by liberal japonicus
To return to my 白鲸 (White Whale), I post this interview with Yi-Ling Liu, author of the new book The Wall Dancers: Searching for Freedom and Connection on the Chinese Internet.
At the beginning of the interview, Aaron Bastani notes that there is a whole cadre of author/analysts who are have a foot in the West and a foot in China, and mentions Karen Hao and Dan Wang. Some others include Leslie T. Chang (author of Factory Girls, which talks about internal migration in China), Alice Han (who does a podcast with James Kynge called China Decoded), Mei Fong (author of One Child) and Yuen Yuen Ang (Chinese-Singaporean), who I mentioned earlier in relation to her book China’s Gilded Age, but also has another interesting book called How China Escaped the Poverty Trap. (I don’t think it is a coincidence that with the exception of Dan Wang, they are all women) I liked all of them, but I think that Liu really nails some things.
I have to admit, there is a faint ache of basically seeing that the train you thought that you’d be riding had left the station without you. I imagined that being Japanese-American and making my home in Japan, I would be able to provide a similar kind of insight (I came here in 1987, in the decade after Ezra Vogel’s Japan as No. 1 and all I can say is don’t believe everything you read) but now, my ability to read Japanese kanji doesn’t buy me much in terms of Chinese fluency. Oh well.
I note that The Economist‘s China staff (those that aren’t ex-pat Brits) all seem to be women as well. Including those from Taipei and Singapore. Hmmm….
Profiles of the people referenced in the post.
“In short, they form a complementary “reading list” for understanding China. Liu, Chang, and Fong bring vivid human stories from the margins; Hao and Wang illuminate the tech/industrial engine; Han translates this into macro/geopolitical and investment signals; and Ang supplies overarching theoretical scaffolding. Dan Wang provides a key analytical male counterpoint in a predominantly female group of insightful voices. Their collective work counters caricatures by showing a restless, innovative, constrained, and multifaceted society and system.”
Comparing Notable China Experts
wj, interesting, that. The reason I said that it wasn’t coincidental was my thinking that the things I’m interested in (cultural and social change) would be best relayed by women, who might have more of an interesting view about the pros and cons of modernity in society.
lj, I’m thinking that perhaps women find it easier to get people to open up and talk to them. In short, to gather information to analyze and to report on.
In as patriarchal a society as China, they may be seen as less threatening. That would apply across the economy and across society, not just when it comes to understanding social and cultural changes.
lj, thanks for the post. The interview is interesting and informative.
wj, that’s true, but my reason is that women, because they have only relatively recently been able to make the strides they have, they understand better than most the tradeoffs that a Chinese century might bring.
You can contrast Liu with Rogoff (I’m not positive is this is the exact interview I’m thinking of, but I think it gets close https://youtu.be/P2b4TjQa4gk?si=9etkI4l0WsJxHh1w ) Rogoff has a lot of insight, but he views the world for the perspective of a white guy stakeholder and isn’t really able to see how that perspective might blind him to other possibilities.