Sinica Podcast

Kaiser Kuo
  • 4.8 (8)
  • POLITICS
  • EVERY TWO WEEKS
Sinica Podcast

A weekly discussion of current affairs in China with journalists, writers, academics, policymakers, business people and anyone with something compelling to say about the country that's reshaping the world. Hosted by Kaiser Kuo.

  1. 6 DAYS AGO

    Inside Shen Yun and the Epoch Times, with NYT's Nicole Hong and Michael Rothfeld

    This week on Sinica, I speak with Nicole Hong and Michael Rothfeld, both investigative reporters at the New York Times, about a series of stories they've done, stretching between August and December 2024, on the Falun Gong-run performance troupe Shen Yun, and the Falun Gong-affiliated newspaper The Epoch Times. Read the latest two articles in that series here and here. There will be links to the other stories on the transcript page. 4:33 – Nicole and Michael's collection of pieces on Falun Gong  6:26 – Background on [the?] Falun Gong: Li Hongzhi, the context out of which the movement emerged, its international spread, and the CCP’s crackdown in the '90s 12:00 – Shen Yun performances, and audience reactions  18:46 – Following the money: Falun Gong’s dramatic financial growth, gray areas, and where the money goes  29:03 – Spiritual project or big grift? 31:39 – What Nicole and Michael uncovered  36:23 – Memorable individuals: Chang Chun-ko, Kate the performer, and Josh the violinist 41:10 – The dynamics within [the?] Falun Gong, and what has been alleged 45:34 – The Epoch Times, and their editorial changes  53:02 – The appeal of Falun Gong, and the level of scrutiny it gets Paying It Forward: Nicole: Researchers/freelancers/translators Yi Liu and Peiyue Wu  Michael: New York Times colleague Susan Beachy  Recommendations: Nicole: Connie: A Memoir by Connie Chung  Michael: Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel; One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez (and the new One Hundred Years of Solitude TV series (2024)); and the TV series Gomorrah (2014-2021) Kaiser: TikTok accounts workplace_doodles (a former Shen Yun performer born into a Falun Gong family) and cocolarkincooks (a fantastic cooking resource) See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    1h 8m

  2. 2 JAN

    Under Pressure: Michael Cerny and Rory Truex on China Discourse in the U.S. Foreign Policy Community

    This week on Sinica, I welcome back Michael Cerny — formerly of the Carter Center and now a Ph.D. student at Harvard — and Rory Truex of Princeton University to discuss a new working paper they've co-authored. They undertook a large-scale survey of foreign policy professionals at U.S. think tanks to ascertain whether there is a "consensus" on China policy, as is often claimed, and whether people working in think tanks feel pressure to take on more "hawkish" positions on China policy. We also introduce a new segment called "Paying it Forward." 5:04 – What motivated Michael and Rory to write their paper together  7:30 – Groupthink vs. consensus 10:08 – The methodology: combining surveys and interviews, and the sampling frame  14:35 – Trying to avoid leading questions  17:58 – Creating the “China Confrontation Index”  20:25 – Different levels of acceptance of the labels “hawk” and “dove”  23:33 – The issue of preference falsification  25:43 – Mechanisms behind disparities in perceived pressure  29:01 – Tying in Rory’s previous research on self-censorship  32:42 – How Michael and Rory decided on interviews  34:10 – What Michael believes were the most important and robust findings 36:09 – The distinction between the beliefs of think tankers vs. elected officials, and why people tend to believe there is a bipartisan consensus on China  40:34 – Pressure on hawks  42:35 – Specific policy questions 44:18 – Feedback on the paper so far, and what Michael and Rory may tweak in a subsequent draft  49:47 – The possible role of personality in hawkishness or dovishness  51:58 – Discussing Mike Mazarr’s concerns about the potential parallels between current Chinese discourse and the lead-up to the Iraq War  55:06 – Advice to younger professionals entering the foreign policy/China field  New segment: Paying It Forward: Rory: Michael Cerny and Edi Obiakpani-Reid  Recommendations: Rory: Edi Obiakpani-Reid’s Sinobabble podcast about Chinese history Michael: Jeffrey Ding’s Technology and the Rise of Great Powers: How Diffusion Shapes Economic Competition Kaiser: Imperium by Robert Harris  See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    1h 6m

  3. 19/12/2024

    Australia, China, and the Economics-Security Nexus with Amy King of ANU

    This week on Sinica I'm delighted to be joined by Amy King, Associate Professor in the Strategic & Defence Studies Centre at The Australian National University. She shares her ideas about how perceptions of insecurity can paradoxically motivate closer economic relations between two states, and she looks at not only the examples of China and Japan after the end of World War II, but Australia and China as well. We also discuss Sino-Australian relations over the last 15 years, and much else! 2:48 – Key phases of Australia-China relations over the past 15 years and the security and economic nexus  9:05 – Amy’s research into the Sino-Japanese relationship and how perceptions of insecurity can motivate closer economic ties, and how Australia is responding to China now  21:22 – How Amy would argue the case for economic engagement with China to folks in Washington  26:31 – Securitization in Australia and the important differences between Australia and the U.S.  30:20 – The shift in the Australia-China relationship under the Albanese government  33:12 – What the U.S. can learn from Australia  35:14 – Why people tend to conflate Australia’s experience with America’s  39:04 – Amy’s essay, “The Collective Logic of Chinese Hegemonic Order,” and how we can understand China’s role in the emerging post-unipolar world 42:47 – Three mechanisms employed by China to amplify its voice post-war  (amplifying, grafting, and resistance by appropriation) and how modern “middle powers” can influence the international order now  52:31 – The state of discourse on China in Australia and what Amy believes China wants  58:54 – Amy’s thoughts on pluralism and international order  1:03:22 – What lessons about de-risking and navigating multi-alignment Australia should be learning from other nations in the region  Recommendations: Amy: Fintan O’Toole’s We Don’t Know Ourselves: A Personal History of Modern Ireland  Kaiser: The Paul Reed Smith (PRS) SE Hollowbody II Piezo electric guitar See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    1h 22m

  4. 12/12/2024

    China's EV Explosion, with Ilaria Mazzocco of CSIS

    China's rapid surge in electric vehicle manufacturing, adoption, and export has variously encouraged, delighted, impressed, frightened, and even enraged people around the world. What did China get right in facilitating the explosive development in this industry? Was is just subsidies, or were there other important policies that helped jumpstart it? How have other geographies responded? And what can they learn? Ilaria Mazzocco,  deputy director and senior fellow with the Trustee Chair in Chinese Business and Economics at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) joins me to share her rich insights into the Chinese EV industry. 3:49 – How Ilaria became interested in green industrial policy 5:59 – The reality of progress in EVs in China  11:21 – The role of state subsidies and other things that tend to get missed in trying to understand EVs in China  16:51 – How other countries are trying to adopt China’s approach  19:21 – The differences between the EU and U.S. approaches  24:17 – The outlook for competition in the Chinese market  26:08 – Business models in the Chinese EV sector and the example of BYD 30:53 – Chinese firms’ push for internationalization and how the rapidity of becoming multinationals [multinational companies?] may pose challenges  35:54 – Alignment between host countries and Chinese companies  39:58 – What the U.S. is doing and the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) 42:27 – How U.S. protectionist measures may affect third markets, and whether restrictions may backfire   48:57 – The coming shift to next-generation batteries, and the potential for international collaboration in advancing more circular practices  55:43 – How Ilaria’s fieldwork shifted her perspective on the EV industry  59:38 – How we can improve industrial policy  Recommendations: Ilaria: My Antonia by Willa Cather; the Wolf Hall trilogy by Hilary Mantel; The Army of Sleepwalkers by Wu Ming (an Italian novelist collective) about the French Revolution  Kaiser: The Wolf Hall audiobooks read by Ben Miles; the HBO series Rome (2005-2007)  See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    1h 14m

  5. 05/12/2024

    Jane Hayward of King's College on Teaching China through YouTube

    This week on Sinica, I chat with Jane Hayward, lecturer at King's College London, about her excellent YouTube channel, Jane Hayward China, and her efforts to bring up-to-date scholarship on modern and contemporary China to audiences through internet video, slaying various bugbears along the way. 3:28 Why Jane started her YouTube channel, her intended versus actual audiences, and navigating the current toxic media environment  10:56 The benefits of an area studies approach, and why Jane chose a U.S. PhD program 14:46 Defining the complicated public discourse in the West  19:35 Jane’s videos: the surprising popularity of “Xi Jinping is NOT like an Emperor;” and more controversial videos 26:28 New Qing History and different critiques of it 34:50 Jane's series on types of communism, and her video on reporting on China in British media  42:31 What may be coming next on Jane’s channel  Recommendations Jane: David Priestland’s The Red Flag: A History of Communism Kaiser: The YouTube channel Chinese Cooking Demystified, and specifically their video “63 Chinese Cuisines: the Complete Guide”  See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    51 min

  6. 21/11/2024

    U.S.-China Crisis Management and Crisis Prevention, with Michael Swaine

    This week on Sinica, I chat with Michael Swaine, Senior Research Fellow at the Quincy Institute for the last couple of years, prior to which he spent nearly two decades as a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, where he led extensive work on Chinese defense and foreign policy, U.S.-China relations, and East Asian international relations more broadly. He was also a senior policy analyst at the RAND Corporation, where he developed a reputation for rigorous research on Asian security and crisis management. We focus on his recent report, “Avoiding the Abyss: An Urgent Need for Sino-U.S. Crisis Management,” which offers both a framework for understanding the forces driving U.S.-China crises and a roadmap to prevent or manage these crises effectively. He drew on his many decades of experience working on the security dimension of the bilateral relationship, including his participation in many Track II dialogues and simulations of crisis scenarios over the years. 4:51 – Defining "crisis" and "crisis prevention"  10:13 – The possibility of a crisis in the South China Sea 12:31 – Lessons from past crises   20:08 – The problematic moralistic stances and tit-for-tat escalation produced by yǒulǐ, yǒulì, yǒu jié 有理, 有利, 有节 27:37 – U.S. concern over the credibility of its alliance commitments  34:50 – The problem of perception  38:16 – Examples of how each side is sometimes unable to see how its own actions are perceived by the other  41:20 – The dangers of failing to understand and making assumptions about the China’s historical memory  45:42 – Problems of signaling and how best to solve them  51:17 – Mike’s suggestions for a crisis toolkit and his proposal of a civilian-led two-tier dialogue structure  58:41 – Track II dialogues  1:02:47 – The importance of educating leaders up and down the system on crisis management  1:06:08 – The structural issues of the decision-making systems in China and the U.S. Recommendations: Michael: Art critic Brian Sewell’s The Reviews That Caused the Rumpus; Robert Suettinger’s The Conscience of the Party: Hu Yaobang, China’s Communist Reformer   Kaiser: The Great Transformation: China’s Road from Revolution to Reform by Odd Arne Westad and Chen Jian  See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    1h 17m

  7. 14/11/2024

    Granta's Chinese Literature Issue: A Chat with Editor Thomas Meaney

    The British literary quarterly Granta has published a new issue dedicated to Chinese writers, featuring familiar mainstays of contemporary literature and some fresh new voices. This week on Sinica, I chatted with Thomas Meaney, editor of Granta, about what's happening in the literary scene in China today and how this fantastically interesting issue came together. Tom is wonderfully thoughtful and articulate, and we really get into some of the individual stories and the larger trends they may or may not represent. 3:17 – Tom’s familiarity with Chinese literature and China 4:40 – Why Granta dedicated this issue to Chinese literature, how the issue came together, and how Granta found its translators  10:54 – Balancing political considerations with artistic merits in curating this issue  17:20 – The Chinese literary obsession with losers and the role of losers in Xiao Hai’s “Adrift in the South” 25:11 – The so-called Dongbei Renaissance, and Wu Qi’s interview and why he pushes back on the idea of the Dongbei Renaissance genre  33:02 – Granta staff favorites  35:18 – The phenomenon of gratuitous name-dropping and borrowing stylistically from other writers  38:05 – The issue’s three photo essays by Feng Li, Li Jie and Zhan Jungang, and Haohui Liu  44:36 – Yu Hua’s “Tomorrow I’ll Get Past It” 50:09 – Mo Yan’s “The Leftie Sickle”  53:10 – Yan Lianke’s “Black Pig Hair, White Pig Hair”  57:56 – The "filmability" of some of the short stories and the connection between the film world and literary writers in China  1:00:08 – Where you can get Granta and pick up this issue Recommendations: Tom: The Egalitarian Moment: Asia and Africa, 1950-1980 by Anthony Low, a comparative history of land reform  Kaiser: The ever-expanding library of guitarless backing tracks on YouTube to play along to See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    1h 9m

  8. 07/11/2024

    Decoupling, De-risking, and the Great U.S.-China Disconnect, with Supply Chain Expert Cameron Johnson

    This week on Sinica in a show taped live at China Crossroads, Shanghai's premier event series, I'm joined by my good friend Cameron Johnson, who is on the governing board of the American Chamber of Commerce in Shanghai, specializes professionally in supply chains in China, and teaches at NYU Shanghai. 4:20 – What makes up a supply chain ecosystem, and why it is difficult to build out  8:39 – A brief history of decoupling, the warning signs, and whether it matters “who shot first”  16:43 – Personal protective equipment (PPE) manufacturing in America, the lessons we (should have) learned, and Washington’s response 25:13 – EVs and batteries: manufacturing in America, and what it looks like on the ground in China  30:46 – The semiconductor industry  34:24 – “China Week” in Congress, and the different responses of GOP versus Democratic congressmen  38:36 – De-risking as globalization 2.0 42:21 – Cameron’s predictions on the effects of the [upcoming] U.S. elections  44:10 – Inside Chinese factories  47:44 – American shortfalls in manufacturing  50:21 – The importance of seeing China’s competitive markets and ecosystem clusters for oneself  53:09 – Cameron’s advice for the next U.S. administration  Recommendations:  Cameron: Gōngyìng liàn gōngfáng zhàn 《供应链攻防战》 (Supply Chain Offensive and Defense War) by Lin Xueping; No Trade is Free: Changing Course, Taking on China, and Helping America’s Workers by Robert Lighthizer  Kaiser: The Praise of Folly by Desiderius Erasmus  See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    1h 2m
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4.8
out of 5
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About

A weekly discussion of current affairs in China with journalists, writers, academics, policymakers, business people and anyone with something compelling to say about the country that's reshaping the world. Hosted by Kaiser Kuo.

Information

  • Creator
    Kaiser Kuo
  • Years Active
    2016 - 2025
  • Episodes
    478
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Show Website
    Sinica Podcast

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