Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia Pacific Center:  

Welcome. I'm just waiting for a couple more 

seconds, as folks are trickling in right now.

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia Pacific Center: 

Alright, I think we can get started.

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia Pacific Center: 

Good afternoon and good evening from the East  

coast and good morning from Asia. Welcome to 

the Ucla Asia Pacific Center. Global Chinese

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia Pacific Center: 

philanthropy lecture on global civil Society and  

China Challenges and Perspectives, by Professor 

Anthony Spires from the University of Melbourne,  

Australia. My name is Siyue Lena Wang. I'm a 

graduate student researcher with the Ucla Asia  

Pacific Center. Myself, I am a PhD Candidate 

at the School of Education here at Ucla.

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia 

Pacific Center: Before we  

start I would like to say a few words 

about the Ucla Asia Pacific Center.

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia Pacific Center: 

So can we go to the next slides? Yes,  

thank you. Currently, The center is led by the 

interim Director Andrea Goldman. Our center  

promotes greater knowledge and understanding 

of Asia and the Pacific region on campus and  

in the community through innovative research 

teaching public programs, such as the GCP  

programs. I know many of you are in our programs 

today and the international collaborations

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia Pacific Center: we 

focus on inter-asia and trans-pacific connections  

from historical, contemporary and comparative 

perspectives. We encourage interdisciplinary  

work on cross-border and supranational issues 

on language and culture, politics, economic  

economy and society and the sustainability 

in the ongoing process of globalization.

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia Pacific Center: 

Our center also runs Taiwan study program,  

the program on Central Asia, the global 

Chinese philanthropy research and training  

program which led to this today's lecture, and 

we also serve as a national resource center,  

supported by the US. Department of 

Education, title 9, title 6. Grant.

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia Pacific 

Center: Our center also administers  

various fellowships and small grants, 

including US. Department of education,  

title Vi. Foreign language and Area study 

Fellowships, Taiwan study fellowships and  

research travel grants a few other awards 

on East Asian studies. I know some of you  

are also our postdocs and awardees, who 

are also in the lecture today. So welcome.

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia Pacific 

Center: And I want to give you a few,  

a brief introduction about the GCP program.

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia Pacific Center: 

Can we go to the next slide, please?

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia Pacific Center: 

The global Chinese philanthropy research  

and training program is led by 

the Ucla Asia Pacific Center,  

and we receive generous support 

from Cyrus Tang Foundation.

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia Pacific Center: And 

the program really aims to integrate networking  

building, research and training to bridge 

intellectual inquiry and professional practice  

in the field of Gcp. We have dedicated our program 

to fostering passion, interest and volunteerism,  

stimulating innovative research ideas 

and sharing best practices in Gcp  

through training programs, lectures and symposium.

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia Pacific 

Center: And the program really focus  

on 3 includes 3 components. The 1st 

one we maintain and expand our Gcp  

network. I think many of you actually know 

about this lecture through the Gcp network  

Listserv so welcome and thanks 

for continuing engaging with us.

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia Pacific Center: and 

we also work alongside with our institutional  

partners, who really help us sustain and expand 

the connection in Asia, but also globally.

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia Pacific 

Center: The second part is, we organize  

the public lecture series, and also the 

by Biannual international symposium. So

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia 

Pacific Center: last year,

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia Pacific Center: 

yeah, I think no. Actually, yeah. The year 2023,  

the end of 2023, we organize a symposium 

at Jinan University, and this upcoming  

spring. We'll have another symposium on 

Gcp. Hosted by the Zhejiang University.

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia Pacific Center: 

Lastly, we also want to foster volunteerism and  

provide professional trainings and trainings 

on research interests on Gcp. So we have a  

training program affiliate with the initiative 

where we provide half-day training workshops  

and also public lectures throughout the year. So 

welcome our student participants for the program.

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia Pacific Center: 

Lastly, I want to thank Cyrus Tang foundation  

for their generous support, and our staff, 

including Center administrator, Jeannie Chen,  

deputy director, Aaron Miller, and 

our graduate student researcher,  

Jerry Sun and undergraduate assistant, Joyce 

Lin for their hard work behind the scenes.

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia Pacific Center: and 

it's now my pleasure to introduce today's speaker,  

our Dr. Anthony Spiers, Dr. Spiers, is 

associate professor at the Center for  

contemporary Chinese study and deputy Associate 

Dean International China in the Faculty of Arts,  

and at the University of Melbourne. He 

was previously associate professor in  

the Department of Sociology and 

the Director of the Center for  

Social Innovation Studies at the 

Chinese University of Hong Kong.

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia Pacific Center: 

His research focuses on the development of

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia Pacific Center: 

civil society in China, including philanthropy,  

governmental regulations, and the cultures of a 

nonprofit organization which is really relevant.  

And I know many of you will be interested 

in today's topic. He has published widely  

in leading journals, including the American 

Journal of Sociology, top Tier journals,  

the China Journal, the China Quarterly and 

Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly.

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia 

Pacific Center: Dr. Spire is  

also the author of global civil society 

and China, and also everyday democracy.

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia 

Pacific Center: civil society,  

youth, and the struggle against 

authoritarian culture in China.

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia Pacific Center: 

which is published pretty recent last year.  

He is a graduate of Occidental 

College, actually in California,  

and he has 3 master degrees, and he got 

his PhD in sociology from Yale University.

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia Pacific 

Center: So in this lecture he will  

present on global civil society and 

China challenges and perspectives.

Siyue Lena Wang - UCLA Asia Pacific Center: 

So Dr. Spires the floor is yours and welcome.

Anthony Spires: Thank you, Lena so much for 

that very generous introduction. I appreciate  

it. Thank you all so much for joining us 

today. I recognize a few of the names in  

the attendees list and a lot of new folks. 

So I'm happy to share with you what I can,  

based on the work that I've done 

over the roughly past 20 years.

Anthony Spires: let me let me get my slides going.

Anthony Spires: See if this 

works hopefully, this works.

Anthony Spires: So

Anthony Spires: I'm probably too ambitious 

today. And what I want to talk to you about,  

so I probably will push us right up against the 

time where we have very little time left for Q&A.  

But I'll try to watch myself, and I ask Lena or 

Jeannie, or others to stop me if I go on too long.

Anthony Spires: But this is a book that I 

published last year. It's a short book with  

Cambridge University Press, and it's simply 

titled global civil society in China. What  

I want to do today is talk about some of the 

content in the book, but also provide a bit,  

maybe broader background for thinking about global 

civil society, its interactions and impacts on  

China, and also thinking about prospects. So 

looking at the future where things are today,  

and then where things are going which I think 

is a much more difficult thing to talk about.

Anthony Spires: With all the changes in the 

world, the changes in the Us. Where many of  

you are sitting, and the changes around us 

in this region here, where I am in Australia,  

as well, predicting the future is impossible, 

but I think it's important to think about what  

the future might hold. So I do want to talk 

about that a little bit towards the end.

Anthony Spires: So let me move forward if 

I can. I hope everyone can see this. Okay,  

what is global civil society?

Anthony Spires: So

Anthony Spires: I think in the broader literature 

and global civil society is is understood as 2  

different sorts of things maybe related. But one 

is organizations. So international Ngos operating  

programs making grants around the world, also 

included in that organizational kind of world  

are pure grant makers, philanthropic 

foundations that are simply donors,  

simply donors. I would say, who don't actually run 

programs on the ground. But who give away money.

Anthony Spires: I realize a lot of you are coming 

from different backgrounds. So for some of you,  

this may be ways too simple for some of you. It 

may be the 1st time you've heard it articulated  

this way. So again I encourage you to raise 

questions in the chat, and the Q&A. If you  

need to, if you like to. I would also say that 

the Gcs. If I can use that short term has been  

conceptualized as a normative project by many 

of the people who've talked about it in the past

Anthony Spires: as international Ngos as carriers 

of cosmopolitan values, including things like  

democracy and human rights. Mary Kaldor, in 

the Uk. Has written a book talking about global  

civil society as an antidote to war. So you can 

take from this. There's a lot of very idealistic

Anthony Spires: visions of what global civil 

society is and what it can be and what it can  

do. And I'm not so much a cynic. But I think these 

are insincere. I think this is, you know, these  

these kind of goals. The values they represent 

are aspirational. And I think you know, it's it's  

characteristics of what we can see when we look at 

many international Ngos around the world, anyway.

Anthony Spires: So a little bit of background to 

Ingos and global society in China. Some of you  

may know, after 1949, when the Communist 

party took power, most foreign supported  

charities in China were shuttered, they were 

closed down. Essentially. The message was that  

the party is here to help. The party is, 

you know, of the people for the people.

Anthony Spires: and so most foreign charities, of 

which there were many, many Chinese universities,  

many of Chinese colleges, many hospitals in 

China, medical schools were founded and funded  

by overseas Chinese, and by foreigners, 

sometimes with religious affiliation,  

sometimes not, but those were all shut 

down for the most part. After 1949.

Anthony Spires: I'll skip ahead in history 

really quickly. 30 years or so after Mao Zedong  

died in 1976, and Deng Xiaoping opened 

up China to the outside world. In 1979,  

a lot of foreign philanthropic foundations 

and Ingos were invited into China by the  

State itself. So at the highest levels of 

Chinese Government. There were invitations  

to many different organizations in the 1980s 

to come in and establish an office in China.

Anthony Spires: to assist in 

China's opening up to the world

Anthony Spires: in many different realms, so 

that includes education. So my home discipline,  

sociology was reestablished 

during this period of time,  

and supported by organizations 

like the Ford Foundation and others

Anthony Spires: as well as you know other 

things about environmental disaster,  

relief, support, poverty, alleviation,  

all the sorts of things that came to be on the 

Chinese kind of agenda, the official agenda.

Anthony Spires: as well as integrating into the 

global economy and the development of different  

kinds of laws and regulations that would help 

facilitate that. So I've given you a couple of  

4 different examples of organizations that 

have been active in China for a very long  

time that came in sometime after the 1979 

period. So the Ford foundation from the Us

Anthony Spires: has as its mission. You 

can find this online. This is a slightly  

older version of the mission statement, I think, 

but the ideas are still there to reduce poverty  

and injustice to strengthen democratic 

values, promote international cooperation

Anthony Spires: and advance human achievement. 

So in this one line from the Ford Foundation,  

I think it's not representative of every ingo,  

but I think it does touch on issues 

that many different INGOs have

Anthony Spires: made a focus of their work 

and core to their own values. So injustice,  

democracy, international cooperation, nice 

thing, advancing human achievement which can be  

understood many ways. Education, for example, the 

Asia Foundation, which is also based in the Us.

Anthony Spires: Has had a focus on good 

governance on women's empowerment, gender  

equality. So again, those kinds of cosmopolitan 

values and kinds of things that we think about  

when we think about progressing democracy 

and human rights globally right. This is  

what the Asia foundation is looking to 

do. Oxfam from the Uk seeks to ensure  

the representation of vulnerable people 

affected by marginalization and injustice

Anthony Spires: and save the children, 

Uk, giving a powerful voice to children  

and championing their rights. So 

you can see in just these short,  

brief statements by these 4 different, 

rather large Ingos. There's a big focus on

Anthony Spires: particular kinds of values and 

governance principles, right? So inclusivity,  

gender equality, rights. As a few of 

those key touchstone words, I would say.

Anthony Spires: but I will go back and just say 

that these are not unique to global civil society.  

For sure, after the party was established before 

the party was, you know, had taken power in 1949,

Anthony Spires: even an early period of 

Republican China, things like democracy,  

rights, liberty, equality. These were, you 

know, catchphrases of the intelligentsia  

leading up to the Republican revolution 

overthrowing the Qing dynasty. So these  

ideas have been floating around China for 

a very, very long time in today in China,  

you can see, as I showed you this picture of a 

street sign in Kunming that I took in 2014 core  

Socialist values in today's China include these 

sorts of things. So these would not be unknown.

Anthony Spires: They're not unfamiliar, 

I would say, within the Chinese context,  

although some people may be skeptical of 

what these things actually mean and how  

they're taught in Chinese schools which they 

are taught now from kindergarten on up, and  

how people interpret what they mean. My impression 

is that although they are widely taught in school.

Anthony Spires: the teaching is often down 

to memorization. So children have to learn  

to repeat these things, and there 

are little songs that kindergartners  

can sing now they're quite cute. But 

you know these are big words even for  

grownups. These are really big words. 

So for kids growing up in China today.

Anthony Spires: you know, they'll be 

hearing these sorts of things a lot.  

But what they mean and what they mean 

in practice are different questions.

Anthony Spires: I think we can't talk about global 

civil society unless we talk about grassroots,  

domestic civil society within China. So 

I want to focus quickly, briefly, maybe,  

on grassroots Ngos, and very explicitly, 

government fears of grassroots, Ngos,  

which I've studied grassroots Ngos 

in China for a couple of decades  

now. And I think it's a part of the story, an 

important part of the story for understanding

Anthony Spires: global philanthropy to China,  

and also the Chinese Government's efforts 

to shape civil society internally and also  

shape the activities of Chinese 

groups when they move overseas.

Anthony Spires: So there's clearly a strand 

within the party a group within the party,  

a way of thinking within the party that says that 

grassroots Ngos, are something dangerous that we  

need to be aware of. We need to take control 

of. There's a fear that grassroots groups are  

anti-government anti-party, or maybe forming an 

alternative party to the Communist Party itself.

Anthony Spires: and I would just briefly state 

here that you know again, in 20 years of working  

with grassroots Ngos, and doing research in this 

area. I don't think there is any alternative  

party organization in existence in China today. I 

don't think there's any group identifiable group.  

At least that is cohesive enough to challenge 

the party, but that fear remains quite strong.

Anthony Spires: There's a fear that Ngos in 

China may link up, and this is an understandable  

fear. The party itself, when it was trying to get 

established and overthrow the well and win power,  

I should say, in the 1940s, and prior to 

that the party itself operated in ways  

that different groups of activists or Communist 

party cells around the country would link up.

Anthony Spires: They're very aware of their own 

history of doing that. And they're concerned that  

Ngos can do this. What this means in practice 

is that in real life is that Ngos today in  

China have a hard time getting together inside 

China. There's been lots of events that I've  

been sort of planning to go to, or others have 

told me about, that. They were going to happen

Anthony Spires: that in the end got canceled 

because the Government stepped in and said, No,  

no, no, you can't meet in this hotel, 

or you can't meet in this university,  

or you cannot do this, or you cannot do that,  

or their travel arrangements were canceled 

for them. So it remains a concern and a fear.

Anthony Spires: There's also, I think, which is

Anthony Spires: pretty relevant for today's topic, 

the fear that grassroots Ngos may actually simply  

be covers for foreign organizations, that 

they're acting as foreign agents for the CIA  

in the Us. Or that foreign foundations like 

the Ford Foundation or others, may actually  

just be working to promote color revolutions, 

which is the narrative that's used to explain  

what happened in Ukraine, also about 20 years 

ago in Georgia, Kyrgyzstan, a few other places

Anthony Spires: in Eastern Central 

Europe, and on the border of China,  

so I won't go into the background of all this. 

I'm happy to talk about it if it's not clear.  

But I just want to raise that and say, look that 

the government is concerned about grassroots Ngos,  

and what they can do in grassroots, 

civil society, and that is relevant. For

Anthony Spires: for Ingo's in ways that 

will become more obvious in a minute.  

But before I talk about that, I just want to say,  

I want to flag some data. This is not data 

that I collected. This is Mary Kaldor,  

and others that collected this data. Again, around 

2,003. I think most of the data was collected.

Anthony Spires: But I just share this to show 

you how China was then. And I would argue still,  

now largely is on the outskirts of global civil 

society. Although economically starting in the  

early 2000, China is moving to the center very, 

very rapidly, the center of the global economy.

Anthony Spires: When it comes to global 

civil society quite on the outskirts. So  

you see this ingo memberships per 1 million 

population which allows us to compare across  

countries. If the world average was 45.4 

higher than that in richer countries.

Anthony Spires: 37.8 in middle income countries, 

and 17.7, China was the lowest of all this 1.9  

memberships per 1 million of the population. 

This is a membership in, for example, Greenpeace,  

you can go online, you can become a registered 

become a member of Greenpeace. And if you were  

in China at the time when they're collecting this 

data with the way that they've they've conceived  

it. If you were one individual that counts 

as one membership. But in this, in this world

Anthony Spires: of Ingo memberships China is  

definitely far at the periphery. 

I would say, not at the center

Anthony Spires: which indicates, I think, 

to the extent to which China has been  

fairly disengaged or fairly isolated 

from global civil society. For a very  

long time. In other places in Africa 

and South America, parts of Southeast  

Asia. Some places you'd find much higher 

numbers than 1.9 where China Falls here.

Anthony Spires: Want to go back to this 

kind of concern that I mentioned earlier  

the fears of grassroots Ngos, and the fears 

of foreign Ngos that are active in China,  

and share with you a piece 

by Professor Zhao Liqing

Anthony Spires: from again roughly 20 

years ago. But I think what he did at  

the time he really captured the debate 

that was happening in China at the time,  

and I would say the debate that has continued 

to some extent to today about whether it's  

good or not to allow foreign Ngos into China 

to allow foreign organizations, whether they  

be grant makers or ingo's operating programs 

to allow them to work inside mainland China.

Anthony Spires: Zhao Liqing listed 

out several things he did. A. This  

is published in the Study Times. I think it was

Anthony Spires: he listed a number of different  

things. Funding they bring in money. 

Obviously, that's a good thing, especially

Anthony Spires: at that time when China didn't 

have so much money of its own experience,  

information, personnel methods, how to 

do things so literally? How do you run  

organizations? How do you deliver social 

services to people in need? How do you  

think about reconstructing the education 

system to support internationalization?

Anthony Spires: Right? These are all things 

that foreign Ngos had experience doing and  

were sharing in China were doing in China just 

after China joined the Wto in 2,001 roughly,  

social development, obviously a good thing, 

a counterpart to economic development.

Anthony Spires: a new social system. I'm 

not quite sure what he meant by that. But  

that's okay. And he also said that they're 

helping build public policy processes and  

rule of law. And there are a great number 

of examples of this where this has happened,  

and one I like to refer to, and some of you 

joining today have more experience with this  

than I do on the ground experience, probably, 

of international Ngos, that, for example, had

Anthony Spires: the round advise city governments 

on how to have a public consultation about  

new laws, concerning the environment, or any 

matter, any number of different kind of matters,  

but on the environment, for example, you know, 

in one particular city in northeastern China,  

where Ingos were actually one Ngo 

was invited by the city government to

Anthony Spires: tell them, I guess, sort of 

help them set up a kind of a Town Hall thing,  

where people in the community could 

come together and discuss the draft  

laws or the draft regulations 

that the city was proposing.

Anthony Spires: and this was a fairly new thing 

at the time, and quite radical, I would say in  

China it hasn't been extended. So if you look 

at the law and laws in China, the laws of the  

law and legislation. How do you make laws? That 

kind of law? One of the results, I think of this  

of this expansion of public policy processes 

and inputs is that now new laws in China.

Anthony Spires: are, typically, 

they have to be posted online  

one month in advance of for or for 

public consultation for 30 days. So

Anthony Spires: a couple of the laws that I 

followed, like the law on the charity law and the  

law on international Ngos or Overseas Ngos. They 

were both put online by the relevant government  

agencies and invited, you know, invited people 

around the country and around the world to submit

Anthony Spires: opinions or suggestions. 

For what could work? What could be a  

problem with the law as it was drafted. 

So those are things that Zhao Li Qing,  

and others around him saw as valuable, and 

they have had an impact in China for sure.

Anthony Spires: He also recognized that national 

security is, there's a threat that Ngos can.  

Foreign Ngos again, may bring to the country 

that they might cause political instability,  

especially if they're trying to 

promote a color revolution. Like,  

again, was the narrative in 

Eastern Europe and in Kyrgyzstan

Anthony Spires: they might increase corruption 

because there's a lot of money flowing in. And I  

have stories about that. I won't share them today. 

But I have heard stories of that. And I would say,  

Yeah, that's a real problem. More money coming in, 

and who knows where the money's going? You know I  

could point to different places where it shouldn't 

be going, and it seems to have landed there. So  

he's aware of that stuff. And then foreign 

models pushed onto China, which I think is a

Anthony Spires: a reasonable criticism. And 

that's also say it's a criticism that many  

international Ngos have faced in many other 

parts of the world. So China is not unique

Anthony Spires: in these concerns, probably, but 

I think Zhao Liqing kind of articulated them quite  

well. At the end of this very short article. Where 

he does this he actually comes down, and saying  

that on balance they're probably better for China 

than they are dangerous, for China on balance are  

probably better than they are bad for China. So 

that was about 20 years ago. I'm not sure now

Anthony Spires: where a similar analysis 

would come down, because in the last 20 years,  

the last couple of decades there's 

been a clear shift towards looking  

at them as more of a threat than as 

a as a bonus, as a helpful thing,  

and I can articulate that a bit 

better later. If you're interested.

Anthony Spires: I wanna

Anthony Spires: focus on a 4 different Us 

based grantmakers. Just to give an example  

of the kinds of things that that grant makers and 

things because we're talking about philanthropy  

today. Grant makers looking at 

China. Do or have said they do.

Anthony Spires: And I'll explain why. Maybe 

I'll go back to this slide just very briefly.

Anthony Spires: When Zhao Liqing article came 

out I was already on the ground in China,  

doing field work, and before I went to 

China I was based in the Us. At Yale,  

and I had met with a number of foundations in 

the Us. And New York, Boston and Washington,  

a couple of other places that were working in 

China, and I asked them, you know, what do you  

do? Why do you do what you do, and virtually 

all of them said. You know we support kind of

Anthony Spires: grassroots groups. We support 

civil society development. We support, you know,  

human rights. Quietly we support these sorts 

of things. We support development of civil  

society in China. And I thought, okay. 

So then I went to the ground in China,  

spent a lot of time, and mostly 

in Guangdong in the South.

Anthony Spires: talking with people meeting 

with different groups, and I had that in my  

mind right. And to give an example of what I had 

in my mind. These are quotes from 4 different  

groups. This is part of their mission statement 

or their vision for what they do. The national  

endowment for democracy which is in a Us. Based 

Washington based Ngo not registered nonprofit

Anthony Spires: in 2,003, which is 

just before I started talking to  

people about these issues, the Ned said 

it concentrated its resources in Asia,  

on organizations meaning civil society 

groups, grassroots, groups working to pry  

open dictatorial systems and broaden rights and 

political space in semi-authoritarian countries.

Anthony Spires: and Nad did not classify 

China as semi-authoritarian. It was a  

full-fledged authoritarian country, or perhaps 

dictatorship in the the rhetoric of the time.

Anthony Spires: the Asia Foundation in China. 

It said that it supports civil organizations and  

government institutions to enhance popular 

empowerment while increasing government  

accountability. So this is about human rights 

and democracy stuff. Right? It's very explicit.

Anthony Spires: the State Department, has 

a Bureau of democracy, human rights sorry,  

and this is a typo and labor. Says that they  

consult and partner closely with the many 

and dedicated and capable Ngos working on  

human rights and democracy right around the 

world. But obviously, particularly in China.

Anthony Spires: The Ford Foundation says 

explicitly, our goals are to strengthen  

democratic values, reduce poverty and 

justice, promote international cooperation,  

advance human achievement. So there's a lot 

of rhetoric here that you can understand would  

worry the Conservatives within the party 

who are worried about color revolutions,  

or worried about foreign organizations trying to

Anthony Spires: harm the rule of the party, or 

to bring down the party and overthrow the State,  

which is an expression here a lot. And 

in official circles about this. And I  

would read this sort of stuff. And I 

talk to people. And I thought, Wow,  

they're very explicit about what they want 

to do. How are they allowed to operate in  

China? Why aren't they allowed to operate in 

China? If this is what they say they're doing.

Anthony Spires: It seems like you just 

need to go on the website. I mean,  

you could access these websites from China 

at the time they weren't blocked. Some of  

them are probably blocked now. They 

weren't blocked. So it's not like,  

you know, people in Beijing didn't couldn't 

know what they said that they were doing.

Anthony Spires: And so yeah, I went on the ground

Anthony Spires: back up and say, I went on the 

ground, and what I found with the grassroots.  

Ngos, for the most part, was that they had 

very little contact with foreign foundations.  

They had very little, very little or no contact 

with these kinds of Grant makers. And so there  

was a big contrast between what I'd heard 

in interviews in the Us. As a researcher,  

as a doctoral researcher, and then, on 

the ground from civil society groups in  

China itself. So I went to try to 

figure out why this was the case.

Anthony Spires: and what I did 

was, I collected lots of data,  

used data from the foundation center based 

in New York to look at private foundations  

and the grantees in China. And I went 

through all the foundations that made  

grants in China from 2,002 to 2,009 that are 

captured in that foundation center database.

Anthony Spires: There were quite a lot, and 

I classified all the grantees. And so this is  

the I don't need you to read. You don't need to 

feel like you need to read all this, but I would  

just shoot to the top 2 lines. Academic and 

research institutions and government agencies

Anthony Spires: got the lion's share of funding 

from foreign grantees from us based foundations  

at the time at least 44% of the money they sent 

to China during that time of 200 million dollars  

effectively went to Chinese universities. 

Essentially right. Another quarter of it went  

to government agencies and another 16% went to 

GONGOs. And then maybe 5% went to grassroots Ngos.

Anthony Spires: International, other 

international Ngos and others got a big  

chunk of the money. But over that period 

of 8 years I think it is. You can see,  

the total amount of money was almost half a 

billion Us. Dollars. That's a lot of money. So  

to go back to Zhao Liqing's worry, worry about 

corruption. You can easily imagine where some  

of that money would get siphoned off right. 

But the bulk of the money going to academic

Anthony Spires: research institutions, 

government agencies and Gongos,  

which are government organized Ngos or 

government controlled organizations.  

This was very different than what 

I expected in that period of time.  

Only 188 grants that I could identify 

were directly made to grassroots Ngos

Anthony Spires: And so that was quite puzzling 

for me. This is another way of looking at the  

same data. If you look at who got the most 

money during that period of time the PRC  

Ministry of Health got the biggest chunk of it. 

I think that comes from the Gates Foundation,  

who who gave a lot of money 

during that period of time.

Anthony Spires: The Academy of Agricultural 

Sciences. So you see number 3, number 4, Tsinghua  

University, Beijing University, Number 5, 

the Ministry of Education. Essentially these  

are all academic government controlled 

universities and research centers or  

government agencies themselves, except for 

Number 6, which is a bit of an outlier here.

Anthony Spires: But the short story is 

that the vast majority of money is not  

going to grassroots groups is actually going 

to the government itself or the government  

controlled entities. So that in part, I 

think, explains why the governments did  

allow them for so long to do what they 

were doing despite their own rhetoric.

Anthony Spires: And if you look at 

where the money in China is going,  

70% of it was going to grantees based in 

Beijing. Other places dropped, you know,  

far down the list, and Number 5 was Guangdong. 

This is where I was doing most of my field work  

as a Phd student getting 2.2% of it right? 

But again, a large, the biggest chunk of  

that would not be going to grassroots groups, 

but to government controlled organizations.

Anthony Spires: I think it's an 

important part of the story. And I  

think it's important part of the history 

that sets us up to where we are today.

Anthony Spires: I can talk more about that 

later. But I do want to just move forward  

just in the interest of time and talk about the 

situation for civil society broadly in China,  

since Xi. Jinping has come to power, and I don't 

think it's terribly controversial to say that  

there's been a lot of repression of civil society 

since 2012, prior to 2,012, just to flag that

Anthony Spires: prior to the 2,008 Olympics there 

were a number of organizations were shut down,  

China Development brief, which was a Beijing 

based kind of Clearinghouse for information  

about civil society was shut down, it reopened, 

but it was shut down prior to that Minjian,  

which is a magazine that was published out 

of Zhongshan University in Guangzhou by some  

scholars there. It was shut down, and Minjian was 

a really interesting magazine, because it included

Anthony Spires: articles, interviews, and articles 

by and with grassroots, activists, Chinese  

civil society actors, as well as you know, like 

migrant workers who come from other parts of China  

to Guangdong, or to other parts of the country, 

it included interviews with people advocating for  

the rights of blind people. It included reports on 

organizations working with people affected by HIV

Anthony Spires: on environmental 

activists, environmental issues  

in China. So it's really broad kind of 

social problems, focused kind of magazine.

Anthony Spires: And that was shut down as 

as were a number of HIV Aids. Groups were  

working in Henan at the time. I could talk 

more about why, but but the you know the

Anthony Spires: the sentiment 

at the time from Beijing

Anthony Spires: seem to be that, 

you know. 2,008. The Olympics are  

going to be a fantastic opportunity for 

China to showcase itself to the world.

Anthony Spires: and it was, and they 

expected millions of people to come.  

I don't know how many people 

came, but let's say a million,  

maybe 2 million. I don't know. Maybe more come to 

China. They're expecting people to come to China,  

and prior to the Olympics. They also announced 

that they would allow foreign journalists to  

travel anywhere in China and interview people 

without constraint, right without restrictions,  

which was very different from the norm at the 

time where foreign journalists had to apply  

to go anywhere and get permission, and that 

sort of thing, and often followed, of course.

Anthony Spires: So the idea was there'd be 

lots of foreigners running around China.  

We don't want to see, we don't want them to 

just see the bad things about China. We don't  

want them to see all the bad things if we can 

avoid that right. So you shut down these kinds  

of organizations and these kinds of magazines in 

a way, as to, you know, protect the image right

Anthony Spires: understandable from the standpoint  

of people in Beijing. But that 

is the impact on civil society

Anthony Spires: leading up to Hong Kong's occupy  

central movement and the 

umbrella movement in 2014.

Anthony Spires: A few other things. The 

term civil society was banned in Media,  

and now it's banned in academia as 

well. Essentially, from what all  

my Chinese colleagues tell me there was a 

nationwide investigation of foreign Ngos,  

including the groups that I mentioned earlier 

in June and July of 2014 so occupy Central  

and the umbrella movement started later 

that late that summer, early in the fall.

Anthony Spires: And

Anthony Spires: There was introduction 

of a new Ingo law that required formal  

registration which came a bit later. But these 

are all things that happened in the lead up to  

that or right after 2014. So in 2015, a number 

of lawyer activists were detained and arrested.

Anthony Spires: And there's other things 

that we could talk about that happened  

before that. And since then, of course, 

but I think that the overall picture  

is that it's become much more difficult 

for grassroots groups to work in China,  

and I would argue a lot more difficult 

for foreign Ngos to work in China as well.

Anthony Spires: so this is just a great photo 

that I grabbed online before it was taken off,  

published by a local city government, 

showing some of its officials getting  

ready to go out and do an investigation 

of civil society groups and asking them  

about all of their contacts with foreigners, 

all their contacts with international Ngos,  

with foreign foundations, whether they got 

any money, what kind of programs they'd run,  

etc, etc. So leading up to occupy 

Central in 2014. I think every

Anthony Spires: grassroots Ngo that I knew in 

China at the time when I when I thought to ask  

them. They all said they'd been visited by some 

people like these, and maybe visited by 3 or 4  

different agencies asking the same kinds of 

questions. You know. What are your contacts  

with foreigners? What have you been doing with 

them? Show us your bank accounts. Some groups  

had their bank accounts frozen. It was, you 

know, a real signal that the State was worried.

Anthony Spires: About Ingos. And why 

is this relevant to Hong Kong? Well,  

because the fear at the time, and perhaps 

still, the fear of the time was that Hong  

Kong activism in Hong Kong would spill 

over into mainland China that protests  

in Hong Kong would spill over into 

mainland China, that Hong Kong based

Anthony Spires: international Ngos that were 

doing work in China, would bring problems  

to mainland China. Right? So if we look at 

that border as a as an international border?

Anthony Spires: And so what we ended up 

with as a result of all that in 2017,  

this 2016 and 2017, there was an ingo law 

that was passed. And this is some work  

that I did on the Ingo law. I can talk more 

about that. But essentially I went around,  

talked to lots of different people when the Ingo 

law was 1st proposed doing interviews, doing focus  

groups, trying to talk to as many people as I 

could, and doing an online survey as well about

Anthony Spires: what the ingo 

law as it was drafted would mean.

Anthony Spires: And then afterwards, you 

know, continue to do this so for Ingos,  

how do they survive prior to the Ingo law? 

It's something I want to briefly touch on,  

and I will say it's not so dissimilar in the ways 

that many grassroots Ngos survived, although the  

political situation is not terribly friendly, or 

there's always risk involved. Many Ngos learned  

that they need to develop trust relationship with 

relationships with local government officials.

Anthony Spires: that they could work 

collaboratively with some central  

government ministries, some provincial government 

or local government ministries as well. Of course  

they brought money, as Zhao Liqing said, 

and they brought money resources skills.  

They worked with Gongos. Some of them worked 

the grassroots Ngos and many of them avoided  

explicitly criticizing China's human rights 

practices and its efforts towards democracy.

Anthony Spires: So prior to the 

law, the Ministry of Public Security

Anthony Spires: estimated there were about 

7,000 Ingos active in China. I never have  

seen that many Ingos active in China. 

I'm not sure where they got the number,  

but that's the estimate that was floated by 

that branch of the government at the time.

Anthony Spires: And so the Ingo law itself. What 

the upshot of it was that it required a lot more  

regulation. It requires still to the day a lot 

more regulation and control of international Ngos,  

and what they're doing in China. There 

you have to have a supervisor agency to  

establish a representative office 

just like grassroots Ngos used to,  

and still do have to do for the most part.

Anthony Spires: It does allow,  

pre approved one off activities without 

registering in an office which some

Anthony Spires: some ingo's have 

taken that option. Since then.

Anthony Spires: importantly, the INGO Law covers 

Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Macau. Taiwan's not such  

a concern. Macau is not a huge concern, but 

the biggest concern, I think politically,  

has always been Hong Kong, because the proximity, 

the easy access to Guangdong and the flow of  

people and information and money across the 

border has meant that many international Ngos  

have based themselves in Hong Kong for a very 

long time and then do work in mainland China.

Anthony Spires: And so the law is not called 

the the Foreign Ngo law. In Chinese it's  

referred to as the Jingwai Ngo law, Jingwai 

means outside the borders of mainland China,  

so that way it allows them to 

include Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Macau

Anthony Spires: and as a signal,  

it puts the Ingo's under the supervision 

of the Ministry of Public Security.

Anthony Spires: and I think Mark Seidel, who 

gave a talk in the same lecture series at Ucla  

a couple of years ago, has written an article 

where he talks about the securitization of  

Ingo's and civil society in China, and 

pointing to the way the law does this.

Anthony Spires: I generally agree with 

this assessment in that regard. The law  

prohibits religious and political activities, 

it specifies punishment. If you break the law,  

this is what's going to happen to 

you, and I will say the earliest  

drafts of the law were very punitive. 

The earliest draft of the law that I saw

Anthony Spires: I want to say, like 80% of it 

don't quote me on this, but roughly, you know,  

a huge chunk of it, anyway, was about 

how you'll be punished if you break the  

law. It wasn't actually establishing 

any kind of supportive mechanisms,  

at least in the reading that I had of, and many 

other people had of it. It was quite a severe law

Anthony Spires: by 2023. This is the last stats I 

have here only less than 700 Ngos had registered  

offices, and this is again compared to the 

7,000 Ingo's that the Ministry of Public  

Security had estimated were operating in 

China. So if the goal of the law was to  

restrict the activities of international Ngos in 

China. I think it's been extremely successful.

Anthony Spires: Okay, just 

if you look at these numbers.

Anthony Spires: I've talked 

with a lot of foundation folks,  

a lot of international Ngo folks 

in the past couple of years

Anthony Spires: who are still trying to work 

in China, and it is very difficult for them  

much more difficult than it was 5 or 10 years 

ago. And there's a lot of frustration yeah,  

in the field as well, and a lot of doubt as to 

whether they should stay or whether they can stay.

Anthony Spires: And I will say to shift gears 

and talk about a different aspect of global  

civil society in China. I think the story is 

not simply about as I've really focused today  

on the impacts on China, what's happening 

within China itself and some of China's  

responses to that. The Government's 

responses, at least. But I think a big  

part of the story which is only unfolding 

right now is what the future holds. And I.

Anthony Spires: There's many pieces 

of this one thing I would point to  

that. I'm interested in myself, and some 

colleagues of mine are as well. Of course,  

the 1 million plus PRC students that 

are studying overseas every year now,  

and the kind of activism that some 

of them are getting engaged in.

Anthony Spires: it's not easily controlled.  

Of course this diaspora activism is not 

something the State can easily control,  

but it is subject to a lot of transnational 

repression and surveillance. These are some  

flyers that appeared at my university here in 

Melbourne almost overnight a few years ago.

Anthony Spires: after the Sitong Bridge incident,  

where someone climbed on the bridge and 

held out a banner, calling for Xi. Jinping  

to step down and and calling for the end 

to covid test and voting for dictatorship.

Anthony Spires: claiming, you know, we want to 

be citizens, not slaves. This sort of stuff.

Anthony Spires: And here are some others, 

you know, quoting the the that person on  

the bridge. And there's a photograph of 

the banner that was up there at the time.

Anthony Spires: This is a bridge in Beijing, 

and for those of you who were who were inside  

mainland China at the time. Maybe you 

heard or didn't hear about this. If you  

were outside of China at the time, you 

probably did hear about it if you were  

paying attention to the international 

media and even to the Chinese kind of

Anthony Spires: social media sphere. At the 

time this was quite visible. These are only  

a few examples of the kinds of things 

that people are doing. And this is,  

you know, the more radical end. Of course, right? 

There's also a lot of activism on in other areas

Anthony Spires: that Chinese students have 

gotten involved in and Chinese young people  

who've left China and as well as other 

people who've left China in recent years,  

migrants to Australia, to the Uk, to the Us. 

To Canada, to other parts of Europe that have  

somehow found themselves interested 

in different kinds of social issues.

Anthony Spires: And are wondering 

what they can do about those issues.

Anthony Spires: At the same time, within 

China. Since Xi Jinping came to power.

Anthony Spires: part of the bri. 

The Belt Road initiative is not  

just only going out economically, 

but also going out in terms of aid,  

foreign aid and development assistance to 

other countries. Building goodwill for China.

Anthony Spires: The Government has passed in 

the in less than 10 years. They passed about  

12 a dozen national level different kinds 

of policies, to coordinate and facilitate

Anthony Spires: Chinese foreign 

aid to go overseas. And this was  

done with the Taxation Administration 

with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs,  

the Ministry of Commerce, the 

Ministry of Civil Affairs.

Anthony Spires: all the the important 

key Government agencies that need to  

coordinate to work together 

to make sure that Chinese

Anthony Spires: aid can go overseas 

and the Chinese donation. So now it's  

legally possible to donate to an 

organization in China as a Chinese  

person and expect that that money will go 

to help someone in Africa or to work on an  

environmental project in Southeast Asia, 

or that will go to places of need right?  

And you that did. That was not the legally the 

legal structures, for it weren't very developed

Anthony Spires: 15 years ago before Xi 

Jinping became to office. But over the  

last 10 years or so it's gotten 

a lot more complex and a lot more  

sophisticated. And it's possible. Now 

there's a lot of funds have been set up  

to support going out. So there's a South South 

Fund. There's a couple of other other agencies  

that have been established by the Government to 

facilitate again the going out of Chinese Ngos

Anthony Spires: and it provides political 

legitimacy for grassroots, groups who are looking  

to expand abroad. Some groups have been working 

overseas. Already, even in the absence of these  

kinds of things, some, some Chinese groups have 

been able to do this and want to, and have been.

Anthony Spires: I think, making their 

contributions overseas. But who will  

benefit the most from, I think, these kinds of 

policies? It's not quite clear grassroots groups,  

I would say probably less so. But I think a lot 

of the money that's going to be collected and  

that can flow now will go through. Gongos will 

go through government organized Ngos, you know.

Anthony Spires: waving the Chinese 

flag and supporting policy goals  

of the State. But perhaps also, you know, 

learning about conditions in other places,  

and and bringing in what they learn 

from interactions with international  

Ngos that work in other areas of the world 

as well. There's just a few examples here.

Anthony Spires: I won't go into 

too much detail given the time.  

But there's a group called 

the Peaceland Foundation,  

which I think is interesting to look at people 

of Asia for climate solutions which is founded  

and co-founded by Chinese people who left 

mainland China and went to the Philippines.

Anthony Spires: And now they work. 

They're based in the Philippines,  

and they do work in the region here, close 

to where I am. The Australian New Zealand  

Rainbow Association advocates for queer 

rights and supports the queer Chinese  

speaking community in Australia, which is 

very large. Again, remembering that we have  

literally hundreds of thousands of Chinese 

students studying in Australia every year,  

and some of them are queer groups like 

Antra are working to basically help them

Anthony Spires: understand what it means to be 

queer living in Australia. So there's all kinds  

of different ways in which activism is taking 

place outside the borders of mainland China,  

and which that involves the State in some cases, 

and in some cases doesn't. It involves the people  

themselves. All these things are happening. 

I think they all deserve our attention.

Anthony Spires: And I would say 

that the the last thing that I

Anthony Spires: I think it's unfolding at 

the moment in the Us. With Trump's new,  

his administration's new Administration's 

policies, putting a pause on all foreign aid,  

pulling the drug out from under Usaid 

and a number of other organizations  

that have supported human rights. 

Democratization groups, overseas

Anthony Spires: as well as many, 

you know, medical care, education,  

other kinds of things overseas. I think it 

really does offer an opportunity for Chinese  

organizations to step in. That's not necessarily 

a bad thing, because people in need are in need.

Anthony Spires: But I think that you know

Anthony Spires: where the Chinese moneys will go. 

Assuming that does start happening really soon  

is kind of predictable. I think we could see it  

going to basic education. We can see 

it going to healthcare in some cases

Anthony Spires: that we should not expect 

that's going to go to supporting human  

rights and democracy movements overseas. 

Like much of us money has done in the past  

several decades. So that's a new thing to pay 

attention to, and I will stop there and say,  

Thank you for your time. I invite any 

and all questions and comments. Happy  

to have a conversation today or later 

on. If you need to do it that way.

Anthony Spires: I'll stop sharing here as well.

Jeannie Chen - Asia Pacific Center: 

Thank you so much. Dr. Spires, yeah,  

a lot of food for thought, and and 

thank you for sharing your insights.

Jeannie Chen - Asia Pacific Center: And as you 

were speaking. There's a lot of questions coming  

in, so we'll cover them as many as we can. 

We have. One just came in. The 1st one is,  

why are foreign charities only from the Us. Or Uk  

instead of European countries or East 

Asian countries? For example, Japan.

Anthony Spires: Yeah. So that's a really 

good question. Before I started launching  

into sort of my second wave of research 

on on international Ngos in China actually  

tried to do a desktop study to find out where 

people are working, where they're coming from,  

and the top 3 bases for international Ngos 

working in China were the Us. The Uk and Hong Kong

Anthony Spires: other European countries are 

active for sure. Some Japanese funds are also  

have also been active in China, for sure. 

So they're there. But in terms of numbers,  

I think they've always been smaller. Yeah.

Anthony Spires: and also sorry to go 

back to the philanthropy aspect of this  

as well. The Us. Has a much greater culture 

of philanthropy than many other countries do,  

so there's a lot of private wealth 

in private foundations in the Us. If  

money is coming from many European countries, 

typically it comes through kind of government,  

government organized Ngos within within our 

government foundations some private foundations,  

some corporate foundations. But in the Us. A 

lot of it's going to be private philanthropy.

Jeannie Chen - Asia Pacific Center: Wonderful. 

Thank you. Yeah, we have a second question that  

came in. So is there any evidence to show 

that the umbrella movement in Hong Kong is  

connected with national investigation on 

Ingos, and are there any other reasons.

Anthony Spires: Yeah. So the investigation 

at the time in 2014. The only evidence I  

can give you is that people told 

me it was. Government people,  

government officials in China, 

academics in China who were involved in

Anthony Spires: in launching that investigation. 

They all said this, yes, this is what's happening.  

And the civil society groups that had their doors 

knocked on and were asked about their connections  

to international Ngos as well as international 

Ngos that I spoke with at the time everybody  

was saying the same thing that this is because 

of what's happening. What's going to happen in  

Hong Kong. Because the Hong Kong protests 

were not spontaneous. They were planned

Anthony Spires: by my colleagues and others 

in Hong Kong. They were actually so. They were  

planning them publicly. So it was a known thing 

that was going to happen. And so the you know,  

Beijing's response to this actually was quite 

rational, probably from a policy standpoint. Yeah.

Jeannie Chen - Asia Pacific 

Center: Yeah, thank you.

Jeannie Chen - Asia Pacific Center: 

Yeah. And then a related question,  

it's a little bit long. So I'll also put 

it in the chat for you. But 3rd question  

is under the greater Bay Area Development scheme. 

On the one hand, the Government encouraged more  

frequent communications or collaborations 

between mainland China and Hong Kong and Macau

Jeannie Chen - Asia Pacific 

Center: by promulgating relevant  

policies and organizing different 

activities. On the other hand,  

the Government still relies on strict 

regulation or policies to manage Ingos.

Jeannie Chen - Asia Pacific 

Center: how do you think of  

this? And how could we balance the situation.

Anthony Spires: Yeah, I I think.

Anthony Spires: I think there's 2 aspects of 

this, right? So there's the political aspect which  

I mentioned earlier about the party's fears of 

grassroots Ngos, and suspicions of foreign Ngos,  

the political element within the party leadership 

itself, or within certain elements of the party.  

And then there's the practical parts of it, 

you know. What do we need? Why do we need  

foreigners to bring in their money? Why do we need 

foreigners to come in and do programs in China.

Anthony Spires: Then there's a Pr 

element to this right. Xi. Jinping  

went to. When the INGO law was being 

debated, Xi. Jinping visited the Us.  

He went to Seattle and was hosted by the 

National Committee on Us. China Relations,  

of which I'm a member at a dinner, and at 

that dinner, he said. We welcome foreign  

Ngos to come into China. We welcome everybody 

to come in as long as they abide by the laws.

Anthony Spires: Right? So this is the question,  

what does it mean to abide by the 

laws, and what are you allowed to do  

when you come in and you register? How do you 

operate within the Chinese legal structure?

Anthony Spires: I think you know Mark Seidel 

again a couple of years ago. Here I watched  

his recording before I joined today. And he 

was saying that you know China welcomes all  

these groups. They want them to stay. 

They don't want them to leave. I'm not  

quite sure that I would say the same thing 

may be true today. I think the message that  

many Ngos are getting is that we're making 

it very difficult for you to work here,  

and you make of that what you want 

to. Right? You're welcome to stay.

Anthony Spires: But staying doesn't mean it's  

going to be easy. So I think there's 

there's probably a debate happening.

Anthony Spires: or some different 

points of view in in Beijing about  

whether having these groups in China is 

is a good thing or a bad thing. Still,  

that debate continues, although largely it's 

shifted towards. It's probably a bad thing.

Anthony Spires: So yes, cooperation 

is important. Cooperation is nice, but

Anthony Spires: only on our terms. Yeah, 

which is understandable. Again, you know,  

many countries have similar kinds of approaches.

Jeannie Chen - Asia Pacific Center: Hmm.

Jeannie Chen - Asia Pacific Center: yeah. 

And another interesting question came in,  

and I also put it in the chat for you, so 

you can have it in front of you. It says,  

how have you done any research on the role of 

Chinese Ngos Internationally, I've heard of  

some being accused of being shills for the Chinese 

government, and thus not quote unquote real Ngos

Jeannie Chen - Asia Pacific Center: in the 

UN context. So to continue. This person has  

also heard of Chinese green Ngos, getting pressure 

from the Chinese State to serve as agents of quote  

unquote civil diplomacy, or Minjian waijiao, and 

welcome to share what you've seen in these areas.

Anthony Spires: Yeah. Yeah. So I would say, 

I've heard the same sorts of things that  

there's pressure on grassroots. Ngos, going 

out. Wave the Chinese flag and let people  

know they're coming with the goodwill of China, 

and that's not necessarily what they want to do.

Anthony Spires: But some of them will. My 

research in this is very undeveloped. I'd  

say it's very anecdotal at the moment, so 

I can't speak to everybody's experiences.  

But I will say that people I've talked 

with, who've worked previously at Gongos,  

who have gone. Chinese people who've 

gone with government, ordered Ngos

Anthony Spires: to Africa or to other 

places, often left those experiences  

quite critical of what they had done 

and what they had seen, and wondering  

kind of what they were doing. 

Having said that, I think

Anthony Spires: Chinese Gongos overseas can do a 

lot of good, and maybe are doing a lot of good,  

so I don't want to. I don't want to be too 

namby Pammy. On this. I think, you know, there's

Anthony Spires: both things are possible. It's 

very possible that they can do great work. It's  

also very possible that any grassroots Ngos, are 

doing this kind of they want to engage in. This  

kind of work will come under a lot of pressure 

to toe a particular political line. But this  

is an open area for research. I think it's really 

about the future. So going back to the prospects,  

part of this top title that's up for all of you to 

go and explore, and I encourage people to get out.

Anthony Spires: Go into the field, talk to 

people as much as you can. The pandemic made  

it difficult to do that. I was hoping 

to do more of that several years ago,  

and the pandemic put a stop 

to much of our travel plans.

Anthony Spires: But I think that things 

are. Things are open again. And with again,  

with this opportunity that that 

trump's new policies have introduced.

Anthony Spires: Yeah, who knows? I think it's a 

good question. It's 1 of many questions to ask. If  

you go into the field and you're interacting with 

grassroots Ngos, and and with gongors from China.

Jeannie Chen - Asia Pacific Center: Yeah, I think 

we have time for one more question. So I'll go  

ahead and put this in our chat. And I think this 

brings it back to focus. But the question asks,  

when you did research in China, did you have 

a chance to talk to the ordinary people about  

their views on Ingos. Do you know if there's a 

change in those views after the 2,017 Ingo law?

Anthony Spires: Yeah, yeah, it's a good 

question. I don't know who ordinary people  

are. I will say in China, I think there's too 

many of them. Of course I did. I mean I I would  

chat to people about my work. You know, random 

people that I'd meet in different scenarios.

Anthony Spires: and we talk about these sorts 

of things. Of course, I got a mixed picture from  

those very, very anecdotal kind of conversations. 

Yeah, some people were very suspicious. Some  

people thought it was a good thing that foreigners 

were helping China. They were very idealistic,  

they thought, oh, this means the people of the 

world can all come together and be friends,  

which is very lovely. But then other 

people were much more suspicious after  

2017. I can't really speak to that again, 

because in part because of the pandemic

Anthony Spires: cut off travel. In part, the 

situation has just changed in China a lot. But  

but again, I think that actually is a great 

research topic for anybody who wants to do  

a survey. A set of interviews, you know, find 

ordinary people. However, you define them, and

Anthony Spires: and and pursue it 

because it does have implications  

for the way people understand China's role 

in the world and the possibilities that are  

out there for China and the outside world to 

interact. That's a really important question.

Jeannie Chen - Asia Pacific Center: 

Great. Thank you so much. So we have like,  

probably like 4 or 5 more questions pending. 

But of course, if you're willing, and some of  

our audience members may reach out to you. Maybe 

follow up, or maybe engage in more discussion. So.

Anthony Spires: Yeah, please, do, yeah.

Jeannie Chen - Asia Pacific Center: Thank you 

so much. And so we've reached the end of our  

presentation today. But we welcome everyone 

to follow the Asia Pacific Center. And also,  

you know, engage with Dr. Spires work, and we 

really appreciate you for coming today. So.

Anthony Spires: Thank you for the invitation. 

Thank you for the invitation. The opportunity.  

I Gary, reach out. If you're interested, 

you want to talk about more. Be happy to.

Jeannie Chen - Asia Pacific Center: Great. 

And thank you so much, Lena, for chairing  

today's talk. So have a great morning evening 

afternoon, wherever you are. Thank you so much.

Anthony Spires: Thank you 

all. Thank you, Lena, as well.