The reference to the media as a “mouthpiece” (喉舌) is not a slight against propaganda media as some may assume, but a term long used by the Chinese Communist Party itself to describe the role of the media. Translating literally to “throat and tongue,” the term defines the media’s role as faithfully projecting the voice of the Party, and accuratel…

Emblazoned as the motto of the Central Party School and the namesake of China’s top theoretical journal, “seeking truth from facts” (实事求是) is one of the party’s most important guiding theoretical principles and has been referred to within the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) as the “magic weapon” （法宝）behind China’s successful revolution, constructi…

The “civilizational state” is the idea that China is unlike any other ordinary country, but a civilization forced into the restrictive nation-state framework developed in the West. While the notion is generally not found in the official discourse of the Chinese Communist Party, it has been championed by a number of prominent Chinese scholars as …