Media
03.09.15China’s Real Inconvenient Truth: Its Class Divide
China is talking about its pollution problem, but its equally serious class problem remains obscured behind the haze. Smog leapt to the forefront of Chinese national discourse after the February 28 release of "Under the Dome," a 103-minute...
Environment
03.05.15Beijing Says Panda Population Up 17%, But Experts Doubtful
from chinadialogue
China's claims that its population of wild giant pandas rose around 17% in just over a decade are being disputed by some experts, who point out that the latest census was over a much wider area than the previous one.The giant panda, a global...
Environment
03.04.15Clearing Skies
from Sierra Club
After dark is when the pollution arrives on the outskirts of Shanghai. On a bright night, when moonlight refracts through the smog, you can see black clouds of soot pouring out of small workshop smokestacks silhouetted against the sky. In case you...
Media
03.04.15The Other China
Writers Michael Meyer and Ian Buruma engage in a discussion co-sponsored by The New York Review of Books centered on Meyer’s new book, In Manchuria: A Village Called Wasteland and the Transformation of Rural China, which combines immersion...
Caixin Media
03.03.15Can Market Mechanisms Clear China’s Air?
The Chinese government recently responded to rising public discontent over environmental degradation by introducing tougher rules for industrial emissions.Meanwhile, a non-governmental organization and a state-run newspaper are coordinating a...
Media
03.03.15The Word That Broke the Chinese Internet
It might be gibberish, but it’s also a sign of the times. The word duang, pronounced “dwong,” is spreading like wildfire throughout China’s active Internet—even though 1.3 billion Chinese people still haven’t figured out what it means. In fact, its...
Earthbound China
03.02.15Village Acupuncture
On a bamboo-covered mountaintop the mud-walled houses of Diaotan village are just barely visible through the thick fog that often shrouds this remote hamlet in China’s Zhejiang province. Worn but sturdy earthen walls still enclose the largest...
Caixin Media
02.25.15Apple Pay Stalled, Frustrated in China
The central bank, UnionPay bank card service, and e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. are standing up to Apple Inc.'s effort to bring the Apple Pay no-card, no-cash payment system to iPhone users in China."Apple is seeking to...
Environment
02.23.15Chinese Firms Must Act Decisively on Climate Change, Report Says
from chinadialogue
Chinese companies will need to cut direct greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of their operations by up to 2.7% a year if China is to stay on track with the level of action required to keep global warming well below 2 degrees Celsius, says a new report...
Media
02.23.15Five Predictions for Chinese Censorship in the Year of the Sheep
Blocked websites, jailed journalists, and nationalist rhetoric have long been features of the Chinese Communist Party’s media control strategy. During the Year of the Horse, which just ended on China’s lunar calendar, President Xi Jinping and his...
Culture
02.20.15‘Still Not Married?’ A Graphic Guide to Surviving Chinese New Year
Maya Hong is a Beijing transplant from a small town outside of Harbin, the icy city not far from China’s border with Siberia. Though proud of her glacial origins and skilled at combating subzero temperatures, over the years Hong, 30, has had to add...
Viewpoint
02.20.15Major China Apple Supplier Pays Workers Less Than Foxconn
Apple, the world’s most beloved maker of sleek mobile phones, powerful personal computers, and slim portable music players recently reported record profits—money a new report from the New York-based nongovernmental organization China Labor Watch (...
Viewpoint
02.19.15Beijing Touts ‘Cyber-Sovereignty’ In Internet Governance
It has been a difficult few weeks for global technology companies operating in China.Chinese officials strengthened the Internet firewall by blocking the use of virtual private networks (VPNs), reasserted demands that web users register their real...
Media
02.19.15Why 700 Million People Keep Watching the Chinese New Year Gala, Even Though It’s Terrible
The Chinese New Year Gala, which aired live on February 18 on Chinese Central Television (CCTV), is a four-and-half hour variety show with song and dance, comedic skits, magic tricks, acrobatic acts, and celebrity cameos. The show celebrates the...
Culture
02.18.15Cai Guo-Qiang’s Love Affair With Fireworks
New York City-based artist Cai Guo-Qiang, one of the most celebrated contemporary artists born in China, has become the Godfather of a spectacular new kind of fireworks displays which he calls “explosion events.” Having done large-scale events...
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...
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...
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...
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...
Environment
02.05.15Parched Beijing’s Olympics Bid Based on Fake Snow
from chinadialogue
Where better for a Winter Olympic Games than famously arid north China?Drought and a fast growing economy have created water shortages so severe that China’s government has spent more than a decade, and up to U.S.$80 billion, constructing 2,400...
Media
02.05.15Why Chinese Promote Confining New Mothers for a Month
HONG KONG—Giving birth is never easy, but for new Chinese mothers the month following a baby’s arrival is particularly fraught. Immediately after I became pregnant for the first time, I started to hear about zuoyuezi, or “sitting the month.” It’s a...
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...
Postcard
02.04.15The Bro Code
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...
Culture
02.04.15‘This is not that China Story’
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...
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...
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...
Caixin Media
01.27.15China Boots Up an Internet Banking Industry
Premier Li Keqiang recently launched a new era for banking in China by ceremonially pressing the "confirm" button for a 35,000 yuan loan issued to a Shenzhen truck driver.Li's gesture on January 4 on behalf of Shenzhen Qianhai WeBank...
Environment
01.23.15China’s Air Pollution: The Tipping Point
Last November, Beijing saw a stretch of solidly clear skies and the Chinese media coined a phrase to describe them: APEC blue. After the diplomats and businesspeople gathered in China’s capital for the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation forum...
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...
Environment
01.21.15‘New Measures Needed’ To Take China’s Cars Off the Roads
from chinadialogue
As air pollution once more soared to hazardous levels last week in Beijing, in Washington a panel of Chinese and other international experts explained some of the solutions to taking cars off the roads in the world’s most populous country, but there...
Caixin Media
01.20.15Good Times Are Over for Local Governments
Two pieces of recent news have piqued the public's interest. First, local governments reported their latest debt figures to the Ministry of Finance. The numbers have not been made public, but sources say many officials reported large amounts in...
Viewpoint
01.16.15The Plight of China’s Rights Lawyers
As the year came to a close, at least seven prominent Chinese human rights lawyers rang in the New Year from a jail cell. Under President Xi Jinping, 2014 was one of the worst years in recent memory for China’s embattled civil society. Bookending...
Environment
01.16.15Can the Potato Help Feed China, Cut Pollution, and Alleviate Drought?
from chinadialogue
The Ministry of Agriculture’s move to make potatoes an increasingly important staple in Chinese kitchens, including the propagation of recipes that rely on the humble tuber, at first glance might appear slightly odd and surprising.The potato has...
Viewpoint
01.15.15Chinese Lawyers to Chinese Lawmakers: Let Us Defend Our Clients
Legal Opinion on Article 35 of the Ninth (Draft) Amendment to the Criminal Law: "We are a group of legal professionals who care about the rights of lawyers and reform of the judicial system and who have taken note of the draft for the Ninth...
Environment
01.15.15China-Latin America Summit ‘A Missed Opportunity’ on Low-Carbon Energy
The first major meeting of Chinese and Latin American leaders agreed closer cooperation on trade, investment, and industry, but is more likely to usher in deals on oil and gas rather than renewable energy, analysts said in response to a summit that...
Media
01.13.15This Culture Has Not Yet Been Rated
It all started with plunging necklines. After the sudden withdrawal and subsequent sanitizing of a popular Chinese show, viewers in China have renewed longstanding calls to strip government censors of their power, using one simple solution: a...
Media
01.13.15‘Where’s Our Unity March?’ China Wants to Know
The January 7 terrorist attack on satirical French newspaper Charlie Hebdo that left 12 dead has mostly inspired unity in the West, but the massive march held in its aftermath is spurring controversy, and even some disdain, in China. While the...
Caixin Media
01.12.15China Turning Gray Over Pension Reform Stress
About 8,000 teachers in the northeastern city of Zhaodong stayed home for three days in November to protest an experimental pension scheme they called tantamount to a pay cut.The teachers claimed they'd been illegally forced to participate in...
Environment
01.09.15China’s Polluters Hit with Biggest-Ever Fines
from chinadialogue
Two days before a new environmental law came into effect, six polluting companies in Jiangsu were ordered by the province’s highest court to pay 160 million yuan ($26 million) in restoration costs for illegally dumping almost 25,000 tons of chemical...
Caixin Media
01.09.15Baby Hatch Programs Struggle to Cope With Number of Infants With Birth Defects
Giving birth to her first baby granted Zheng Yuling no happiness, but instead brought pain and sadness. The seriously ill girl died hours after birth, and Zheng's husband, Chen Dafu, was arrested on suspicion he abandoned the newborn.Their baby...
Media
01.08.15What Will Happen to Uber in China?
Ride-sharing app Uber has expanded around the world at a blistering pace, launching in a new city every one or two days. At first glance, China would appear the ideal fit for the Silicon Valley startup. Most urban residents in the world’s second-...
Environment
01.07.15A Post-Mortem on Jack Ma’s Hunting Trip
from chinadialogue
In 2014, just before the U.S. IPO of his company Alibaba, Jack Ma became caught up in a debate sparked by a hunting trip he took to the U.K.. My colleagues and I at chinadialogue had an idea: rise above that debate and look at the facts.The U.K...
Caixin Media
01.06.15In Praise of Hu Feng
Hu Feng (1902-85) is a name that most students of P.R.C. history have undoubtedly encountered at one time or another. I remember reading it for the first time years ago in Jonathan Spence's "The Search for Modern China." It stuck in...
Caixin Media
12.30.14Nephew of Disgraced Official Ling Jihua Involved in Tangled Web of Businesses
The investigations into Ling Jihua, Vice Chairman of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, and his two brothers, Ling Zhengce and Ling Wancheng, have shed light on a powerful family that had a grip on both government resources...
Reporting & Opinion
12.23.14China in 2014 Through the Eyes of a Human Rights Advocate
from China Change
This time last year, volunteers and I were busy writing and translating articles to prepare for the New Citizens Movement trials. Many Chinese voices were speaking out forcefully against these trials: law professors, rights lawyers, liberal...
Caixin Media
12.22.14Wild Stock Market Is Detrimental to Reform Efforts
Chinese leaders' pledge to strengthen risk control at last week's Central Economic Work Conference could not be more timely, given the frenzied exuberance in the stock market.In a statement released after three days of meetings, the...
Culture
12.19.14‘One Day the People Will Speak Out for Me’
The ongoing exhibition “@Large: Ai Weiwei at Alcatraz” is both revelatory and heart-wrenching, a stunning and sobering work by an artist who understands firsthand the fragility and pricelessness of freedom.Detained without warning or charge for 81...
Media
12.18.14Hong Kong, the Resilient City
The tents have folded. After 75 days of camping on the street, braving police crackdowns, occasional civilian attacks, and the city’s (admittedly mild) winter chill, Hong Kong’s pro-democracy protesters have cleared out. As promised, police moved in...
Viewpoint
12.16.14Why Marx Still Matters: The Ideological Drivers of Chinese Politics
In days of greater political brouhaha, “to go and see Marx” used to be a slang expression among Chinese Communists, to refer to death. More recently, a considerable number of commentators have pronounced the expiry of Marxism itself. China’s reform...
Earthbound China
12.15.14A Map of China’s Back-to-the-Land Efforts
In our short film “Down to the Countryside,” Sun Yunfan and I follow Ou Ning, an artist and curator who moved from Beijing to the village of Bishan in rural Anhui province in 2013, where he experiments with preserving and revitalizing local heritage...
Caixin Media
12.15.14China, Russia Near Deal for Wide-Body Aircraft
Russian and Chinese aircraft manufacturers are preparing to cooperate to help China meet soaring demand for new jumbo jets without kowtowing to industry heavyweights Airbus and Boeing.Aviation industry officials on the sidelines of the recent Zhuhai...
Viewpoint
12.11.14Here Is Xi’s China: Get Used To It
from China Economic Quarterly
The prevailing mood among China-watchers in 2014 was one of anxiety and skepticism. The year began in the shadow of Chinese assertiveness in the East and South China Seas. Economic concerns quickly took over: by February the property market seemed...
Caixin Media
12.11.14Sacked Deputy Reform Commissioner Gets Life in Jail for Graft
A former deputy head of the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) has been sentenced to life in prison for taking 35.6 million yuan (U.S.$5.8 million) in bribes between 2002 and 2012, according to a microblog post from a Langfang court...
Features
12.10.14Why Beijing’s Troubles Could Get a Lot Worse
from Barron’s
Few foreigners know China as intimately as Anne Stevenson-Yang does. She has spent the bulk of her professional life there since first arriving in 1985, working as a journalist, magazine publisher, and software executive, with stints in between...
Caixin Media
12.09.14With New Fund, China Hits a Silk Road Stride
China's ambitious plan to expand trade links westward into Central Asia in the spirit of the ancient Silk Road is taking shape now that the government has decided to shift foreign currency into a special fund.The State Council will tap the...
Media
12.08.14Happy Friday, Zhou Yongkang
Eight minutes after midnight on Friday, the axe fell on Zhou Yongkang: a terse news release from state-run Xinhua news agency said that China’s former security czar Zhou had been expelled from the Chinese Communist Party, his case handed over to...
Media
12.08.14On First Annual Constitution Day, China’s Most Censored Word Was ‘Constitution’
On December 4, China’s first annual Constitution Day, Communist Party mouthpiece People’s Daily posted the complete text of the Chinese constitution to its Weibo microblogging account, accompanied by the upbeat hashtag: “Let’s all read the...