Another economic milestone but does it actually mean anything?

By Dr.  David O’Brien, Assistant Professor, School of Contemporary Chinese Studies at the University of Nottingham Ningbo China. In a matter of weeks China is very likely to surpass the United States and officially become the world’s leading trading nation.  According to official figures the value of China’s imports and exports in 2013 reached $4.16 …

Party’s Reform Plan

By Dr. Zhengxu Wang, Associate Professor, School of Contemporary Chinese Studies, and Deputy Director of the China Policy Institute, at the University of Nottingham, UK. Last week saw the eagerly anticipated event of the Plenum of the Communist Party of China’s Central Committee. It was planned as a milestone in China’s reform history, as the …

Overtaking the UK, chasing the US… in property prices

By Dr. Youqing Fan, Assistant Professor, School of Contemporary Chinese Studies at the University of Nottingham Ningbo China. The slogan ‘Overtaking the UK, chasing the US’ proposed by Chairman Mao in 1958 has now been realized in China.  The rapid growth of its economy has enabled China to overtake the UK in terms of Gross …

China to relax ban on Facebook and Twitter?

By Dr. David O’Brien, Assistant Professor, School of Contemporary Chinese Studies at the University of Nottingham Ningbo China. China may be about to relax its ban on foreign media websites such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and the New York Times in order to make ex-pats working in a pilot free-trade zone ‘feel more at home’. …

The Chinese Dream Controversy

By Angela Wang, Assistant Research Fellow to the Dean of Arts & Education, At The University of Nottingham Ningbo. The Chinese Dream has become a blazing topic for months, prominent in discourse within every field (economic, political, entertainment, academic, individual, etc.). Ever since the central government implemented the idea of a Chinese dream, it has …

Shanghai, Then and Now

By Boon Hooi Hong, Studying Chemical Engineering at the University of Nottingham Malaysia. It was 2003 when I first visited to Shanghai, exactly 10 years ago. I remember it clearly as Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) incident happened in the same year and it affected China greatly especially the economy. As an innocent teenager, I …

Religion in China: Christianity

By Ademola Akande, Studying Mathematics at the University of Nottingham UK. At virtually every place we visited, there was a substantial amount of fetish practices and beliefs proudly displayed to us tourists as Chinese history and culture. There was in fact a religious sculpture erected in front of a restaurant where we had lunch. However, …

China and Industrialisation

By Calvin Johnson, Studying Economics at the University of Nottingham UK. Over the past two weeks, I have had the opportunity to experience and witness the transformation that has occurred in China in recent decades, creating China into a truly economic superpower. However this is an achievement that could have happened centuries ago, had China …

China’s Elderly – The Old, The Wise and The Burden

By Liam Flaine, Studying Finance, Accounting and Management at the University of Nottingham UK. China’s booming commerce industries have caused economic growth levels to soar. In every aspect, China remains a growing superpower. Nevertheless, despite its thriving economical development, ironically it is China’s most durable, legitimate citizens that are inevitably going to restrict further development …

The Rise of China: a threat to the world, or a model for the rest?

By Edward Pode, Studying Mathematics at the University of Nottingham UK. The question of whether China’s recent growth marks it as a model to be followed by other countries around the world or sets it up as a threat to them is dependent on several assumptions.  Firstly it presupposes that the two characteristics are mutually …