169 Photos and videos
Xi's meeting with private tech titans goes beyond an alignment b/w the state & the private sector. It's part of a detailed tech security strategy by China's Central National Security Commission in "The Total National Security Paradigm (2022)," translated here for the first time:
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Emily Jin retweeted
Mar 31
An open source website on the Chinese Communist Party elite, with data visualizations. Every Central Committee (4,324), Politburo (168), and PBSC member from 1945–Present.
All data available for download, as promised. Link and some standout charts below🧵
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Emily Jin retweeted
Mar 24
An interactive website of warfare across Chinese imperial history. 3,735 battles geolocated and split by dynastic period.
Drawn from the PLA Press' comprehensive chronology of Chinese warfare (中国历代战争年表)
All data on site: chinawarfare.pages.dev/
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Emily Jin retweeted
Mar 16
An open source website on the Soviet elite with data visualizations. Every Central Committee (4,480) and Politburo member (130) from 1917–1991.
All data made easily available for replication (compiled from books below and other sources)
sovietleadershipdata.pages.d…
Jan 11
Two books that contain copious data on the Central Committee and Politburo from 1917–1991.
The Soviet Elite is particularly impressive: detailed life histories of all 2,000 CC members across the Soviet era ~100 interviews with former CC members.
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Emily Jin retweeted
8 Nov 2025
The differentiating role of clans vs corporations in the development of China and Europe.
I expect to find this more convincing than Henrich’s WEIRDest but less convincing than Scheidel’s Escape from Rome. TBD
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Emily Jin retweeted
4 Nov 2025
Gorbachev was weak. Powerful entrenched interests made redressing the USSR's economic maladies impossible, and radical political change the only viable reform path.
So argues the 2016 book "The Struggle to Save the Soviet Economy."
All wrong, I argue: cogitations.co/p/from-reform…
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Emily Jin retweeted
10 Oct 2025
Another PRC move to match US tools. Maybe we should talk about an "economic coercion balance of power"? For these port fees, the 25% US ownership rule does the work because the US builds or flags few ships. US advantage is finance, and China is using it against the US here.
China will start levying special fees on American ships docking at its ports in a retaliatory move bloomberg.com/news/articles/…
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Emily Jin retweeted
9 Oct 2025
Quite the day for Chinese export controls... Big things are happening.
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Emily Jin retweeted
11 Sep 2025
Red Ink remains the Gold Standard of China industrial policy reports.
Their marquee finding (see chart) is conservative: China spends 1.73% of GDP on industrial policy.
The new IMF study estimates it at 4% of GDP, because they make substantially less conservative assumptions.
11 Sep 2025
We were more conservative in "Red Ink". 2/ csis.org/analysis/red-ink-es…
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Emily Jin retweeted
8 Sep 2025
1587 is absolutely one of the great books on Chinese history.
It is a series of vignettes, each a chapter centered on the life of a single notable individual in a single year during the Ming dynasty’s decline.
Actually kind of gives ATLA's "Tales of Ba Sing Se" vibe
31 Aug 2025
I am launching a blog on Chinese political economy. It's my contribution to the conversation on China.
"An ancient civilization starting anew, China remains poorly understood by the world. Superficial resemblance to the Soviet Union masks its complex history, distinctive culture, and hybrid economy. Yet the importance of getting China right can hardly be overstated."
In the inaugural essay, I recommend six books that serve as the necessary foundation for in-depth understanding of China.
Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of China (2011) by Ezra Vogel
1587, a Year of No Significance (1981) by Ray Huang
The Rise of Modern China, 6th Edition (1999) by Immanuel C. Y. Hsu
Prisoner of the State: The Secret Journal of Premier Zhao Ziyang (2009) by Zhao Ziyang
The State Strikes Back (2019) by Nicholas Lardy
How China Works: An Introduction to China’s State-Led Economic Development (2024) by Lan Xiaohuan
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Emily Jin retweeted
29 Aug 2025
what does it mean that the most insightful book review dan is going to get is from a substack with 3k followers?
For one, it means you should all subscribe to Jon's substack
28 Aug 2025
On Dan Wang's new book: Breakneck
This essay assesses the book's big idea: China is an engineering state facing off against America, a lawyerly society. The book is well-informed and packed with wit.
But I wanted more data. So I assembled some.🧵
cogitations.co/p/litigation-…
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Emily Jin retweeted
28 Aug 2025
On Dan Wang's new book: Breakneck
This essay assesses the book's big idea: China is an engineering state facing off against America, a lawyerly society. The book is well-informed and packed with wit.
But I wanted more data. So I assembled some.🧵
cogitations.co/p/litigation-…
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Emily Jin retweeted
20 Aug 2025
“A Plum for a Peach” is a term describing the bargaining process that characterized China’s fragmented bureaucracy (via David Lampton).
America’s far more fragmented version:
A Plum for a Peach…and Don’t Forget My Papaya Or I Will Sue You
(adversarial legalism)
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Emily Jin retweeted
11 Aug 2025
Excellent compilation Chinese-Language analysis of Chinese politics and some econ
very good podcast recommendations in particular: 钱粮胡同 and 体制内
asiasociety.org/policy-insti…
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Emily Jin retweeted
31 Jul 2025
Reading two new books seemingly designed to give whiplash. Both want to argue institutions are fundamental to China's trajectory, but very different kinds. The first clan/kinship organizations (micro and mezzo), the second so-called dynastic Soviet totalitarian genes (macro).
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Emily Jin retweeted
15 Jul 2025
After a year of sitting on them, I decided to publish my notes and take aways from Kotkin's first volume on Stalin.
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Emily Jin retweeted
18 Jul 2025
🚨✍️ NEW POST — Industrial Colossus: China vs 1950s America
In a number of ways, China mirrors America at the height of its industrial powers.
Despite UN projections and the dreams of some industrial maximalists, as share of global manufacturing, China is peaking. 🧵
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Emily Jin retweeted
23 Jun 2025
NEW: Some bonkers numbers in China's May customs data.
Detailed figures came out Fri when I was off, so took a deep dive today
First big picture EU stuff:
China's EU exports up 12%
China's EU imports down 2.37%
There is a 22% increase in the EU's China deficit in May alone
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Emily Jin retweeted
18 Jun 2025
🚨 New essay: on Torigian’s biography of Xi Zhongxun.
This isn’t a book about Xi Jinping. It’s a study of the Chinese Communist Party, centered around the life of a man who rose, fell, and rose again inside its Leninist machinery.
And it's a book about suffering and meaning 🧵
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Emily Jin retweeted
17 Jun 2025
Marveling at this review of my book on Xi Zhongxun by @JonathonPSine: he absolutely nailed it. It was precisely to facilitate this kind of reflection that I wrote “The Party’s Interests Come First”
17 Jun 2025
I’m only halfway through @JosephTorigian’s biography of Xi Zhongxun. But already agree with @JonathonPSine on what an impressive book it is. open.substack.com/pub/jonath…
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Emily Jin retweeted
16 Jun 2025
The three most important contributions in history to human health-span: 1) vaccines, the greatest medical intervention of all time; 2) the rise of urban sanitation—clean water and sewage systems; and 3) antibiotics.
A crude estimate
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