in America.In vivid, gonzo prose blending first-person reportage with exhaustive research and a sense of karma, Kelly and Jacobs describe China’s ancient love affair with coal, Bill Clinton’s blunders cutting free-trade deals enabling the U.S. to "export" manufacturing emissions to Asia in a shift that pilloried the West's middle class, Communist Party manipulation of eco-statistics, the horror of cancer villages, the deception of the 2008 Beijing Olympics, and spellbinding peasant revolts against cancer-spreading plants involving thousands in mostly-censored melées. Ending with China’s monumental coal-bases decried by climatologists as a global warming dagger, The People's Republic of Chemicals names names and emphasizes humanity over bloodless statistics in a classic sure to ruffle feathers as an indictment of money as the real green that not even Al Gore can deny. —Rare Bird Books, A Vireo Book {chop}
Media
02.10.15Chinese Corruption, Now Officially Hilarious
Corruption is finally funny—at least, according to the Chinese Communist Party. That’s because comedic performances in the upcoming February 18 performance of China’s annual New Year Gala, a variety show on China Central Television (CCTV) expected...
Books
02.10.15Buried Ideas
The discovery of previously unknown philosophical texts from the Axial Age is revolutionizing our understanding of Chinese intellectual history. Buried Ideas presents and discusses four texts found on brush-written slips of bamboo and their seemingly unprecedented political philosophy. Written in the regional script of Chu during the Warring States period (475–221 BCE), all of the works discuss Yao’s abdication to Shun and are related to but differ significantly from the core texts of the classical period, such as the Mencius and Zhuangzi. Notably, these works evince an unusually meritocratic stance, and two even advocate abdication over hereditary succession as a political ideal. Sarah Allan includes full English translations and her own modern-character editions of the four works examined: Tang Yú zhi dao, Zigao, Rongchengshi, and Bao xun. In addition, she provides an introduction to Chu-script bamboo-slip manuscripts and the complex issues inherent in deciphering them. —SUNY Press{chop}
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02.10.15As U.S. Exits, China Takes On Afghanistan Role
Wall Street Journal
After a decade of rebuffing U.S. requests for help in Afghanistan, China may be ready to do more.
Caixin Media
02.09.15In China, Quantum Communications Comes of Age
This may be a quantum leap year for an initiative that accelerates data transfers close to the speed of light with no hacking threats through so-called quantum communications technology.Within months, China plans to open the world's longest...
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02.09.15Is China Making Its Own Terrorism Problem Worse?
Foreign Policy
Beijing's repressive policies toward members of its Uighur minority may be helping to strengthen ties to the Islamic State and al Qaeda.
ChinaFile Recommends
02.09.15China Tells Schools to Suppress Western Ideas, With One Big Exception
New York Times
Some teachers and students reject the idea that foreign pedagogy and textbooks pose a threat to the government.
The NYRB China Archive
02.09.15China: Inventing a Crime
from New York Review of Books
In late January, Chinese authorities announced that they are considering formal charges against Pu Zhiqiang, one of China’s most prominent human rights lawyers, who has been in detention since last May. Pu’s friends fear that even a life sentence is...
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02.06.15A Chinese Perspective on the BRICS in 2015
Council on Foreign Relations
The BRICS group is not only an economic concept but increasingly it is also taking the form of a political entity.
ChinaFile Recommends
02.06.15Q. and A.: Andrew Small on the China-Pakistan Relationship
New York Times
The book “The China-Pakistan Axis: Asia’s New Geopolitics” argues that there have always been irritants below the surface.
ChinaFile Recommends
02.06.15Obama’s Public Encounter With the Dalai Lama Riles China
New York Times
Obama previously met the Dalai Lama privately in the White House rather than in public.
Conversation
02.05.15What’s the Case for Heads of State Meeting the Dalai Lama?
On Thursday in Washington, the Dalai Lama attended the annual National Prayer Breakfast hosted by President Barack Obama, angering China's leaders in Beijing who have long called the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader a "splittist" and...
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02.05.15Canadian Woman Detained in China on Spying Suspicions Released on Bail
Globe and Mail
Julia Garratt was released to her family “pending trial by Liaoning Provincial State Security Bureau.”
The China Africa Project
02.05.15Flash of Anti-Chinese Xenophobia in the DR Congo
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...
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02.05.15Is China Preparing for Currency War?
Bloomberg
As China grapples with its slowest growth in 24 years, President Xi Jinping is under pressure to stimulate the economy.
Viewpoint
02.04.15Why China Is Banning Islamic Veils
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*...
Features
02.04.15The City of Urumqi Prohibition on Wearing Items That Mask the Face or Robe the Body
A Proclamation from the Standing Committee of the Urumqi People’s CongressThe “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...
Caixin Media
02.03.15Minsheng Bank President Resigns Amid Corruption Investigation
China Minsheng Banking Corp. said on January 31 that its president has resigned, shortly after people close to the matter said the Communist Party is investigating him for corruption.Minsheng said in a statement that Mao Xiaofeng had quit as...
The NYRB China Archive
02.03.15How to Be a Chinese Democrat: An Interview with Liu Yu
from New York Review of Books
Liu Yu is one of China’s best-known America-watchers. A professor of political science at Tsinghua University, she lived in the U.S. from 2000 to 2007 and now researches democratization in developing countries, including her own. The thirty-eight-...
The China Africa Project
01.30.15We’re Not Building an Empire
There is a custom in Chinese diplomacy that the Foreign Minister’s first overseas trip of the year always begins in Africa. This year was no exception, as Wang Yi led a high-profile tour of five African states including Kenya, Sudan, the DR Congo,...
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01.30.15Why Scrapping Quotas in China’s Criminal Justice System Won’t Be Easy
Wall Street Journal
Can judicial reform increase the courts' independence by reducing local government and party influence?
ChinaFile Recommends
01.30.15China and the World: Yuan for All
Economist
The yuan is not yet fully convertible and will not be for several years, which limits China's influence.
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01.30.15China Says No Room for ‘Western Values’ in University Education
Agence France-Presse
Education minister says books which ‘smear socialism’ will be banned.
ChinaFile Recommends
01.30.15China Expels Top Police Official from Communist Party
Reuters
Cai Guangliao, a major general in the paramilitary armed police, accepted bribes, illegally engaging in business activities and accepting gifts.
Conversation
01.29.15Is China’s Internet Becoming an Intranet?
With Astrill and several other free and paid-subscription virtual private networks (VPNs) that make leaping China’s Great Firewall possible now harder to use themselves after government interference "gummed" them up, the world wide web...
Environment
01.28.15China to Appoint Academic as New Environment Minister
from chinadialogue
The head of Beijing’s Tsinghua University is likely to be appointed to the top environmental job in in China’s Ministry of Environmental Protection, according to reports, as the country’s leadership moves to defuse public anger about worsening air,...
Features
01.28.15‘I Don’t Know Where Some Cadres Get Their Magical Powers’
Earlier this month, at the close of the Chinese Communist Party’s 5th Plenum, the official People’s Daily noted on its website that as this important agenda-setting meeting came to a close it was worth paying attention to the recent publication of a...
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01.27.15China Tries to Stay Aloof From a Warming U.S.-India Relationship
New York Times
Beijing is aware India’s problems with the United States are based largely on Washington’s relationship with Pakistan.
ChinaFile Recommends
01.27.15A Softer Touch on Soft Power
China Media Project
Soft power has become strategically important for China because cultural productivity and influence are now regarded as important components of comprehensive national power.
ChinaFile Recommends
01.26.15Xi Stresses Adherence to Dialectical Materialism
Xinhua
China should not be judged by GDP alone, said the president. China should be judged by its transition in economic development, restructuring, dissolution of overcapacity and by the strength of the nation's commitment to an ecological society...
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01.26.15China Communist Party Magazine Blasts Professors Who Spread ‘Western Values’
South China Morning Post
Party journal's commentary targets liberal academics after President Xi Jinping calls for 'ideological guidance' for teachers and students
ChinaFile Recommends
01.26.15Bobby Jindal & China’s Louisiana Methanol Plant
Al Jazeera
A Chinese tycoon whose natural gas firm's environmental and labor rights record is under fire in the Chinese press is parking assets in a multibillion dollar methanol plant in Louisiana.
Conversation
01.26.15Does Size Matter? (In the U.S. and Chinese Economies, That Is...)
Last week, President Obama’s State of the Union Address touted a U.S. economic recovery. Meanwhile, China’s economic growth is slowing and Ma Jiantang, head of the National Bureau of Statistics, has said that China’s economy, contrary to overseas...
Sinica Podcast
01.26.15Inside the Property Revolution
from Sinica Podcast
Luigi Tomba, expert on municipal government in China, fellow at the Australian Centre on China and the World, and author of the book The Government Next Door: Neighborhood Politics in Urban China, is this week's Sinica Podcast guest. Since 2005...
ChinaFile Recommends
01.25.15Death Threats and Dawn Raids: Welcome to China’s Anti-Graft Drive
Bloomberg
On one side is Peking University Founder Group, a state-owned company that partnered with Credit Suisse Group AG (CSGN) in a separate securities joint venture whose chairman has disappeared.
The China Africa Project
01.23.15South Africa: China’s BFF in Africa
South Africa is emerging as one of China’s most important international partners as the relationship deepens across all levels. Economically, South Africa is the source of more Chinese investment than any other country on the continent. However,...
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01.23.15The Pacific Power Index
Foreign Policy
The world's most important relationship isn't the superpower showdown most analysts would have you believe. It’s a constantly shifting, symbiotic relationship shaped by millions of people, not just officials in Washington and Beijing.
ChinaFile Recommends
01.23.15Who’s Afraid of China’s Economy Slowing? Not Alibaba’s Jack Ma
Reuters
"If China still keeps 9 percent growth of the economy there must be something wrong. You will never see the blue sky. You will never see quality. China should pay attention to the quality of the economy," he said in a question-and-answer...
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01.22.15Obama’s Top Asia Adviser: Goal is for Complete Trade Pact in 2015
Reuters
Evan Medeiros, senior director for Asia at the U.S. National Security Council, asked about the Trans-Pacific Partnership, said: "We are confident we can and we will get it done."
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01.22.15China Says Ousted Security Tsar’s Influence Corrupted Others
Reuters
Last year, China arrested Zhou and expelled him from the party, accusing him of crimes ranging from taking bribes to leaking state secrets.
ChinaFile Recommends
01.22.15Chinese Director’s Film For Greenpeace Shows How Smog Changes Everything
Huffington Post
The film follows families from Hebei, in heavily polluted industrial northern China, and from Beijing, the prosperous Chinese capital next door, that has seen epic pollution emergencies recently.
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01.22.15Xi’s Yunnan Visit Highlights Poverty Elimination, Ethnic Solidarity
Xinhua
President Xi Jinping seeks to rally support for a "tough battle" against poverty and to speed up growth in the country's relatively underdeveloped ethnic regions.
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01.22.15Don’t Worry About China Slowdown, Premier Li Tells Davos
Bloomberg
China will avoid a hard landing and is focused on ensuring long-term medium-to-fast growth, Premier Li Keqiang told global leaders in Davos.
Media
01.22.15Xi Jinping’s Pay Raise
It just got slightly less difficult to be a clean Chinese official. State media reported on January 20 that Chinese civil servants had received their first pay raise in ten years, a move that includes a 60 percent bump for President Xi Jinping and...
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01.22.15The South China Sea: Oil on Troubled Waters
Economist
Two Chinese oil companies show contrasting approaches in their attempts to operate in the South China Sea where, to the discomfort of its smaller neighbours, China’s claims in disputed waters have grown increasingly assertive.
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01.22.15The Trans-Pacific Partnership Can Help the U.S. Counter China’s Expansion
Washington Post
We’ve faulted President Obama for his less-than-full-throated support of free-trade agreements that enjoy the nominal backing of his administration. There was no such cause for complaint about his State of the Union address Tuesday night, however,...
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01.21.15China Labor Activists Say Facing Unprecedented Intimidation
Reuters
The number of strikes more than doubled in 2014 to 1,378 from 656 the year before, according to China Labor Bulletin, a Hong Kong-based advocacy group. April saw the biggest strike in decades, when about 40,000 employees of Adidas and Nike supplier...
Excerpts
01.20.15China’s Losing Bet Against History
In 1991, Deng Xiaoping famously explained that in order to reassure the world of its peaceful intentions, China should “cope with affairs calmly; hide our capacities and bide our time; be good at maintaining a low profile; and never claim leadership...
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01.20.15Why Paul Krugman is Scared of China
CNN
"China scares me," he said Tuesday at the Asian Financial Forum in Hong Kong. "It scares me not because the policies have been wrong or anything, but because of the magnitude of the adjustment."
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01.20.15China’s Scramble for Africa
Al Jazeera
In a remarkable departure from its long history of low-profile foreign policy, especially since Deng Xiaoping took over China's leadership in the late 1970s, Beijing has recently committed up to 700 combat troops to South Sudan in the hopes of...