CoCo19 and the Quarantines: The Scene from Beijing

Barbarians at the Gate

Post-Covid China border closings, the expulsion of western journalists, and suspensions of academic exchanges have resulted in a woeful lack of foreign “eyes on the ground” to provide updates and insights into the current situation in China. While the like-minded community of foreign journalists and China watchers often constitutes an insular community whose reportage devolves into group-think and fixed narratives, the presence of knowledgeable China-based reporters and researchers is essential for dispelling the Twitter-fed misinformation and hackneyed western media tropes. In addition to the podcast’s perennial topic of the “information asymmetry” between China and the US, Jeremiah and David also touch upon current Covid-19 restrictions on the eve of the 20th National Party Conference and the thorny question of whether or not foreigners should agree to appear as commentators on Chinese state media.