Sinica Podcast

This week on Sinica, I speak with Mark Sidel, the Doyle Bascom Professor of Law and Public Affairs at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a senior fellow at the International Center for Not for Profit Law. Mark has written extensively on law and philanthropy in China and across Asia, including widely cited analyses of how the Chinese security state came to play a central role in managing foreign civil society organizations. Since the Law on the Management of Domestic Activities of Overseas NGOs took effect on January 1, 2017, China has introduced a remarkably comprehensive, vertically integrated system of oversight for foreign NGOs, foundations, and nonprofits.We discuss how this system combines securitization and political risk management with selective accommodation of service provision and technical expertise, Mark’s typology of organizational responses (survivors, hibernators, regionalizers, work-arounders, and leavers), the requirement that foreign NGOs secure professional supervisory units, the impact on China’s domestic nonprofit ecosystem, and what this tells us about the party-state’s long-term vision for controlled engagement with the outside world.4:43 – The landscape of non-state organizations before the 2016 law 7:06 – What changed: color revolutions, Arab Spring, and domestic anxieties 9:08 – Public security intellectuals and their influence on the law 11:51 – How registration and temporary activity filing systems work in practice 13:48 – Why the Ministry of Public Security, not Civil Affairs, was put in charge 19:31 – The professional supervisory unit requirement and dependency relationships22:48 – How the state shifted foreign NGO work away from advocacy without banning it26:17 – Mark’s typology: survivors, hibernators, regionalizers, work-arounders, and leavers 35:19 – What correlates with success for those who have survived 40:41 – Impact on China’s domestic nonprofit ecosystem and professional intermediaries 45:54 – What makes China’s system distinctive compared to India, Egypt, Russia, and Vietnam 50:19 – The Article 53 problem and university partnerships 55:32 – Advice for mid-sized foundations or NGOs considering work in China todayPaying it Forward: Neysun Mahboubi and the Penn Project on the Future of U.S.-China RelationsRecommendations:Mark: Everyday Democracy: Civil Society, Youth, and the Struggle Against Authoritarian Culture in China by Anthony SpiresKaiser: The music of Steve Morse (Dixie Dregs, The Dregs, Steve Morse Band)See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This week on Sinica, I'm delighted to have Iza Ding as guest host. Iza is a professor of political science at Northwestern University and a good friend whose work on Chinese governance I greatly admire. She's joined by Deborah Seligsohn, who has been a favorite guest on this show many times. Deb is an associate professor of political science at Villanova University and was previously a science and environmental counselor at the U.S. Embassy in Beijing. This episode was recorded in three parts: the first two in Belém, Brazil during COP30 (the 30th UN Climate Change Conference), and the final segment after the conference concluded. Iza and Deb discuss China's role at the climate summit, the real story behind the famous 2007 U.S. Embassy air quality monitor in Beijing (spoiler: it wasn't China's "Silent Spring moment"), Brazil's management of the conference, why China leads on technology but not on negotiation, and what the outcomes of COP30 mean for the future of global climate cooperation. This is an insider's view of how climate diplomacy actually works, complete with unexpected fire evacuations and glut-shaming of The New York Times.3:43 – Deb's impressions of COP30 and Brazil's inclusive approach 9:21 – China's presence at COP30: technology leadership without negotiation leadership 15:34 – Xie Zhenhua's absence and the U.S.-China dynamic at previous COPs 24:46 – Inside the negotiation rooms: language, politeness, and obstruction 33:06 – BYD's presence in Brazil and Chinese EV expansion 40:54 – The real story of the 2007 U.S. Embassy air quality monitor in Beijing 45:00 – Fire evacuation at COP30 and UN territorial sovereignty 1:22:06 – What actually drove China's air pollution control: the 2003 power plant standards 1:41:27 – The dramatic final plenary and the Mutirão decision 1:55:17 – China's NDC 3.0: under-promise and over-deliver strategySee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This week on Sinica, I speak with Zhong Na, a novelist and essayist whose new piece, "Murder House," appears in the inaugural issue of Equator — a striking new magazine devoted to longform writing that crosses borders, disciplines, and cultures. In January 2024, a young couple, both Tsinghua-educated Google engineers living in a $2.5 million Silicon Valley home, became the center of a tragedy that captivated Chinese social media far more than American outlets. Zhong Na explores how the case became a collective Rorschach test — a mirror held up to contemporary Chinese society, exposing cracks in the myths of meritocracy, the prestige of global tech firms, and shifting notions of gender, class, and the Chinese dream itself. We discuss the gendered reactions online, the dimming of America's appeal, the emotional costs of the immigrant success story, and the craft of writing about tragedy with compassion but without sentimentality.5:06 – How the story first reached Zhong Na, and the Luigi Mangione comparison 7:05 – Discovering she attended the same Chengdu high school as the alleged murderer Chen Liren 8:10 – The collaboration with Equator and Joan Didion's influence 10:30 – Education, class, and the cracks in China's meritocracy myth 16:01 – Tiger mothers vs. lying flat: two responses to a rigged system 19:12 – The pandemic and the dimming of the American dream 22:49 – Chinese men as perpetrators: immigrant stress and the loss of patriarchal privilege 25:56 – The gender war online: moral autopsy and victim-blaming 30:25 – The obsession with the ex-girlfriend and attraction to the accused 34:37 – The murder house, Chinese numerology, and the rise of Gen Z metaphysics 37:08 – Geopolitics, the China Initiative, and rethinking America as a destination 39:42 – Craft and moral compass: learning from Didion and Janet Malcolm 42:31 – Zhong Na's fiction: writing Chinese experiences without catering to Western expectationsPaying it forward: Gavin Jacobson and the editorial team at EquatorRecommendations: Zhong Na: Elsewhere by Yan Ge Kaiser: Made in Ethiopia, documentary by Xinyan Yu and Max Duncan (available on PBS)See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This week on Sinica, I welcome back Finbarr Bermingham, the Brussels-based Europe correspondent for the South China Morning Post, about the Nexperia dispute — one of the most revealing episodes in the global contest over semiconductor supply chains. Nexperia, a Dutch-headquartered chipmaker owned by Shanghai-listed Wingtech, became the subject of extraordinary government intervention when the Netherlands invoked a Cold War-era emergency law to seize temporary control of the company and suspend its Chinese CEO. Finbarr's reporting, drawing on Dutch court documents and expert sources, has illuminated the tangled threads of this story: preexisting concerns about governance and technology transfer, mounting U.S. pressure on The Hague to remove Chinese management, and the timing of the Dutch action on the very day the U.S. rolled out its affiliate rule. We discuss China's retaliatory export controls on chips packaged at Nexperia's Dongguan facilities, the role of the Trump-Xi meeting in Busan in unlocking a temporary thaw, and what this case reveals about Europe's agonizing position between American pressure and Chinese integration in global production networks.4:34 – Why the "Europe cracks down on Chinese acquisition" framing was too simple 6:17 – The Dutch court's extraordinary tick-tock of events and U.S. lobbying 9:04 – The June pressure from Washington: divestment or the affiliate list 10:13 – Dutch fears of production know-how relocating to China 12:35 – The impossible position: damned if they did, damned if they didn't 14:46 – The obscure Cold War-era Goods Availability Act 17:11 – CEO Zhang Xuezheng and the question of who stopped cooperating first 19:26 – Was China's export control a state policy or a corporate move? 22:16 – Europe's de-risking framework and the lessons from Nexperia 25:39 – The fragmented European response: Germany, France, Hungary, and the Baltics 30:31 – Did Germany shape the response behind the scenes? 33:06 – The Trump-Xi meeting in Busan and the resolution of the crisis 37:01 – Will the Nexperia case deter future European interventions? 40:28 – Is Europe still an attractive market for Chinese investment? 41:59 – The Europe China Forum: unusually polite in a time of tenterhooksPaying it forward: Dewey Sim (SCMP diplomacy desk, Beijing); Coco Feng (SCMP technology, Guangdong); Khushboo Razdan (SCMP North America); Sense Hofstede (Chinese Bossen newsletter)Recommendations: Finbarr: Chokepoints by Edward Fishman; Underground Empire by Henry Farrell and Abe Newman; "What China Wants from Europe" by John Delury (Engelsberg Ideas) Kaiser: The Three Musketeers: D'Artagnan and Milady (2023 French film adaptation)See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This week on Sinica, I welcome back Jeremy Goldkorn, co-founder of the show and my longtime co-host, to revisit the "vibe shift" we first discussed back in February. Seven months on, what we sensed then has fully borne out — there's been a measurable softening in American attitudes toward China, reflected not just in polling data but in media coverage, podcast discussions, and public discourse. We dig into what's driving this shift: the chaos of American politics making China look competent by comparison, the end of Wolf Warrior diplomacy, the gutting of China hawks in the Trump administration, Trump's own transactional G2 enthusiasm, and the generational divide in how younger Americans encounter China through TikTok rather than legacy media. We also discuss the limits of this shift, the dangers of overcorrection, and what it feels like to watch the fever break after years of panic and absolutism in U.S.-China discourse.5:29 – The [beep] show in America as the biggest factor 8:38 – China hawks deflated: from Pompeo to Navarro's pivot to India 11:21 – Ben Smith's piece on the end of a decade of China hawkism 13:30 – Eric Schmidt and Selina Xu's Atlantic piece on tech decoupling 17:17 – Long-form China podcasts: Dwarkesh Patel with Arthur Kroeber, Lex Fridman with Keyu Jin 19:35 – Jeremy's personal vibe shift: distance from The China Project and renewed perspective 23:33 – The world turning to predictability and stability 26:05 – The Chicago Council poll: dramatic shift away from containment 29:09 – The generational shift: TikTok, infrastructure porn, and Gen Z's globalized worldview 31:15 – The end of Wolf Warrior diplomacy and why it mattered 37:03 – Kaiser's "Great Reckoning" essay and why it didn't get the usual hate 39:00 – The destruction of Twitter and the vicious China discourse culture 41:10 – The pendulum swinging too far: China fanboys and new hubris 43:20 – How the vibe shift looks from inside China Paying it forward: Echo Tang (Berlin Independent Chinese Film Festival organizer) and Zhu Rikun (New York Chinese Independent Film Festival organizer)Recommendations: Jeremy: Ja No Man: Growing Up in Apartheid Era South Africa by Richard Poplak Kaiser: Rhyming Chaos podcast with Jeremy Goldkorn and Maria RepnikovaSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This week on Sinica, I chat with Lizzi Lee, a fellow on the Chinese economy at the Asia Society Policy Institute and one of the sharpest China analysts working today. We dig into the 4th Plenary Session of the 20th Party Congress and what it reveals about China's evolving growth model — particularly the much-discussed but often misunderstood push against "involution" in key sectors like EVs and solar. Lizzi walks us through the structural incentives driving overcompetition, from local government finance and VAT collection to the challenges of rebalancing supply and demand. We also discuss her recent Foreign Affairs piece on China's manufacturing model, why "overcapacity" is a misleading frame, the unexpected upsides of China's industrial strategy for the global green transition, and what happened at the Trump-Xi meeting in Busan. This is a conversation about getting beyond the binaries and understanding the actual mechanisms — and contradictions — shaping China's economic trajectory.4:43 – What Western reporting missed in the 4th Plenum communique 6:34 – The "anti-involution" push and what it really means 9:57 – Is China's domestic demand abnormally low? Context and comparisons 12:41 – Why cash transfers and consumption subsidies are running out of steam 15:00 – The supply-side approach: creating better products to drive demand 18:33 – GDP vs. GNI: why China is focusing on global corporate footprints 20:13 – Service exports and China's ascent along the global supply chain 24:02 – The People's Daily editorial on price wars and profit margins 27:31 – Why addressing involution is harder now than in 2015 29:56 – How China's VAT system incentivizes local governments to build entire supply chains 33:20 – The difficulty of reforming fiscal structures and local government finance 35:12 – What got lost in the Foreign Affairs editing process 38:14 – Why "overcapacity" is a misleading and morally loaded term 40:02 – The underappreciated upside: China's model and the global green transition 43:14 – How politically potent deindustrialization fears are in Washington and Brussels 46:29 – Industry self-discipline vs. structural reform: can moral suasion work? 50:15 – BYD's negotiating power and the squeeze on suppliers 53:54 – The Trump-Xi meeting in Busan: genuine thaw or tactical pause? 57:23 – Pete Hegseth's "God bless both China and the USA" tweet 1:00:01 – How China's leadership views Trump: transactional or unpredictable? 1:03:32 – The pragmatic off-ramp and what Paul Triolo predicted 1:05:26 – China's AI strategy: labor-augmenting vs. labor-replacing technology 1:08:13 – What systemic changes could realistically fix involution? 1:10:26 – Capital market reform and the challenge of decelerating slowly 1:12:36 – The "health first" strategy and investing in peoplePaying it forward: Paul TrioloRecommendations: Lizzi: Chokepoints: American Power in the Age of Economic Warfare by Edward Fishman Kaiser: Morning Coffee guitar practice book by Alex RockwellSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This week on Sinica, I chat with Daniel Kurtz-Phelan, editor of Foreign Affairs, about how the journal has both shaped and reflected American discourse on China during a period of dramatic shifts in the relationship. We discuss his deliberate editorial choices to include heterodox voices, the changing nature of the supposed "consensus" on China policy, and what I've called the "vibe shift" in how Americans across the political spectrum think about China. Daniel also reflects on his own intellectual formation, including his work on George Marshall's failed mission to mediate China's Civil War and the cautionary lessons that history holds for today's debates. We explore the challenges of bringing Chinese voices into Foreign Affairs, the balance between driving and reflecting policy debates, and whether we're witnessing a genuine opening of the Overton window on China discussions.7:15 – Foreign Affairs in the era of Iraq and "China's peaceful rise" 12:09 – The Marshall mission and the "Who Lost China?" debate 17:17 – China's changing role and the journal's coverage density 19:43 – The Campbell-Ratner "China Reckoning" and subsequent debates 25:00 – The challenge of including authentic Chinese voices 29:42 – How Chinese leadership perceives and reads Foreign Affairs 32:12 – The "vibe shift" on China across the American political spectrum 35:56 – Cultivating contrarian voices: Van Jackson, Jonathan Czin, and David Kang 40:17 – Avoiding the trap of making everything about U.S.-China competition 43:12 – Diversifying perspectives beyond the Washington-Beijing binary 48:18 – The big questions: American exceptionalism and Chinese identity in a new era 51:42 – The dangers of cutting off U.S.-China scholarly conversations 56:26 – The uses and misuses of historical analogies 58:09 – Spain's Golden Age and late Qing memes as contemporary analogiesPaying it forward: The unsung editorial staff at Foreign AffairsRecommendations: Daniel: Equator.org; The Rise of the Meritocracy by Michael Young; Granta's new India issue; The Party's Interests Come First by Joseph Torigian; The Coming Storm by Odd Arne Westad Kaiser: The Spoils of Time by C.V. WedgwoodSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This week on the Sinica Podcast, I speak with Jonathan Czin, the Michael H. Armacost Chair in Foreign Policy Studies and a fellow at the Brookings Institution’s John L. Thornton China Center. His new essay in Foreign Affairs, “China Against China: Xi Jinping Confronts the Downsides of Success,” challenges the dominant Western narrative of Xi Jinping as either Mao reincarnate or a brittle autocrat presiding over imminent collapse. Instead, Czin argues that Xi’s most illiberal reforms can be understood as attempts to cure the pathologies of China’s own success. We discuss his framing of Xi’s “Counterreformation,” how it helps explain China’s current political direction, and what it reveals about our own analytical blind spots in the West.7:15 – Xi’s “reformation” and Carl Minzner’s “end of reform and opening”12:18 – Corruption, decentralization, and the “lost decade” under Hu and Wen20:12 – Defining “resilience” and what Xi means by “eating bitterness”29:45 – The “downsides of success”: property, corruption, and governance contradictions45:30 – Counter-reformation vs. counterrevolution: what Xi wants to preserve and discard54:20 – The myth of yes-men: triangulation and feedback in Xi’s leadership style1:07:07 – Cognitive empathy and why most U.S. analysis of Xi falls short1:15:35 – Systems that can’t course-correct: comparing the U.S. and China1:22:05 – Cognitive empathy, ideology, and the problem of American exceptionalismPaying it forward:Jonathan: Allie Mathias and Dinny McMahonRecommendations:Jonathan: The Thirty Years War by C.V. Wedgewood; The Betrothed by Alessandro ManzoniKaiser: Transplants by Daniel Tam-ClaiborneSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This week on Sinica, I chat with Peking University's Professor Wang Dong (王栋), an international relations scholar at the School of International Studies at Peking University, where he also serves as Deputy Director and Executive Director of the Office for Humanities and Social Sciences and the Institute for Global Cooperation and Understanding. Professor Wang’s scholarship and public commentary focus on U.S.–China relations, Cold War history, and the uses of historical memory in diplomacy. He has been an especially thoughtful voice in connecting the Flying Tigers legacy with today’s efforts to stabilize and strengthen the people-to-people ties between our two countries.Check back in a day or two for the full podcast page and the transcript!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This week on Sinica, co-host Tianyu Fang makes his debut on the show to join me in interviewing his Stanford classmate and talented writer Jasmine Sun, who studies the anthropology of disruption. This summer, she took a trip to China with a group of friends with different levels of China experience, from people raised in the country to total novices. She reflects on how it hit, and how a group of young people reckoned with the reality of Chinese hypermodernity, which she wrote about in a terrific essay titled "america against china against america: notes on shenzhen, shanghai, and more."06:10 – Getting to know the new co-host: Tianyu Fang07:17 – Meet the guest: Jasmine Sun08:47 – Is there really an “American Vibe Shift” in how people see China?13:56 – The stories nations tell: America vs. China18:26 – Why that title for the essay?21:05 – Surveillance, awe, and future shock: China vs. San Francisco28:19 – Chinese tech’s power to surprise (and scare) + U.S.–China perceptions34:34 – China vs. Silicon Valley: patriotism and motivation39:51 – The involution phenomenon: China vs. U.S.45:41 – China’s public services and the U.S. gap52:33 – What U.S. cities could learn from China56:13 – Guests’ tips for understanding ChinaRecommendations:Jasmine: Yunnan foodTianyu: Mad Men (Tv series)Kaiser: The Origins of Political Order and Political Decay by Francis FukuyamaSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.