Alec Ash - Chinas New Youth: How the Young Generation Is Shaping Chinas Future

Copyright 2016, 2017, 2020 by Alec Ash

Foreword copyright 2020 by Skyhorse Publishing, Inc.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without the express written consent of the publisher, except in the case of brief excerpts in critical reviews or articles. All inquiries should be addressed to Arcade Publishing, 307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018.

First North American Paperback Edition

First published in hardcover under the title Wish Lanterns

Map copyright 2017 by Liuba Vladimirova and used by permission. The photographs on is copyright 2017 by Lu Ran and used by permission.

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Visit the authors website at http://alecash.net/.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available.

Library of Congress Control Number: 2020932521

ISBN: 9781950691562

Ebook ISBN: 9781950691722

Cover design by Erin Seaward-Hiatt

Cover photo courtesy of Christopher Cherry

Printed in the United States of America

Praise for Chinas New Youth

Ashs book paints a telling portrait of this most restless generation raised in a system that has provided them with unprecedented personal opportunities while denying them political ones A gifted observer.

John Pomfret, Washington Post

A refreshing variant on the [China book] category. Ash is a deft pointillist whose work offers a fresh take on a society the West still struggles to understand.

Howard W. French , Wall Street Journal

Announces the arrival of a talented young observer of todays China. Alec Ash documents the lives of Chinese millennials with detail, insight, and sympathy, and his book is an invaluable resource for anybody hoping to understand the countrys future possibilities.

Peter Hessler, New York Times bestselling author of River Town , Oracle Bones and Country Driving

One of the best Ive read about the individuals who make up a country that is all too often regarded as a monolith.

Jonathan Fenby, Financial Times

Compelling and beautifully written.

Rana Mitter, Prospect

Masterfully crafted The richness of Ashs book is in the character development, the details of everyday life, dreams, frustrations, and contradictions of these particular individuals. Ash enters their worlds as a peer (he is their same age) and hes a sensitive listener, reporter, and storyteller.

Gail Hershatter, Los Angeles Review of Books

Informative and often humorous Through six individuals, Ash addresses topic such as recent Chinese politics, music, urbanization, internet addiction, and presents a refreshing range of perspectives about being twenty-something in China.

Marianna Cerini, Forbes

Alec Ashs book has opened a window in the wall between China and the west for us to see the hopes and fears of these young Chinese who are struggling to build their lives in a world that their parents could never dream of.

Xinran, author of The Good Women of China

A gem of a book. Its brief chapters flow like a skillfully crafted set of interconnected short stories, yet all are rooted in the real life experiences of six individuals. An impressive debut book by a writer to watch.

Jeffrey Wasserstrom, author of China in the 21st Century

A beautiful and thoughtful book about the life of young people in China. Alec Ash has succeeded in giving us an intimate and complex portrait of the one-child-policy generation. I enthusiastically recommend you to read it.

Xiaolu Guo, author of I Am China

[Ashs] deft style, welcome restraint (he writes the lives of his subjects but does not comment on them or, with a couple of exceptions, appear himself) yet discreet sympathy for the travails of those who have plainly become close friends, make the stories compelling.

Graham Hutchings, Standpoint

Alec Ash hangs out with Chinas post-80s generations to give us a series of fascinating and insightful snapshots of where the country might be heading.

Paul French, author of Midnight in Peking

Ash effortlessly dissolves stereotypes with this refreshing and nuanced portrait of individuals who are shaping the China of tomorrow.

Rob Schmitz, Shanghai correspondent for NPR

Alec Ash has assembled a fascinating mosaic that gives us a wonderfully vivid sense of what its like to grow up today in the Peoples Republic of China. [The book] enables a reader to get an immediate feel of how contradictory life in this dynamic but still unresolved country often is.

Orville Schell, Director, Center on US-China Relations

A wonderfully readable and engaging account of Chinese millennials. Alec Ash weaves the joy, heartbreak, drama and trauma of this group through disparate stories, making up a highly realistic, and at times poetic, portrait of the people who will likely have the greatest future impact in the world today.

Kerry Brown, Professor of China Studies, Kings College London

Through deep dive longitudinal reporting and masterful storytelling, Alec Ash lets readers feel closely connected to the coming of age experience in todays China

Eric Fish, author of Chinas Millennials

A perceptive and quietly profound book.

Booklist , starred review

Novelistic anecdotes reveal Chinese young people struggling with universal themes of education, employment, and love The author eloquently delineates the dreams and disappointments of young Chinese. Sensitive, fascinating reports.

Kirkus Reviews

Fascinating Ashs deeply insightful exploration paints a vivid picture of growing up in China today, and, by implication, this powerful and ever-morphing nations future leaders.

Publishers Weekly

Here is a completely novel take on contemporary China A work of heart-felt reportage, and also great suspense, as we wait to learn each characters fate. I couldnt put it down.

Michael Meyer, author of The Last Days of Old Beijing

For my father

who taught me to show not tell

Contents

Foreword

Who are Chinese millennials, and what do they want? On Google, you can easily find figures and facts for this group. There are 400 million of them, which is more than the total US population. Most of them are single children, a result of the draconian one-child policy that lasted for more than thirty years. They have benefited from family resources but also face enormous pressure. There are huge differences between them and older generations, in spending habits, attitudes to marriage and career, and views on the future. They grew up with more exposure to the West, are net natives and active on social media. Yet, after piecing together all these demographic and sociological labels, the portrait of Chinese millennials is still far from complete.