The contrast in these photos, of Shanghai 1990 and 2010, is an eye opener more than literally. It is the Chinese economic and urban development behemoth let loose. (H/T Derek Thompson) Here is NPR in December 2006. It’s become an urban myth that at one time, one-quarter of the world’s construction cranes were in Shanghai. […]
The Bell* II
Perry Link at the NYR Blog reports on the circumstances surrounding the eleven-year sentence in China of writer Liu Xiaobo,”which aims at Liu’s support for Charter 08 and his writings on human rights, democracy, and rule of law in China.” If the purpose of the harsh sentence was to intimidate others, it has not worked […]
Zhao Ziyang and Charles Freeman
The New York Times reports today of a rare and remarable occurrence, the publicly released memoir of communist Chinese leader – secretly recorded, in this case, during his 16-year house-arrest prior to his death, by former party General Secretary Zhao Ziyang, deposed in 1989 for being soft on the Tiananmen demonstrators before the ultimate crackdown […]