Biden’s New China Doctrine | Countering China’s Belt and Road | China’s “Lying Flat” Movement, and more

The “Lying Flat” Movement Standing in the Way of China’s Innovation Drive  (David Bandurski, Brookings)
As China’s leaders push for hard work and innovation in the country’s tech sector as a path toward national prosperity, workers across China are responding with a distinct sense of malaise. What is known as the “lying flat” movement calls on young workers and professionals, including the middle-class Chinese who are to be the engine of Xi Jinping’s domestic boom, to opt out of the struggle for workplace success, and to reject the promise of consumer fulfilment. For some, “lying flat” promises release from the crush of life and work in a fast-paced society and technology sector where competition is unrelenting. For China’s leadership, however, this movement of passive resistance to the national drive for development is a worrying trend—a threat to ambition at a time when Xi Jinping has made grand ambition the zeitgeist of his so-called “New Era,” David Bandurski writes.

China’s Big Tech Crackdown Has Opened a New Front: National Security  (Jane Li, Quartz)
In the span of just a week, Chinese ride-hailing giant Didi Chuxing, went from being a tech darling with a successful US listing to the face of a new dimension to Beijing’s crackdown on its tech firms.
With what appears to be the first national security review of a Chinese tech giant, authorities appear to now be concerned about whether companies like Didi could end up providing sensitive data to the US in the course of being listed there. According to the Wall Street Journal, Chinese regulators had asked Didi to postpone its listing until the potential national security ramifications were addressed. The Journal also reported that TikTok parent ByteDance decided to postpone plans for a US IPO after regulators asked it to address data risks.

Biden’s New China Doctrine  (Economist)
Its protectionism and its us-or-them rhetoric will hurt America and put off allies.

The United States Can’t Afford the Brutal Price of Chinese Solar Panels  (By Henry Wu, Foreign Policy)
Americans need a national green tech strategy.

Will China’s European Ambitions Founder in Hungary?  (Natalie Liu, VOA News)
China’s bid to expand its influence in Eastern Europe could hit a snag if Hungary’s controversial Prime Minister Viktor Orban is defeated in what is shaping up to be an unexpectedly close election next year.
Hungary under Orban has fostered ever-closer ties with China, which sees the country as a linchpin of its efforts to reach deep into Europe with elements of its global Belt and Road initiative involving infrastructure and cultural projects on several continents.
Among those projects is a new railroad running from the Hungarian capital, Budapest, to Belgrade, Serbia. Hungary is also the proposed site of the first overseas campus of Fudan University, one of China’s top educational institutions.

U.S. Strengthens Warnings of Business Risks in China’s Xinjiang Region  (Reuters / VOA News)
The U.S. government strengthened its warnings to businesses about growing risks of supply chain and investment links to China’s Xinjiang region on Tuesday, citing forced labor and human rights abuses there.
Signaling broader U.S. government coordination on the issue, the Department of Labor and the U.S. Trade Representative joined in the issuance of the updated advisory, first released on July 1, 2020 under the Trump administration by the State, Commerce, Homeland Security and Treasury departments.

WHO Chief Says Push to Discount Covid-19 Lab Leak Theory Was “Premature”  (AP / Guardian)
Tedros says ‘accidents happen’ in labs and calls on China to be more transparent.