Livelihood Clashes in Inner Mongolia and Mongolia
Memo #87 – The Southern Mongolia Human Rights Information Center, a U.S.-based group, has been reporting on protests in cities along the central-northeastern border between the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region (IMAR) in China and Mongolia. These reports raise the spectre of ethnic conflict between Han Chinese and Mongolians. In fact, the origins of conflict are less ethnic in nature and more of a clash between traditional pastoral livelihoods and mining operations.
China’s Next Revolution: Fracking in the East
Memo #76 – Will Sichuan’s landscape one day resemble northeastern British Columbia’s Horn River Basin, one of North America’s most promising shale gas plays? The least contentious answer is ‘it won’t anytime soon,’ but there are many who would like to think so, especially in China. With the socialist revolution under their belt, Beijing is taking on another one – the shale gas revolution of North America. What the shale gas revolution lacks in cadres, it makes up in energy; coincidentally, the type most favoured by Beijing – the potential energy stored in hydrocarbon molecules of methane gas.
Hard Days for China’s Public Intellectuals Will Likely Get Harder
Memo #73 – These are hard days for China’s public intellectuals. International media highlight crackdowns and repression, the recent disappearance and now apparent arrest of Ai Weiwei, incarceration and abuse of public interest lawyers, and the heavy-handed police presence on the streets of major Chinese cities to avert a “jasmine revolution” among Sunday shoppers. Six months after the controversy over the Nobel peace prize for China’s most prominent dissident, Liu Xiaobo, is this the unraveling of “the China model”?
Chinese Artist/Activist Ai Weiwei Detained
Memo #71 – Famous artist, tweeter, and critic of the Chinese authorities Ai Weiwei (艾未未) disappeared on April 3rd, 2011. This marks the latest in a series of arrests and detentions of human rights activists, bloggers, and lawyers in the Chinese government’s crackdown in response to fears of a jasmine revolution in China. Yet rather than having links to a ‘colour’ revolution, it is Ai’s self-assigned role as memory-keeper for the child victims of the 2008 Sichuan earthquake and obsessive recorder of state-sanctioned acts of violence and surveillance that has led to his detention. Ai Weiwei has taken on the time-honoured task of Confucian historian, allocating praise or blame or imperial censor critiquing a ruler’s shortcomings. His is a modern take on ancient roles: documenting abuses and criticizing injustices by using the internet and social media.
Literature in 21st Century China – Harvard Professor David Der-wei Wang (Video Interview)
Memo #70 – What is the status of literature in 21st century China? Harvard professor David Der-wei Wang analyzes this question in a brief video interview. He discusses the impact of the internet, which has become an important medium for the dissemination of politically sensitive works. He mentions that there has been a resurgence of genres such as science fantasy to a prominence not seen since the late Qing dynasty. He talks about the new concept of “Sinophone literature,” which redefines “Chinese literature” as a field determined by language rather than purely by geography. He further touches on important new works, such as Hu Fayun’s novel, “Ruyan@SARS.com,” which was first serialized on the Internet but banned upon its print publication.
Key Issues Facing East Asia – (Video Interview with Dr. Tun-jen Cheng)
Memo #67 – In this interview, Dr. Tun-jen Cheng discusses a range of key issues facing East Asia today, including religion, governance, economics, and politics. When speaking about a religious revival in China, Dr. Cheng notes that Christianity is accepted by many new middle class urbanites as a source of inspiration and a symbol of modernity and greatness. Dr. Cheng then gives an account of the challenges facing East Asian democracies. Most notably, he mentions the public’s complaints about the shortage of horizontal accountability – the checks and balances between various branches and units of government. Nonetheless, he concludes that East Asian democracies are quite robust when compared to systems in Southeast Asia and the Middle East.
Sino-European Hope for the G20 in 2011
Memo #63 – Is the G20 still useful? What can we expect of it this year? Analysts in Canada and the US are often quick to discount the G20 process as meaningless summitry among too many countries focused on widely divergent domestic agendas and embroiled in pre-electoral politics. Ian Bremmer and Nouriel Roubini both call this a G-zero situation.
Espoirs Sino-Européens pour le G20
Memo #63 – Le G20 a du mal à s’affirmer comme instance politique capable de résoudre énergiquement les risques systémiques, notamment financiers, et déçoit donc ceux qui en espéraient le plus.
Is China the Next Domino?
Memo #59 (Part 2) – Authoritarian regimes seem to be crumbling almost daily. Will China go the way of Middle Eastern dictatorships?
The similarities are obvious. China relies on harsh measures to put down calls for democratic reform. And it is plagued by a huge gap between rich and poor, rampant corruption, rising prices of basic food stuffs, and high unemployment among recent university graduates.
Comparing Tahrir Square Demonstrations of 2011 and Tiananmen Protests of 1989
Memo #59 (Part 1) – At first glance there are many similarities: huge crowds (including many young people) demonstrate peacefully in the main square of the capital city against a repressive government that has been in power for a long time; the crowd has no clearly defined leaders; and the military allows the demonstrations to continue over an extended period of time.