For observers of Chinese politics who eagerly await word from secretive events like this week’s Fifth Plenum of the 19th Central Committee of the CCP, the first whiffs of news are generally an anti-climax. The signs emerging from such events are rarely concrete, and require tedious unpacking. Little surprise, then, that the “bulletin,” or gongbao […]
China’s Five-Year Plans are about much more than simply defining medium and long-term goals. They are bold statements about the nature of political power and its relationship to society.
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi (王毅) has been getting what seems to be a clear uptick in attention in China’s party-state media ever since his launch late last month of a new “Research Center for Xi Jinping Thought on Diplomacy.” Both yesterday and today, media have widely reported Wang’s “exclusive interview” with the official Xinhua […]
On July 20, Chinese media reported the formal inauguration of a new research center located within the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the “Center for Research of Xi Jinping Thought on Diplomacy” (习近平外交思想研究中心). The news made the rounds on the internet, and here is the notice as it appeared on the website of the official Xinhua […]
A commentary published on General Secretary Xi Jinping’s 67th birthday fawningly praises his political thought as “21st Century Marxism.”
As the full import sinks in of China’s announcement last night that the National People’s Congress, opening today in Beijing, will “debate” the introduction of a new national security law in Hong Kong, perhaps it is a good moment to look at the full text of Li Keqiang’s government work report, which runs to just […]
In recent days China Central Television has hurled a series of verbal attacks at US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and others in the United States. As the US and China lock horns over the question of responsibility for the global coronavirus epidemic, the state-run network’s “International Commentary” (国际锐评) segment, which is featured on the […]
Use of the word fèngquàn (奉劝), meaning “advise,” in Chinese diplomatic language is an indicator of a new attitude and tone in the country’s foreign relations. But the word is not new.
In the feverish era of the Cultural Revolution, the “loyalty dance,” or zhongziwu (忠字舞), was a way of conveying adulation for Mao Zedong. In the Xi era, such displays of loyalty seem to be returning.
Infectious diseases have no politics. In January 2020, through the course of the Wuhan people’s congress and the provincial people’s congress, no new coronavirus cases were reported in China. But the epidemic continued unabated – paying no heed to the political prerogatives of the Chinese Communist Party. One of the medical facilities hardest hit by […]