Life in a changing China
Since 1978, China has changed beyond recognition thanks to its economic boom. 800 million people have been lifted out of poverty as GDP per capita has grown eighty times. Some 60 per cent of the count...
27 Maj 202439min
China's vendetta against Nato
Last week, President Xi Jinping visited Serbia. An unexpected destination, you might think, but in fact the links between Beijing and Belgrade go back decades. One event, in particular, has linked the...
13 Maj 202446min
How China is quietly cutting out American tech
Last week, President Joe Biden finally signed into law a bill that would take TikTok off app stores in the US, eventually rendering the app obsolete there. This is not the end of the saga, as TikTok h...
29 Apr 202432min
Was Marco Polo a 'sexpat'?
When I recently came across a book review asking the question ‘was Marco Polo a "sexpat"?’, I knew I had to get its author on to, well, discuss this important question some more. The 13th century Vene...
15 Apr 202424min
What Chinese hackers want
Over the last week the UK has been rocked by allegations that China was responsible for two cyber attacks in recent years – one on the Electoral Commission, where hackers successfully accessed the ope...
28 Mars 202426min
Life on the margins pt II: Li Ziqi and the phenomenon of the rural influencer
In the last episode, I discussed Chinese rural lives with Professor Scott Rozelle. One point he made which particularly stuck with me was the dying out of farming as an occuption – he'd said that most...
18 Mars 202422min
Life on the margins: how China's rural deprivation curbs its success
Too often our stories about China are dictated by the urban experience, probably because journalists inside and outside of China are often based in the big cities; Beijing specifically. Those who live...
4 Mars 202441min
What the Messi row reveals about Chinese football
The Argentinian football star Lionel Messi has been trending on Weibo – and unfortunately, not for a good reason. It all started when Messi sat out a match in Hong Kong earlier this month. His reason ...
19 Feb 202439min
