Chinese history

Chinese Memoirist Yuan-tsung Chen, 93, Rejects Forgetting of Maoist Horrors

Chen is one of the few survivors of the Great Leap Forward, but struggles with doubters of the veracity of her accounts. 

For First Time Since Great Leap Forward, China Deaths Outpace Births

The reluctance of young Chinese to have children brings the potential of a demographic crisis and potential political turmoil. 

China's 2022: Protest, Ceremony, and Surprise

by Jeffrey Wasserstrom and William Yang

China's recent oscillations between official ceremonies of authority and insurgent protests presents a complex picture of a Chinese Communist Party struggling to maintain authority despite its formidable mechanisms of surveillance and coercion. 

The 1979 Formosa Incident Sparked Taiwan's Democracy Movement

by James Carter

An explainer of the wave of protests that began on December 10, 1979, that disrupted the one-party authoritarian rule of the Kuomintang in Taiwan.

For Chinese Protesters, Blank Pages are the Punch Line. What's the Joke?

by Christopher Rea and Jeffrey Wasserstrom

To understand the current Chinese protests, consider the nation's traditions of creative, surreptitious, and subversive political humor. 

Two Books Highlight the Internal Flux and Politics of the Chinese Communist Party

Books by Frank Dikötter and Julian Gewirtz highlight the path taken by the Chinese Communist state leading to the recent 20th party conference, and the alternative paths untaken. 

Rana Mitter on Xi Jinping's Place in Chinese History and Politics Today

"All of the last 10 years has been about making sure, as you might put it, that it's Xi Jinping's China. It's Xi Jinping's party, everyone else is just living in it."

The Democratic Potential of China's Grassroots Intellectuals

by Sebastian Veg

Chinese intellectuals working outside the protection of state-controlled universites have a perilous existence, but carry on the struggle against the regime's efforts to impose orthodoxy on the nation's history. 

The Xi Era Demands New Ways of Understanding China

by Jeffrey Wasserstrom

This is the introductory essay to a special issue on contemporary China. 

How the Chinese Language Modernized

Jing Tsu's book examines the ways that the Chinese written language has survived waves of iconoclasm and shifts in the politics of cultural authority. 

Jonathan Spence, Noted China Scholar, Dies at 85

Spence taught for four decades at Yale, and published a number of popular and critically acclaimed books on the vast history of modern China. 

Michael Schuman: Xi's New China is Terrifying

by Michael Schuman

A leading China scholar argues that the government's increased restrictions on individuals and companies, from the petty to the consequential, signal a retrenchment of central authority after a period of liberalization. 

China Passes Historical Resolution Enabling Xi's Ongoing Rule

“By tracing the continuity of the party over 100 years, it is used to show that it was inevitable for Xi to emerge at this time to be the ‘core’ of the party,” said Tony Saich of Harvard's Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation. 

Xi Understands the Crises Facing China Better than His Propagandists Do

by Walter Russell Mead

Creating a heroic role for Xi in the sweep of Chinese history is an important propaganda aim, but it shows that China faces urgent problems in the here-and-now that the leader may not be able to manage.

To Hold Control in China's Present, Xi Seeks to Rewrite its Past

The Chinese Communist Party's newest official history elevates Xi as a figure of historical significance alongside Mao and Deng Xiaoping, making the country's history an instrument of political power. 

How Hong Kong's Elite Have Embraced a Shifting Narrative on Tiananmen Square

The rise of pro-Beijing politicians in Hong Kong has led to increasing reluctance to condemn the Tiananmen massacre. The arrest of protest leaders under the Beijing-backed national security law has further chilled dissent. 

Rebel is Right: Reassessing the Cultural Revolution

by Chaohua Wang

A new book by the Chinese scholar Yang Jisheng examines the Chinese Cultural Revolution's lasting impact on the Communist Party, concluding that the generation of party leaders who experienced it were indifferent to utopianism but deeply attracted to the exercise of absolute power. 

Jonathan Mirsky: Historian Turned Beijing Correspondent, Mao Fan turned Critic of Beijing

After beginning an academic career in east Asian history, Mirsky reported on the Chinese occupation of Tibet and the Tiananmen demonstrations and massacre, letting the facts he observed change his assumptions.

Psychologically Speaking, Who Were the Heads of the Chinese Communist Party?

by David Shambaugh

Sinologist David Shambaugh's new book examines the evolution of the Chinese Communist Party and the People's Republic's role in the world through a psychological history of the CCP's leaders. Excerpted here, he offers a schematic overview of the work. 

Ying-shih Yu, Renowned Scholar of Chinese Thought, Dies at 91

"Professor Yu often returned to the theme that China’s long traditions could be a wellspring, not an enemy, of enlightenment, individual dignity and democracy."