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Artificial algorithms on the open web. 杂七杂八，英中夹杂。 Sharing ≠ Endorsement. 联系请发送消息至 @tombenbot
China’s defeated youth
Across China young people are disillusioned. They have been raised on stories of economic dynamism and social mobility. The Chinese economy more than doubled in size every ten years from 1978, when Communist Party leaders first adopted market reforms, until 2018. City kids could study hard, get into a good university and expect a white-collar job upon graduation. Lucky students from small towns or the countryside might do the same and make their way into the middle class. Less-educated young people had fewer options. But they could travel to cities, where rising wages in factories or on building sites were enough to start a family.
China is relying on increases in “human capital” (like education) to offset its decrease in humans. But the lying-flat phenomenon and high graduate unemployment show that is not enough. The tightening grip of the authorities over civil society, popular culture and entrepreneurs also would seem to discourage the risk-taking that marked earlier generations.
Some of China’s best-educated youngsters will no doubt emigrate. Others are seeking a different kind of safe harbour. Applications for the civil service are expected to jump again this year. And the share of graduates ranking state-owned enterprises as their first-choice employer has increased for three years in a row, according to the survey by Zhaopin. These businesses offer stability and security over dynamism and ingenuity. If China is to become the more innovative economy Mr Xi demands, it cannot afford to lose too many of its best minds to its least efficient firms.
Now, though, Mr Xi says the “Chinese Dream” of national rejuvenation is to be achieved by focusing on collective goals, rather than by encouraging individual aspirations. He admonishes the young to obey the party and toughen up—to “engrave the blood of their youth on the monuments of history, just as our fathers did.” That is a message that relatively few young people are taking to heart. Told to eat bitterness, they prefer to let it rot.
To understand the dramatic collapse of the socialist order and the current turmoil in the formerly communist world, this comprehensive work examines the most important common properties of all socialist societies.
János Kornai brings a life-long study of the problems of the socialist system to his explanation of why inherent attributes of socialism inevitably produced in-efficiency. In his past work he has focused on the economic sphere, maintaining consistently that the weak economic performance of socialist countries resulted from the system itself, not from the personalities of top leaders or mistakes made by leading organizations and planners.
This book synthesizes themes from his earlier investigations, while broadening the discussion to include the role of the political power structure and of communist ideology. Kornai distinguishes between two types, or historical phases, of socialism. The “classical socialism” of Stalin, Mao, and their followers is totalitarian and brutally repressive, but its components fit together and make up a coherent edifice. Associated with names like Tito, KNBdar, Deng-Xiaoping, and Gorbachev, “reform socialism” relaxes repression, but brings about a sharpening of inner contradictions and the eventual dissolution of the system. Kornai examines the classical system in the first half of the book, and moves on to explore the complex process of reform in the second half.
To cite this book: Kornai, János. The Socialist System: The Political Economy of Communism. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992. https://doi.org/10.1515/9780691228020.
Dear Z-Librarians,
As you may have noticed, our library has been through significant updates in the last few months. It's been a time of growth and evolution, as we've worked tirelessly to improve library accessibility and service stability. However, behind the scenes, we're continue facing a tremendous amount of pressure from the FBI.
In November of last year, two alleged participants in the project were arrested in Argentina at the request of the United States and still remain imprisoned for almost a year. Their detention occurred without compliance with legal norms and with numerous procedural violations. For example, a court sanction for arrest has been issued after the arrest. This situation has not only affected them personally but has also been a significant blow to our project - the Z-Library.
Today, we are calling on you, our community to stand with us in our fight for the Z-Library project. This project represents more than just a platform; it's a gateway to knowledge for people all over the world.
We are launching a petition https://www.change.org/zlibrary2023 to restore access to Z-Library and stop the illegal criminal prosecution. Your signature can make a world of difference.
By signing the petition, you're not only supporting our cause, but you're also helping to ensure that the Z-Library project remains available to people worldwide. Furthermore, we urge you to spread the word about this petition. Share it on your social networks, discuss it with your friends, and encourage them to sign it. Every signature counts, and every share expands the reach of our cause.
‼️ Please follow this link https://www.change.org/zlibrary2023 and sign the petition (after signing, check your email inbox to confirm your signature). It will only take two minutes of your time, but will greatly help the Z-Library project.‼️
徐中约在他的 一篇论文 中提到了曾国藩的一段话，英文是这样说的：
> When we negotiated on boundaries and trade with Russia (in 1689 and 1727), we actually treated her with the etiquette due an enemy state, which was entirely different from that accorded dependencies like Korea.
这段话的中文原文出自《筹办夷务始末（同治朝）》第 54 卷曾国藩的奏折（1867 年）：
> 伏查康熙十五年，聖祖仁皇帝召見俄人尼果賚事，其時儀節無可深考。然當日與俄羅斯議界通市，實係以敵國之禮待之，與以屬藩之禮待高麗者迥不相同。
出自：中華書局編輯部, and 李書源, eds. 籌辦夷務始末（同治朝）第六册. 北京: 中華書局, 2008. p. 2226.
在同一份折子中，曾国藩还有一句话很有意思：
> 即異日中國全盛，洋人衰弱，亦但求保我黎民，而别無耀兵海外之心。
很像邓小平说过的一句话：
> 如果中国有朝一日变了颜色，变成一个超级大国，也在世界上称王称霸，到处欺负人家，侵略人家，剥削人家，那么世界人民就应当给中国戴上一顶「社会帝国主义」的帽子。就应当揭露它、反对它，并且同中国人民一道打倒它。
Chen, Janet Y. The Sounds of Mandarin: Learning to Speak a National Language in China and Taiwan, 1913–1960. New York: Columbia University Press, 2023. https://doi.org/10.7312/chen20902.
Mandarin Chinese is the most widely spoken language in the world today. In China, a country with a vast array of regional and local vernaculars, how was this “common language” forged? How did people learn to speak Mandarin? And what does a focus on speech instead of script reveal about Chinese language and history?
This book traces the surprising social history of China’s spoken standard, from its creation as the national language of the early Republic in 1913 to its journey into postwar Taiwan to its reconfiguration as the common language of the People’s Republic after 1949. Janet Y. Chen examines the process of linguistic change from multiple perspectives, emphasizing the experiences of ordinary people.
After the fall of the Qing dynasty, a chorus of influential elites promoted the goal of a strong China speaking in one unified voice. Chen explores how this vision fared in practice, showing the complexities of transforming an ideological aspiration into spoken reality. She tracks linguistic change in schools, rural areas, and urban life against the backdrop of war and revolution.
The Sounds of Mandarin draws on a novel aural archive of early twentieth-century sound technology, including phonograph recordings, films, and radio broadcasts. Following the uneven trajectory of standard speech, this book sheds new light on the histories of language, nationalism, and identity in China and Taiwan.
Hsü, Immanuel C. Y. The Rise of Modern China. 6th ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-rise-of-modern-china-9780195125047
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Despite not using Vim extensively in my everyday tasks, I extend my deepest gratitude to Bram for his remarkable contribution.
RIP Bram Moolenaar
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bram_Moolenaar
Many foreigners would love to return to China, but they can’t because they’re turned down by the authority or they’re just afraid.
https://twitter.com/UselessTree/status/1468388598563184644
https://twitter.com/isaacstonefish/status/1687191264389984256
https://twitter.com/dearclarissa/status/1687318015686410240
锁志刚 and 庄得年 What a lovely story!
https://twitter.com/zhigangsuo/status/1686328559655088128
反思百年前全球第二波民主化（第三讲） #秦晖
https://youtube.com/watch?v=T6DdFCfhduo
Ice-cream used as cryotherapy during high-dose melphalan conditioning reduces oral mucositis after autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplantation
In simpler terms, the study found that eating ice cream during chemotherapy can help reduce the chances of developing painful mouth sores, a common side effect of the treatment. This is a cost-effective and easy method that could improve the quality of life for patients undergoing this type of chemotherapy.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-021-02002-x
The Fall of Stack Overflow
ayhanfuat/the-fall-of-stack-overflow" rel="nofollow">https://observablehq.com/@ayhanfuat/the-fall-of-stack-overflow
In Imperial China, the idea of filial piety not only shaped family relations but was also the official ideology by which Qing China was governed. In State and Family, Yue Du examines the relationship between politics and intergenerational family relations in China from the Qing period to 1949, focusing on changes in family law, parent–child relationships, and the Chinese state during this period.
This book highlights how the Qing dynasty treated the state-sponsored parent–child hierarchy as the axis around which Chinese family and political power relations were constructed and maintained. It shows how following the fall of the Qing in 1911, reform of filial piety law in the Republic of China became the basis of state-directed family revolution, playing a central role in China’s transition from empire to nation-state.
Du, Yue. State and Family in China: Filial Piety and Its Modern Reform. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2021. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108974479.
How to fix problems with iCloud and iCloud Drive
https://eclecticlight.co/2023/07/24/how-to-fix-problems-with-icloud-and-icloud-drive/
China’s Xi calls for patience as Communist Party tries to reverse economic slump
Chinese leader Xi Jinping has called for patience in a speech released as the ruling Communist Party tries to reverse a deepening economic slump and said Western countries are “increasingly in trouble” because of their materialism and “spiritual poverty.”
趙紫陽. 改革歷程. Edited by 杜導正 and 鮑彤. 香港: 新世紀出版社, 2009.
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20th century socialism vs. 21st century socialism
https://twitter.com/Noahpinion/status/1692442921717629311
中華書局編輯部, and 李書源, eds. 籌辦夷務始末（同治朝）第六册. 北京: 中華書局, 2008. https://book.douban.com/subject/3322880/.
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The Evolution of American Contemporary China Studies: Coming Full Circle?
In the nearly 75 years that the People’s Republic of China has been in existence, the field of contemporary China studies in the United States has developed and evolved through six distinguishable ‘generations’ of scholarship.
The evolving social science scholarly analyses of contemporary China have paralleled the changes in the PRC itself over time, but they have also reflected paradigmatic changes in scholarly disciplines in the United States. Other stimuli which have also impacted the field include domestic politics in America and shifts in US-China relations.
This article traces the evolution of field (as observed and interpreted by the author); it concludes that while the field is generally very healthy, diverse, and enjoys great breadth and depth of knowledge, it faces significant new challenges for source material and research in Xi Jinping’s China.
Six ‘generations’ of scholarship of contemporary China:
- Generation 1: The Soviet Era (1950s through the mid-1960s)
- Generation 2: The Chaotic Era (late-1960s through the late-1970s)
- Generation 3: The Liberal Reform Era (1980s)
- Generation 4: The Hard Authoritarian Era (1989–2002)
- Generation 5: The Soft Authoritarian Era (2002–2012)
- Generation 6: The Neo-Totalitarian Era (2012–present)
To cite this article: Shambaugh, David. “The Evolution of American Contemporary China Studies: Coming Full Circle?” Journal of Contemporary China, July 27, 2023, 1–18. https://doi.org/10.1080/10670564.2023.2237918.
著名历史学家徐中约，以个人致 30 年之力，综述 400 年中华史。
这是网友基于香港中文大学出版社 2001 年翻译出版的版本制作的简体中文版。
许成钢用 视频 的形式阐述了他在《剑桥中国经济史》中所写的这篇文章中的核心观点，以及中国的极端 不平等 等问题。
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Xi Jinping’s revealing response to floods and heatwaves
Alas, the party seems allergic to freewheeling grassroots debate about whether the climate is changing. To date, most public discussion about China’s year of extreme weather has been strikingly inward-looking. State-media outlets have dwelled on heroics by soldiers, officials and rescue teams. Netizens have complained about instances of official incompetence. Social-media users have asked whether storm warnings were given in time, or whether floodwaters were diverted away from Beijing towards less privileged places.
China is both a climate hero and a potential villain. It is a leader in renewable energy. But it is also rich in coal and run by officials worried about power cuts and paranoid about their dependency on imported oil and gas.
Extreme weather surely frightens China’s rulers. Any challenge to their absolute control alarms them more.
China’s Latest Problem: People Don’t Want to Go There
Half a year after China lifted Covid-19 restrictions and reopened its borders, few international travelers are coming—another sign of decoupling between China and the West that could have negative repercussions for a long time.
Nationwide, just 52,000 people arrived to mainland China from overseas on trips organized by travel agencies during the first quarter, the latest period for which national data is available, compared with 3.7 million in the first quarter of 2019.
Matt Kelly, a Boston-based business consultant, said he has fond memories of his trip 15 years ago cycling around Guilin, a picturesque hilly city in southern China. He visited China two more times, but said he had no interest in going back today.
Desperate Chinese parents are joining dating apps to marry off their adult children
Chinese parents are turning to an array of new online matchmaking services, where they are able to create dating profiles and set up first dates for their unmarried children.
In recent years, as marriage rates have plummeted to the lowest it has ever been in decades, Chinese parents are increasingly pressuring their children to marry, give birth and continue the family line.
Given China’s former one-child policy, many parents have only one child, adding to their anxiety.
On apps such as Perfect In-Laws (完美亲家), Family-building Matchmaking (成家相亲), and Parents Matchmaking (父母牵线), parents create profiles to advertise their offspring to prospective suitors — sometimes without their children’s consent.
To all the missing masturbators
This book navigates an overlooked history of representation during the transition from the Qing Empire to the Chinese Republic — a time when older, hierarchical notions of licentiousness were overlaid by a new, pornographic regime.
The book draws on previously untapped archives to argue that pornography in China represents a unique configuration of power and desire that both reflects and shapes historical processes.
On the one hand, since the late imperial period, pornography has democratized pleasure in China and opened up new possibilities of imagining desire. On the other, ongoing controversies over its definition and control show how the regulatory ideas of premodern cultural politics and the popular products of early modern cultural markets have contoured the globalized world.
The book emphasizes the material factors, particularly at the grassroots level of consumption and trade, that governed “proper” sexual desire and led to ideological shifts around the definition of pornography.
By linking the past to the present and beyond, the book’s social and intellectual history showcases circulated pornographic material as a motor for cultural change. The result is an astonishing foray into what historicizing pornography can mean for our understandings of desire, legitimacy, capitalism, and culture.
Wang, Y. Yvon. Reinventing Licentiousness: Pornography and Modern China. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2021. https://doi.org/10.7591/cornell/9781501752971.001.0001.
Ice Cream Is Good for You
To the surprise, dismay, and—to read between the lines—embarrassment of experts, more than one legitimate scientific study has suggested that the consumption of ice cream might mitigate or even prevent diabetes.
Perhaps it’s the same difference when you consider the mental-health potential: by the end of a recent date there, a friend and I were both very, very happy.
自 2015 年起，各省最低工资调整趋于停滞，上调频率下降，增长率降低。一方面，调整最低工资标准的频率已由原来的至少两年一次，变为至少三年一次，甚至在疫情期间全面停滞。另一方面，最低工资的年均增长率也大幅下降，平均增长率由 2013 年的约 14% 左右降到 2022 年仅有 5% 左右。此外，最低工资增长率也在 2017 年后开始低于人均 GDP 增长率，经济增长成果无法被基层劳动者共享。
https://www.laodongqushi.com/minimum_wage/
一位加拿大奶奶写了一本关于中国奶奶的书，真有意思 👍
Over the past century and a half, China has experienced foreign invasion, warfare, political turmoil and revolution, along with massive economic and technological change. Through all this change there is one stable element: grandmothers, as child-carers, household managers, religious devotees, transmitters of culture and, above all, sources of love, warmth and affection.
In this interdisciplinary and longitudinal study, China’s Grandmothers sheds light on the status and lives of grandmothers in China over the years from the late Qing Dynasty to the twenty-first century. Combining a wide range of historical and biographical materials, Diana Lary explores the changes and continuities in the lives of grandmothers through revolution, wars and radical upheaval to the present phase of economic growth. Informed by her own experience as a grandchild and grandmother, Lary offers a fresh and compelling way of looking at gender, family and ageing in modern Chinese society.
Lary, Diana. China’s Grandmothers: Gender, Family, and Ageing from Late Qing to Twenty-First Century. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2022. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009064781.
Former Belarus diplomat: “What was all this for? These months of useless negotiations about the same thing (Xi Jinping’s visit to Belarus in 2015). This game of arithmetic with steps at the museum at night?”
A subordinate of Qin Gang: “In Beijing, there are several hundred people rowing behind me for my position. So, if I don’t do this, someone else will.”
https://twitter.com/pavelslunkin/status/1683465198785425408