Twenty-five years in the making, China has developed a mass surveillance state, from Beijing alleyways to rural villages. And citizens don’t object because they’ve been co-opted into it.
Author: Dan Wu
Undergraduate student at Sciences Po Paris, majoring in Political humanities and International Relations. I grew up in China, and am currently living in Europe. I am interested in issues about Greater China and the inter-perceptions between the east and the west.
Cast out by family, discriminated against by the state, shut off from the medication, China’s “male-to-female” trans community is under immense pressure, as suicide rates rise and incomprehension continues to spread.
A series of interviews in Wuhan with aging gay men — all currently or formerly married to women — reveals a hidden story of how Chinese LGBTQ culture is gradually emerging from the shadows.
As more young people in Taiwan use Chinese social media, drawn to the fun and glitzy elements of life on mainland China, they need to learn to distinguish real life from propaganda.
An Estonian e-residency that gives holders access to the country’s government services and business networks has growing takeup in both mainland China and Taiwan. For both business and political reasons.
COVID infections have skyrocketed since China eased restrictions as public health policy has not been able to keep up. Unable to find medications, many have turned to generic drugs of questionable safety. It’s the culmination of a longstanding problem.
The past year has added new elements into the showdown across the Taiwan Strait, from Nancy Pelosi’s visit to the war in Ukraine to Xi jinping’s power grab. Now we may be reaching a tipping point that could lead to a military showdown, even if the question of when is still wide open.
An agreement between the Vatican and Beijing was quietly renewed recently. However, China still views Catholicism with a mix of deep suspicion and general distraction. Meanwhile the faithful and pastors are caught between two very different worlds.
Protests that engulfed China quickly faded as the government made a U-turn on its strict Zero-COVID policies, even as police sweeps of demonstrators have left families where their vanished loved ones are. Still, the “Blank Paper Revolution”‘s cry for democracy may have quietly left its mark.
China is facing its biggest political protests in decades as frustration grows with its harsh Zero-COVID strategy. However, the real reasons for the protests run much deeper. Could it be the starting point for a new civic movement?
While street demonstrations have spread in China to protest the strict Zero-COVID regulations, some Chinese university students have taken up public acts of crawling to show what extended harsh lockdowns are doing to their mental state.
The deepening ties between China and Africa are a hot topic, but the voices we hear are usually the same — white and Western. So what does China look like to an African? Nigerian journalist Solomon Elusoji is the best person to ask.
Around China, Zero COVID policy has shut down entire towns and workplaces. But in the high-tech Foxconn factory in Zhengzhou, famous for cranking out iPhones, employees were forced to work even if they tested positive. Exclusive testimony from some of those who fled Foxconn premises last week.
My fear for China’s future has never been greater…
When China cracked down on cyber crime, many involved in the industry moved to Cambodia. The Southeast Asian country has since become synonymous with online scams and forced labor. But the Cambodian government isn’t just turning a blind eye — it is actively benefiting.
Too much has been put in to the state-sponsored truth that minimal spread of the virus is the at-all-cost objective. Xi Jinping may eventually have no choice but to renounce the harsh measures, but at this week’s Communist Party Congress, the Chinese President was giving no ground.
Tensions between Taiwan and China have ratcheted up over the last two years, peaking with Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan in August. The Taiwanese who have lived peacefully on the mainland for many years are now questioning their place in an increasingly hostile environment.
The city in southern China was put under harsh lockdown earlier this month after just a few positive COVID tests. Then a bus carrying quarantined residents crashed, killing 27. The senseless accident left residents more fearful and suspicious of each other than ever.
In an attempt to counter an aging population, China announced its “three-child policy” last year. It has also cracked down on sex education and contraception. The move has meant that abortion is often the only option for Chinese girls and women in the post-family planning era.
Following the escalation of the Chinese-U.S. trade war in 2018, the “Made in China” label is not as ubiquitous as it once was. Southeast Asian economies are on the rise — but their growth doesn’t necessarily threaten Chinese dominance.
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Russia Cuts Off Gas To Europe
The Nord Stream 1 pipeline halted its gas flow into Europe Wednesday morning. Russian state energy giant Gazprom said this was part of a scheduled stoppage announced last week, and is expected to last through September 2. Still, the cut raises renewed concern over the power Russia wields with its energy supplies ahead of the […]
“Taiwanese would laugh at the leader worship of the North Koreans, but wasn’t that what we did in the days of Chiang Kai-shek?”
Emerging religions and cults in Asia are deeply intertwined with politics: in China, religions need political approval, while in Japan religious groups use political platforms to assert themselves. Not even the killing of former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, carried out by a member of the Unification Church, has prompted a closer look at exactly what role religion plays in society.
“She’s now the leader of the Western movement recognizing the existence of a democratic Taiwan, aiming to break Beijing’s “one-China principle…” A Taiwanese political scientist argues the 19-hour visit by U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi will have real lasting impact.
A phone call Thursday between Presidents Xi and Biden may have avoided adding tensions to U.S.-China relations, but now all attention will be back on the question of whether Nancy Pelosi lands in Taipei next month for a meeting that Beijing has been warning against and the Chinese media stirs the pot.
A new regulation in China is cracking down hard on tattoos. The law is ostensibly about minors, but some argue that it’s going too far and actively erasing the glorious Chinese past.
As China holds firm in its zero-COVID approach, discrimination against those who have tested positive is rampant. Some even find themselves homeless and jobless. Now, the government is trying to tackle the stigma, but it won’t be easy.
It may have taken a little while, but the Chinese Communist Party woke up to the risks of losing control of information flows on livestream platforms.
The death of the former Japanese Prime Minister has provoked different reactions between mainland China and Taiwan, but also between government officials and the public in the People’s Republic. Looking ahead, will Japan’s pro-Taiwan stance stick for the long haul?
The festivities to mark 25 years since the British handover to China of Hong Kong also marked the official arrival of the new leader of Hong Kong, John Lee, who will move things even faster and closer to Beijing.
Thousands of students and young people were detained during Hong Kong’s democracy protests in 2019. Now with criminal records, many are struggling to re-integrating into a changed society
Not only strict rules of freedom of movement as part of Zero-COVID policy but also an increase in censorship has raised many questions for the expat population in the megacity of 26 million that had long enjoyed a kind of special status in China as a place of freedom and openness. A recent survey of foreigners in the Chinese megacity found that 48% of respondents said they would leave Shanghai within the next year.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has put China’s stance on Taiwan back in the spotlight. But despite shared narratives of national unity, there are key differences in how Beijing and Moscow approach territories they consider their own.
The port city is China’s most international and cosmopolitan, which helps explain the ongoing culture clash between its residents and Chinese authorities aiming to enforce a strict Zero-Covid policy of restrictions on movement and freedom.
China has no specific laws on transgender groups, and even the word “transgender” does not appear in any legal provisions. But the real-life issues of public bathrooms is forcing Chinese to confront the issue, especially after the murder in the city of Wuhan of a trans woman earlier this month.
On social media and at universities, with sarcastic videos and graffiti, young people are showing they are sick and tired of Zero COVID policies. People are still waiting to see how the Xi Jinping regime might react.
Do you long for bedtime stories told remotely? Or miss the companionship a voice provides? There’s an app for that, which also responds to special COVID-19 needs of dating apps that allows for more direct online communication.
Crunching the numbers of South Korea’s personal and household debt offers a glimpse into what drives the win-or-die plot of the Netflix hit produced in the Asian country.
The rise and fall of 35-year-old Sebastian Kurz was breathtaking in any context. Yet the resignation of the Austrian chancellor offers unique insights into a political scenario that was very much of our COVID times.
In its diaspora around Asia and the rest of the world, Hong Kong’s identity is closely tied to its food and tea. Now with the pressures from the mainland, the stakes are suddenly multiplied.