Premier’s news conference

Source: NYT (3/6/24)
A Window Into Chinese Government Has Now Slammed Shut
阅读简体中文版 | 閱讀繁體中文版
Once a year, the premier held a news conference, explaining the economy and giving Chinese a taste of political participation. That has come to an end.
By Li Yuan

Rows of government officials sit on a wide stage decorated in red and gold with an audience that includes media, standing with cameras recording the event.

Premier Li Qiang spoke from a dais during the opening session of the National People’s Congress at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on Tuesday. The annual news conference used to close the congress. Credit…Andy Wong/Associated Press

For more than 30 years, the Chinese premier’s annual news conference was the only time that a top leader took questions from journalists about the state of the country. It was the only occasion for members of the public to size up for themselves China’s No. 2 official. It was the only moment when some Chinese might feel a faint sense of political participation in a country without elections.

On Monday, China announced that the premier’s news conference, marking the end of the country’s annual rubber-stamp legislature, will no longer be held. With that move, an important institution of China’s reform era was no more.

“Welcome to the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea,” a commenter wrote on the social media platform Weibo, reflecting the sentiment that China increasingly resembles its dictatorial, hermitic neighbor. The search term “news conference” was censored on Weibo, and very few comments remained by Monday evening Beijing time.

Although increasingly scripted, the premier’s news conference at the National People’s Congress was watched by the Chinese public and the world’s political and business elite for signs of economic policy shifts and, occasionally, high-level power plays taking place beneath the surface.

“As stage-managed as it was, it was a window to see how official China works and how official China explains itself to the Chinese people and to the wider world,” said Charles Hutzler, a former colleague of mine who attended 24 premier pressers since 1988 as a journalist for the Voice of America, The Associated Press and The Wall Street Journal. Continue reading

Techno-Futures symposium

Symposium Announcement
Techno-Futures: Collaborations in Performance, Technology, and Creative Scholarship
March 7-9, 2024
University of Maryland (in person and online)

A weekend of events investigating new horizons in the application of technology in performance through the work of Asian diasporic artists, scholars and artists who study or create work in East Asia, and UMD graduate students who research the intersections of performance and technology. Co-organized by Jyana Browne (UMD), Tarryn Chun (University of Notre Dame), and Van Tran Nguyen (UMD).

Events include a film festival showcasing works by Asian diasporic artists, graduate student research and creative works, and an international symposium, artists talks, and an artist roundtable. The symposium, “Technology in Contemporary East Asian Performance,”  focuses on critical studies of recent works of theater and performance from Japan, South Korea, the PRC, and Taiwan that employ technologies such as virtual and extended reality, online platforms, vocaloids, holograms, and drones. Keynote addresses by Rossella Ferrari (University of Vienna) and Suk-Young Kim (UCLA). The artist talks and an artist roundtable offer a view of technology and performance from the perspective of working artists. All events open to the public and symposium proceedings will be live streamed via Zoom.

Advance registration required. Please visit https://tdps.umd.edu/techno-futures for more information, schedule, and registration.

Posted by: Tarryn Chun <tchun@nd.edu>

30 years of the internet, part II

Thirty Years of the Internet in China: A Retrospective (Part II)
SAT-SUN, March 2-3, 2024
Virtual Event, Open to the Public

Jointly organized by Center on Digital Culture and Society and Center for the Study of Contemporary China, University of Pennsylvania. REGISTER HERE

Schedule

March 2, 8:00-10:15pm ET

  • Matt Debutts and Jennifer Pan (Stanford University), “China’s Internet Controls: What If Citizens Disengage?”
  • Jack Qiu (Nanyang Technological University), “The Constants of Chinese Internet Research”
  • Yunya Song (Hong Kong Baptist University), “Gender and the Internet in China: A Historical Perspective”
  • Wei Wang (Zhejiang University), “The Reinvention of ‘Locality,’: Imagining Local Society with Local Media”
  • Jian Xu (Deakin University), “From ‘Wanghong’ to ‘Wanghong Thinking’: New Research Agenda and Critical Reflections”
  • Haiqing Yu (RMIT University), “Chinese Internet as the Nexus of Socio-technological Power”
  • Weiyu Zhang (National University of Singapore), “30 Years of China’s Online Fandom”

March 3, 8:00-10:00am ET

  • Jun Liu (Copenhagen University), “Reflections on Studying the Internet and (Contentious) Politics in China”
  • Gianluigi Negro (Siena University), “Studying the Internet in China through Metaphors”
  • Gabriele de Seta (University of Bergen), “From ASCII Greetings to Synthetic Livestreams: Three Decades of Chinese Digital Folklore”
  • Florian Schneider (Leiden University), “Nationalisms on China’s Evolving Internet”
  • Ge Dino Zhang (City University of Hong Kong), “A Decade of Chinese Game Studies in Retrospect”
  • Lin Zhang (University of New Hampshire), “Platformized Family Production: Social Reproduction and E-Commerce in Rural China”

Digital Cultures and AI Governance symposium

China Through the Looking Glass: Digital Cultures and AI Governance: An in-person Asian Studies Symposium 
Date: February 29 and March 1
Location: Montclair State University, 1 Normal AVE, Montclair, NJ, 07043

Thursday, February 29, 3:00pm-4:30pm, University Hall 1030
China’s Digital Cultures: From BBS to Papi Jiang
Guobin Yang, Grace Lee Boggs Professor of Communication and Sociology, University of Pennsylvania

Friday, March 1
A) 9:45am-11:00am, Dickson Hall 177
AI and Data Governance: Going Beyond the US-China Arms Race Framing
Peter D. Hershock, Director, Asian Studies Development Program, East-West Center

B) 11:15am-12:15pm, Dickson Hall 177
Why China and Asian Studies Matter: A Panel Discussion
Moderator: Peter D. Hershock, East-West Center
Panelists: Dona Cady, Middlesex Community College; Kin Cheung, Moravian University; Dorothee Hou, Moravian University; Robin Kietlinski, LaGuardia Community College–CUNY

C) 1:45pm-3:45pm, Dickson Hall 178, Asia Across Disciplines: A Roundtable Discussion

More info, and please sign up here: https://forms.gle/mU5VQiczKVYiKvY47

Sponsored by Montclair State University, Luce Foundation, Asian Studies Development Program at East West Center

Posted by: Wing Shan Ho <how@montclair.edu>

Leaked files

Source: NYT (2/22/24)
Leaked Files Show the Secret World of China’s Hackers for Hire
China has increasingly turned to private companies in campaigns to hack foreign governments and control its domestic population.
Paul MozurKeith BradsherJohn Liu and Paul Mozur reported from Taipei, Keith Bradsher from Beijing, John Liu from Seoul and Aaron Krolik from New York.)

The exterior of the I-Soon office in Chengdu, China.

The I-Soon office building in Chengdu, China, on Tuesday. Credit…Dake Kang/Associated Press

The hackers offered a menu of services, at a variety of prices.

A local government in southwest China paid less than $15,000 for access to the private website of traffic police in Vietnam. Software that helped run disinformation campaigns and hack accounts on X cost $100,000. For $278,000 Chinese customers could get a trove of personal information behind social media accounts on platforms like Telegram and Facebook.

The offerings, detailed in leaked documents, were a portion of the hacking tools and data caches sold by a Chinese security firm called I-Soon, one of the hundreds of enterprising companies that support China’s aggressive state-sponsored hacking efforts. The work is part of a campaign to break into the websites of foreign governments and telecommunications firms.

The materials, which were posted to a public website last week, revealed an eight-year effort to target databases and tap communications in South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Malaysia, India and elsewhere in Asia. The files also showed a campaign to closely monitor the activities of ethnic minorities in China and online gambling companies.

The data included records of apparent correspondence between employees, lists of targets and material showing off cyberattack tools. Three cybersecurity experts interviewed by The New York Times said the documents appeared to be authentic.

Taken together, the files offered a rare look inside the secretive world of China’s state-backed hackers for hire. They illustrated how Chinese law enforcement and its premier spy agency, the Ministry of State Security, have reached beyond their own ranks to tap private-sector talent in a hacking campaign that United States officials say has targeted American companies and government agencies. Continue reading

Censorship targets critics of the economy

Source: NYT (1/31/24)
China’s Censorship Dragnet Targets Critics of the Economy
阅读简体中文版 | 閱讀繁體中文版
As Beijing struggles with a slumping stock market and a collapsing real estate sector, commentary and even financial analysis it deems negative are blocked.
By Daisuke Wakabayashi and Reporting from Seoul

A 2012 interview with the economist Wu Jinglian seen as criticizing current China policy was taken down from WeChat after it recirculated last year. Credit…Vivek Thakker

China’s top intelligence agency issued an ominous warning last month about an emerging threat to the country’s national security: Chinese people who criticize the economy.

In a series of posts on its official WeChat account, the Ministry of State Security implored citizens to grasp President Xi Jinping’s economic vision and not be swayed by those who sought to “denigrate China’s economy” through “false narratives.” To combat this risk, the ministry said, security agencies will focus on “strengthening economic propaganda and public opinion guidance.”

China is intensifying its crackdown while struggling to reclaim the dynamism and rapid economic growth of the past. Beijing has censored and tried to intimidate renowned economists, financial analysts, investment banks and social media influencers for bearish assessments of the economy and the government’s policies. In addition, news articles about people experiencing financial struggles or the poor living standards for migrant workers are being removed.

China has continued to offer a rosy outlook for the economy, noting that it beat its forecast for economic growth of 5 percent last year without resorting to risky, expensive stimulus measures. Beyond the numbers, however, its financial industry is struggling to contain enormous amounts of local government debt, its stock market is reeling and its property sector is in crisis. China Evergrande, the high-flying developer felled by over $300 billion in debt, was ordered into liquidation on Monday. Continue reading

What does the Party stand to gain from AI

Source: China Media Project (1/30/24)
What Does the Party Stand to Gain from AI?
With the help of AI, CCP propaganda is becoming more targeted, accessible, and quickly made than ever before. We found one state-backed AI website and took it for a test drive.
By Alex Colville

Since ChatGPT was unveiled to the world just over two years ago, prompting what some have called an “artificial intelligence revolution,” China has been playing catch-up. But when it comes to applying AI to super-fuel the media control and propaganda objectives of the government, both at home and overseas, China may be ahead of the game — even if the results so far are mixed.

For a closer look at China’s plans for AI-driven propaganda and messaging, we spent a bit of time with Zhongke Wenge (中科闻歌), a company touted in China Daily as having “established a panoramic international communication” system, integrating AI-based news gathering, content production, editing, and impact analysis. Zhongke Wenge is one of a growing number of companies in China offering AI-based communication services to answer the call of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

Back in 2018, President Xi Jinping identified it as a “necessary” mission for the CCP “to develop artificial intelligence systems suitable for government services.” Two years later, a set of opinions from the Party’s Central Committee urged media specifically to use AI to improve the quality of their content, innovate new ways to tell the news, and integrate the Party’s messaging into both domestic and international outlets. Last year, CCP mouthpiece People’s Daily  highlighted how AI can use big data to generate images, text, and in-depth analysis “in seconds,” and this month urged the development of “AI-aided translation software” to assist with outreach overseas. Continue reading

Thirty Years of the Internet in China

Thirty Years of the Internet in China: A Retrospective
February 2, 2024, 8:30am-3:30pm

Perelman Center for Political Science and Economics, Suite 416, 133 S. 36th St, Philadelphia, PA 19104

Jointly organized by Center on Digital Culture and Society and Center for the Study of Contemporary China, University of Pennsylvania.

Zoom option available for invited guests, and for the public during Panel 3.

Schedule

9:00-10:20 am

Chair: Guobin Yang
Ke Angela Li – Ethnographers and the Digital Industry in China: Beyond Access Barrier
Kaiping Chen – Computational Methods in Chinese Internet Studies – An Overview and Looking Ahead
Min Jiang – Chinese Internet Policies: Historical Reflections and New Research Directions
Discussant: Yang Zhang, American University Continue reading

Ideology power bank

Source: China Digital Times (1/17/24)
Xi-Branded Power Bank/Speakers Provides Two Kinds of Positive Energy
Posted by 

A top Party outlet has created a Xi Jinping Thought-themed combined Bluetooth speaker and power bank for distribution to cadres across the country. The contraption, clunkily titled the “‘Xi Jinping’s “The Governance of China” Volumes 1-4’ Ideology Power Bank,” was unveiled by Guangming Online, a subsidiary of the influential Guangming Daily, in March 2023, but has gained broader attention online this month. The “ideology power bank” is designed to allow on-the-go cadres to charge their phone while listening to any of 72 essays expounding on Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era.

A photograph of the "ideology power bank" which is red and has yellow text.

The text reads: “Xi Jinping’s ‘The Governance of China’ Volumes 1-4. Ideology Power Bank: Charging Phones, Empowering Thought

The product is not available for purchase online. However, CDT Chinese editors have found that many local Party Congress representatives and government employees have received the “ideology power banks.” A press release touting their release quoted a “zoomer” member of China’s rubber stamp national consultative body, who claimed to carry it with her everywhere: “The ‘ideology power bank’ provides us youth with ever-available, ever-informative scenarios. It will be a big hit among youth.” She added that the essays provide a much-needed “north star” and “compass” for the study of ideology. Continue reading

Chinese Theater Collaborative digital resource center

LAUNCH OF CHINESE THEATER COLLABORATIVE DIGITAL RESOURCE CENTER
January 16, 2024, 8 pm EST

We invite you to the launch of the “Chinese Theater Collaborative/華語戲聚“ (CTC) digital resource center.  CTC is a companion site to two recent publications devoted to making traditional Chinese drama accessible to a broader audience, How To Read Chinese Drama: A Guided Anthology (Columbia University Press, 2022) and How To Read Chinese Drama in Chinese: A Language Companion (Columbia University Press, 2023).

The “Chinese Theater Collaborative” (https://chinesetheatercollaborative.org, going live on 01/16/24)  features over twenty original modules that examine modern renditions of iconic Chinese plays (Orphan of ZhaoStory of the Western WingMulan and Peony Pavilion and more) in multiple formats (theater, film, TV, and comics among others).

These narrated and illustrated modules showcase the vibrant and diverse afterlives of traditional Chinese plays, while facilitating the integration of drama into the literature, culture, media, and language classroom.

Join us on Tuesday, January 16, 2024, 8 pm Eastern Standard Time (EST) by registering here: https://easc.osu.edu/events/ics-event-launching-chinese-theater-collaborative/huayuxiju

For questions, please contact chinesetheatercollaborative@osu.edu.

Patricia Sieber (Professor, DEALL) and Julia Keblinska (Postdoctoral Fellow, EASC)
Editors, CTC
The Ohio State University
Launch supported by The Institute for Chinese Studies (The Ohio State University) and co-sponsored by the Advanced Institute for Global Chinese Studies (Lingnan University)

Chine: les influenceurs de la colonisation

Excellent new film on the ongoing Chinese colonization of genocided areas:

https://www.arte.tv/fr/videos/113682-006-A/sources/
Chine: les influenceurs de la colonisation [English subtitles]
Arte / Sources, France 2023.
Disponible: 15 dec. 2023 to 29 Nov. 2026

Also available on Youtube:

This new 15 minute ARTE film is about Chinese colonizer-influencers in Xinjiang, hired by the State to promote colonization of ethnic- cleansed areas under the military-industrial Bingtuan complex (XPCC), the main tool of state settler colonialism in Xinjiang kicking in higher gears during this phase of the genocide.

It’s a lot like what Nazi Europe would have been like, had the Nazis won WWII. Or indeed, Israelis in a future fully cleansed Gaza, with an ocean view,” as one extremist settler leader recently memorably promoted it.

(I was just interviewed by the RFA to comment on the ARTE film. The interview may first come out in Uyghur, but I can send the link later. The main point: this is all part of a logical sequence of genocide – camps, mass destruction of separated families, forced labor or prison for split up parents and children’s Gulag for the kids. Down to how the belongings of the evicted and detained Uyghur owners of the land, now in the camps, or dead, shows up on Chinese ebay: https://bitterwinter.org/uyghur-family-fortunes-mysteriously-reappear-for-auction/)

Sincerely,

Magnus Fiskesjö, nf42@cornell.edu

Don’t expect kindness and humanity from dictators

Source: China Digital Times (11/6/23)
Translation: “Don’t Expect Kindness and Humanity from Totalitarian Dictators”
By

A fanciful and colorful illustration of China's first emperor Qin Shi Huang, with regal robes, a jeweled headdress, and fiery purple eyes.

A fiery-eyed Qin Shi Huang, China’s first emperor (259-210 B.C.E.), who was famed for his book-burning and brutality.

A brief, fiery essay excoriating totalitarianism has been censored on WeChat, and appears to have precipitated the closure of a Jiangxi-based current- and legal-affairs blog. First posted on the public WeChat account 法制江西 (Fǎzhì Jiāngxī, “Jiangxi Legal”), the ten-paragraph essay—interspersed with photographs of contemporary strongmen and vivid illustrations of the brutal emperors of old—extolled the virtues of liberal democracy and argued for the “inevitable demise” of authoritarian systems. Some aspects of the essay echo, intentionally or not, the vision for a “Beautiful China” of rights lawyer Xu Zhiyong, who was sentenced in May to 14 years in prison for subversion. Soon after the essay disappeared from WeChat, the “Jiangxi Legal” public account announced, without any explanation, that it had been suspended and would cease posting updates. The account’s public profile described it as “a general news column, under the auspices of a legal-affairs Party media outlet, offering in-depth analysis and commentary on trending topics in the news,” and described the content as “a global perspective, a Chinese point of view, explaining current events and discussing all manner of things.”

On Chinese social media, there is routine censorship of content praising so-called “western values” such as democracy, rule of law, human rights, freedom of the press, and freedom of speech. In recent years, there has also been an uptick in the censorship of content and works referring to failed or despotic emperors and other figures from antiquity, particularly if that content is viewed as being obliquely critical of Xi Jinping’s rule. In October, a reprint of the historical biography “The Chongzhen Emperor: Diligent Ruler of a Failed Dynasty” was pulled from bookstore shelves and online booksellers due to a cover redesign and promotional quotes that seemed to implicitly criticize Xi Jinping. (One blurb on the book’s wrapping read: “The diligent ruler of a failed dynasty, Chongzhen’s repeated mistakes were the result of his own ineptitude. His ‘diligent’ efforts hastened the nation’s destruction.”) The name “Chongzhen” and related topics were later search-blocked on Weibo, with searches only showing results from verified users. Continue reading

China Project closing?

Happy new year MCLC.

I am wondering if anything more has come to light regarding the closure of the web journal “The China Project” which succeeded “SUP China.”

The China Project web journal was closed down in December for no clear reason, but there was some mention of withdrawal of funds. Were the financial support withdrawn to kill the journal? For what purpose?

We know that one of the key sponsors/financiers, Anla Cheng, who was closely involved and listed as founding the SUPChina journal in 2015, is also involved in both the socalled Committee of 100 Chinese in America, and in the China Institute in New York, neither of which has ever said anything, or permitted any kind of activity that touches on, let alone criticising the monstrous atrocities now under way in Xinjiang (East Turkestan).

At one point, she suggested to the South China Morning Post that the mass atrocities is only a problem of different “perceptions” (!), not reality (see here), and refused to clarify.

Given this context, it is very difficult to avoid speculating that the CP closure had something to do with a desire to silence the good work of the China Project journal, in regularly featuring several knowledgeable writers on the Chinese atrocities in Xinjiang (East Turkestan).

Magnus Fiskesjö,  <magnus.fiskesjo@cornell.edu>, or: <nf42@cornell.edu>

Unfit for Chinese eyes, part two

Source: China Digital Times (1/2/24)
The Top ███ Chinese ██████s of 2023 (Part Two: Comedy to Tragedy)
By 

In part two of our retrospective on the most sensitive topics of 2023, as selected by our Chinese team, we focus on dissent and disasters. In part one we covered long-standing taboos on discussions about Xi Jiping and the Tiananmen Massacre, as well as the increasingly explosive problem of youth discontent. The following six themes are not the “most censored” words of 2023 but rather some of the more important censored themes. Each section will lead with censored terms and then follow with a brief explanation of their provenance and context. For more on many of these themes, see CDT’s newly launched ebook, “China Digital Times Lexicon: 20th Anniversary Edition.”

Dissident Leanings

Censored termsChizi, Wang Yuechi, Slap, Lew Mon-hung

Comedy proved a notable avenue for dissent in 2023. Chinese comedians performing abroad broke new ground with politically minded stand up routines. Many of them have paid a price for their humor. Wang Yuechi, known by his stage name Chizi, had all his Chinese social media accounts deleted after performing a North American stand-up tour during which he touched on human rights, Xinjiang, and the changes to China’s constitution that have allowed Xi to indefinitely extend his tenure as state president. One stand up comedian in China was issued a lifetime ban for an innocuous joke about the People’s Liberation Army and his dogs. Revitalized corps of “culture cops” stirred further anxieties that the space for humor is now even more tightly closed. Continue reading