IN THE EARLY months of America’s trade war against the world, speculation mounted. Could the two other major trading powers, China and the European Union, collaborate to intensify their bilateral trade links so as to compensate for America’s isolationism? A summit on July 24th in Beijing will show that the answer is emphatically “no”. It was supposed to be a celebration of 50 years of diplomatic ties. Now it looks set to be a sputtering squib. The Economist
IN THE EARLY months of America’s trade war against the world, speculation mounted. Could the two other major trading powers, China and the European Union, collaborate to intensify their bilateral trade links so as to compensate for America’s isolationism? A summit on July 24th in Beijing will show that the answer is emphatically “no”. It was supposed to be a celebration of 50 years of diplomatic ties. Now it looks set to be a sputtering squib. The Economist
FOR OVER a decade, America’s justice department has been indicting Chinese government hackers. Almost all of them have remained beyond the reach of the law. The aim has been to expose and embarrass, rather than to arrest. Now that is changing. On July 3rd Italian police in Milan arrested Xu Zewei, who is alleged to have worked on behalf of the Shanghai branch of the Ministry of State Security (MSS), China’s main spy agency. America wants to extradite him for wire fraud, identity theft and hacking. The Economist
UGLY NUMBERS lurk in the books of China’s local governments. An annual audit released on June 24th showed that over 40bn yuan ($6bn) of state pension funds were misappropriated last year in 13 of 25 provinces looked at. (There may be more dodgy practices but the auditors only have the resources to focus on certain bits of the country each year.) Among other things, the money was used to repay government debts. Another 4bn yuan was lifted from a programme to pay for refurbishing schools. And billions more were diverted…
THE RISE of a property-owning, entrepreneurial middle class in China has transformed its cities this century. It has helped to drive consumption in the world’s second-largest economy. In May retail sales grew 6.4% year on year—the fastest pace since December 2023—helped by state subsidies aimed at reviving consumers’ enthusiasm. The government has even cautiously promoted borrowing in past years. But all this has created new risks. Along with car-jammed streets, glitzy restaurants and vast malls has come a massive, invisible change, no less far-reaching: soaring household debt. The Economist
Leung kwok-hung understands the power of images. One of Hong Kong’s most famous pro-democracy lawmakers for two decades, he spurned suits for t-shirts emblazoned with the face of his idol, Che Guevara. The side of his van bore a large cartoon of Mr Leung kicking the bottom of one of the city’s former leaders. In 2010 he bought a licence plate that read “d0naldpk”—an abbreviation that suggested that the city’s then leader, Donald Tsang, should drop dead (puk kai in Cantonese). His mane, seemingly as untamable as its owner, is…
“Reading banned books behind closed doors on a snowy night is one of life’s greatest pleasures,” goes a popular saying in China. It is often (perhaps mistakenly) attributed to a 17th-century scholar, but is used to convey a yearning that many relate to today. Surprisingly, Chinese officials are among those who treasure poring over gossipy political works that the Communist Party prohibits. In recent months, numerous high-ranking ones have been accused of keeping secret stashes. The Economist
TEARS ROLLED down Chan Po-ying’s face at the disbandment of the League of Social Democrats (LSD), the last functioning pro-democracy party in Hong Kong, on June 29th. Ms Chan, the party’s leader, spoke of the impossibility of operating amid “the omnipresence of red lines and the draconian suppression of dissent”. The Economist
WHEN CHINA’S prime minister, Li Qiang, announced in March that the country’s GDP growth target for the year would be “around 5%”, the number seemed ambitious. After President Donald Trump announced his tariffs in April, the target seemed almost fanciful. Yet China’s economy has done surprisingly well so far this year. Exports have continued to grow and, despite low consumer confidence, retail sales have picked up. A manufacturing index published by Caixin, a business magazine, jumped to 50.4 in June from 48.3 the month before. “We are confident and capable…
IT WAS IN 1984, of course, that police stations in China started issuing national ID cards to those over the age of 16. Citizens still need them to travel, pay taxes or gain access to public services. Now the Communist Party wants to cross another Rubicon. On July 15th the government will launch “digital IDs” for use on the internet, shifting responsibility for online verification from private firms to the government. This is a potentially enormous step change in the state’s control over data. It augments China’s radically different approach…