This week on Sinica, Neil Thomas of MacroPolo sits down with Kaiser to talk about what we know — and what we don’t know — about popular support for the Chinese political leadership. Taking into account the effects of censorship and propaganda, how much “natural” regime support is left, and what explains it?

8:51: How reliable are public opinion surveys of regime support?

19:53: Ian Johnson’s NYT op-ed on the October 1 parade

22:20: The Party and the People

38:18: Anniversaries and “dark anniversaries” — the significance of 2019

43:56: Hong Kong and Party legitimacy

Recommendations:

Neil: “Twists in the Belt and Road,” by Ryan Manuel.

Kaiser: New episodes of The China History Podcast on the Warlord Period.

This podcast was edited and produced by Kaiser Kuo and Jason MacRonald.

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Neil Thomas on regime support in the P.R.C.