5 Archives | Week In China

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WiC 5 (Mar 6, 2009)

Economy, Talking Point There are 20 million unemployed workers in the countryside. Any solutions?

If you want to get an idea of how basic life is in the Chinese countryside, it is worth devoting a couple of hours to watching Not One Less. Zhang ...

Drill, baby, drill

Energy & Resources Who is coordinating China’s acquisition of natural resources abroad?

How do you maintain the flow of raw materials required to fuel the fastest (and largest) industrial expansion in history – one that last year ...

Not smart enough

Telecoms Why a low cost mobile service is to be phased out

For generations, overly-precocious English children were berated by parents for being “too smart for their own good”. Conversely a telephone ...

The other woman

Society Downturn sees mistresses made redundant

Zhang Mutou, an area of the formerly booming Dongguan industrial zone in Southern China, has two nicknames. The first is ‘Little Hong Kong’, a ...

University challenge

Economy A curious idea for linking executive pay to that of professors

Forbearance is in vogue in the boardroom in 2009. Hence chief executives at the Detroit automakers drive rather than jet to Washington for bailout ...

History Lessons A local hero

Tang Bin (1627-1687 AD) was a government official during the Qing Dynasty. Originally from Henan Province, Tang is remembered as an honest and upright ...

Maoist paradise

Society Inside China’s last commune

There’s a small oasis in China where the unemployment rate is close to zero, inflation is negligible, and people generally seem immune from the ...

Foreign affairs

Society How the internet is catching out government officials

China’s public officials are becoming increasingly aware of the dangers of a “human flesh search”. No Congolese vaccine required here, however, ...

Entertainment American hit Ugly Betty gets China makeover

When media mogul Rupert Murdoch set out to conquer the Chinese satellite television market, he brought America’s most popular judge, Judge Judy, to ...

Too pig to fail

Society Graduate opts for country life

"Fame portends trouble for humans just as fattening does for pigs” warns a rather gloomy Chinese proverb. But for Long Bo, a business administration ...

Hooked on the classics

Society Why Confucius is back in vogue

A teacher in China claims to have discovered the cure to internet addiction. According to the Wuhan Morning Post, An Deyi runs a home school (or ...

Waste not, want not

Environment China’s powerful new approach to trash

Discussions of China’s ‘rubbish’ are normally the domain of indignant American politicians complaining about the nation’s unsafe products – ...

China and the World Why African traders have made a beeline for China

Despite news that it will soon be possible to use mobile phones in-flight, it is still almost second nature for most passengers to shut down their ...

Pudong versus Beijing

Banking & Finance The battle to be China’s financial centre

You may think Shanghai is China’s financial centre. But Beijing has other ideas. Competition among the two cities has always been fierce, with ...

Planet China Ever since its invention in 1955, couch potatoes have not been…

Ever since its invention in 1955, couch potatoes have not been able to live without the remote control. But a burglar in China probably rues the day it ...

Cartoons Patriot Games

The world’s most controversial rat and rabbit hit the headlines again this week. Readers will recall from WiC4 that the sale of two Qing dynasty ...

The rights and wrongs

And Finally China attacks America’s human rights record

According to Sun Tzu, the doyen of military thinkers, you should “attack where your opponent is unprepared, appear where you are not expected.” ...