When Churchill announced in 1946 that an iron curtain had descended over Europe, the US government only employed two dozen experts on the Soviet Union. Two years later, with the cold war well underway, the CIA only had 12 Russian speakers. Over the following decades, philanthropists and the US government started an intellectual mobilization that had profound effects on the course of the cold war. To talk about this, David Engerman, author of Know Your Enemy: The Rise and Fall of America's Soviet Experts, joins the show along with cohosts Chris Miller, a professor at Tufts, and Sam George, who just finished a masters in East Asian studies at Stanford. We discuss: How America created a cadre of Sovietologists. What their impact was on US policy. Why the experiment ultimately failed. What lessons the story has for contemporary area studies and China studies in particular. Outro music: We Didn't Start the Fire by Billy Joel https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eFTLKWw542g Check out David's book here:https://www.amazon.com/Know-Your-Enemy-Americas-Experts/dp/0199832471 ChinaTalk substack:https://chinatalk.substack.com ChinaTalk Youtube:https://www.youtube.com/user/jugurtha656 Support ChinaTalk on Patreon:https://www.patreon.com/ChinaTalk Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
In light of Abe's assassination, I thought it would be worthwhile to reflect on the man and his legacy. Last year I recorded an episode discussing Abe Shinzo, second only to Xi as the most consequential East Asian politician of the 21st century. Tobias Harris of the Center for American Progress joined to discuss his new biography of Abe, The Iconoclast. Tobias and I discussed His dramatic rise, fall, and rise again to power How he reshaped governance in Japan through bureaucratic reform How he managed relations with the US and China How tasty his wife's Izakaya is Please consider supporting ChinaTalk at https://glow.fm/chinatalk/ Outtro Music: あそびたりない by Pop Art Town https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=icqfJx_0_W0&list=PL0Lwt5eNBHLmL8zP03KbqekrRbje8FCbu&index=92 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
I'm off getting married/honeymooning for the next couple of weeks so in my absence please enjoy this fine ChinaTalk vintage. How does a bookish Beijing teenager, who found himself stuck for six years planting potatoes in the Gobi Desert, grow up to study with former chair of the Federal Reserve Janet Yellen, teach at Wharton, and now lead one of Asia's most successful investment firms? In this episode, Weijian Shan, the chairman and CEO of investment firm PAG Group, and the author of Out of the Gobi: My Story of China and America, tells his personal story of exile during the Cultural Revolution and provides his view on China’s economic transformation. ChinaTalk substack:https://chinatalk.substack.com ChinaTalk Youtube:https://www.youtube.com/user/jugurtha656 Support ChinaTalk on Patreon:https://www.patreon.com/ChinaTalk Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
I'm off getting married/honeymooning for the next couple of weeks so in my absence please enjoy this fine ChinaTalk vintage. How can China be so corrupt and yet grow so fast? What's the relationship between corruption and competent governance? How does 'access money' at the higher levels differ from the "profit-sharing" you see lower down in the bureaucracy? How does China in the 21st century compare with America's gilded age? And why won't anyone give me dinosaur eggs? To discuss, Prof.Yuen Yuen Angjoins the show to talk about her fantastic new book,China's Gilded Age. The incredible propaganda rap song feat. Xi Jinpinghere. ChinaTalk substack:https://chinatalk.substack.com ChinaTalk Youtube:https://www.youtube.com/user/jugurtha656 Support ChinaTalk on Patreon:https://www.patreon.com/ChinaTalk Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
I'm off getting married/honeymooning for the next couple of weeks so in my absence please enjoy this fine ChinaTalk vintage. Mister Softee, the famed northeastern American ice cream brand, in Suzhou, China? Yes, that was a thing. Turner Sparks, rising from humble beginnings as just another English teacher making his way in the world, achieved fame and fortune thanks to a catchy jingle and some tasty mango-flavored soft serve. Yet his vision of China-wide ice cream domination dissolved amid a deluge of backstabbing regulators, slashed tires, and stolen cones. Listen here to learn about the circumstances that finally melted Turner’s ice cream dream. Athena Cao cohosts. ChinaTalk substack:https://chinatalk.substack.com ChinaTalk Youtube:https://www.youtube.com/user/jugurtha656 Support ChinaTalk on Patreon:https://www.patreon.com/ChinaTalk Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
From then-PM David Cameron knocking back pints with Xi at the local pub to the Chinese ambassador being banned from Parliament: how has China's relationship with the UK changed since the so-called Golden Era? This week we have on Sam Hogg (@BeijingToBrit), the recently unmasked writer behind the Substack Beijing to Britain. Co-hosted by ChinaTalk's editor and crypto journalist Callan Quinn (@Quinnishvili). We discuss The decline of the UK-China relationship UK attitudes and policy towards Xinjiang, Hong Kong and Taiwan The building up of Chinese expertise within Parliament and the government Confucius Institutes, higher education and Liu Xiaoming's foot fetish Outro music: Shook Ones Part 2 by Mobb Deep https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rTKpYJ80OVQ Check out Beijing to Britain here: https://beijingtobritain.substack.com ChinaTalk substack: https://chinatalk.substack.com ChinaTalk Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/user/jugurtha656 Support ChinaTalk on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/Ch...
Where should US-China tech relations go? What should “Competitive when it should be. Collaborative when it can be. Adversarial when it must be” actually mean in practice? To discuss, on this episode we have John Bateman, a newly minted senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and my Rhodium colleague Charlie Vest as co-host. We get into - Analyzing the China tech threat and current tech policy - US public strategy on China and tech and why it’s not very clear. - How LCD panels made it onto the list of critical tech in mid-nineties but mobile phones didn’t. - Why it’s so difficult for intelligence analysts to assess and predict the behavior of a foreign leader. John's report: https://carnegieendowment.org/2022/04/25/u.s.-china-technological-decoupling-strategy-and-policy-framework-pub-86897 What American policymakers read: https://scholars-stage.org/american-policy-makers-do-not-read-books/ Outro music:Talkin' John Birch Paranoid Blues by Bob Dylan, live a...
The Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act will come into force in the US on June, 21, 2022. On this episode, John Foote, a partner and the head of the customs practice at Kelley Drye&Warren, discusses the ins and out of what it will mean for companies importing to the US. We also get into: - The legal history of preventing goods produced by forced labor from being imported to the US. - How companies could run into supply chain issues if any of their raw materials for goods come from Xinjiang. - What it means for Chinese entities. - The difficult appeals process for disputing customs seizures. Outro music: Alenurkhan performed by Ayshemgul Memet https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XvVJrSXiwOI Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
China is now the largest market for movies globally, and there have long been whispers about exactly how this impacts Hollywood decisions when it comes to scripts and casting. This episode I’m joined by Erich Schwartzel, author ofRed Carpet: Hollywood, China, and the Global Battle forCultural Supremacy, for a deep dive into the world of Chinese cinema, Chinese movies abroad and China in Hollywood. Along with co-host Irene Liu, a research analyst at Rhodium Group, we get into: Why the director of Seven Years in Tibet apologized to China 15 years after its release Which tech giant has a minority stake in Steven Spielberg’s production company Whether Richard Gere is unhireable Why the Kenyan official responsible for importing films loves Chinese ones The American movies makers involved in Wolf Warriors Irina Nistor, the Romanian translator of Rambo: https://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/18/opinion/vhs-vs-communism.html. Chuck Norris vs Communism was a fantastic movie https://www.youtube.co...
Hal Brands (@HalBrands), professor at the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies, is the author of The Twilight Struggle: What the Cold War Teaches Us about Great-Power Rivalry Today. Along with co-host Emily Jin @ew_jin) of the Center for a New American Security (CNAS), we discuss: How the US capitalized on Soviet heavy-handedness in the developing world How technology impacted the broader trajectory of the Cold War The US’s never-ending cycles of self-confidence and self-doubt Today’s Sinologists versus Cold War Sovietologists Why the only person who can stop the war in Ukraine is the one who started it Outro music: Nancy by Ak Benjamin ft. Marz23 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=agIvGYMA7Cw CHECK OUT THE CHINATALK SUBSTACK! https://chinatalk.substack.com Support us on Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/ChinaTalk Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices