An event that would have caused Mary Wollstonecraft to turn in her grave recently took place in Chengdu on November 27th. In a hotel 40 young women strut their stuff on a provided catwalk not to demonstrate the clothes they are wearing, but to demonstrate their skills as “workers”. In the audience 80 CEOs sit tight and ogle together at the specimen presented. more ›

Hard to tell from the raucous clamor of Shanghai streets, but apparently the most Chinese character is 和 ("peace") according to a study from China Heritage. Not all that evident as old ladies push and shove their way to the front of any line, but he does appear as the first character in two government slogans: 和谐社会 (hexie shehui) meaning "harmonious society" and 和平崛起 (heping jueqi) or "peaceful rise." Let's not also forget the expo and the splattering of posters around the city with people coming together to hug Haibao as well as the Beijing Olympics banner touting "One World, One Dream." At the same time, also topping the list is tan (贪 ), the character representing greediness...perhaps a little more reflective of actual society than the much more philosophical concept of harmony. more ›

This a rough translation of Fan Gui's response to Sun Liping's essay (which we wrote about here): 1. Regarding Sun's first point, I believe that he has ignored a very crucial fact—the growing gap between rich and poor. 20% of the population controls 80% of the wealth, how can you say that such a status quo has "flexibility"? While Professor Sun divides the population into urban and rural, does he mean that the urban poor... more ›