Sinica Podcast - Sinica at the Association for Asian Studies Conference, Boston 2023: Capsule interviews

Sinica at the Association for Asian Studies Conference, Boston 2023: Capsule interviews

04/06/23 • 63 min

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This week on Sinica, something different: Kaiser asks over a dozen scholars of various facets of China studies to talk about their work and make some recommendations! You'll hear from a variety of scholars, from MA students to tenured professors, talking about a bewildering range of fascinating work they're doing. Enjoy!

3:00 – Kristin Shi-Kupfer — recommendations: this essay (in Chinese) by Teng Biao on Chinese Trump supporters; Han Rongbin's work on digital society; and Yang Guobin's work on digital expression on the internet in China.

7:48 – Lev Nachman — recommendation: Ian Rowen, One China, Many Taiwans: The Geopolitics of Cross-Strait Tourism; and the city of Taichung, and especially its night market food on Yizhong Street and the Fang Chia Night market.

9:27 – Lin Zhang — recommendation: Victor Seow, Carbon Technocracy: Energy Regimes in Modern East Asia; and Gary Gertle, American Crucible: Race and Nation in the 20th Century

15:32 – Maura Dykstra — recommendation: Richard von Glahn's contribution to the Oxford History of Modern China about registration in imperial China

19:00 – Jonathan Elkobi — a Rand Corporation study on economic cooperation between Israel and China; the fusion band Snarky Puppy

22:22 – Seiji Shirane — Seediq Bale (Warriors of the Rainbow) and Lust, Caution

25:18 – Zhu Qian — Rebecca Karl, Staging the World: Chinese Nationalism at the Turn of the 20th Century, and two films: Hou Hsiao-hsien's A City of Sadness and Jia Zhangke's A Touch of Sin

31:23– Fabio Lanza — Sarah Mellors Rodriguez, Reproductive Realities in Modern China: Birth Control and Abortion, 1911–2021; and Leopoldina Fortunati, The Arcane of Reproduction: Housework, Prostitution, Labor and Capital by Leopoldina Fortunati <...

9:27 – Lin Zhang — recommendation: Victor Seow, Carbon Technocracy: Energy Regimes in Modern East Asia; and Gary Gertle, American Crucible: Race and Nation in the 20th Century

15:32 – Maura Dykstra — recommendation: Richard von Glahn's contribution to the Oxford History of Modern China about registration in imperial China

19:00 – Jonathan Elkobi — a Rand Corporation study on economic cooperation between Israel and China; the fusion band Snarky Puppy

22:22 – Seiji Shirane — Seediq Bale (Warriors of the Rainbow) and Lust, Caution

Previous Episode

The Maoist legacy in Chinese private enterprise, with Chris Marquis

This week on Sinica, Kaiser chats with Chris Marquis, a professor at Cambridge University’s Judge Business School, and formerly at Cornell’s business school, about the book he co-authored with Kunyuan Qiao, Mao and Markets: The Communist Roots of Chinese Enterprise. In it, they examine how even in China's private sector, socialization into the ideology of the Chinese Communist Party among some entrepreneurs has left an enduring legacy that is visible in some of the ways Chinese private enterprises conduct business.

3:35 – Motivation for Mao and Markets

5:34 – Enduring elements of Maoism in contemporary Chinese enterprise

12:35 – Variation among “Maoist” entrepreneurs

20:40 – Differentiating superficial and authentic Maoist entrepreneurship

35:04 – Is today’s China ideological or simply nationalistic?

39:17 – Xi’s Maoist revival: real or imagined?

44:30 – Chris’s transition from business and sociology to Chinese politics

47:09 – Chris’s experience as a Thousand Talents recipient

A complete transcript of this podcast is available at TheChinaProject.com.

Recommendations:

Chris: The Entrepreneurial State and The Big Con by Mariana Mazzucato

Kaiser: This calendar of lunar phases from theoriginallunarphase.com, and Mongolian salty milk tea, or sūūtei tsai

which is easy to make at home

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Next Episode

As the U.S. and China part ways, the Global South finds its own path, with Kishore Mahbubani

This week on Sinica, Kishore Mahbubani, who served as Singapore's UN Ambassador and has written extensively on ASEAN and the U.S.-China rift, returns to the show to discuss his recent essay in Foreign Affairs, and to advocate for the pragmatic approach that's held ASEAN together for over five decades of continuous peace and growing prosperity.

4:36 – Kishore talks about Macron’s state visit to China and the controversy around his comments in media interviews

8:53 – How the Ukraine War has highlighted divisions between the West and the Global South

11:45 – Pragmatism: is this a euphemism for amorality?

15:26 – ASEAN as a template for multipolarity

19:38 – Cultural relativism, moral absolutism, and the shift in the American intelligentsia

24:56 – How does ASEAN handle specific issues of U.S.-China tension?

29:12 – Investment and trade: China and ASEAN vs. U.S and ASEAN — guns and butter

40:04 – The Belt and Road Initiative and American attitudes toward it

44:10 – Kishore’s “three rules” for U.S. engagement with ASEAN

49:49 – China’s recent diplomatic efforts: Saudi-Iran, and the Ukraine War

52:34 – How receptive has the American strategic class been to Kishore’s ideas?

A complete transcript of this podcast is available at TheChinaProject.com.