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Posts from the ‘Urban culture and cities’ Category

Jan 6

Image from ESWN: The Shishou Mass Incident (2009)

Legal Daily report on mass incidents in China in 2012

The Legal Daily 法治日报 has published a summary of their ’2012 Mass Incident Research Report’ 2012年群体性事件研究报告, quantifying and analyzing ‘mass incidents’ in China – riots, civil unrest, and protests. The data sources and methodology behind the report are not made explicit in their introduction (which says the full report can be provided if you contact them; Danwei has not yet obtained a copy of the full report).

The summary does not give an absolute number of mass incidents in 2012, and the numbers in the geographical distribution section which seem to indicate, for example, that Guangdong only had eight mass incidents, do not make sense when compared to previous reports by Chinese government organs that talked about 80 to 100,000 mass incidents a year nationwide.

The report highlights Weibo as an increasingly significant factor in mass incidents, and makes recommendations that local authorities take “positive” steps like making official announcements and dealing with the person responsible for the situation, rather than using “negative” methods such as information blackouts, forced dispersals and arrests.

Some key statistic of the report are summarized below: Read more

Jan 4

Dongfang Jinbao 4 Jan

China’s “most severe traffic law in history”

China’s newspapers are today mulling over what is being portrayed as a sea change on China’s roads, a new regulation that has caused some consternation: Running a yellow light (note yellow, not red) will now be severely punished with an automatic deduction of six points! Thus cartoons and graphic depictions of cars, traffic lights and other nondescript yellow things (see gallery below) all bellow out that running a yellow light (闯黄灯) is now no longer cool.

Yet when a journalist from Orient Today (东方今报) from Henan province yesterday went to observe the traffic in Zhengzhou (郑州), capital of Henan province, he found the usual black Audis and other cars jumping yellow lights, some drivers talking on their mobile phones while they did so, as if there were no new “most severe traffic law in history” in force in China.

Here’s a few other yellow traffic light-themed front pages from around China today:

Read more

Dec 24

Jinchen Liu Dian 24 Dec

China’s hottest “styles” of 2012

The Six O’Clock This Morning (今晨六点) from Shandong province today has a special feature rounding up the newspaper’s selection of the hottest “styles” of 2012, using an English word that has been popularized in China this year because of the global pop song hit ‘Gangnam Style’. Intending to capture some of the humor and pedantic banality of our social media-obsessed world, the special round-up of 2012 is divided into six categories:

  1. “Funny (幽默) Style”
  2. “Strong (实力) Style”
  3. “Emotional (感情) Style”
  4. “Surprising (惊诧) Style”
  5. “Lateral Thinking (偏锋) Style”, and
  6. “Controversial (争论) Style”

To put the whole section in its proper context, the newspaper prefaces it with the following quip:

In this year of 2012 sports and entertainment stars performed all kinds of remarkable deeds; they accomplished acts of great strength; they made some unconventional winning gambits (剑走偏锋); they got a lot of attention by means of marriage and divorce; and they swaggered around endlessly leaving you dazed and confused. No matter what kind of Style, these were all hot in 2012. They fully deserve the right to be called hot, and yet we are still mystified at why they became hot.

Read more

Dec 10

Shenyang Wanbao 12Dec12

Female mayors given extra classes on makeup, tea ceremonies and flower arranging

Wouldn’t it be great if you had female leaders in China that are not only strong leaders but also look attractive and know how to work with tea and flowers because these things make them more charming? Or does that sound slightly odd? This is exactly what’s been happening with 21 female city mayors from all over China who have just graduated from a 13-week training course in Shanghai that focused both on their leadership abilities as well as their skills with tea ceremonies, flower arranging and makeup.

Read more

Dec 4

Henan Shangbao 4 Dec 12

Unknown migrant worker dies after lying 20 days under a bridge in Henan

In Zhengzhou (郑州) in Henan province in November, a migrant worker lay under a bridge for more than 20 days. He didn’t seem to be very ill, just cold, hungry and destitute. People came and went, even emergency medical services were there  once – yet he still died, alone. Who is he and why did he die? This is what the Henan Business Daily (河南商报) asks today with a front page special section on the fate of this forlorn migrant worker and others like him in China.

Read more

Nov 26

Xinmin Wanbao 26 Nov

Aircraft on the Liaoning and other stories from China’s newspapers today

Most of the front pages of China’s newspapers today revelled in the display of aircraft landing on China’s new aircraft carrier. Scroll down to see a gallery.

But there was also much else on China’s front pages to enjoy today, such as China’s own 47 kg “Mike Tyson”; China’s best books of 2012; marine life off Shenzhen; a tirade against incorrect signposts in Shanghai; and the travails of a 14-year old girl working in her mother’s stead sweeping the streets of Wuhan – and no-one seems to mind. Read more

Nov 16

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The Wrinkly Arm of the Law

A photo diary of encounters with retiree security volunteers in Beijing during the 18th Party Congress. Read more

Nov 15

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Celebrating Singles’ day


This is the 1510 Digest, a weekly roundup of recent essays and articles published on the Chinese web, with links to translations on the Marco Polo Project.

On November 11 – 11/11 – China celebrated ‘Singles’ day’. The origins of the festival are somewhat obscure – it allegedly started within a group of friends on the Nanjing campus in the early 90s – but it has since become a popular celebration. The festival has grassroots origin, and its fame spread over the internet, though business has also encouraged this festival, seeing urban singles as an attractive consumer group. A form of ‘bachelor pride’ for unmarried young people, singles’ day is an occasion for them to come together and indulge, or – for others – it is a day to get married and say goodbye to single’s life.

This festival also reflects changes in contemporary Chinese relationships and families, which this week’s digest will focus on. Li Yinhe’s post looks through the causes for the growing number of single-person households in China; Peng Peng reflects on the reasons why Singles’ day turned into an e-shopping festival; and Wang Feng’s more melancholy piece, ‘Chinese lonesomeness’, gives us insight into the spiritual life of a single Chinese urbanite.
Read more

Oct 26

Shenyang Wanbao 26 Oct 12

“Black kid’s happy life” in Shenyang orphanage

On the front page of Shenyang Evening News (沈阳晚报) from the capital of Liaoning province today is a large picture and profile of a four-year-old mixed-race child — the “happy black kid” of the headline who ended up in a Shenyang orphanage after he was found abandoned on a street in the city. Surnamed Shen after Shenyang (沈阳) like all the children at the orphanage, the child was a source of amazement to the Shenyang Evening News journalist who went to the orphanage to check him out. Read more

Oct 24

Chanjiang Shangbao 24 Oct 12

“Obama’s mouth won”

Obama won the debate, and both Obama and Romney think China should be a partner of the US. That in a nutshell is the verdict of the Changjiang Times (长江商报) from Hubei province today on Monday’s third and final debate of the Big American Election (美国大选), as US presidential elections are commonly referred to in China’s newspapers. In a full page spread, the Changjiang Times has a neat summary of the essential information: Who won the debate and what was said about China. A handful of papers in China today carried similar reports of the debate on their front pages. Read more

Oct 19

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Can you blame the post-eighties generation?

This is the China Writing Digest, a weekly roundup of recent essays and articles published on the Chinese web, with links to translations on the Marco Polo Project.

This week’s digest takes a look at the Chinese Gen Y – generally known as ‘the post-eighties’ (80后) – through three posts written by representatives of this generation. Xi Mu confronts an older friend’s criticism that the post-eighties are spoilt apolitical only children by putting forward a number of concrete grassroots initiatives led by them. Written from a Christian perspective, Tan Ni’s article reflects on history to try and understand how the second-hand memories of the Cultural Revolution affected the post-eighties. Finally, Zhang Junkai takes us across the straits to consider the common experiences of the post-eighties generation in Taiwan. Read more

Oct 17

Xinkuai Bao 17 Oct 12

Children chained to a wall by parents working at Guangzhou construction site

What do you do when you have two children but no-one to look after them and not enough money to put them in kindergarten? The New Express Daily (新快报) from Guangdong has a picture on its front page today showing what happened when migrant worker parents in Guangzhou found themselves in this predicament: they chained their children chained to a wall at a construction site. Read more

Oct 11

Beijing Chenbao 11 Oct 12

Beijing Morning Post investigation reveals horrid state of pet dog market in the city

It has often happened in China that buying a dog can turn into a nightmarish experience. The same little puppy that looked so lively in the shop window would suddenly become sick beyond help and die. The front page of the Beijing Morning Post today features a harrowing investigation into the dirty secrets of the pet dog market in China.

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