Writing on the wall for outspoken Chinese magazine two years ahead of closure
Not even endorsement of president’s late father could save ‘Yanhuang Chunqiu’
The writing was probably on the wall for the outspoken, Beijing-based liberal political journal Yanhuang Chunqiu two years ago, when it was placed under the oversight of the Ministry of Culture’s Chinese National Academy of Arts.
Du Daozheng, the founder of the 25-year-old journal, which was previously under a lighter rein when it was affiliated with the ministry-linked Association for Yan Huang Culture of China, announced on July 19 it had ceased publication.
In China we have a saying, ‘even rabbits bite when they’re provoked’
The immediate cause was the academy’s unilateral removal or demotion of almost all members of the magazine’s top, decision-making editorial committee on July 13. A year earlier, chief editor Yang Jisheng had been forced to step down.
The influential journal, particularly popular among liberal-minded retired officials and intellectuals as a rare voice on the mainland in support of constitutional democracy and for its habit of running articles contesting the official version of Communist Party history, had a monthly circulation of about 200,000.
But not even the endorsement of President Xi Jinping’s late reformist father Xi Zhongxun, among the first generation of Communist revolutionaries, could save it. A calligraphic scroll written by the elder Xi on its 10th anniversary, which was displayed at the magazine’s office, read: “Yanhuang Chunqiu is pretty good.”
