Taiwan president has a call with her new Czech counterpart
Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen and Czech President-Elect Petr Pavel had a cordial phone call, as Beijing continues to lose friends in Central and Eastern Europe. Could Ukraine be the next country to give China the cold shoulder?
Other news this week
- Can Chinese discount ecommerce firm Temu charm America?
- Protests disrupt China’s copper mine in Peru, warnings over Taiwan, and border tensions with India
- First Chinese IPO in the U.S. this year, domestic tourism, electric buses
- ‘A bumping porcelain piggyback scam’ — Phrase of the Week
- PMI back in the black, bad year for Huayi Brothers, airline losses, new energy investment
Business and technology
China’s COVID-killing machine craze
In order not to get COVID (again), some people will buy almost any product that claims to kill the virus or that can prevent infection.
Under-the-radar private Chinese investments are a blind spot for U.S. regulators
For years, China’s sovereign wealth fund has made investments in large private American investment funds that finance startups and companies working on strategic or sensitive technology in the U.S. — but regulators have yet to investigate these activities.
Longi to build the world largest solar manufacturing base
Longi is a giant of the solar energy industry, and it has just announced ambitious plans to construct an enormous new plant in Shaanxi Province.
Cash-strapped urban Chinese youth salivate over cheap, filling meals
As Chinese urban professionals tighten their purse strings in the face of a slowing economy, an unassuming lunch option traditionally enjoyed by blue-collar workers in Northeastern China has become an online sensation.
The China Project 2023 Red Paper
2022 was an annus horribilis for China, its people, and its reputation abroad: We look back on a year of lockdowns and slowdowns and make predictions for 2023, Year of the Water Rabbit.
Featured articles
On Jiang Zemin and inter-Party struggle, Willy Wo-Lap Lam’s book remains a gold standard
‘The Era of Jiang Zemin’ is dense with detail, built up from a wide range of interviews with Chinese executives, officials, academics, diplomats, and businesspeople. In that sense, the book itself was a product of a more open political system under Jiang.
Activision Blizzard and NetEase’s feud, explained
The messy breakup has it all: disgruntled gamers, changing power dynamics, and even shade-throwing beverages.
The Uyghur Tribunal one year on: Has anything changed?
One year has passed since a panel of ordinary citizens in the U.K. declared a genocide to be unfolding in the Uyghur homeland, but much of the world still has to act on its implications.
Is China’s demography China’s destiny?
Bert Hofman, former World Bank country director for China, talks about China’s shrinking population.
Video from The China Project
The significance behind China’s population decline | Live with Lizzi Lee
China has rolled out a slew of policies to boost its shrinking population. Yun Zhou, an assistant professor at the University of Michigan's Department of Sociology, talks about the issues behind the demographic crisis, but also warns of the policies’ impacts on gender inequality and what might come next.
Society and culture
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Best China books of 2022
From reform-era history and present-day policy to wartime history and protest fiction, we round up our top picks from the China bookshelf of 2022.
The best music to come out of China in 2022
While live music endured a tumultuous year in China, artists from the Chinese music scene pushed through and kept listeners comforted, thrilled, and empowered in a time of uncertainty and anxiety.
How brands are ushering in the Year of the Rabbit
For the first time since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, Chinese people are allowed to celebrate without restrictions on the Lunar New Year, the country’s most important holiday. Brands are gearing up for a blockbuster bunny bonanza.
Editors' Picks
Peking University’s first Yiddish class
At one of China’s most prestigious universities, students from a variety of majors are learning the Ashkenazi Jewish language.
Why do China books all look the same?
The color red, dragons, cropped Asian faces…when it comes to presenting China, book publishers often rely on a set of familiar tropes — to the detriment of the authors and the genre.
In search of spirit in China’s wild west
Through history, culture, and contemporary China: A motorbike trip from Xi'an to Dunhuang.
China looks to the Western classics
As American universities reevaluate the role of Western classical education, Latin and Greek courses are proliferating in China, where students see the Classics as a wellspring of wisdom that remains relevant regardless of hemisphere.