China
Threats on Western media + Campaign against private tutoring
It is a classic complaint among China's rulers: foreign countries do not understand the People's Republic. But to fully understand the full pictures, you need to look at both sides of the same coin. The everyday life of foreign journalists working in China, who set out to understand the country and its people, is becoming increasingly difficult. Marcel Grzanna describes how even reports on the Olympic Games or on the catastrophic flooding in Henan are provoking vicious threats against Western media.
Beijing is currently also cracking down on other unpopular industrial sectors: private education companies are under fire – if only metaphorically. Our team of authors in Beijing reports on how China's authorities are brutally cracking down on companies that up until now stood for rapid growth and big profits. But if and how new rules and guidelines will actually give stressed-out students more free time and equal educational opportunities remains to be seen.
Meanwhile, Taiwanese semiconductor manufacturer TSMC is considering Germany as a location for one of its plants. Plans may still be at an early stage, but given the importance of chips for several economic branches, the construction of a new plant would be an important competitive advantage for TSCM. As one of many affected branches, German car manufacturers have had to reduce or even interrupt production in many cases over the recent months due to the shortage.
