My Academic Story with China | Martin Jacques: Without understanding China, many questions simply cannot be answered

BEIJING, May 26, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- A news report from Global Times:

【Martin Jacques, renowned British author and critic】

China Studies implies a kind of coherent whole. This is studies about China. Because of China's rise, because how important it is in so many sectors now, you can't really answer a lot of questions without knowing something about China. So I think that is already a big change that's taking place.

And I would only encourage that because it makes the whole thing more accessible. So I think that is the way in which I see China studies moving more "hybrid."

And the other aspect is, I think, until now, there have been really two centers of China Studies, geographically. One is obviously China, and the other is the West. They made a lot of running in these areas. So, very few of the criticisms that you find of China flow from the Global South, because that's completely different. 

So I think that changing minds is not easy as we can see. I would say it's a progressive thing. It takes time. The younger people probably more likely to shift. But it depends on the generation, depends on what's happening in the world.