Thriving microblogging culture has become China’s de facto town square. But as more alleged rumors and critical commenters are quieted or deleted this center of civil society becomes a less interesting place to visit.
Five years after the massive Wenchuan quake in China’s Sichuan province left about 90,000 dead and missing, allegations are surfacing that corruption and official wrongdoing have plagued the five-year-long quake reconstruction effort....
The demands for ideological conformity show that Mr. Xi and other leaders want to inoculate the public from expectations of major political liberalization, even as they explore loosening some state controls over the economy....
Liao Minyue last saw her mother, the rights activist Liu Ping, in mid-April 2013. “I’m afraid she’ll be beaten. It has happened before,” Ms. Liao, 20, said by telephone. “Now I’m waiting for any news of her trial. I’ll fight for her freedom...
The dissident Chinese artist Ai Weiwei has filmed a fight in China in which dozens of Han Chinese brawled with Tibetans in a street in Beijing. Witnesses said the scrap was between ethnic Tibetan street vendors and Beijing's native Han...
As Marxist ideology has faded in China, ancient mystical beliefs once banned by the Communist Party are gaining ground. This mystical revival is attracting devoted followers in that most forbidden of realms: the marbled, atheistic halls of...
On May 3rd, an anonymous Chinese expat posted on the White House website a petition demanding justice for the woman who many believe is responsible for Zhu Ling’s poisoning. In six days it has collected over 140,000 signatures....
Reports circulated online this week that Zhang Yimou has seven children from his two marriages and from relationships with two other women in violation of the country’s strict family planning laws.
While anti-death penalty activists say public education is needed to get the message out, they believe change ultimately needs to come from the top -- something that they're not optimistic about at all.
The wacky and arbitrary nature of some rules, regulations and laws imposed by the local and national governments recently demonstrates the arrogance of power in China.
President Xi Jinping’s administration has detained at least 10 activists who have led a campaign for officials to publicly disclose their wealth - the first coordinated crackdown by the new government on activists.
Almost half of all Chinese report feeling “more anxiety” now than they did five years ago. What, exactly, is driving these concerns, or increasing reports...
Dissident intellectuals pointed out that the regime is not afraid of what you say, no matter how strong; however, it is fearful of any form of organization and collective activities, and it has been cracking down harshly on these street...
In his 1925 account of Chinese restaurants in America, G.H. Danton introduces the reader to the cuisine, clientele and commercial considerations of the industry which had ‘supplanted the Chinese laundryman in typifying for America where...
The public has quickly jumped to assume the guilt of both Sun and related officials. In all likelihood, if there had been solid evidence the perpetrator would not have gone unpunished.
For a Chinese government determined to corral public opinion in its favor, the failed attempt to shut down the debate about a once-obscure 19-year old poisoing case is nothing short of a spectacular public-relations failure....
Every summer, the 59-year-old Chinese blogger Zhang Shihe rides his bicycle thousands of miles to the plateaus, deserts and hinterlands of North Central ...
This week, Kaiser and Jeremy welcome back Bill Bishop, the force behind the invaluable Sinocism newsletter and the man Evan Osnos once referred to as “the China watcher’s China watcher.” Starting...
The 19-year-old case has again become so blazing hot on Chinese social media that as of Saturday, the name of the victim, Zhu Ling, was censored on Weibo. But it's too late: The case has been brought to the attention of tens of millions of...
The month my wife and I moved to Beijing in 2004, I saw a bag of oatmeal at our local grocery store prominently labeled: “NOT POLLUTED!” How funny that this would be a selling point, we thought.
But 7 years later as we prepared to return...
Human Rights Watch believes the Chinese government should take immediate steps to protect the human rights of all people who engage in sex work. It should repeal the host of laws and regulations that are repressive and misused by the police, and...
Ma Licheng (马立诚) is a former Senior Editorials Editor at People’s Daily, the Communist Party’s most important mouthpiece, and the author of eleven books. In 2003, when...
Feel that your jokes have been falling flat lately? Enough that you’ve even started wondering whether China is a grand experiment in irony and deadpan humor? This week on Sinica, hosts Kaiser Kuo and Jeremy Goldkorn are delighted to invite guests...
Chinese officials, like political dissidents or regular citizens, also suffer under a party that is accountable chiefly to itself and a government that arbitrarily enforces laws.
Following are excerpts from a recent conversation among Chen Guangcheng, the blind legal activist who was recently permitted to leave China and is currently a distinguished visitor at New York University School of Law; Jerome A. Cohen,...
As Wal-Mart expands in China, activists and academics have found that along with “Wal-Mart culture,” the company has also imported abuses familiar to those who follow Wal-Mart in the United States.
This week on Sinica, we deliver a salacious podcast that covers everything you always wanted to know about sex in China, but have been afraid to ask. And with a discussion that stretches from Daoist sex manuals and imperial sex customs to getting...
Yu Hua on how the new Schwarzmen scholarship ought to look to Apple’s and Google’s experience in China as instructive examples of how to (and how not to) do business in China.
In the wake of Tuesday’s violence, State Department spokesman Patrick Ventrell called for a thorough and transparent investigation and expressed concern over discrimination against Uighurs and the practice of Islam.
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At a meeting he had requested to discuss a 37 percent mark he had recently received on his dissertation (3 percentage points short of a pass) Li Yang offered £5,000 (47,000 yuan). He also came armed with an air pistol.
Clashes in China’s restive Xinjiang region have left 21 people dead, including 15 police officers and officials, authorities say. It is very difficult to verify reports from Xinjiang, reports the BBC’s Celia Hatton...
A picture showing an official's wrist, with what appears to be the imprint of a watch, has gone viral with many Netizens wondering whether the timepiece was removed in light of scandals involving corrupt officials caught wearing expensive...
Liu Xia was allowed to leave the Beijing apartment where she has been held for two-and-a-half years to attend the trial of her brother on fraud charges that his lawyers said are trumped up to punish the family.
Fight promoter Bob Arum insisted that he had seen the future of boxing, and that it was in China and Singapore and would perhaps spread elsewhere in Asia, like the Philippines.
Most young men getting married in China today are expected to fork out, often providing an apartment, sometimes a car and a betrothal gift, too. Things were much easier when his parents got married four decades ago.
The Red Cross Society of China, a state-run organization that is one of the country’s largest charities, has yet to recover from a 2011 scandal that struck a serious blow to China’s nascent notions of philanthropy.
Parents are confining sons and daughters to their homes, even if it means keeping them away from friends. Schools are canceling outdoor activities and field trips. Parents with means are choosing schools based on air-filtration systems....
Though better than the response to the 2008 earthquake in Wenchuan, survivors face a third night with no shelter and little food or water. The economic impact from the earthquake should be...
The arrests of four activists have both infuriated and disappointed reformers and human rights advocates, who say the crackdown bodes ill for Mr. Xi’s widely trumpeted war on graft.
While many have praised the government for its swift response, growing anger among some underscores the government’s challenge, magnified by the fact that Sichuan bore the brunt of a 7.9 earthquake in 2008 that killed nearly 70,000 people...
While the traditional jabs at America are still present on Chinese social media, it’s notable that so many reflected on the peace and safety both countries are trying to achieve.
Chinese tennis player Li Na, the first Asian woman to win a Grand Slam title, was named on Thursday among Time magazine’s most influential people in the world, along with N.B.A. player LeBron James and Italian soccer star mario Malotelli.
Winston Lord, former United States Ambassador to China, tells us he recently hacked into the temples of government, pecking at his first-generation iPad with just one finger—a clear sign that both Beijing and Washington need to beef up their ...
Premier Li Keqiang said China is cooperating closely with WHO and other international organizations on the H7N9 avian flu. The government attaches great importance to public health and has been working to effectively prevent...
The virtual currency’s decentralized and speculative nature, combined with the country’s experience with online currencies and “gold-mining” in the past are all cited as possible factors contributing to Bitcoin’s future take off in China.
To the Chinese who awoke to the news Thursday, it was a confusing object lesson in what they are so often told is a model political system.
The state-run news media, which had initially given credence to the story, abruptly reversed course, and the tale was in shreds. What does it mean when feel-good propaganda cannot be trusted even on its own fanciful terms?
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In China’s rapidly expanding social media sphere, most of the buzz is split between Tencent’s WeChat, a text and voicemail service and Sina Weibo, a microblogging service where users post unfiltered snippets of news in a cat-and-mouse game...
The family of Lu Lingzi, the young Chinese woman killed in the attack at the Boston Marathon, didn’t want their daughter’s name revealed, but at least 12,000 people had left comments in her memory on her microblog account after it was...
Chinese Web users seemed to draw two general conclusions: that China would be more effective at preventing a Boston-style attack, but that the U.S. is better equipped to respond to and cope such an event.
A 108-meter high Eiffel Tower rises above Champs Elysées Square in Hangzhou. A Chengdu residential complex for 200,000 recreates Dorchester, England. An ersatz Queen’s Guard patrols Shanghai’s Thames Town, where pubs and statues of Winston Churchill abound. Gleaming replicas of the White House dot Chinese cities from Fuyang to Shenzhen. These examples are but a sampling of China’s most popular and startling architectural movement: the construction of monumental themed communities that replicate towns and cities in the West.
China’s social media was in mourning yesterday as users turned their profile photos to grey in remembrance of the victims of the 7.0 earthquake that struck the Ya’an region in Sichuan province on Saturday. As of April 22, the...
Since the mid-1990s, the Internet has revolutionized popular expression in China, enabling users to organize, protest, and influence public opinion in unprecedented ways. Guobin Yang’s pioneering study maps an innovative range of contentious forms and practices linked to Chinese cyberspace, delineating a nuanced and dynamic image of the Chinese Internet as an arena for creativity, community, conflict, and control.
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This week on Sinica, Kaiser and Jeremy are delighted to be joined by Joy Chen, former Deputy Mayor of Los Angeles, and now high-profile author of the book Do Not Marry Before Age 30, a look at the state of...
Chinese author and poet Liao Yiwu on his reluctant dissent, his years in a Chinese prison, his relatively new celebrity status, and living with the torturous memories of his violent experiences.
Some are speculating that China is trying to ensure that U.S.-North Korean relations remain terrible, as they are, therefore increasing its influence over the region, politically, economically and strategically.
San Francisco’s courting of Chinese partnerships contrasts with Washington suspicion towards China. Last year the House Intelligence Committee urged U.S. firms to avoid partnering with Chinese telecom firms, to safeguard customer data....
