FEATURED ARTICLE How To Make My Ex Want Me Back Yahoo Answers Does Christianity Have a Future in China? (September 10, 2012, ChinaSource)Given the resurgence of Christianity in China’s recent history, the church’s continued momentum going forward is, for some observers, almost a foregone conclusion. Others, however, would suggest that, without a fundamental change at this juncture in its development, the church’s future may not be so bright. To understand where the church is going, let’s first take a look back at where it has been.GOVERNMENT / POLITICS / FOREIGN AFFAIRSChina sends patrol ships to disputed East China Sea islands (September 11, 2012, BBC News)Two Chinese patrol ships have been sent to islands disputed with Japan, which has sealed a deal to purchase the territory, Chinese state media say. The ships had reached waters near the islands – known as Senkaku in Japan and Diaoyu in China – to “assert the country’s sovereignty”, Xinhua said. Japan confirmed on Tuesday it had signed a contract to buy three of the islands from their private owner.China’s Xi not seen in public because of ailment: sources (September 11, 2012, Reuters)China’s top leader-in-waiting Xi Jinping, who has set off a storm of rumors after not showing up at scheduled public events for more than a week, is nursing an ailment, possibly a back injury suffered while swimming, sources said on Tuesday. Xi, who is due to take over the presidency of the world’s second-largest economy in March next year, has skipped several meetings with visiting foreign leaders and dignitaries over the past week, including U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and the prime ministers of Singapore and Denmark. China’s government, however, has declined to spell out what is ailing Xi, 59 – in keeping with decades of official secrecy over the health of senior leaders, a tradition viewed in the West as out of step with a modern state and emerging superpower.US calls for ‘cooler heads’ in China-Japan islands row (September 12, 2012, BBC News)The US has called for ”cooler heads to prevail” as tension intensifies between China and Japan over disputed islands in the East China Sea. China sent two patrol ships to islands – known as Senkaku in Japan and Diaoyu in China – on Tuesday. This came after Japan sealed a deal to buy three of the islands from their private Japanese owner. Washington will not take sides in the matter, said Assistant Secretary of State Kurt Campbell.Chinese media cite absent leader Xi Jinping (September 13, 2012, BBC News)Chinese Vice-President Xi Jinping has been cited in state media – the first reported communication since he disappeared from view 12 days ago. Mr Xi’s name appeared in the Guangxi Daily newspaper with those of several other officials offering condolences over the death of a former general. Mr Xi is expected to become president at a party congress later this year. But his absence – including cancelled meetings – has sparked rumours from sporting injury to serious illness.Do China’s bloggers threaten or bolster Communist rule? (September 9, 2012, Globe and Mail)The public backlash after the Harbin bridge collapse was just the latest example of how people have used Weibo (pronounced way-bwah) to break news, expose corruption and challenge a power structure that has little experience in dealing with public opinion. For the first time, many Chinese can choose which news they want to read and to believe, and let others know what they think about it.China’s Revolution Risk (September 10, 2102, The Telegraph)We all know by now about the simmering leadership crisis in China. The Bo Xilai affair has lifted the lid on a hornet’s nest. I had not realised quite how serious the situation has become until listening to China expert Cheng Li here at the Ambrosetti forum of the world policy elites on Lake Como. (My hardship assignment each year.) Nor had anybody else in the room at Villa d’Este. There were audible gasps.The rifts within the upper echelons of Chinese Communist Party are worse than they were during the build-up to Tiananmen Square, he said, and risks spiralling into “revolution”.Re-Examining Re-Education Through Labor (September 11, 2012, The Wall Street Journal)Public debate is growing in China over the countrys decades-old practice of sending alleged troublemakers to labor camps for years at a time without formal arrest or trial. The fact that the system, known as re-education through labor (laojiao, or RETL), is being debated openly in China has been portrayed in some quarters as evidence of the increasing power of public opinion to bolster rule of law in the country. But is there any evidence of substantive reform?Seriously questionable (September 12, 2012, Analects)These rumours bear repeating not because any have been reported with anything like corroborating information, but because they illustrate the nature of the information vacuum that Chinas system produces, and the nature of what rushes in to fill it.Conspiracy theories as China’s heir disappears (September 11, 2012, Sydney Morning Herald)For veteran analysts and insiders, the public relations debacle over what might be an ordinary physical ailment is further evidence that China’s elite political framework is reaching its use-by date.The Mysterious Case Of China’s Disappearing Heir Apparent (September 11, 2012, NPR Two-way Blog)In the rarefied air of China’s leadership circle, anything that strays from strict protocol becomes grist for the rumor mill. So it is with the mysterious and sudden disappearance of Xi Jinping, the presumptive heir to President Hu Jintao.Wheres Xi? Using New Code Words, Chinas Netizens Speculate by the Thousands (September 11, 2012, Tea Leaf Nation)You want to know about politics in Beijing? Four words: Watch your back, Jinping. Gu Kailai heading to luxury ‘Club Fed’ prison (September 12, 2012, Shanghaiist)Gu Kailai heading to luxury ‘Club Fed’ prisonXi Jinping mystery echoes back to Chinas history (September 13, 2012, The Washington Post)When Lin Biao, Chinas then heir apparent, died in an air crash more than 40 years ago, it took the Communist Party two months to inform the public. This weeks unexplained disappearance of Xi Jinping, Chinas leader-in-waiting, who has not been seen in public for 11 days, shows that, despite the countrys economic transformation, when it comes to its leaders, Beijing is as secretive now as it was in 1971, when Lin Biao died and Mao Zedong was still in power.RELIGIONChina’s Great Leap Outward (Summer 2012, ChinaSource Quarterly)As several writers have suggested in this issue, China’s “leap outward” has two clear implications for the expansion of the gospel among and through the Chinese. This outward migration comes at a time when Christians in China are increasingly zealous to take the gospel beyond China’s borders. The “Back to Jerusalem” vision has animated much of the church with a sense of mission. Providentially, the growing ability of Chinese believers to go abroad, including to countries that do not welcome traditional Christian workers, provides a means of putting feet to this vision.The Church in China: A Place at the Table (September 12, 2012, ChinaSource Blog)I sat across from a Chinese Christian in the lobby of a Beijing hotel as he rearranged the cups and plates on the coffee table between us. Having cleared a space at the center of the table, he pointed to a cup sitting at the edge, near one corner. The church is here,” he said. “So concerned with its own internal problems, it doesn’t recognize there is this growing empty space in the center of society.” This space, representing China’s growing crisis of faith, was created by China’s leaders following the death of Mao Zedong.HEALTHHealth agencies contain plague (September 12, 2012, Shanghai Daily)Chinas health agencies are taking every effort to prevent the spread of plague, Deng Haihua, a spokesman for the Ministry of Health, said yesterday. On Monday, the ministry reported that one person in southwest China’s Sichuan Province had died of the disease last Friday. The ministry will inform the public of developments and possible risks, Deng said. Specialists have been despatched to prevent any spread of the disease.900,000 babies born with defects every year (September 13, 2012, China Daily)China has 900,000 new cases of birth defects every year, a report issued by the Ministry of Health said on Wednesday. The high number of birth defects has become the second cause of newborn death in 2011, or 19.1 percent of all deaths, the report said. Birth defects, or congenital disorders, include at least 8,000 kinds of diseases, such as congenital heart disease, cleft palate, hydrocephalus and neural tube deformities, and those are the most common among all the defects.Foot-and-mouth disease reported in Tibet (September 13, 2012, China Daily)Foot-and-mouth disease infections have been confirmed in livestock in Southwest China’s Tibet autonomous region, the Ministry of Agriculture announced Thursday. A total of 123 live head of cattle and 108 pigs at a village in Bomi county, Nyingchi prefecture, showed symptoms associated with foot-and-mouth disease, according to the MOA. The National Foot-and-Mouth Disease Reference Laboratory on Thursday confirmed that the livestock were infected with type O foot-and-mouth disease after testing samples collected at the farm, the MOA said. Local authorities have sealed off and sterilized the infected area, where a total of 612 head of cattle and pigs have been culled and safely disposed of in order to prevent the disease from spreading since the case was confirmed, according to the MOA.EDUCATION / CULTUREHong Kong backs down over Chinese patriotism classes (September 8, 2012, BBC News)The Hong Kong government has backed down over plans to make schoolchildren take Chinese patriotism classes, after weeks of protests. City leader Leung Chun-ying said the classes would be optional for schools. “The schools are given the authority to decide when and how they would like to introduce the moral and national education,” he said. Critics said the plans were an attempt to brainwash the city’s children by the Chinese government in Beijing.Asia’s largest ski resort to open this year (September 13, 2012, China Daily)Asia’s largest ski resort is expected to open by the end of the year on Changbai Mountain in Northeast China’s Jilin province, according to local authorities. Covering an area of seven square kilometers, the resort has 43 ski runs totalling 30 kilometers and can accommodate 8,000 skiers at a time, said Chen Weigen, vice-governor of Jilin. The resort is part of the Changbai Mountain international holiday resort. The first phase of the project, which includes five-star hotels, a resort town and a cultural center, started operating in late July after three years of construction.Walk the Great Wall: Interview with the author Bryan Feldman(September 10, 2012, Sapore di Cina)Last month, while I was doing a research for an article about the Great Wall of China, I stumbled upon the Great Wall Forum.A Bite of China: the finest food TV ever?(September 12, 2012, Word of Mouth Blog)It’s not on British telly yet but the beautifully made series ‘A Bite of China’ puts our own food TV in the shade, says Oliver ThringTop English Phrases Borrowed from Chinese (September 12, 2012, World of Chinese)Here are the top 10 Chinese phrases that made it over the Great Wall and into the vocabularies of English speakers everywhere, with a few that might just surprise you.SOCIETY / LIFEDeath toll from China quake rises to 81 (September 9, 2012, China Daily)A 3.7-magnitude aftershock that occurred in Southwest China’s Yunnan province Saturday evening killed one person, the latest victim following multiple earthquakes that hit a mountainous area in the province on Sept 7. The Ministry of Civil Affairs said Sunday that the quakes have killed 81 people in the city of Zhaotong.120,000 expats covered by Chinese social insurance (September 10, 2012, China Daily)More than 120,000 foreigners have subscribed to China’s social security system so far, Hu Xiaoyi, China’s vice-minister of human resources and social security, said Monday. Hu said at a press conference that local governments have been actively promoting the work since China offered to cover foreign employees by its social safety net last year. The social insurance scheme that took effect October 15 last year allows foreigners with work permits in China to receive the same retirement, unemployment, medical, work injury and maternity benefits as Chinese citizens.The ministry has maintained communication with foreign organizations and enterprises in China to solve problems in the detailed implementation of the scheme, he said.Railway ministry extends ticket booking period to 28 days (September 10, 2012, Shanghai Daily)The Railway Ministry is extending ticket booking period on a trial basis with trains that leave from Shanghai for Wuhan, Zhengzhou, Nanchang and Chengdu cities, Wuhan Evening News reported today. Tickets can be booked 28 days in advance, compared with the current practice of 12 days. Travelers can log on www.12306.cn between 11am to 8pm today to reserve tickets for any of the 42 trains that leave Shanghai on September 29- 30 and October 1, 5, 6 and 7, peak travel dates during the upcoming National Day holiday.The Ten Grave Problems Facing China (September 8, 2012, The China Story)Many of the issues raised below are touched on in our recently published China Story Yearbook 2012: Red Rising Red Eclipse, available on this site.The forbidden public toilets of Beijing(September 8, 2012, BBC News)The journalists’ rule of thumb in China is that you cannot report the so-called three Ts – Tiananmen, Taiwan or Tibet. But it turns out there is also another T that upsets Chinese censors.What Keeps the Chinese Up at Night (September 9, 2012, The New York Times)For four years, I tried to answer this question, as I traveled to and from the foggy, industrial megacity of Chongqing as a visiting professor. I spent months teaching and studying in communities without foreigners around, where state-run factories had closed and where landless ex-farmers now live in barren blocks of apartments.Population and the challenge of Chinese growth (September 9, 2012, East Asia Forum)Thirty years on, the Chinese government is confronted with another problem in redoubling its long-term efforts to raise the potential growth rate of the Chinese economy. The workforce has already begun to shrink. Confronted by a decline in the supply of labour, lifting economic efficiency through the reallocation of resources to lift output is now the major challenge.Portraits of the Chinese and Their Possessions (September 10, 2012, micgadget.com)A Chinese photographer from Beijing has created a set of interesting pictures showing Chinese people standing in front of their homes, surrounded by all of their worldly possessions.A Panoramic View of Chinas Cultural Revolution (September 10, 2012, NYT Lens Blog)Li Zhenshengs photographs of the Chinese Cultural Revolution are perhaps the most complete and nuanced pictorial account of the decade of turmoil ignited by Mao Zedong.Women in Prison Fare Better in China (September 11, 2012, The Los Angeles Times)With new amendments to female prisoners rights about to be introduced, China appeared to be doing well, though Mr. Kamm cautioned that far more needed to be known about conditions on the ground. Often, in China, laws look good on paper, but enforcement is, at best, patchy.Murong Xuecun on the living echoes of the past (September 12, 2012, Shanghaiist)Over a hundred years ago, there was a group of people who called for the boycott of foreign products. Anyone who would so much as light a foreign lamp would be the target of their fury. They burnt the churches, killed the missionaries, and slaughtered their own people, leaving a trail of utter destruction in their paths.Xia Shang on what would make him die for China (September 13, 2012, Shanghaiist)If there were freedom from fear, if there were real elections, if the army belonged to the people,SCIENCE / TECHNOLOGY / ENVIRONMENT20 funniest Chinese homemade machines (September 6, 2012, China Whisper)Everything is copied in China, but there are also creative minds among the population. Here is a selection of homemade Chinese inventions.The river that DID run red: Residents of Chinese city left baffled after Yangtze turns scarlet(September 7, 2012, Daily Mail)It is the last thing the residents of Chongqing would have expected to see. But the Yangtze river, which runs through the city in south-western China, turned a bright shade of orange-red yesterday. The waterway where the Yangtze met the Jialin River provided a fascinating contrast as the red started to filter into the other river.The millionth tree planted in Inner Mongolia by Shanghai Roots and Shoots (September 12, 2012, Danwei)In 2007 a bright eyed bunch of volunteers in a nascent NGO called Shanghai Roots & Shoots, had a dream to help fight desertification in China. Their dream: to plant one million trees on the edge of the Gobi Desert in Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region of China.BUSINESS / ECONOMICS / FOREIGN TRADEChina growth forecasts shrink as economy stumbles (September 10, 2012, CNN)Spurred by a wave of disappointing data, economists are growing more pessimistic about China’s short-term growth prospects. Swiss banking giant UBS has lowered its forecast for how much China’s economy will grow this year to 7.5% from 8%. And Goldman Sachs has issued a slightly less dour outlook for China growthdropping it to 7.6% from 8.0%. The downward revisions suggest experts believe China’s economy may not mount a recovery this quarter and instead would remain in a holding pattern. China’s GDP grew 7.6% in the second quarter.China to raise gasoline, diesel prices (September 10, 2012, Xinhua)China will raise the retail prices of gasoline by 550 yuan (85.75 U.S. dollars) per tonne and diesel by 540 yuan per tonne starting Tuesday, the country’s top economic planner announced on Monday. The benchmark retail price of gasoline will be lifted by 0.41 yuan per liter and diesel by 0.46 yuan per liter, according to a statement posted on the website of the the National Development and Reform Commission. The price hike, which marks the second such increase in a month and the fourth this year, comes amid rising pressures for the country’s refineries as increasing global crude prices keep driving up their operation costs.China on track to hit ambitious public housing target (September 10, 2012, Reuters)China has this year invested 820 billion yuan ($129 billion) in 6.5 million public home building starts as of the end of August, the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development said, putting it on track to achieve an ambitious construction target.Construction of affordable housing is a crucial part of China’s spending this year, and its importance is heightened as China’s cooling trade sector forces the country to fall back on state investment to drive growth.China aims to start building 7 million such homes and complete construction of 5 million in 2012, compared with actual starts of 10.4 million units and completion of 4.3 million in 2011.The ministry added that China finished building 4.2 million units as of the end of August.China’s consumer confidence weakens slightly in August (September 10, 2012, Xinhua)Chinese consumers, particularly those with bank cards, were slightly less confident in consumption in August, as inflation rebounded slightly in the month due to higher food prices, according to an index released Monday. The Bankcard Consumer Confidence Index (BCCI), compiled by the Xinhua News Agency and China UnionPay, a national bank card association, retreated 0.5 point from July to 86.21 points in August. On a year-on-year basis, the BCCI index stayed flat, according to the report. The report said consumer confidence was dampened by the macroeconomic situation, and rising food prices that reduced consumption of non-essential items caused the loss of confidenceChina’s Wen promises to boost consumer spending (September 11, 2012, AP)Premier Wen Jiabao promised to step up efforts to stabilize China’s slowing economy with tax cuts and measures to boost consumer spending but appeared to rule out a major stimulus, saying Beijing will stick with established policies. Speaking Tuesday at a meeting of the World Economic Forum, Wen expressed confidence in the economy, saying growth still is within the official target range. That appeared to be a rejection of warnings by some analysts that activity has weakened so much in recent months that growth this year might come in below the 7.5 percent official target.Sock City’s decline may reveal an unravelling in China’s economy (September 9, 2012, The Guardian)The hosiery business has been good to the entrepreneurs of Datang, who rode out the 2008 crisis and recovered. But now business is slowing again and experts fear that may presage a hard landing for the whole countryHow To Deal With Chinas Slowdown (September 10, 2012, China Law Blog)Chinas economy is slowing and that slowing has and will continue to impact foreign companies doing business in or with China. I recently wrote a piece for the Wall Street Journal discussing the impact Chinas slowing economy is having on American businesses and how they should respond to that.Nation Rich in Land Draws Workers From One Rich in People (September 10, 2012, The New York Times)The influx of Chinese farm labor in Russia reflects the growing trade and economic ties between the two countries, one rich in land and resources, the other in people.Are Chinese Banks Hiding The Mother of All Debt Bombs?(September 10, 2012, The Diplomat)Over-leveraged real estate developers, for example, are struggling to stay a step ahead of bankruptcy. The Chinese media has reported several instances of suicides of bankrupt real estate developers. Some bankrupt businessmen simply vanished. According to a story in the South China Morning Post in May this year, 47 business owners disappeared in 2011 to avoid repaying billions in bank loans.Top Ten China Mistakes (September 12, 2012, China Law Blog)Came across a really good list of mistakes businesspeople make in China. The list, entitled, Top Ten Mistakes Businessmen Make in China, was compiled by Stanley Chao, of All In Consulting. It really is a nice collection of tips and I present them below, with my comments in italics.ARTICLES IN CHINESE (Pacific Institute for Social Science) (Pacific Institute for Social Science)LINKS FOR RESEARCHERSReinventing the Manchus: An Imperial People in Post-Imperial China (August 27, 2012, The China Story)On 20 June 2012, Mark Elliott, Professor of Chinese and Inner Asian History at the Harvard University and CIW Professorial Fellow, presented the Seventy-third George E. Morrison Lecture on Ethnology. The title of his oration was: Reinventing the Manchus: An Imperial People in Post-Imperial China, a filmed version of which is available here. The text of the lecture will be published in the e-journal China Heritage Quarterly.Personnel changes in Chinas Politics and Law Committees (September 12, 2012, East Asia Forum)Recent personnel shifts in local- and provincial-level Politics and Law Committees (PLCs), the entities responsible for administering Chinas legal system, have been attracting attention. Media reports point out two major trends: firstly, that some PLC jobs have been filled by provincial deputy party secretaries; secondly, that there is a trend away from provincial police chiefs concurrently acting as PLC secretaries.RESOURCESNational Library of China- A fine place to do research (September 11, 2012, Frog in a Well)Most of our readers who might care already know this, but the National Library in Beijing is a fine place to do research on Republican China.BOOKSThe China Story Yearbook 2012 in print (September 10, 2012, Danwei)Today Danwei is happy to announce the launch of the first print on demand edition of The China Story Yearbook 2012: You can order a copy from Lulu.com here (the books contents are free, you pay USD11.35 for printing, plus shipping).China’s Great Famine and its impact on Chinese Politics (September 11, 2012, Asia Sentinel)Asia Sentinel is privileged to present excerpts from Tombstone, the magisterial history of the starvation deaths of 36 million people in Chinas Great Leap Forward. In this except from the final chapter, author Yang Jisheng details how Maos stubbornness in defending the Great Leap Forward would precipitate the equally murderous Cultural RevolutionChristianity and the Modernization of China (September 12, 2012, China Global Center)With the publication of this final volume in the highly-acclaimed Salt and Light series, stories of nine outstanding Chinese provide yet more evidence that Christian ideas and ideals played a vital role in the formation of modern China. how to get a girlfriend ZGBriefs is a weekly compilation of the news in China, condensed from published sources and emailed free-of-charge to more than 6,000 readers in China and abroad. ZGBriefs brings you not only the most important stories of the week, but also links to blogs, commentaries, articles, and resources to help fill out your understanding of what is happening in China today. Coverage includes domestic and international politics, economics, culture, and social trends, among other areas. Seeking to explore all facets of life in China, ZGBriefs also includes coverage of spiritual movements and the role of religious believers and faith-based groups in China. The publication of ZGBriefs is supported by readers who find this weekly service useful. ZGBriefs is a publication of ChinaSource. zp8497586rq zp8497586rq