CFR-scholar Ian Johnson describes how oral history changes the perception people have about the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution, now documents and interviews emerge on the internet, he tells at the Manchester China Institute.Read More →
CFR-scholar Ian Johnson discusses the way the West lost its interest in China and missed the wide-ranging intellectual debate in China. He reacts on contributions by David Ownby and Xiang Biao who plead for the inclusion of China’s intellectuals into the global debate, instead of ignoring them, at the Berlin Contemporary China Net (BCCN). You can find the full debate here.Read More →
A lot of speculations have marred the relations between Afghanistan’s Taliban and the outside world. For China for example the exploitation of rare earths shows up regularly, but China veteran Ian Johnson, a senior fellow at the CFR, explains why security in Xinjiang is key for China’s considerations, he tells in PRI.Read More →
China and the US have continued their warrior diplomacy, also after US president Joe Biden took over from Donald Trump. CFR-scholar Ian Johnson sees both upsides and downsides in the fierce language both countries use to define their relationship, he tells at ShanghaiEyes.Read More →
China has been talking informally to the Taliban, but now the Islamic group has taken over neighboring Afghanistan, the situation is more tricky, says CFR-scholar Ian Johnson, author of The Souls of China: The Return of Religion After Mao to CNBRead More →
Scholar Ian Johnson, author of The Souls of China: The Return of Religion After Mao, looks back at how China’s government has embarked into new policies on religion at the conference of the 28th International Conference of the US-China Catholic Association, “China, Christianity, and the Dialogue of Civilizations”Read More →
Winning gold medals has been key at the recent Tokyo Olympic Games 2020, with China as one of the major winners. But is that what the Olympics should be about, wonders China veteran Ian Johnson at the Council for Foreign Relations. It should give people in western countries pause to think about China’s course—is it really so brutal, or just a reflection of a system that we all, wittingly or not, follow, asks Ian Johnson.Read More →
The world looks with awe at China’s economic achievements, but because of its one-child policy, it not only gained fast economic growth but also an aging population that offers an equally devastating income trap for the decades to come, unless it invests more smartly into its people, says China veteran Ian Johnson at the Vietnam Brief.Read More →
China’s communist party celebrated earlier this month its 100th anniversary. China watcher Ian Johnson explains how change and experimenting became part of the principles of the country’s leading political force. “They were always experimenting, and in the economic reforms of the ’70s they showed an ability to improvise,” he tells in Hamodia.Read More →
Journalist Ian Johnson will become a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) from July 1, 2021, the council announced. At the China Speakers Bureau, we are happy to see Ian in such a prestigious position after what has been a turbulent year, both personally as professionally.Read More →
When US President Donald Trump lost last year the presidential elections from his contestant Joe Biden, some people expected the trade war between China and the US would end. At the China Speakers Bureau, we had set up a category of expert speakers on the trade war. For a short moment, we contemplated retiring that section but decided to wait and see how Joe Biden would behave.Read More →
The new US president Biden is following closely his predecessor’s approach on China. Wrongly, says long-term China correspondent Ian Johnson in an opinion piece at the New York Times. “Washington’s plan appears to be to wait for the results of the comprehensive review of America’s national security policy toward China that Mr. Biden announced in February. This caution is a mistake,” says Johnson.Read More →