Guanxi Master

Does the commencement of Shanghai’s World Expo mark a bid for the passing of the scepter?

China has spent vast amounts on preparing for the World Expo this year, spending billions more than it did even on the 2008 Olympics. There is no aspect of the city or the surrounding areas that has remained untouched by the grand expectations of the event. People are told to be good examples of civilized behavior for the Expo. Old buildings have thin plastic veneers tacked on to make them look like Old Shanghai Longtangs, and plastic bags have been outlawed to make the Expo “Green”. This is quite a lot of trouble for a country that is still “developing” and “should resist the siren song of ‘Big China’.” Read the rest of this entry »

Modern Chinese art and the agony of global urbanization

“The new comradeship will be a comradeship in the task of preserving being itself, a comradeship in the work of facing future danger and menace…Without those values another and terrible possibility could emerge; man might succumb to the power of the anonymous” (Romano Guardini, The End of the Modern World).

To understand China today, one sometimes has to take a painful look at what the Chinese are losing while they rise as the next economic force of this century.

In the Spring Showcase of Chinese modern art at the Galerie du Monde of Hong Kong, three famously striking and controversial images by artist Liu Bolin (劉勃麟) show a remarkable state of consciousness among the Chinese today. Read the rest of this entry »

Looking at Business Week’s list of the Top 100 Companies in China, it struck me that many of the names we see every day here in China are either “pinyinized” into English, or abbreviated in their official English translations. Why don’t they translate the full names? It’s an interesting study, and here are three that stuck out to me: Read the rest of this entry »

How the West overlooks the positive requirements for constructive critique

In a recent blog at The China Beat, the Association of Asian Studies’ annual conference in Philadelphia expressed dismay that Beijing had prevented its Chinese featured speaker Cui Weiping (崔卫平) from attending. Ms. Cui had been scheduled to participate in the conference’s round table discussion “Against Amnesia: History, Memory, and the Role of Public Intellectuals in 21st Century China,” and while her work commitments were cited as the reason for refusing her exit from China, the title of the session itself may have been enough to raise concerns in Beijing. Control of an intellectual who may potentially be critical of China has a long historical precedent.

In China, artists and intellectuals have been fostered in an atmosphere of an almost religious awe for authority that must be scrupulously maintained in order to keep harmony and prevent dissent from breaking out into social unrest and chaos. When it comes to pointing out flaws in the ruling system, class, or person, the Chinese have a saying: Read the rest of this entry »

In the face of heartbreaking tragedy, we share the sorrow of a nation

Yesterday, China’s internet turned gray as the major websites removed color from their home pages, and memorial ceremonies where held on television and around the country. In a display of national solidarity, the people have come together to mourn the tragic loss of life in last week’s Yushu earthquakes. As soldier and civilian, monk and minister have labored side-by-side to desperately save as many lives from the wreckage as they can, differences have been put aside, and across the rest of the country, people from all walks of life are also pausing to grieve the appalling tragedy.

We stand with the Chinese people, to mourn the deaths of so many people and the destruction of so many lives. We grieve the permanent impact last week’s events will have on countless loved ones left behind, children wretchedly orphaned, and families forced to restart their lives from the rubble. And we encourage all our readers, in the face of such incalculable loss, to pause and commiserate with the Chinese people.