US lawmakers have started debate on a law that would ban the successful TikTok app.  Political analyst Kaiser Kuo dismisses the effort as misguided at best, he writes in the ChinaFile. “In a sense, the threat of TikTok is real: In this crisis of confidence, and in a state of moral panic that we’ll look back on red-faced a decade out, TikTok is causing us to inflict grievous self-harm.”Read More →

Financial expert Victor Shih dives into the 2024 figures at the annual NPC and concludes China cannot roll over debts anymore and finance its budget like it did before. He tells Bloomberg that central state policies have increasingly replaced a market-driven economy.Read More →

China will continue to focus on supporting its manufacturing power, instead of changing to household subsidies, says economist Victor Shih, out of line with many other economists who expect support for consumption, as reported by Al Jazeera. Shih added: “There are 1.4 billion people in China, so comprehensive social assistance would be extremely expensive, especially in a deflationary context.”Read More →

China will implement a new PRC company law and veteran lawyer Mark Schaub expects most people will doze off before they make it to the end of that law. In his China Chit-Chat website, he summarizes the main changes and insists you should pay attention. He covers important issues like: “The new PRC Company Law sets a 5-year deadline to make promised capital contributions. Crucially this requirement will apply retrospectively. Ouch!” And who is the boss in a company, and how to fire a director.Read More →

Former rocket factory worker and author Zhang Lijia discusses labor relations in China in an opinion piece at the South China Morning Post after a video about a dismissal of a worker caused an online uproar. “The government’s commitment to protect its workers is on the line here,” she argues.Read More →

Book reviews of Sparks: China’s Underground Historians and their Battle for the Future by China veteran and Pulitzer prize winner Ian Johnson start to come in, rightfully, like this overview in Public Discourse by Robert Carle. “In Sparks, Ian Johnson tells the stories of people such as Lin Zhao and Hu Jie—Chinese journalists and filmmakers who explore the darkest episodes of Chinese communism, often at great risk to themselves.”Read More →

China’s consumers are trading down because of deflation, and are looking for cheap prices, says Shanghai-based business analyst Shaun Rein to CNBC. China’s government is unlikely to use financial support for the economy, he adds, as it finds the current growth of 5 percent quite enough, as its priority is dealing with the gap between the haves and have-nots, not at trying to increase that economic growth.Read More →

China expert Victor Shih, Director of the 21st Century China Center at the University of California San Diego School of Global Policy and Strategy, discusses the current state of US-China relations with Bill Gertz of the Washington Post, covering questions like, “Is China an existential threat or a competitor?” and “Is China trying to replace the US as hegemon?” at PNYX.Read More →

Relations between China and Japan have been tense since the end of World War II, and the annual remembrance of the rape of Nanking,  this year 86 years ago, marks those tensions. Author Zhang Lijia argues that nowadays both countries need better relations, she argues in the South China Morning Post. “An amicable Sino-Japanese relationship is vital for regional stability and prosperity. If the two remain hostile, it will play into the US’ hands,” she writes.Read More →

Business analyst Shaun Rein is interviewed by marketing guru Ashley Dudarenok on the most recent developments, as consumer confidence in China is slowly recovering at the end of 2023. But because of the ongoing trouble with the US, and because US firms fear more counterproductive measures by US President Biden, there are still many bears on the road to economic recovery. China focuses more on domestic companies, as US companies retreat, and the global south turns decisively to China for support, he says.Read More →

In an in-depth account of his book Sparks: China’s Underground Historians and their Battle for the Future, author Ian Johnson explains how China’s rulers have been changing the country’s history to solidify their position. He quotes extensively the current generation of so-called underground historians, who use new technologies to reinstate their views on their history, for a talk at USC China Institute.Read More →