ChinaFile

EVENT: Did Biden get China right? Join @CChivvis, @RushDoshi , @JulianGewirtz , and @rosenbergerlm to explore Trump's approach to China, lessons from the Biden admin, and what comes next. 📆 Tuesday, March 24 | 11:00 AM ET | Live Online carnegieendowment.org/events/2026/03…

Link to Wenhao Ma's excellent piece in @ChinaFile chinafile.com/reporting-opin…

It saddens me that a surprising number of people in the West do not seem to care about the political censorship built into Chinese AI models, considering that is irrelevant to their usage.

Delighted to contribute to this @ChinaFile conversation on China-Japan tensions ahead of Prime Minister Takaichi’s visit to Washington this month. Also feat. Danny Russel, Yun Sun, Elli-Katharina Pohlkamp, and @mcgregorrichard. (Link below)

China banned seafood imports, restricted dual-use exports, and sent joint bomber patrols with Russia near Japan. Is this a familiar pressure playbook—or something more ominous? ChinaFile's latest Conversation: chinafile.com/conversation/t…

i’m still a little surprised by the amount of attention and unexpected paths my @WIRED piece has taken. for those who don’t know the context: this piece was published in January on WIRED and it's about Morning Star of Lingao, a crowd-sourced, essentially never-ending sci-fi story written collaboratively on the chinese internet. the premise is: 500 people time-travel back to the Ming dynasty to industrialize China. what’s been most humbling is seeing where the piece has travelled. A scholar friend at Yale just told me she assigned it as required reading in her “China in the World” course and is considering incorporating it into one of her public lectures. I’ve also been invited to write a follow-up for the European publication Le Grand Continent, which will publish the piece in French and Spanish (coming out in April). i also had the chance to talk about it on @KaiserKuo's podcast Sinica, and @kyleichan's podcast High Capacity (i'll post the links in reply). And perhaps most surreal of all, the piece has been translated and circulated widely in China, including among readers of Lingao. Ma Qianzu himself — whom i couldn’t reach while reporting the article — recently reached out to chat. I’m honestly just grateful the story resonated with people. link in reply.

The lawsuit in the case of the death of Dr Jane Wu is worth a read - it alleges shocking details in what has been one of the most horrific cases tied to the China Initiative npr.org/2026/03/04/nx-…

While recognizing how hard it would be, I urge the China human rights community to move away from U.S. government support, for the sake of our work's long-term sustainability, integrity and effectiveness. My piece: chinafile.com/reporting-opin…

The latest issue of Hǎi 海 newsletter includes a profile of ceramic artist Chang Liu, and listings of events, podcasts, and articles from the global Chinese community: alltimehai.substack.com/p/from-coding-…

"We wouldn't take Chinese or Saudi government money. At what point should we stop taking U.S. government money?" Amid funding cuts, the China human rights community some tough questions. chinafile.com/reporting-opin…

A very thoughtful take on Chinese civil society by one of Japan’s top China watchers.

Journalist and author Zha Jianying joined @ChinaFile to discuss her piece "Trains: A Chinese Family History of Railway Journeys, Exile, and Survival." "I started with details of my own childhood train-hopping, and that metaphor and image of [my grandfather] saying goodbye to his French wife and daughter, both have to do with trains ...I realized trains are a very apt metaphor, both in terms of this particular family history and as sort of a central metaphor for China’s journey of modernization." chinafile.com/reporting-opin…

"my grandfather told her in great detail about that train station farewell, how they parted and his French wife was holding this baby girl and waving this white scarf until they disappeared and none of them knew this was going to be forever…" chinafile.com/reporting-opin…

Today in @ScienceMagazine my colleagues and I address the mystery of why opioid overdoses in the US and Canada suddenly began dropping dramatically. We assemble traditional and novel evidence to point to an illicit drug supply disruption, probably in China. 1/8

In which I argue it’s a mistake for anyone who cares about the democratic future in China to rejoice. By apprehending Maduro through dubious means, Trump weakens the international legal framework, undercutting the system that gives human rights advocacy its moral and legal force.

Would America’s military operation embolden Beijing to pursue similar aggression against Taiwan? Would it inject new tensions in US-China relations & potentially complicate Trump’s plans to visit Beijing in April? @ryanl_hass is skeptical. He writes why in @ChinaFile.

We asked a panel of experts: How will Trump's moves and threats against Venezuela, Greenland and other countries affect Beijing’s investments in Venezuelan oil industry, its calculus on Taiwan, and its relations with the rest of the world? chinafile.com/conversation/h…

'Mistress Dispeller' has been shortlisted for the Oscars. Here is a recent interview with director Elizabeth Lo by ChinaFile Editor-in-Chief Susan Jakes: chinafile.com/reporting-opin…

Violet Feng's "The Dating Game" follows a romance coach in Chongqing and three of his students. In this Q&A, Feng talks about: • China's gender imbalance • 'Left behind' children • AI boyfriends in China • Pick up artist culture & global crises of masculinity