Researchers from MIT and Harvard have found that “Chinese companies lead the world in exporting face recognition,” potentially enabling other governments to perform more surveillance and harming citizens’ human rights, reports Will Knight for Wired. “The fact that China is exporting to these countries may kind of flip them to become more autocratic, when in fact they could become more democratic,” says Prof. Martin Beraja.
In an article for The Boston Globe, Prof. Yasheng Huang examines the size, scale and impact of the protests underway in China. “The protests may not have damaged the foundation of the Communist Party rule, but they are a sign that the trust people have in their government, in its capacity to solve problems and its ability to safeguard the public’s welfare, has eroded,” writes Huang.
Writing for The New York Times, Prof. Yasheng Huang examines the roots of the protests underway in China. “Covid protests are occurring at the height of China’s autocratic moment. While there are calls for free speech and elections, the rallying cry since Sunday has been against a jarring oppression: the incarceration of hundreds of millions of people in their homes and in field hospitals.”
Prof. M. Taylor Fravel speaks with Bloomberg News reporter Iain Marlow about the U.S. - China relationship. “I do not expect U.S. - China relations to improve,” said Fravel. “The only question is how much further they will deteriorate and if the relationship will shift from one of competition to one of hostile confrontation.”
Profs. Daron Acemoglu and David Autor speak with New York Times correspondent Thomas B. Edsall about the forces driving working-class voters towards the Republican party. “Elites are making choices that are not good news for non-college workers,” said Acemoglu. “In fact, they are bad news for most workers.”
Forbes contributor Anuradha Varanasi spotlights a new study co-authored by MIT researchers that finds that in China, “masks might function as a ‘moral symbol’ and decrease the likelihood of an individual engaging in any form of deviant behavior.”
Using machine learning techniques, MIT researchers analyzed social media sentiment around the world during the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic and found that the “pandemic precipitated a dramatic drop in happiness,” reports Charlotte Hu for Popular Science. “We wanted to do this global study to compare different countries because they were hit by the pandemic at different times,” explains Prof. Siqi Zheng, “and they have different cultures, different political systems, and different healthcare systems.”
A new study co-authored by MIT researchers finds that China’s ban on cryptocurrencies sent the process of creating new coins to other locations in the world that use less renewable energy, reports Hiroko Tabuchi for The New York Times. The researchers found that “Bitcoin miners lost their access to hydropower from regions within China that had powered their computers with cheap, plentiful, renewable energy during the wet summer months.”
Writing for Science, Prof. Gang Chen emphasizes the need for universities and funding agencies to stand up for faculty who are wrongfully prosecuted. “What gave me hope and ultimately saved me is a lesson for all universities. MIT leadership, under President L. Rafael Reif, supported me morally and financially after I was detained at the airport, and the university made its support public soon after I was arrested,” writes Chen. He adds, “I urge university leaders, trustees, and alumni associations to protect their faculty from a campaign that is misdirected. The talent loss and terror lobbed upon faculty are weakening their institutions, supporting harmful bias, and ruining lives.”
Jim Axelrod of CBS News speaks with Professor Gang Chen about his ordeal following charges he faced – all now dismissed – under the “China Initiative.” Describing the accusations against Chen as “a massive jolt,” President L. Rafael Reif said, “I felt it was an attack on all Chinese Americans in America, particularly in academia.” Added Chen, a U.S. citizen for more than two decades, “We thought we had achieved the American Dream. Until this nightmare happened.”
Bloomberg reporter Chris Anstey spotlights a new study by MIT researchers that finds that during the Covid-19 pandemic people have been taking cues from their neighbors as to whether it is safe to resume social activities like dining in restaurants. “We felt that in [some] uncertain times, such information might be particularly valuable,” said Prof. Siqi Zheng. “If others think it’s safe to go out, then maybe I should feel safe. To be sure, we were also prepared for the opposite reaction, that people would hunker down and try to avoid crowds.”
Prof. Gang Chen speaks with New York Times reporter Ellen Barry about the damage inflicted by the “China Initiative.” “My love is science. I did not want politics, right?” says Chen. “But I learned that you can’t get away. Politics impacts everybody. So if there are things that are not right, we all need to speak out.”
Writing for The Boston Globe, Prof. Gang Chen calls for a thorough review of the Justice Department’s China Initiative and the “critical mistakes on the part of the FBI, federal prosecutors, and other federal investigative agencies.” Chen writes: “As a nation, we can be more true to our ideals — and a better world leader — by acknowledging our wrongdoings and learning from our mistakes rather than blindly pressing forward.”
Prof. Carlo Ratti has proposed a 51-story skyscraper for China’s technology hub of Shenzhen that would produce crops to feed populations of up to 40,000 per year, reports Bloomberg News. “Ratti envisions his farmscraper as a self-contained food supply chain, where the crops can be cultivated, sold and eaten all within the same building.”
Bloomberg Businessweek reporter Shawn Donnan spotlights Prof. David Autor’s series of research papers examining the impact of the surge of Chinese imports on the overall American economy and specific regions of the country. Autor and his colleagues make the case that “well-funded, targeted government policies could have helped prevent the economic blight that engulfed many affected communities.”