Neican: Solomon Islands, domino theory, Lithuania

1. Solomon Islands In the Solomon Islands last week, anti-government protests broke out, with protestors burning Chinatown in the capital Honiara. The Solomon Islands Government requested help from Australia, which sent police and military personnel. Prime Minister Sogavare blamed unspecified “foreign powers” for encouraging this civil unrest. It is unclear which foreign powers he refers … more

Neican: History resolution, domestic politics, Wang Liqiang, beauty standards

1. History resolution At the recent 6th Plenum, the Party Central Committee adopted a resolution on history. The Party made this document public last Tuesday (November 16). We told you that the 6th Plenum communiqué lionised Xi and whitewashed history. The text of the resolution confirms this assessment. The resolution praises the Party’s achievements, downplays … more

Neican: US-China, ideology, Peng Shuai

1. US-China relations Summit Biden and Xi held a virtual summit [US readout | PRC readout (in Chinese)]. While the US readout is only four paragraphs, the Chinese readout ran to 20 paragraphs, mostly paraphrasing Xi. Both readouts are very polite, couched in diplomatic rhetoric 外交辞令. Such diplomatic rhetoric has been helpfully translated by Chinese … more

Neican: Plenum, climate, Keating, tennis

1. 6th Plenum: outcomes The 6th Plenum concluded on Thursday with a communiqué [Chinese | English] that held little surprises: Xi was lionised and history whitewashed. We put together a bilingual side-by-side version of the communiqué for those of you preferring to work with both languages: Click here to download the PDF The most significant … more

Neican: Plenum, PLA, focus on China, esports

1. Sixth Plenum preview The Sixth Plenum is currently underway in Beijing and will run until Thursday. For background on plenums and how they fit into China’s political system, see our explainers (written | video) from last year. The outcome of this Plenum is important to both policies in China as well as Xi’s prospects … more

Neican: Climate, history, Digicel, news sources, Li Yundi

1. Climate policy The Chinese Government is getting very serious about climate change. A few days ago (just before the Glasgow Climate Change Conference), the Central Committee and the State Council jointly released Working Guidance For Carbon Dioxide Peaking And Carbon Neutrality In Full And Faithful Implementation Of The New Development Philosophy 关于完整准确全面贯彻新发展理念做好碳达峰碳中和工作的意见 [English | … more

Neican: Chinese language media in Australia, censorship in media, US-China trade, BRI debt, Taiwan flights

1. Chinese language media in Australia Two recently published papers shed some insights on Chinese-language media in Australia: Waning Sun’s journal article “Chinese-language digital news media in Australia” published in June in Continuum: Journal of Media and Cultural Studies and Fan Yang’s analysis “Translating tension” published last week by the Lowy Institute. Sun focused her … more