China is now remoulding Hong Kong at speed.  Forty-seven Democratic politicians and activists have been arrested on national security charges for participating in last year’s primary polls, and only people Beijing deems ‘patriots’ allowed to run for office.  One prominent pro-Beijing figure has even warned that the electoral reforms risk ‘killing the patient’.  With the legislature muzzled, the authorities are turning their attention to the media, the arts and the education sector.  This month we're joined by a high-profile political exile, former Democratic party legislator Ted Hui, who's the first Hong Kong politician to flee to Australia, and former Democratic party chairperson, Emily Lau, who’s still in Hong Kong.

Image c/- Flickr, Studio Incendo_DSC5956, 3 March 2021

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With the world’s attention focused on industrial-scale oppression in Xinjiang, developments in Tibet are passing beneath the radar.  But activists are warning of a full-spectrum assault on the Tibetan way of life, as Tibetan language teaching is outlawed and urbanisation campaigns relocate nomads from their ancestral pastures.  The CCP has underlined its determination to choose the next Dalai Lama, and Tibetans were recently urged by their Party Secretary to ‘reduce religious consumption’ to build a ‘new modern socialist Tibet’.  To hear about the sophisticated ‘rolling repression’ that characterises Chinese rule in Tibet, Louisa and Graeme are joined by Barbara Demick, author of Eat the Buddha: Life and Death in a Tibetan Town, Benno Weiner, Associate Professor of History at Carnegie Mellon University who has just published The Chinese Revolution on Tibetan Frontier and Tendor Dorjee, a Senior Researcher at the Tibet Action Institute.

Image: Polata Palace in Tibet with a mirrored reflection on water, c/- Gang Hao on Unsplash.

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This month we’re delving into boys’ love or BL fiction. From niche online novels to TV shows such as the Netflix fantasy epic The Untamed, their storylines revolve around male relationships with a tinge of sexual tension. But there’s a quirk. It’s not gay fiction; the stories are often written by women for women. This genre is incredibly popular in China, making BL fans an intimidating political and economic force, creating and destroying celebrities and the brands they endorse. To unravel the drama behind BL drama, Louisa and Graeme are joined by Hong Kong University’s Angie Baecker and boys’ love author Huanxiang Zhenghuanzhe 幻想症患者.

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China's five thousand years of history has become a fact, repeated ad nauseum by the state-run media and Chinese textbooks alike, but could it be a national myth?   In his recently published book, The Invention of China, Bill Hayton argues that “China” was cooked up by a small group of intellectuals who brought notions of sovereignty, citizenry and borders back from Europe just over 100 years ago, using a 'pick-and-mix' approach to history to invent their own past. But how does this interpretation sit against China's long historiographical tradition? In this episode, Hayton, a former BBC journalist now with the Asia program at Chatham House, tests his claims with Esther Klein, a senior lecturer in Chinese intellectual history at the Australian National University.

Image: Yellow Emperor, Xinzheng. Wikimedia Commons 2017

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A quick glance at the headlines suggest that only one man seems to count in today’s China – the Chairman of Everything, as he’s been dubbed - Communist party leader President Xi Jinping. He’s helmed China’s reemergence as a world power through his aggressive foreign policy, while consolidating power at home. In this episode, we delve into his own princeling past, looking at his relationship with his father, former Vice Premier Xi Zhongxun, and how his family background has influenced his political philosophy. To discuss how Xi’s revolutionary past is shaping China’s future, we’re joined by the Chinawatchers' Chinawatchers, Frederick Teiwes from the University of Sydney and Joseph Torigian from American University in Washington DC.

Image: Xi Jinping, Xi Yuanping and Xi Zhongxun in 1958, Wikipedia Commons

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Last year China's international state-run broadcaster, CGTN, spent millions opening a state-of-the-art London headquarters. Just one year on, it may already be scrambling for an exit strategy. CGTN may even lose its licence in the United Kingdom after the British regulator found it breached the broadcasting code. This episode we interview two people who have brought complaints against CGTN after it broadcast their forced confessions: Peter Dahlin from Safeguard Defenders and private investigator Peter Humphrey. Along with Sarah Cook of Freedom House, they join Louisa and Graeme to discuss whether China's global media ambitions are being stopped in their tracks.

Image: Peter Humphrey's TV appearance, c/- Alexey Garmash, Safeguard Defenders

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Even before they had seen its contents, Hong Kong's family-run firms - including two non-Chinese business empires that have shaped Hong Kong - were lining up to pledge support to the New National Security legislation.  Even in 2020, Hong Kong remains an oligopoly with a handful of wealthy conglomerates controlling vast swathes of Hong Kong's economy.  But these family-run firms no longer have the luxury of remaining silent about Chinese politics.   To look at two of these commercial dynasties and their role in creating Hong Kong as Asia's global city,  Louisa and Graeme are joined by Robert Bickers who has written China Bound: A History of John Swire & Sons and Its World, and Jonathan Kaufman, former Wall Street Journal correspondent who examines the Sassoons and the Kadoories in the Last Kings of Shanghai: the Rival Jewish Dynasties that Helped Create Modern China.  

Photo credit: Wikiswire.com, B&S Shanghai Staff 1883. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution Noncommercial Share Alike 3.0 License.

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China-US ties are in a tailspin, spiralling ever deeper into an abyss. Just one short month has seen US sanctions on senior Chinese officials for atrocities against the Uyghurs, Hong Kong’s special status for trade and diplomacy revoked, and consulates closed in Houston and Chengdu respectively. There's even been talk of a travel ban on China's 92m Communist party members and their families. Is armed conflict really a possibility, and if so when? Louisa and Graeme are joined by Gady Epstein and Stanford University’s Oriana Skyler Mastro to discuss the strategy behind the belligerence and the timeline for war.

Photo credit: Flickr. USS San Antonio alongside USS Carter Hall. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Corbin J. Shea/Released) 130321-N-SB587-349

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On June 30, Hong Kong will be subject to a new National Security Law. No one, not even Hong Kong’s Chief Executive, knows what will be in the bill, but details are slowly coming into focus. For critics, the legislation will create a ‘dual state’ that will undermine Hong Kong’s legal system and allow Beijing to target its opponents at will. For proponents, the bill will only affect a handful of people, and bring stability after a year of unrest. To ask whether the law spells the end of Hong Kong’s autonomy, Louisa and Graeme are joined by NYU legal expert Alvin Cheung, Lingnan University’s Ho Lok-sang and digital activist Glacier Kwong.

Photo credit: Jonathan van Smit, Hong Kong Protests 2019, Flickr

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For the first time since 1989 Hong Kongers are banned from holding their annual June Fourth vigil in Victoria Park. Despite this provocation, Hong Kong establishment figures—from vice chancellors to movie stars to religious figures—have been lining up to pledge their loyalty to China and their support for the proposed National Security Law that will be enacted in Beijing, bypassing the local legislature. Only one newspaper in Hong Kong opposes it: the popular Apple Daily. Today we speak to its chairman and founder, Jimmy Lai-Chee-ying to discuss the impact of that decision.  Lai has already been called a traitor and accused of ‘subversion’ by China’s Global Times newspaper, even though this crime is not yet on the statute books in Hong Kong.  

Image: Hong Kong skyline at night, c/- Sergio Capuzzimati on Unsplash.

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