Featured Article
Explainer | Here Are 5 Ways to Enter China Without a Visa, By Land, Sea or Air (September 27, 2025, South China Morning Post)
Obtaining a visa to enter Mainland China often requires filling out pages of paperwork, paying more than US$100, and waiting days for the documents to be processed. But for a growing number of visitors, some hurdles have been lowered or removed entirely as Beijing continues to relax visa-free entry rules to attract more foreign visitors and boost the nation’s tourism sector.
Spotlight
Call for Submissions: US-China Catholic Association
Since its founding in 1989, the US-China Catholic Association (USCCA) has been committed to building bridges of friendship between the people of the US and the people of China. USCCA International Conferences have presented valuable opportunities for scholars and practitioners to grow in mutual understanding. The 30th USCCA International Conference will be held July 31–August 2, 2026, at the University of St. Thomas in Houston, TX. The theme of our upcoming conference will be “Nourishing Trust and Friendship: Following the Way of Christ.” The Conference Call for Submissions has now been opened on the USCCA website! For more information, navigate to uscatholicchina.org/conference-30.
Government / Politics / Foreign Affairs
The Three Pillars Underpinning the 2027 Centennial Military Building Goal (September 25, 2025, China Brief Archives – Jamestown Foundation)
The “2027 Goal” was first framed in the 14th Five-Year Plan as an effort to accelerate military development, improve force readiness, and enhance deterrence capabilities in time for the 100th anniversary of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) (Xinhua, November 3, 2020). Subsequent Chinese sources suggest that there are three key dimensions to the 2027 Goal. Of these, two—military readiness and anti-corruption work—are seen as essential to progress in the ultimate dimension: military modernization.
How Does China Want the World to Work? (September 26, 2025, National Committee on U.S.-China Relations)
Beijing views the current global governance system as one that skews unfairly in favor of Western powers. China seeks to reshape the dynamics in international organizations in pursuit of its own goals, mimicking the multilateral foreign policy that the United States pursued during the Cold War. However, unlike the United States, China prefers to build economic partnerships instead of military alliances – such as through BRICS, the Shanghai Cooperation Agreement, or the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation. How does China’s alternate vision for global governance differ from the United States’ and will it resonate with the rest of the world?
In UN Speech, Beijing Makes Clear Its Intent to Remold Global Norms, Seizing on Trump’s Retreat (September 29, 2025, AP News)
Hardly a month after Chinese President Xi Jinping proposed his “Global Governance Initiative,” Beijing made its intent clear at the most global of forums — that it should, and is qualified to, help shape the world order even as the United States tips more inward under Donald Trump. In a seemingly jargon-filled speech delivered to the U.N. General Assembly on Friday, Chinese Premier Li Qiang told the audience that “a China that bears in mind the greater good of humanity and stands ready to take up responsibilities will bring more positive energy into the world.”
Religion
Building Mercy in China: Part 2 (September 25, 2025, China Partnership)
China, and the Chinese church, are far too big to generalize or simplify. Still, when talking about modern, urban house churches, it’s fair to say that there’s strong interest in mercy ministry, but there’s also overt tension. Many urban churches are seeking to sacrificially serve their cities. However, sometimes there is conflict between the role of verbally proclaiming the gospel, versus displaying the fruit of the gospel through good deeds.
Traditional China Meets Christianity (September 26, 2025, ChinaSource)
Traditional China’s framework thus produced a paradox that still echoes. On the one hand, Christianity was foreign—a heterodox teaching, later a treaty-protected religion associated with Western power. On the other hand, it gradually became part of the texture of daily life for communities who believed: worshipping in chapels, translating and copying Scriptures, running schools and hospitals, practicing charity, and forming household and congregational networks. That double perception—foreign yet lived, tolerated yet suspect—helps explain much of what follows in modern times: the oscillation between curiosity and resistance, between public usefulness and ideological suspicion, between room to breathe and moments of constraint.
Building Mercy in China: Part 3 (September 29, 2025, China Partnership)
Caleb Ai says mercy ministry is a way for Christians to demonstrate to the world what it looks like to follow Jesus. Although Chinese believers face a lot of challenges in trying to organize and love their communities, engaging in acts of mercy is not optional for Christians. Mercy ministry is not primarily about results. Instead, it is about where the motivation to sacrificially serve comes from. Chinese house churches can’t always build big organizations (listen to our podcast for more on how they can love neighbors!), but Caleb says, when they show deep-rooted love for their neighbors, God can use that in big ways.
State Dominance of Religion (September 29, 2025, ChinaSource)
Surveying the fraught relationship between church and state in China, the late Chinese church historian Daniel Bays asserted that government control of religion has been a constant feature from Imperial times to the present. While this control may have varied in intensity, the assumption has always been that the state maintains the prerogative to monitor and regulate religious groups, which are ultimately accountable to the government.
Society / Life
Translations: “Lying Down” Vloggers Banned for Espousing the Simple Life (September 24, 2025, China Digital Times)
Some popular social media accounts that depict “lying down”—eschewing the rat race in favor of a more frugal, less ambitious, low-consumption lifestyle—have recently been deplatformed, to the dismay of their many fans. Although the bans were ostensibly for “violating platform rules and regulations,” there is widespread speculation that they were targeted for deletion because their easygoing ethos clashed with central government policies promoting marriage, childbirth, homebuying, consumption, and relentless hard work and sacrifice.
Between ‘Throwing Bombs’ and ‘Lying Flat’: The Psychology of China’s Economy (September 26, 2025, The Diplomat)
As I calculated the odds, discreetly signaled to my partner, and weighed risks amid ambiguity, I realized why Guandan – a card game known as “throwing bombs” – has become a ritual for cadres and entrepreneurs alike. Its mechanics mirror China’s economy with unsettling precision.
Street Theater: How ‘Chengguan’ and Vendors Play Their Roles (September 26, 2025, Sixth Tone)
In 2015, Lü Dewen, a professor at Wuhan University’s School of Sociology, conducted field research on the catch-me-if-you-can relationship between “chengguan” — China’s urban management officers — and street vendors, focusing on Lumo Road, a 2.3-kilometer artery connecting urban and rural areas of Wuhan, capital of China’s central Hubei province. Lü’s findings formed the basis for his new book, On Lumo Road: Chengguan, Street Vendors, and Street Politics. The following is an excerpt.
How Residential Renovation Became China’s New Urban Battleground (September 30, 2025, The World of Chinese)
Over the past year, Gu Song has given up his habit of taking after-meal strolls around his apartment block in Beijing. “It’s all such a mess,” the career consultant in his 50s complains. “Who’s got the mood for it?” Built in 2005, Gu’s apartment compound was advertised as a “garden villa” boasting tree-lined sidewalks and a pond. But since last April, it has more often resembled a construction site, dotted with protective nets, scaffolds, and building materials rather than flowers.
‘She Didn’t Realize How Dangerous It Was’ : London Bound Student Held in China Over Tibet Support (September 30, 2025, The Guardian)
While she could hear conversations in Tibetan everywhere, all of the signage was in Mandarin Chinese. Every shop and restaurant she passed appeared to be Chinese owned, not Tibetan. Every lamp-post was decorated with Chinese flags; an endless river of red flowing above them against a cloudy summer sky. It felt to her like Tibetan culture and identity was being erased. The experience started her on a path that would end with her arrest and disappearance.
In China’s ‘Sympathy Economy,’ Trauma Finds a Livestream Stage (September 30, 2025, Sixth Tone)
Guo is part of a growing wave of livestreamers who lean on public sympathy to build an audience. From parents once searching for missing children to families caught in public tragedies, many are turning empathy-driven attention into viable businesses, a phenomenon that has come to be known as China’s “sympathy economy.” Yet in recent months, their rise has also drawn sharp scrutiny, as the blending of grief and commerce raises uneasy questions about exploitation, authenticity, and whether trauma can — or should — be monetized.
Chinese Woman Convicted After ‘World’s Biggest’ Bitcoin Seizure (September 30, 2025, BBC News)
A Chinese national has been convicted following an international investigation which resulted in what’s believed to be the single largest cryptocurrency seizure in the world. The Metropolitan Police says it recovered 61,000 bitcoin worth more than 5B pounds in current prices. Zhimin Qian, also known as Yadi Zhang, pleaded guilty on Monday at Southwark Crown Court of illegally acquiring and possessing cryptocurrency.
Economics / Trade / Business
How Have China’s 5-Year Plans Shaped the Country’s Economic Trajectory (September 24, 2025, South China Morning Post)
Though China moved away from a command economy decades ago, its successive five-year plans have remained a pillar of macroeconomic policymaking. Despite that seeming contradiction, under the 14 plans implemented since 1953, Beijing has turned what was a limited industrial capacity into a scale of mass production that has earned China a reputation as the “world’s factory.” Beijing is now endeavouring to move higher in the value chain and become a global hub for innovation in cutting-edge sectors – and the next five-year plan, the 15th, is expected to be an important part of that process.
China Is Turning Up Its Nose at American Soyabeans (Subscription Required) (September 25, 2025, The Economist) (subscription required)
In the corn belt of midwestern America, the soyabean harvest is under way. By this point last year China had ordered close to 40% of America’s overseas sales. This year, however, China has not booked a single shipment. It is the first time that such a late stage in the season has been reached without any recorded Chinese orders, according to official online records that date back to 1998.
Beijing’s Rare-Earths Export Licensing System: Delays By Design? (September 30, 2025, MERICS)
Since China imposed export controls on seven rare earth elements (REEs) and certain types of REE magnets in April, European importers have struggled with Beijing’s intricate approval process. Although China in July agreed to ease restrictions, many European companies remain in limbo as they wait for their applications to be processed. There is no sign that Beijing will lift its measures any time soon.
Science / Technology
DeepSeek Secrets Unveiled: Engineers Reveal Science Behind China’s Viral AI Model (September 17, 2025, South China Morning Post)
Engineers behind the viral Chinese artificial intelligence (AI) reasoning model DeepSeek-R1 have unveiled the deep science behind its training. Upon its release in January, the open-source model developed by Hangzhou-based AI start-up DeepSeek sent shock waves through the industry when it became a challenger to US-based OpenAI’s industry-leading o1 model. Now, the DeepSeek AI team has revealed how they used rewards to train their R1 model to solve problems, allowing them to bypass some of the costly computational and scaling barriers, to teaching AI models to reason like humans.
Why China Hawks Love Talking About AI (September 23, 2025, Foreign Policy)
In a speech delivered this month, US Sen. Elissa Slotkin, a Democrat, called for a Manhattan Project-like effort for artificial intelligence, saying, “We are in a tech race with China … and there’s no area more important to win than on artificial intelligence.” This belief in AI’s primacy is widely held in both Washington and Silicon Valley, including by US President Donald Trump. But like many common ideas about both China and AI, it is wrong.
Travel / Food
China’s New Wave of Backlash Against Pre-Made Food (September 25, 2024, The World of Chinese)
When Jia Guolong, founder of Xibei, a popular restaurant chain known for its northwestern Chinese cuisine, announced that he would open the kitchens of the chain’s 370-plus outlets in China so that consumers could inspect them—and verify his earlier claim that they do not use yuzhicai (预制菜), or pre-made dishes—he likely did not expect the exact opposite effect it would have.
Explainer | Here Are 5 Ways to Enter China Without a Visa, By Land, Sea or Air (September 27, 2025, South China Morning Post)
Obtaining a visa to enter mainland China often requires filling out pages of paperwork, paying more than US$100, and waiting days for the documents to be processed. But for a growing number of visitors, some hurdles have been lowered or removed entirely as Beijing continues to relax visa-free entry rules to attract more foreign visitors and boost the nation’s tourism sector.
Arts / Entertainment / Media
How a Historical Fantasy Game Nearly Broke the Chinese Internet (September 25, 2025, Sixth Tone)
When Leenzee Games officially released its fantasy action game Wuchang: Fallen Feathers on July 24, hopes were high that it could replicate last year’s global success of China’s blockbuster game, Black Myth: Wukong. It had already reached a remarkable feat for the gaming industry, having sold nearly 3 million copies worldwide as of Aug. 31, according to an estimation by market research platform Video Game Insights. And yet, when patch 1.5 arrived on Aug. 12 to introduce adjustments to the game, Wuchang was soon embroiled in a public relations crisis.
The Malice Police (September 26, 20205, China Media Project)
In China’s digital landscape, even feelings can be subject to government regulation. On September 22, the Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) announced its latest “Clear and Clean” (清朗) campaign—this time targeting the “malicious incitement of negative emotions” (恶意挑动负面情绪) across social media, short video, and livestreaming platforms. The two-month campaign promises to crack down on everything from “group antagonism” to “excessive rendering of pessimistic emotions.”
Health / Environment
The Legacy of ‘Sponge Cities’ Left by Chinese Landscape Architect Yu Kongjian (September 29, 2025, Global Voices)
Yu’s main legacy is designing and implementing projects based on his sponge cities theory. A professor at Peking University, his “sponge city” concept became a top national priority in China in 2013, following the massive floods in the Beijing region in 2012, which left 79 people dead and tens of thousands displaced. He also founded Turenscape, one of the main landscape architecture firms in the world, based in China.
Pray for China
September 25 (Pray For China: A Walk Through History)
On Sept. 25, 1938, James O. Fraser (富能仁), the apostle to the Lisu people (傈僳族), graduated to glory at age 52 in Baoshan, Yunnan. Fraser worked among the Lisu for nearly 30 years. He and Burmese missionary Sara Ba Thaw (巴多) developed a written script for the Lisu people; this contributed to a people movement among them which resulted in 90% of the Lisu becoming Christians. Fraser wrote, “Once we attain to a real faith, all the forces of hell are impotent to annul it. The real battle begins when the prayer of faith has been offered.” Many young Lisu are moving to cities and adapting to Chinese culture, so walking with the Lord is a great challenge for them. Pray for Lisu Christians to walk with God and be free from the spirits of legalism and materialism. He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God? Micah 6:8
All Things in Light of Eternity (September 30, 2025, ChinaSource)
“Make us wise to see all things today in light of eternity and make us brave to face all the changes in our lives which such a vision may entail.”
Praying Through ZGBriefs (August 29, 2025, ChinaSource)
Operation World (April 21, 2025, ChinaSource)
Pray for China (prayforchina.us)
Pray for China (China Partnership)
Prayer Walking as a Rhythm of Life (May 30, 2025, ChinaSource)
Jason Mandryk on Intercessory Prayer (July 29, 2025, ChinaSource)