Salt Hysteria
In the wake of the March 11, 2011, earthquake and tsunami in Japan, which resulted in severe damage to a nuclear power plant, rumors spread in China of possibly disastrous radiation fallout impacting...
View ArticleLove the Future
As news broke on April 3, 2011, that artist and activist Ai Weiwei (艾未未) had been detained in Beijing, Chinese web censors apparently moved to scrub references to Ai from popular microblog platforms...
View ArticleSecond-generation Reds
The term “second-generation reds,” or hong er’dai (红二代), refers to Chinese who born in the 1960s and early 1970s (before the end of the Cultural Revolution) and were weaned on the politics and ideology...
View ArticleBloody GDP
A disastrous high-speed train collision in the city of Wenzhou on July 23, 2011, which killed at least 39 people and injured more than 200 others, capped with tragedy two weeks of rising doubts in...
View ArticleGuidance of Public Opinion 舆论导向
This term first appeared in official Party criticisms of former Party secretary Zhao Ziyang following the crackdown on demonstrators in Beijing on June 4, 1989. The following is an excerpt from “Major...
View ArticleStake it on Daddy
Two decades of economic growth have certainly made China richer. But uneven growth and lagging political reforms have also contributed to a sharp widening of the gap between rich and poor in the...
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Buried Alive
On January 11 this year, dissident Chinese writer Yu Jie (余杰) arrived in the United States with his wife and family for a self-imposed exile. At a press conference in Washington DC on January 18, Yu...
View ArticleMinistry of Truth 真理部
Internet controls are handled in China by a dizzying array of party and government bodies. Most important are the CCP’s Central Propaganda Department, the supreme body enforcing “propaganda discipline”...
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Naked Official 裸体做官
The term “naked official” or, luoti guanyuan, is a popular term referring to Party or government officials whose immediate family members live overseas or have already become foreign nationals. In many...
View ArticlePower Progeny 官二代
The Chinese term guan er’dai (官二代) could be translated numerous ways into English, and possibilities might include “sons and daughters of government officials” or “official offspring.” Whatever the...
View ArticleValue Bombs
In the weeks following a speech on ideology given by Chinese President Xi Jinping in August 2013, a new hardline term emerged to characterize the CCP’s bid for dominance over public opinion. That term,...
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Internet Sovereignty
Formally introduced into the Chinese political lexicon in a June 2010 State Council Information Office white paper called “The Internet in China,” the term “Internet sovereignty,” or wangluo zhuquan...
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