This past May, as Southern Californians entered their third month in quarantine from Covid-19, the local affiliate of PBS premiered a new documentary about poverty in China. Promising “unprecedented access,” the hour-long film followed Robert Lawrence Kuhn, a brain scientist and investment banker-turned-documentarian, as he traveled around China’s impoverished countryside. In his trademark mock turtlenecks, Kuhn interviewed villagers and officials about Beijing’s anti-poverty program — a massive effort that intends to lift 100 million people out of abject poverty.
“President Xi Jinping,” the trailer’s narrator said knowingly, “is counting on its success.”
Kuhn has a limited grasp of Mandarin, but he seems at home in the film. With his glasses, thin frame, and shock of white hair, the 75-year-old rides on the back of motorbikes, walks through murky rivers, and sits on plastic chairs with local government officials. The documentary — entitled “Vo
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On Thursday, Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo met with Wang Wentao, the Chinese Commerce Minister, in Washington. It marked the first cabinet-level meeting in Washington between the U.S. and China during the Biden administration, and it was a signal of the Commerce Department’s increasingly central role in the current U.S.-China relationship. Usually, the Commerce Department is far from the center of anything, but as Katrina Northrop reports, the department is uniquely suited to address the China challenge.
The lawyer and author talks about the attack on a train in the 1920s which created an international incident, the rise of the Communist Party and the conditions for foreign media in China today.
