A 7.7 magnitude earthquake recorded on Friday near the Burmese city of Mandalay has killed at least 3,145 people, with at least 4,589 injured and hundreds more missing and feared trapped under rubble. Numerous...
While the CCP swept away many remnants of China’s imperial past, one prominent feature has endured: the existence of an elevated official class, to which fiercely contested examinations offer an entryway. A pair of...
Hong Kong conglomerate CK Hutchison and its owner Li Ka-shing have found themselves in the...
Despite troubling jurisdictional issues, the Urumqi Municipal Culture and Tourism Bureau in...
The Open Technology Fund published a report earlier this month highlighting the rise of...
If the officialdom complex remains intact, society will be trapped in a vicious cycle of officials fixating on power, businesses fixating on befriending them, young people fixating on becoming officials, and the whole country’s energies wasted on meaningless power games."
— A recent WeChat essay from Ni Ren enumerated the ways that China's "officialdom complex" is draining vitality from China's economy, workforce, and society
While the CCP swept away many remnants of China’s imperial past, one prominent feature has endured: the existence of an elevated official class, to which fiercely contested examinations offer an entryway. A pair of recent essays on WeChat discuss the social, economic, and other effects of China’s “officialdom complex.” The first, by the public account Ni Ren, describes the official system as an ossifying force causing the misdirection of human talent and economic resources, and calls for its reform: Becoming an official has always been something that countless people in China dream of. From...
Despite troubling jurisdictional issues, the Urumqi Municipal Culture and Tourism Bureau in...
This year, the theme of World Consumer Rights Day on March 15 was “a just transition to...
Following China’s unannounced naval exercises off the coast of Australia late last month, there...
A photo showing three construction workers suspended from a gateway in their safety harnesses has...
China’s annual Two Sessions political meetings recently drew to a close, minus the presence of...
Chinese tech giant Huawei is embroiled in a major corruption scandal, in which the company is suspected of having bribed members and employees of the European Parliament to challenge the E.U.’s position against adopting Huawei’s 5G technology. A cross-border corruption investigation, involving raids on 21 homes in Belgium and Portugal, has resulted in Belgian prosecutors bringing charges against five people. This saga highlights the E.U.’s continued vulnerability to bribery by foreign entities and the varied forms of Chinese influence in Europe. On Wednesday, Laura Dubois at the Financial...
An acidic waste spill by a Chinese company in Zambia has created a massive environmental crisis...
A new report by the Open Technology Fund (OTF) explores the growing demand for human-powered...
Last week, a Chinese PhD student at University College London was found guilty by a British court...
The annual Two Sessions political meetings in Beijing have been accompanied by the traditional...
Thailand’s government deported 40 Uyghur asylum seekers to China in a secretive overnight...
Last week, Chinese state media reported that Wu Yingjie, the former Party chief of the Tibetan Autonomous Region (TAR), pleaded guilty to bribery charges during a trial in Beijing. Wu joins a long and growing list of officials swept up in Xi Jinping’s anti-corruption campaign. While Wu played a key role in carrying out the government’s hardline policies in Tibet, analysts doubt that his conviction will improve the human rights situation in the region. Tibetan Review provided more details about Wu’s prosecution and role in Tibetan affairs: The [China Daily] report cited prosecutors as saying...
Last week, a Chinese PhD student at University College London was found guilty by a British court...
Convening next week for its annual gathering, the U.N. Commission on the Status of Women (CSW)...
Thailand’s government deported 40 Uyghur asylum seekers to China in a secretive overnight...
Following increased attention to Southeast Asia’s online scam industry, especially since the...
Friday marked the 25th International Mother Language Day, a UNESCO observance for promoting the...
While the CCP swept away many remnants of China’s imperial past, one prominent feature has endured: the existence of an elevated official class, to which fiercely contested examinations offer an entryway. A pair of recent essays on WeChat discuss the social, economic, and other effects of China’s “officialdom complex.” The first, by the public account Ni Ren, describes the official system as an ossifying force causing the misdirection of human talent and economic resources, and calls for its reform: Becoming an official has always been something that countless people in China dream of. From...
Despite troubling jurisdictional issues, the Urumqi Municipal Culture and Tourism Bureau in...
This year, the theme of World Consumer Rights Day on March 15 was “a just transition to...
Following China’s unannounced naval exercises off the coast of Australia late last month, there...
A photo showing three construction workers suspended from a gateway in their safety harnesses has...
China’s annual Two Sessions political meetings recently drew to a close, minus the presence of...
A 7.7 magnitude earthquake recorded on Friday near the Burmese city of Mandalay has killed at least 3,145 people, with at least 4,589 injured and hundreds more missing and feared trapped under rubble. Numerous countries—including China, India, Thailand, Vietnam, Russia, Japan, Malaysia, and Singapore—have sent donations of funds, emergency supplies, rescue teams, and more. Chinese state media has prominently trumpeted China’s mobilization of resources to support aid and rescue operations. But the Chinese government is also under intense scrutiny for the deadly collapse of a skyscraper in...
While the CCP swept away many remnants of China’s imperial past, one prominent feature has...
Hong Kong conglomerate CK Hutchison and its owner Li Ka-shing have found themselves in the...
The Open Technology Fund published a report earlier this month highlighting the rise of...
Chinese tech giant Huawei is embroiled in a major corruption scandal, in which the company is...
Last week, Chinese state media reported that Wu Yingjie, the former Party chief of the Tibetan...
In late 2020, CDT acquired and verified a collection of propaganda directives issued by central Party authorities to state media at the beginning of that year. These directives were issued on an almost daily basis in early 2020 through the early weeks of what would become the COVID-19 pandemic, and shed light on the propaganda machinery’s efforts to grapple with the outbreak. They were originally published between September and December, 2020 as the Minitrue Diary series, after the censorship and propaganda organs’ Orwellian online nickname 真理部 Zhēnlǐ bù, or "Ministry of...
In late 2020, CDT acquired and verified a collection of propaganda directives issued by central...
In late 2020, CDT acquired and verified a collection of propaganda directives issued by central...
In late 2020, CDT acquired and verified a collection of propaganda directives issued by central...
In late 2020, CDT acquired and verified a collection of propaganda directives issued by central...
In late 2020, CDT acquired and verified a collection of propaganda directives issued by central...
In late 2020, CDT acquired and verified a collection of propaganda directives issued by central Party authorities to state media at the beginning of that year. These directives were issued on an almost daily basis in early 2020 through the early weeks of what would become the COVID-19 pandemic, and shed light on the propaganda machinery’s efforts to grapple with the outbreak. They were originally published between September and December, 2020 as the Minitrue Diary series, after the censorship and propaganda organs’ Orwellian online nickname 真理部 Zhēnlǐ bù, or "Ministry of...
In late 2020, CDT acquired and verified a collection of propaganda directives issued by central...
In late 2020, CDT acquired and verified a collection of propaganda directives issued by central...
A recent WeChat post reveals that some Chinese schools and universities are using special software...
In the two weeks since the Ministry of Public Security and the Cyberspace Administration of China...
A pair of recently surfaced screenshots appear to offer unusual detail about a special month-long...
On September 12, 2003, John Battelle published the first post on chinadigitaltimes.net: Here’s what a Google Search on “china weblog” yields, I’m looking forward to seeing ours at the top soon! China’s online population at the start of that year was nearly 60 million. Ten years later, it was fast approaching 600 million, and now, after 20, it is well over a billion. This new completely revised and hugely expanded update to our ebook series, formerly known as “the Grass Mud Horse Lexicon,” aims to capture something of the enormous explosion of online speech that accompanied this growth, with...
In 2014, Leta Hong Fincher published her first book, Leftover Women: The Resurgence of Gender...
Starting in March 2008, Tibetans across the Tibetan Autonomous Region (TAR), Qinghai, Gansu, and...
Surveys have shown that Xi Jinping’s hardline foreign policy is increasingly unpopular abroad....
Jeremy Wallace, associate professor of Government at Cornell University, joined CDT to discuss his...
Evidence of human rights abuses against Uyghurs and other ethnic groups in Xinjiang has...
While the CCP swept away many remnants of China’s imperial past, one prominent feature has endured: the existence of an elevated official class, to which fiercely contested examinations offer an entryway. A pair of recent essays on WeChat discuss the social, economic, and other effects of China’s “officialdom complex.” The first, by the public account Ni Ren, describes the official system as an ossifying force causing the misdirection of human talent and economic resources, and calls for its reform: Becoming an official has always been something that countless people in China dream of. From...
Hong Kong conglomerate CK Hutchison and its owner Li Ka-shing have found themselves in the...
Chinese tech giant Huawei is embroiled in a major corruption scandal, in which the company is...
This year, the theme of World Consumer Rights Day on March 15 was “a just transition to...
A new report by the Open Technology Fund (OTF) explores the growing demand for human-powered...
A photo showing three construction workers suspended from a gateway in their safety harnesses has...
A 7.7 magnitude earthquake recorded on Friday near the Burmese city of Mandalay has killed at least 3,145 people, with at least 4,589 injured and hundreds more missing and feared trapped under rubble. Numerous countries—including China, India, Thailand, Vietnam, Russia, Japan, Malaysia, and Singapore—have sent donations of funds, emergency supplies, rescue teams, and more. Chinese state media has prominently trumpeted China’s mobilization of resources to support aid and rescue operations. But the Chinese government is also under intense scrutiny for the deadly collapse of a skyscraper in...
While the CCP swept away many remnants of China’s imperial past, one prominent feature has...
Despite troubling jurisdictional issues, the Urumqi Municipal Culture and Tourism Bureau in...
The Open Technology Fund published a report earlier this month highlighting the rise of...
This year, the theme of World Consumer Rights Day on March 15 was “a just transition to...
Following China’s unannounced naval exercises off the coast of Australia late last month, there...
The Open Technology Fund published a report earlier this month highlighting the rise of censorship-related jobs in China between 2015 and 2022. But growing evidence also shows that human-powered censorship is being increasingly enhanced—if not yet replaced—by AI. Alex Colville at China Media Project reported this week on hundreds of gigabytes of data found on an unsecured Chinese server linked to Baidu, which shows how the government and tech giants are using AI large language models (LLMs) to boost their online surveillance and censorship capacity: First uncovered by Marc Hofer of the...
Chinese tech giant Huawei is embroiled in a major corruption scandal, in which the company is...
A new report by the Open Technology Fund (OTF) explores the growing demand for human-powered...
In late 2020, CDT acquired and verified a collection of propaganda directives issued by central...
The annual Two Sessions political meetings in Beijing have been accompanied by the traditional...
In late 2020, CDT acquired and verified a collection of propaganda directives issued by central...
Hong Kong conglomerate CK Hutchison and its owner Li Ka-shing have found themselves in the crosshairs of the Chinese government over a multibillion-dollar port deal, which received heavy criticism in state media for supposedly undermining China’s national interests. This external pressure has stalled the deal and raised questions about the extent of Beijing’s influence over Hong Kong companies and Chinese-owned ports around the world, notably near the Panama canal. Jeffie Lam, Denise Tsang, and Lam Ka-sing from the South China Morning Post provided more details and first reported that,...
Despite troubling jurisdictional issues, the Urumqi Municipal Culture and Tourism Bureau in...
Chinese tech giant Huawei is embroiled in a major corruption scandal, in which the company is...
Last week, Chinese state media reported that Wu Yingjie, the former Party chief of the Tibetan...
A photo showing three construction workers suspended from a gateway in their safety harnesses has...
Last week, a Chinese PhD student at University College London was found guilty by a British court...
In late 2020, CDT acquired and verified a collection of propaganda directives issued by central Party authorities to state media at the beginning of that year. These directives were issued on an almost daily basis in early 2020 through the early weeks of what would become the COVID-19 pandemic, and shed light on the propaganda machinery’s efforts to grapple with the outbreak. They were originally published between September and December, 2020 as the Minitrue Diary series, after the censorship and propaganda organs’ Orwellian online nickname 真理部 Zhēnlǐ bù, or "Ministry of...
In late 2020, CDT acquired and verified a collection of propaganda directives issued by central...
On March 16, China’s National Bureau of Statistics announced that the Chinese economy was...
A recent WeChat post from oft-controversial entrepreneur, publicity hound, and philanthropist Chen...
Even before the lifting of China’s long-standing “zero-COVID” policy in early December of last...
After conducting nucleic acid testing on its 26 million residents this week, Shanghai remains...
Last week, Chinese state media reported that Wu Yingjie, the former Party chief of the Tibetan Autonomous Region (TAR), pleaded guilty to bribery charges during a trial in Beijing. Wu joins a long and growing list of officials swept up in Xi Jinping’s anti-corruption campaign. While Wu played a key role in carrying out the government’s hardline policies in Tibet, analysts doubt that his conviction will improve the human rights situation in the region. Tibetan Review provided more details about Wu’s prosecution and role in Tibetan affairs: The [China Daily] report cited prosecutors as saying...
Last week, a Chinese PhD student at University College London was found guilty by a British court...
Convening next week for its annual gathering, the U.N. Commission on the Status of Women (CSW)...
At South China Morning Post last week, Mandy Zuo reported on employment targets announced at the Two Sessions legislative and advisory meetings, which concluded on Tuesday in Beijing: The Chinese government wants the economy to create more than 12 million new urban jobs in 2025 while facing “more pronounced structural employment problems”, Premier Li Qiang said in his annual work report to China’s top legislature, the National People’s Congress, on Wednesday. […] Calling employment the “cornerstone of people’s livelihood”, Li repeated his sentiment from two years prior, when he kicked off...
In late 2020, CDT acquired and verified a collection of propaganda directives issued by central...
In late 2020, CDT acquired and verified a collection of propaganda directives issued by central...
While Weibo and other Chinese social media platforms continue to generate congratulatory content about the animated box-office smash “Ne Zha 2,” the reception for "Living the Land," a moving and realistic film about life in the Chinese countryside in the early 1990s, has been decidedly less welcoming. After its director and screenwriter, Huo Meng, won the Silver Bear Award for Best Director at the recent 2025 Berlin Film Festival, Weibo was flooded with negative comments, including accusations that the filmmaker played up rural poverty in China to curry favor with foreign...
Since it began screening in late January during the Spring Festival holiday, the Chinese animated...
In late 2020, CDT acquired and verified a collection of propaganda directives issued by central...
In late 2020, CDT acquired and verified a collection of propaganda directives issued by central Party authorities to state media at the beginning of that year. These directives were issued on an almost daily basis in early 2020 through the early weeks of what would become the COVID-19 pandemic, and shed light on the propaganda machinery’s efforts to grapple with the outbreak. They were originally published between September and December, 2020 as the Minitrue Diary series, after the censorship and propaganda organs’ Orwellian online nickname 真理部 Zhēnlǐ bù, or "Ministry of...
The fallout from Friday’s heated Oval Office meeting between U.S. President Donald Trump and...
In late 2020, CDT acquired and verified a collection of propaganda directives issued by central...
Hong Kong conglomerate CK Hutchison and its owner Li Ka-shing have found themselves in the crosshairs of the Chinese government over a multibillion-dollar port deal, which received heavy criticism in state media for supposedly undermining China’s national interests. This external pressure has stalled the deal and raised questions about the extent of Beijing’s influence over Hong Kong companies and Chinese-owned ports around the world, notably near the Panama canal. Jeffie Lam, Denise Tsang, and Lam Ka-sing from the South China Morning Post provided more details and first reported that,...
Despite troubling jurisdictional issues, the Urumqi Municipal Culture and Tourism Bureau in...
Chinese tech giant Huawei is embroiled in a major corruption scandal, in which the company is...
Over the past two weeks, the Biden administration has issued a series of regulations intended to halt China’s development of advanced technologies. The measures restrict the export of advanced chips, design software, and semiconductor manufacturing equipment that are crucial to China’s military, AI, and supercomputing initiatives. While the impact of these regulations remains to be seen, this “major watershed” demonstrates a significant U.S. policy shift towards a more aggressive approach to China, and risks accelerating technological and economic decoupling between the two countries across...
Popular online writer Shen Maohua, who writes under the pen name Wei Zhou, is known for his...
As citizens revolt against never-ending lockdowns and local governments “resolutely struggle...
Despite troubling jurisdictional issues, the Urumqi Municipal Culture and Tourism Bureau in Xinjiang has imposed a fine of 75,000 yuan (US$10,300) on Yunnan-based artist and independent filmmaker Guo Zhenming (郭珍明) for “illegal filmmaking” activities. The administrative punishment also included the confiscation of Guo’s hard drive, two cameras, and some sound and lighting equipment. The penalties are being criticized by some Chinese netizens and supporters as blatant examples of administrative overreach, “high-seas fishing,” and suppression of artistic freedom. The unusually harsh punishment...
This year, the theme of World Consumer Rights Day on March 15 was “a just transition to...
Convening next week for its annual gathering, the U.N. Commission on the Status of Women (CSW)...
In late 2020, CDT acquired and verified a collection of propaganda directives issued by central Party authorities to state media at the beginning of that year. These directives were issued on an almost daily basis in early 2020 through the early weeks of what would become the COVID-19 pandemic, and shed light on the propaganda machinery’s efforts to grapple with the outbreak. They were originally published between September and December, 2020 as the Minitrue Diary series, after the censorship and propaganda organs’ Orwellian online nickname 真理部 Zhēnlǐ bù, or "Ministry of...
In late 2020, CDT acquired and verified a collection of propaganda directives issued by central...
On March 16, China’s National Bureau of Statistics announced that the Chinese economy was...
The Open Technology Fund published a report earlier this month highlighting the rise of censorship-related jobs in China between 2015 and 2022. But growing evidence also shows that human-powered censorship is being increasingly enhanced—if not yet replaced—by AI. Alex Colville at China Media Project reported this week on hundreds of gigabytes of data found on an unsecured Chinese server linked to Baidu, which shows how the government and tech giants are using AI large language models (LLMs) to boost their online surveillance and censorship capacity: First uncovered by Marc Hofer of the...
Chinese tech giant Huawei is embroiled in a major corruption scandal, in which the company is...
A new report by the Open Technology Fund (OTF) explores the growing demand for human-powered...
An acidic waste spill by a Chinese company in Zambia has created a massive environmental crisis that threatens a river on which millions of Zambians rely. The incident occurred last month at a facility owned by Sino-Metals Leach Zambia, a firm majority-owned by the Chinese state-run China Nonferrous Metals Industry Group. In addition to straining Zambia-China relations, the incident underscores Zambia’s economic vulnerability, since its copper extraction industry is dependent on Chinese and Western corporations with poor environmental track records. Richard Kille and Jacob Zimba at the...
On Tuesday morning, a county in Tibet experienced one of its strongest earthquakes in years....
Infrastructure projects in Tibet have often drawn controversy for failing to balance development,...
In late 2020, CDT acquired and verified a collection of propaganda directives issued by central Party authorities to state media at the beginning of that year. These directives were issued on an almost daily basis in early 2020 through the early weeks of what would become the COVID-19 pandemic, and shed light on the propaganda machinery’s efforts to grapple with the outbreak. They were originally published between September and December, 2020 as the Minitrue Diary series, after the censorship and propaganda organs’ Orwellian online nickname 真理部 Zhēnlǐ bù, or "Ministry of...
In late 2020, CDT acquired and verified a collection of propaganda directives issued by central...
In late 2020, CDT acquired and verified a collection of propaganda directives issued by central...
Following China’s unannounced naval exercises off the coast of Australia late last month, there has been a noticeable increase in Chinese social media content promoting the invasion (or “nabbing/seizing”) of Australia. There has also been pushback: many Chinese bloggers and commenters have expressed alarm about the rise of such bellicose online sentiment, and the extent to which it is being allowed to proliferate online, particularly in comparison to platform censorship of some more level-headed commentary on Sino-Australian relations. Last month’s Chinese live-fire naval drills, while...
In late 2020, CDT acquired and verified a collection of propaganda directives issued by central...
In late 2020, CDT acquired and verified a collection of propaganda directives issued by central...
Click on the image to download Firefly for circumvention
CDT is a non-profit media site, and we need your support. Your contribution will help us provide more translations, breaking news, and other content you love.
![Photo: Family [Yuyuan Shopping Center / Shanghai], by d’n’c](https://chinadigitaltimes.net/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/Family-Yuyuan-Shopping-Center-Shanghai-by-dnc-440x264.jpg)
![Photo: Night piece of Guiyang, Guizhou Province [HiRes+], by QuantFoto](https://chinadigitaltimes.net/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Night-piece-of-Guiyang-Guizhou-Province-by-QuantFoto-440x264.jpg)
![Photo: Harbin [St. Sophia Cathedral], by Xiquinho Silva](https://chinadigitaltimes.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/Harbin-by-Xiquinho-Silva-e1672460089395-440x264.jpg)
![Photo: Zhangye Danxia Landform [Gansu Province], by vil.sandi](https://chinadigitaltimes.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/Zhangye-Danxia-Landform-by-vil.sandi_-440x264.jpg)
![Photo: 兰州 [Lanzhou], by hongliang ren](https://chinadigitaltimes.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/兰州-by-hongliang-ren-440x264.jpg)
![Photo: Shenzhen [Lihu Lake], by Tony](https://chinadigitaltimes.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Shenzhen-Lihu-Lake-by-Tony-440x264.jpg)
![Photo: 希拉穆仁草原 [Xilamuren Grassland, Inner Mongolia], by Frank Wang](https://chinadigitaltimes.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/希拉穆仁草原-Xilamuren-Grassland-Inner-Mongolia-by-Frank-Wang-440x264.jpg)
![Photo: Untitled [Dujiangyan, Sichuan], by Jason](https://chinadigitaltimes.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/Untitled-Jason-440x264.jpg)
![Photo: Photo [Sunset at the Great Wall], by Bruno Abreu](https://chinadigitaltimes.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Photo-Sunset-at-the-Great-Wall-by-Bruno-Abreu-01182022-440x264.jpg)
![Photo: The summit [Changbaishan / 长白山天池], by Caitriana Nicholson](https://chinadigitaltimes.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/The-Summit-Changbaishan-440x264.jpg)
![Photo: Photo [a street in the Muslim quarter of Xi’an], by Bruno Abreu](https://chinadigitaltimes.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/Photo-a-street-in-the-Muslim-quarter-of-Xian-by-Bruno-Abreu-440x264.jpg)
![Photo: DSC01164 [New Century Global Center, Chengdu], by Felix Filnkoessl](https://chinadigitaltimes.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/DSC01164-New-Century-Global-Center-Chengdu-by-Felix-Filnkoessl-440x264.jpg)
![Photo: DSC_3584 [Ili, Xinjiang, China], by Felix Guan](https://chinadigitaltimes.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/Felix-Guan-Ili-DSC_3584-440x264.jpg)
![Photo: Skating [Shichahai, Beijing], by b cheng](https://chinadigitaltimes.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/Skating-Shichahai-Beijing-440x264.jpg)
![Photo: Dongfeng 153 [Taxkorgan, Kashgar, Xinjiang Region, China], by hans-johnson](https://chinadigitaltimes.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/Dongfeng-153-by-hans-johnson-440x264.jpg)
![Photo: 瑞丽莫里瀑布 [Moli Waterfall, Ruili, Yunnan Province], by llee_wu](https://chinadigitaltimes.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/瑞丽莫里瀑布-440x264.jpg)
![Photo: 九华山 [Mount Jiuhua, Anhui Province], by Thomas_Yung](https://chinadigitaltimes.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/九华山-Mount-Jiuhua-Anhui-Province-by-Thomas_Yung-440x264.jpg)
![Photo: DSC_8623.06.莆田.步行街 [Putian Walking Street], by Michael Wong](https://chinadigitaltimes.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/14473421951_ae37ed70e2_k-440x264.jpg)
![Photo: Basketball [Hong Kong], by Robert Anders](https://chinadigitaltimes.net/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/33466895688_bf74abd0f4_c-440x264.jpg)
