We all know how serious environmental degradation is in China. Its emissions have skyrocketed, air and water quality have plummeted, and critical habitat and ecosystems have disappeared. That’s why unadulterated research on the topic is critical to better informed policy. But my recent experience shows that China’s censorship model is spreading to the West, hindering that research from taking place.
In 2012 I published an academic paper in the journal Environmental Politics coining the term “authoritarian environmentalism” to describe the way that environmental policy is made in China. This year, I was approached by Lu Liao, a professor of urban planning at Renmin University in Beijing, to submit a paper to a special issue on China in Environmental Policy and Governance, a respected journal published by the major academic publisher Wiley, based in New Jersey.
I suggested reviewing what we have learned about “authoritarian environmentalism” since 2012. “The idea of revisiting the 2012 paper sounds very timely and meaningful,” replied Liao, who sits on the editorial board of Environmental Policy and Governance.
That’s when things went awry. The proposal I sent her included a new research question about whether the policy model in China is flawed by design, a form of greenwashing intended to legitimate one-party rule rather than improve the environment.
After a few days, Liao wrote back to report some “intriguing context from my own position,” as she called it. “Due to current sensitivities around ideology and international relations in China, many Chinese universities are quite cautious about discussions involving certain terms, and faculty are prohibited from publish[ing] work on some sensitive topics.”
I was “invited” to withdraw my submission and seek publication elsewhere. China’s censorship regime was being extended to a Western scholar and to a Western academic journal.
I reached out to the journal’s editor, Andy Gouldson, professor of environmental policy at Leeds University, who has done work in China, seeking clarification. He confirmed that “there are sensitivities for the guest editors of the special issue” and invited me to submit the paper as a regular contribution. I’ll decline. I won’t publish in a journal that bends to China’s censorship regime.
Put aside the irony that my research on authoritarianism in China was sidelined by authoritarianism in China. The bigger scandal here is how Western academics and publishers are willing to allow PRC censorship to dictate the terms of their trade.
Hellbound and Down 