Top Read: International Risks and Challenges Facing China in 2023 by Zheng Yongnian

"When it comes to international political risks, the US's domestic problems have to be placed at the top of the list."

Dear Everyone,

Zheng Yongnian (郑永年) should be a familiar figure for most China watchers. A well-known Chinese political scientist and prolific political commentator, Zheng has held a number of posts abroad and is currently the director of the Institute for International Affairs at the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK). The following paper drew my attention for reaching the top spot of Aisixiang’s (爱思想) most-read articles (over a 30-day period), just four days after being published. Aisixiang is a well-known Chinese aggregator of articles by scholars and think tank analysts. I am still unsure how politicised Aisixiang’s rankings tend to be, but should Zheng’s paper have been artificially promoted to the top spot, this would be interesting in and of itself. His article is entitled “Ten critical shifts in international politics in 2023 and their prospects” and is an extension of an interview conducted by CUHK’s Institute for International Affairs. Excerpts are provided below.

Ten ris…