China China is a primary source in English about human rights, the rule of law, and civil society in China, an essential aspect of China’s political landscape.

Reports

Officials Came in Droves: Daughter-in-law of Former CCP Security Tsar Paints Details of Asset Grab
China Change, July 4, 2019 Given the serial nature of Ms. Huang Wang’s Twitter revelations, which began on June 25, we will start our report on her latest revelations with a recap of what she has posted earlier. Huang Wan (黄婉) is the daughter-in-law of Zhou Yongkang (周永康), one of the nine CCP Standing Committee members during Hu Jintao’s tenure …
Torture and Show Trial — Former CCP Security Tsar’s Daughter-in-Law Steps up Twitter Revelations
China Change, July 2, 2019 Since we posted our last piece, Billionaires and Zhongnanhai Families — China’s Newest Breed of ‘Rights Defenders’, Ms. Huang Wan (黄婉), daughter-in-law of Chinese Communist Party’s former standing committee member and chairman of the powerful and much feared Central Political and Legal Affairs Commission Zhou Yongkang (周永康), has made more revelations. In her latest statement, …
Billionaires and Zhongnanhai Families — China’s Newest Breed of ‘Rights Defenders’
China Change, June 29, 2019 On June 6, Ms. Huang Wan (黄婉) received her “certificate of release from community correction” (解除社区矫正证明书) from the Justice Bureau of Chaoyang District in Beijing. From that day on, she was a free woman, and she had made plans to travel to the United States for a long-waited reunion with her aging parents. “From December …
Lawyer Liu Xiaoyuan’s Statement Regarding the Revocation of His License
Liu Xiaoyuan, June 26, 2019 After months of appealing, complaining, and calling to resume practice, on June 23, lawyer Liu Xiaoyuan received “Beijing Bureau of Justice’s Decision to Cancel Lawyer Liu Xiaoyuan’s License.” For the past four years he had not been able to practice because Fengrui Law Firm (锋锐律师事务所), of which he was a partner, was at the center …

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Analysis and Opinions

The Main Dangers in Xinjiang
Wang Lixiong, July 18, 2019 Beijing has designated “the main dangers affecting the stability of Xinjiang” as being “separatist forces and illegal religious activity.” This, as a matter of logical extrapolation, naturally divides the Han and local ethnic minorities into opposed groups. Because the Han are neither in favor of separation, nor do they hold religious beliefs (in particular the …
Proposing a Chinese Day of Fast
Citizens Movement in China, June 2, 2019 In the hearts of millions of people, there is a collective memory that has been suppressed for 30 years. How to awaken this memory, and confront our nation’s historical wounds? How to exorcise the haze of authoritarianism that has plagued this great land for millenia past? How to break out from the totalitarian …
Explaining China’s ‘People’s Congress’ Through the Tales of Three: A Hand-raising Automaton, An Independent Candidate, and An Electoral Activist
Teng Biao, March 12, 2019 As the Communist Party held this year’s “Two Sessions” (两会), Beijing activist Hu Jia (胡佳) was kept under control by being forcibly moved across the country to Guangdong. Human rights lawyer Tang Jitian (唐吉田) and Xu Zhiyong (许志永), of the New Citizens Movement, received midnight visits in Zhengzhou and were interrogated without explanation. The number …
Four Years on: The Whereabouts of the ‘Feminist Five’ and the Sustainability of Feminist Activism in China
Lü Pin, March 11, 2019 “As far as human rights activism is concerned, the outside world tends to focus on short-term incidents, such as when activism comes into direct confrontation with the state. But the outside world cannot keep long-term and sustained attention, which leads to many long-term, internal difficulties being left undiscussed.” On March 6 and 7, 2015, police …

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Interviews and profiles

Li Hai’s List
Between 1991 to 1994, Li Hai, a graduate student of philosophy at Peking University, compiled a list of 522 "June 4th Rioters” — Beijing residents who had been severely punished for their participation in the 1989 democracy movement. The list was published by Human Rights in China and Human Rights Watch in 1994. From 1995 to 2004, Li Hai was …
Campaign for Direct Elections of Beijing Lawyers Association, 2008-2009
In 2008, encouraged by a sense that China was opening up to more democratic norms, a group of lawyers in Beijing sought to directly elect the Beijing Lawyers Association. In this film, nine participating lawyers tell this story of struggle and persecution.
I Travel the Earth in Sound — Marking the 10th Year of Being Barred From Leaving China
Ai Xiaoming, March 26, 2019 This is the tenth year since I was barred from leaving the country. I still remember the last time I came back to Shenzhen, from Hong Kong, on March 17, 2009. After that I have never been out of Luohu Border Control. The first time I was barred from leaving the country was in 2005, …
An Interview With Xu Youyu: ‘The Worst Is Yet to Come’
China Change, October 31, 2018 This is part of China Change’s new interview series that seeks to understand the effort of civil society in bringing change to China over the past 30 years. The interview was conducted in June 2018 by Yaxue Cao, editor of this website, at Professor Xu Youyu’s home in Flushing, New York City. — The Editors …

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