ANU Australian Centre on China in the World / 中华全球研究中心／中華全球研究中心

Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://hdl.handle.net/1885/125925

The Australian Centre on China in the World (CIW) is a research institution established to enhance the existing capabilities of The Australian National University (ANU). It aims to be an integrated, world-leading institution for Chinese Studies and the understanding of China, or what has been called 'Greater China' or the 'Chinese Commonwealth' (the People's Republic of China, the Hong Kong and Macau Special Administrative Regions, as well as Taiwan and the Chinese diaspora), on a global scale.

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Open Access
Wayfaring: Photography in 1970s-80s Taiwan
(Australian Centre on China in the World, 2021) Krischer, Olivier; Chen, Shuxia
Catalogue publication for Wayfaring: Photography in 1970s-80s Taiwan, held at the Australian Centre on China in the World, 30th July to 28th October 2021. As Taiwanese society was coming to terms with a new political reality in the 1970s and 1980s, many artists and intellectuals addressed issues of locality, history and cultural identity. Despite the pressure on civil society, Taiwan’s visual culture flourished, with photography playing a key role as a visual medium that intersected many creative practices and platforms. Pioneering photographers produced groundbreaking works across these decades, from experimental art to photojournalism and much in between. ‘Wayfaring’ refers to the term zhaolu (找路), used by seminal photographer Chang Chao-Tang to discuss his work at this time. Literally meaning to search for (zhao) a path or road (lu), here it intends to lyrically evoke both the actual journeys that artists undertook to photograph an increasingly diverse idea of place and ‘people’, as well as the personal, introspective search for new ways forward, through photographic experimentation. Drawn principally from the collection of the National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts, Taichung, the broad selection of photographic artworks reflects the diversity and shifting experiences of Taiwanese society and culture at this pivotal time. The exhibition featured 35 artworks by 12 artists, including: Chang Chao-Tang 張照堂, Chien Yun-Ping 簡永彬, Chuang Ling 莊靈, Ho Ching-Tai 何經泰, Hou Tsung-Hui 侯聰慧, Hsieh Chun-Te 謝春德, Hsieh San-Tai 謝三泰, Juan I-Jong 阮義忠, Kao Chung-Li 高重黎, Lien Hui-Ling 連慧玲, Wang Hsin 王信, Yeh Ching-Fang 葉清芳. This illustrated catalogue introduces each of these artists and their works, with an introductory curatorial essay on photography in 1970s-80s Taiwan, a time of transition from decades of martial law.
Open Access
A 'Pessoptimistic' View of Chinese Labour NGOs
(Australian Centre on China in the World, ANU, 2018) Franceschini, Ivan; Lin, Kevin
In the wake of the 2015 crackdown on labour NGOs, pessimism about the future of Chinese civil society has been unavoidable even for the most assured optimists. Still, pessimism and optimism in discussions of Chinese labour NGOs have roots that go far deeper than these latest turn of events. In this essay, Ivan Franceschini and Kevin Lin take stock of the existing literature and reconsider the debate in light of the latest developments, proposing a possible synthesis between 'optimistic' and 'pessimistic' views.
Open Access
Ren Hang: Bodies Without Redemption
(Australian Centre on China in the World, ANU, 2017) Chen, Shuxia
On 24 February 2017, photographer Ren Hang leapt to his death from a twenty-eight-floor building in Beijing. He had not yet turned thirty, but his work had already attracted considerable international attention. This essay retraces the path of Ren’s life, contextualising it within the rapidly developing field of Chinese photography. Beginning with the emergence of ‘private photography’ in China in the early 2000s, the article describes how a cultural industry made up of independent-publishing and photo fairs has blossomed in contemporary China.
Open Access
Christian Sorace on 'Shaken Authority'
(Australian Centre on China in the World, ANU, 2017) Sorace, Christian
Open Access
What Does Wukan Have to Do With Democracy?
(Australian Centre on China in the World, 2016) Tomba, Luigi
In September 2011, the village of Wukan, Guangdong Province, made international headlines for its violent protests against the illegal sale of land by their corrupt village elite. Villagers were successful in both toppling the existing village leadership and electing, in their stead, the moral leaders of the revolt as their new village committee. A few months ago, the original leader of the protests was arrested on unclear corruption charges, an event that led to violent clashes between villagers and police. Is Wukan's sad story an example of a conscious democratic challenge to the existing system?
Open Access
Meet the State Security: Chinese Labour Activists and Their Controllers
(Australian Centre on China in the World, ANU, 2017) Franceschini, Ivan
Open Access
To Establish Peace: being the Chronicle of the Later Han dynasty for the years 189 to 200 AD as recorded in Chapters 59 to 69 of the Zizhi tongjian of Sima Guang
(Australia Centre on China in the World, The Australian National University, 2020) de Crespigny, Rafe
This work was first published as No. 21 of the Asian Studies Monographs: New Series of the Faculty of Asian Studies at the Australian National University, 1996. This internet edition of 2020 is based upon the original, but has been extensively reviewed and revised.
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Industrial Landscapes of Socialist Realism
(ANU Press, 2018-04) Smith, Craig A.
Although industrial landscapes today appear as one of the most alien of art forms, they were once fundamental as backgrounds of socialist realist paintings. This essay examines the legacies of two masters of the genre in China and North Korea—Song Wenzhi (1919–1999) and Chōng Yōngman (1938–1999)—and demonstrates how different revolutionary histories have led to a divergence in legacy and achievement.
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The Last Days of Shi Yang
(Australian Centre on China in the World, ANU, 2018) Franceschini, Ivan
What follows is a fictionalised account of the last days of Shi Yang (1889–1923) based on the prison diaries included in the commemorative volume Shi Yang jinian wenji (Museum of the 7 February Massacre, Wuhan 1988). Shi Yang was a weiquan lawyer ante litteram, and to this day he remains an inspiration to many labour activists in China. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) celebrates him as a martyr of the revolution, the irony of which will not escape those who are aware of the plight of human rights lawyers and labour activists in the country today. That in April 2018 the Chinese government passed a new law to protect the reputation and honour of ‘its’ heroes and martyrs can be seen as further adding to the irony.
Embargo
On a Chinese screen: media, power, and voice in China
(Canberra, ACT : Australian Centre on China in the World, The Australian National University, 2018) Australian National University. Australian Centre on China in the World
The previous decade saw widespread discussions about the role of the Internet in reshaping power relations in Chinese society. New media—it was widely believed—would give voice to the poor and downtrodden, allow citizens to better supervise government activity, and foster lively cultural exchanges. Workers would also benefit from this, as the Internet provided them with the tools needed to bring their grievances into the spotlight and enhance their ability to connect with their peers to establish new forms of solidarity. A decade later, what is left of that cyber-utopian discourse? This issue of Made in China offers a series of essays that attempt to answer this question against the backdrop of the latest developments in Chinese politics and society.
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To the soil: The labour of rural transformation in China
(Canberra, ACT : Australian Centre on China in the World, The Australian National University, 2018) Australian National University. Australian Centre on China in the World
China’s four decades of reform and opening have been rooted in a fundamental socioeconomic restructuring. Contemporary China has changed from a largely agrarian society to a rapidly urbanising one, characterised by a floating populace moving back and forth between rural and urban spaces, which are in a continuous state of flux. Going hand in hand with China’s ascent into modernity is the subordination of rural areas and people. While rural China has historically been a site of extraction and exploitation, in the post-reform period this has intensified, and rurality itself has become a problem, best typified through the ubiquitous propaganda about the need to revitalise the countryside, and ongoing attempts to reconstruct rural areas in a new image. This issue of Made in China focuses on the labour that these attempts to restructure and reformulate rural China have entailed, and the ways in which they have transformed rural lives and communities.
Open Access
A question of loyalty : Xun Yu, Cao Cao and Sima Guang
(Canberra, ACT : Faculty of Asian Studies, Australian National University., 2002) de Crespigny, Rafe
In 212 AD, as the army of the great warlord Cao Cao 曹操 was moving south against his southern rival Sun Quan 孫權, there was a sad incident in the camp. Xun Yu 荀彧, a leading counsellor and one of Cao Cao's oldest supporters, died at Shouchun 壽春 city on the Huai 淮 River. There are varying accounts and opinions whether he died of natural causes or whether he killed himself, but Cao Cao was embarrassed and Emperor Xian of Han 漢獻帝, though close-held under his control, made a point of mourning Xun Yu. Nine hundred years later, moreover, as Sima Guang 司馬光 of the Northern Song dynasty compiled his chronicle Zizhi tongjian 資治通鑑, he took the death of Xun Yu as the occasion for a powerful essay on proper conduct in troubled times. The story of Xun Yu and Cao Cao, therefore, not only touches the tensions of loyalty and legitimacy between a falling dynasty and a rising power, it provided one of China's greatest Confucianists with a case-study for his moral teaching. This article first appeared in Sino-Asiatica; papers dedicated to Professor Liu Ts'un-yan on the occasion of his eighty-fifth birthday (Canberra 2002). The original pagination, from 30 to 59 in that volume, is indicated in brackets [].
Open Access
Northern Frontier: The policies and strategy of the Later Han Empire
(Canberra, ACT: The Australian National University, Faculty of Asian Studies, 2018) de Crespigny, Rafe
In presenting a history of the northern frontier during the period of Later Han, I have discussed in turn the major non-Chinese groups, from the Qiang in the northwest through the Xiongnu and their rivals the Xianbi in present-day Mongolia, to the Wuhuan who occupied the northeastern region of China Proper and the borderlands of Manchuria. In each case, I have sought to provide some account of the people themselves, and a discussion of the policies by which the Chinese attempted to deal with them.
Open Access
The Three Kingdoms and Western Jin: a History of China in the Third Century AD - II
(Faculty of Asian Studies, The Australian National University) de Crespigny, Rafe
A paper written in three parts: Part 1: The Formation of the Three Kingdoms (189-220) Part 2: Rival Empires (220-265) Part 3: The Empire of Western Jin (265-317)
Open Access
Generals of the South: the foundation and early history of the Three Kingdoms state of Wu
(Faculty of Asian Studies, The Australian National University, 2018) de Crespigny, Rafe
The present volume is concerned with one aspect of that great tradition: the development of the state of Wu, under control of the Sun family, in the territory south of the Yangzi. The establishment of this separate state, and its maintenance for the best part of a hundred years, was a critical factor for the centuries that followed. On the one hand, the independence of Wu prevented Cao Cao, victor of the civil war in the north, from restoring the unity which had been lost by the last emperors of Han. At the same time, however, by confirming and developing a Chinese presence in that frontier territory, the generals of Wu established the conditions not just for their own short-lived political survival, but also for the dynasties which took refuge there after the overthrow of Western Jin at the beginning of the fourth century, and which maintained their cultural heritage through the next three hundred years.
Embargo
Anybody out there ? : The Chinese Labour Movement under Xi
(Canberra, ACT : Australian Centre on China in the World, The Australian National University, 2018) Australian National University. Australian Centre on China in the World
Labour activism has undergone significant transformation in China over the last decade. Between the mid-2000s and mid-2010s, an increase in labour protests seemed to herald a growing and more self-confident labour movement. A series of high-profile collective actions that took place in the early 2010s brought forward a time of renewed optimism, during which the public debate on Chinese labour came to be dominated by the idea of China’s workers ‘awakening’ and taking their fate into their own hands. Far from the optimism of those years, today the effects of economic slowdown and the tightening of civil society have thrown China’s workers into a state of uncertainty and disorientation, and the Chinese labour movement has once again found itself at an impasse. This issue of Made in China takes a look at the current conjuncture.
Embargo
States of Emergency: The Sichuan Earthquake Ten Years On
(Canberra, ACT : Australian Centre on China in the World, The Australian National University, 2018) Australian National University. Australian Centre on China in the World
On 12 May 2008, a 7.9 magnitude earthquake hit Wenchuan county, Sichuan province. Felt as far as Beijing, the tremors caused horrific damage: 69,229 people died and 17,923 went missing. Yet, the aftermath of the seism was also a time of hope with Chinese citizens from all over the country outdoing each other to show solidarity with the victims. As local governments began to recognise the importance of NGOs in providing disaster relief and social services, 2008 was widely seen as a 'Year Zero' for Chinese civil society. At that time, hardly anybody could have foreseen the wave of repression against civil society that was to come and that is today the norm. This issue looks back at the legacy of this disaster, and the ways in which state and civil society actors renegotiate their positions during 'states of emergency'.
Embargo
Disturbances in Heaven
(Canberra, ACT : ANU Press, The Australian National University., 2017) Australian National University. Australian Centre on China in the World; Franceschini, Ivan; Lin, Kevin; Loubere, Nicholas
According to the Chinese zodiac, 2016 was the year of the fire monkey. What better character than Sun Wukong to inspire this inaugural volume of the Made in China Yearbook? In this past year, Chinese workers and activists from all walks of life have struggled under heightened repression by the Chinese party-state, showing remarkable endurance even under these dire circumstances. Through their battles, however small or short-lived, they repeatedly challenged the message of 'harmony' put forward by the Chinese authorities, creating 'disturbances' in the imaginary heaven engineered by the party-state. All of this is nothing other than proof of the survival of the monkey spirit in Chinese society. Even when trapped under a mountain of repression, or in terrible pain due to the curse of the magic headband of state control, the monkey still manages to briefly wriggle free, reminding us that not all is well, that not everything is predictable.
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Gilded Age
(ANU Press, 2018) Australian National University. Australian Centre on China in the World; Franceschini, Ivan; Loubere, Nicholas
According to the Chinese zodiac, 2017 was the year of the 'fire rooster', an animal often associated with the mythical fenghuang, a magnificently beautiful bird whose appearance is believed to mark the beginning of a new era of peaceful flourishing. Considering the auspicious symbolism surrounding the fenghuang, it is fitting that on 18 October 2017, President Xi Jinping took to the stage of the Nineteenth Party Congress to proclaim the beginning of a 'new era' for Chinese socialism. However, in spite of such ecumenical proclamations, it became immediately evident that not all in China would be welcome to reap the rewards promised by the authorities. Migrant workers, for one, remain disposable. Lawyers, activists, and even ordinary citizens who dare to express critical views also hardly find a place in Xi's brave new world. This Yearbook traces the stark new 'gilded age' inaugurated by the Chinese Communist Party. It does so through a collection of more than forty original essays on labour, civil society, and human rights in China and beyond penned by leading scholars and practitioners from around the world.
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A new beginning
(Canberra, ACT : Australian Centre on China in the World, The Australian National University, 2016) Australian National University. Australian Centre on China in the World
With this first issue, we are pleased to announce the launch of Made in China, a quarterly on Chinese labour, civil society, and rights. This project stems from our previous experiences as editors of a newsletter on Chinese labour funded by the Italian Trade Union Institute for Development Cooperation (Ivan Franceschini) and co-editor of the website China Labour News Translations (Kevin Lin). In the last few years, the Chinese labour movement has witnessed significant developments, not only with the occurrence of some of the largest strikes in decades but also the emergence of grave challenges for workers and activists. As researchers of Chinese labour, we believe that this calls for more serious analysis from both scholars and practitioners, as well for a critical engagement with a broader international audience interested in forging international solidarity. It is with these aims in mind—and thanks to the support of the Australian Centre on China in the World, ANU, and the European Union Horizon 2020 Programme— that we are now starting this new venture. In this first issue, you will find summaries of recent events that have taken place in China, as well as a series of columns on specific topics, such as the recent wave of protests in the Chinese state sector and the expected impact of the Trans-Pacific Partnership on labour rights. We devote the core of the first issue to the plight of Chinese labour NGOs, contextualising it through a debate between three promi-With this first issue, we are pleased to announce the launch of Made in China, a quarterly on Chinese labour, civil society, and rights. This project stems from our previous experiences as editors of a newsletter on Chinese labour funded by the Italian Trade Union Institute for Development Cooperation (Ivan Franceschini) and co-editor of the website China Labour News Translations (Kevin Lin). In the last few years, the Chinese labour movement has witnessed significant developments, not only with the occurrence of some of the largest strikes in decades but also the emergence of grave challenges for workers and activists. As researchers of Chinese labour, we believe that this calls for more serious analysis from both scholars and practitioners, as well for a critical engagement with a broader international audience interested in forging international solidarity. It is with these aims in mind—and thanks to the support of the Australian Centre on China in the World, ANU, and the European Union Horizon 2020 Programme— that we are now starting this new venture. In this first issue, you will find summaries of recent events that have taken place in China, as well as a series of columns on specific topics, such as the recent wave of protests in the Chinese state sector and the expected impact of the Trans-Pacific Partnership on labour rights. We devote the core of the first issue to the plight of Chinese labour NGOs, contextualising it through a debate between three promi-With this first issue, we are pleased to announce the launch of Made in China, a quarterly on Chinese labour, civil society, and rights. This project stems from our previous experiences as editors of a newsletter on Chinese labour funded by the Italian Trade Union Institute for Development Cooperation (Ivan Franceschini) and co-editor of the website China Labour News Translations (Kevin Lin). In the last few years, the Chinese labour movement has witnessed significant developments, not only with the occurrence of some of the largest strikes in decades but also the emergence of grave challenges for workers and activists. As researchers of Chinese labour, we believe that this calls for more serious analysis from both scholars and practitioners, as well for a critical engagement with a broader international audience interested in forging international solidarity. It is with these aims in mind—and thanks to the support of the Australian Centre on China in the World, ANU, and the European Union Horizon 2020 Programme— that we are now starting this new venture. In this first issue, you will find summaries of recent events that have taken place in China, as well as a series of columns on specific topics, such as the recent wave of protests in the Chinese state sector and the expected impact of the Trans-Pacific Partnership on labour rights. We devote the core of the first issue to the plight of Chinese labour NGOs, contextualising it through a debate between three promi-nent international labour experts. Finally, we celebrate the award of the prestigious Joseph Levenson Prize to Luigi Tomba, a long-standing researcher of Chinese labour. The newsletter is hosted by Chinoiresie. info, a forthcoming collective blog edited by young scholars and dedicated to the analysis of Chinese society. If you are interested in sharing your insights on this newsletter, or on the website, you can contact us at madeinchina@chinoiresie. info. We welcome any feedback and we hope you will consider sharing this newsletter with y our friends and colleagues.

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