Could you clarify what kind of output you’d like on this topic? For example:
- Are you asking for a political-philosophical framework for understanding how Chinese communism (as ideology or state structure) operates as a form of colonization?
- Are you looking for examples of how this ‘colonization’ manifests in cultural, psychological, educational, or regional terms (e.g. Tibet, Xinjiang, Inner Mongolia)?
- Do you want this framed in postcolonial theory, psychoanalytic terms, or something else (e.g. decoloniality, Marxist critique)?
Let me know your preferred angle(s) or any references you’d like it in dialogue with (e.g. Fanon, D&G, Chen Kuan-Hsing, etc.).
我在想的解殖主體，非少數民族，就是中國漢族人民，（ChatGPT, 2025-8-19)
Thank you for the clarification. I’ll research how Chinese communist ideology and state structures have been theorized as a colonizing force over the Han majority itself—and how scholars, writers, or activists have proposed modes of decolonization for Han Chinese subjectivity.
I’ll focus on frameworks that:
- Treat communism as an internal colonizer or imperial logic.
- Engage with Fanonian or psychoanalytic critiques of ideology.
- Explore how the Han subject is produced through Party-state apparatuses, educational systems, or affective economies.
I’ll let you know once the summary and references are ready for your S12 seminar.
Decolonizing Han Chinese Subjectivity from Communist Ideology
Ideology as an Internal Colonizer
Colonizing the Majority: While colonialism traditionally refers to foreign domination, scholars have applied the term to the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) ideological domination over China’s Han majority. CCP ideology and Party-state institutions are theorized as a colonizing force that remolds Han subjectivity much as a foreign occupier might remold a colonized people . In Louis Althusser’s terms, the Party’s Ideological State Apparatuses (schools, propaganda, etc.) continually interpellate individuals – “hailing” Han Chinese to identify as loyal socialist subjects. Crucially, this process penetrates everyday life: official ideology “helps to shape everyday habits of speech and dispositions” . Its influence is so powerful that it “even colonises the rhetoric of those cynics and critics who seek to subvert it” . In other words, even Han Chinese who think they’ve rejected Party doctrine often end up speaking in its terms, revealing how deeply the ideological narrative has been internalized.
Fanon’s Insight: Frantz Fanon famously analyzed the colonized mind as one that internalizes the values and gaze of the colonizer. Some theorists draw a parallel with the Han under CCP rule: just as colonized peoples may develop a sense of inferiority or alienation, Han Chinese have been encouraged to see the Party as the source of truth and their only savior (a dynamic Fanon would recognize as psychological colonization). Fanon described how colonized subjects can come to police themselves and each other in line with the colonizer’s expectations. Similarly, through decades of propaganda and political campaigns, the Han majority has been conditioned to self-censor, monitor peers, and reflexively defend the Party-state – behaviors strikingly akin to those of a colonized populace. Some Chinese intellectuals explicitly invoke Fanon in critiquing this “colonial mentality”. For example, cultural studies scholar Chen Kuan-Hsing notes that a “critical reflection on de-colonization” is needed in China to break the subconscious identification with dominating structures . Drawing on Fanon, Albert Memmi, and others, Chen argues that the Chinese must “rupture coloniser–colonised identification”, i.e. stop seeing the Party-state as a benevolent master around which their identity revolves . In this view, the first step in decolonizing Han minds is recognizing how deeply Communist ideology has been implanted as an internal authority.
Cultural Revolution-era poster urging the masses to wield Mao Zedong’s philosophy as a “sharp weapon.” During Mao’s campaigns, Han Chinese youth were interpellated as Red Guards tasked with destroying the “old world” and internalizing revolutionary ideology – a vivid example of how Party dogma sought to colonize subjectivity.
Producing Han Subjectivity: Education, Surveillance, and Affect
Mass Education and Interpellation: From primary school onward, Han Chinese are systematically hailed by ideology. Althusser called education the “number-one” Ideological State Apparatus, and the CCP has refined this tool . Textbooks and curricula present a Manichean world: the Party is heroic and paternal, while “enemies” (capitalists, imperialists, or separatists) are villainous. This schooling produces “desired subjectivity” – citizens who think and feel in line with socialism. For instance, Mao-era schools made students start each day with Mao Zedong Thought, and today classes in “思想政治” (ideological-political education) remain mandatory through university . Campaigns like the Cultural Revolution (1966–76) took this to extremes, mobilizing students as Red Guards to purge impure thoughts. The accompanying propaganda (big-character posters, loudspeaker broadcasts, model operas) conveyed “clear and unambiguous indications of what behavior and slogans were acceptable” . In effect, the Party colonized the cultural imagination of a generation, encouraging young Han to reject their own family traditions (“old ideas, customs, habits, and culture”) and to rebuild themselves wholly around socialist ideals . The lasting impact is a homogenized historical narrative and national identity – often described by critical scholars as Han-centric and Party-centric – instilled through mass education and propaganda.
Surveillance and Self-Discipline: The CCP’s surveillance apparatus further shapes Han subjectivity by enforcing compliance and internalizing discipline. In the Mao era, a culture of “participatory surveillance” prevailed: ordinary people were enlisted to inform on neighbors or co-workers in political campaigns. This was not just social control, but a technique of subject formation. As film scholar Xiaoning Lu observes, 1950s campaigns against “counter-revolutionaries” were accompanied by popular counter-espionage films that modeled vigilant behavior; consequently, “participatory surveillance promoted and practised in the early PRC shaped the vigilant and responsible socialist subjectivity and thus became an essential dimension of socialist modernity” . In other words, constantly watching each other for ideological deviance trained people to watch themselves – creating self-policing subjects much like Foucault’s panopticon. Today, this dynamic persists through high-tech means. A dense network of CCTV cameras, facial recognition systems, and the Social Credit System serves as a panoptical presence in Han Chinese daily life. A China Quarterly analysis calls the CCP’s ever-expanding surveillance network “the Party’s nervous system”, directly intervening in the affective lives of subjects . A 2021 study noted that digital surveillance and data-driven “stability maintenance” have a constructive side: they encourage individuals to behave as compliant, risk-averse citizens, effectively producing a certain kind of self. Even pop culture has aided this process – e.g. TV shows glorifying police and informants – normalizing the idea that “to be a good citizen is to surveil and be surveilled.” In sum, surveillance in China is not only repression; it is also a social pedagogy that colonizes the mind, blurring the line between voluntary loyalty and fear-induced obedience.
Affective Governance – Ruling by Emotion: Recent scholarship highlights affective governance (情感治理) as a key mechanism by which the Party molds Han Chinese subjectivity. This refers to state strategies that manipulate emotions – love, gratitude, fear, indignation – to produce political compliance. Under Xi Jinping, for example, the CCP has orchestrated waves of nationalist pride (through grandiose narratives of China’s “revival” and constant celebration of Party history) alongside anxiety about threats (foreign “hostile forces,” separatists, etc.). By oscillating between pride and fear, the Party creates an emotional dependence: citizens feel they need the Party’s guidance for national glory and protection from chaos. Scholar Christian Sorace argues that the Party’s “gratitude imperative” is one such affective tool – officials demand that people feel grateful for the state’s benevolence (disaster relief, poverty alleviation, COVID-19 measures) and suppress feelings of grievance . In the extreme case of Xinjiang’s re-education camps, detainees must repeatedly profess heartfelt gratitude to the Party and Xi, until “when they are finally freed, they believe that they owe the country a lot, that they could never repay the Party” . This is affective interpellation at its starkest – the state compelling subjects to emotionally invest in their subjugation. Even outside such extremes, everyday propaganda encourages Han Chinese to love the motherland and the Party with near-religious fervor. The Party often presents itself in familial terms (as Father and Mother of the people), blurring political loyalty with intimate attachment . By colonizing the emotional life of individuals – teaching them what to love, who to hate, when to cheer or mourn – the CCP secures not just outward compliance but inward acceptance. This affective dimension complements material and coercive controls, completing the colonization of the psyche: many Han come to feel that Party rule is natural and necessary, making alternative modes of thinking emotionally difficult to sustain.
Psychoanalytic Perspectives on Han Subjectivity
Althusser and the Subject: Althusser’s theory of ideology provides a useful framework for understanding how Chinese communist ideology constitutes subjects. Sorace and others explicitly apply Althusser to contemporary China . The Party’s expansive use of ideological apparatuses – from the education system to workplace Party cells and social media censorship – ensures that at key moments (flag-raising ceremonies, Party anniversaries, even online discussions) the individual is “hailed” as a loyal citizen. This continuous interpellation means a Han Chinese person is rarely outside the ideological message, much as a person in church or a ritual is continuously reminded of their role. The result, Althusser would say, is that the CCP produces its own compliant subjects. Notably, Althusser argued that ideology works best when it disguises itself as nature – and in China, many aspects of Party ideology have been normalized as part of “Chinese culture” or national identity. For example, the narrative of China’s “century of humiliation” avenged by the CCP is taught as if it were an unquestionable part of being Chinese, interpellating even young children into a nationalist subject-position. Many Han thus internalize Party ideology to the point that it forms their very sense of self (the classic colonization of consciousness).
Lacan, Žižek, and the Cynical Subject: A puzzling feature of Chinese society is that many people profess not to believe official ideology, yet they still act in accordance with it. This is where Lacanian psychoanalysis, especially as interpreted by Slavoj Žižek, offers insight. Žižek notes that cynicism is not true liberation – one can consciously scoff at ideology while unconsciously following its dictates . In China, it’s common to hear educated Han dismiss Party slogans as propaganda, yet those same individuals often abide by what the slogans demand (or at least avoid contradicting them publicly). Žižek would call this a form of disavowal: “I know very well, but even so…”. The unconscious “Big Other” (Lacan’s term for the imagined authoritative gaze) in China is arguably the Party itself – an internalized presence that must not be openly defied. Psychoanalytic scholars of China observe that the Mao era implanted a powerful “father figure” archetype in the collective psyche (first Mao, now the Party as a whole). Through campaigns of both love (mass adulation) and fear (purges), the Party became what Lacan might call the Name-of-the-Father – the ultimate authority in the symbolic order. Even after Mao’s death, this structure persisted. People learned to navigate the system with a kind of split subjectivity: a public, compliant persona and a private, skeptical one. However, as Žižek emphasizes, such splits can actually sustain the system – knowing the ritual is absurd doesn’t stop one from performing it. Indeed, Sorace found that the post-Mao “cynical distance” many Chinese keep from official ideology actually “functions as the very support for the effectiveness of the ideological apparatuses” . In other words, when citizens half-mock propaganda but still comply “as if” it were real, the ideological domination is arguably even more secure (because it faces no outright challenge). Lacanian analysis would say the subject’s desire is still hooked – perhaps by what Žižek calls ideological jouissance (enjoyment). For instance, nationalism today offers an enjoyment of pride and unity; a Han Chinese may roll their eyes at bombastic state media, yet still feel a visceral surge of satisfaction when China wins a victory. That emotional payoff is what keeps the subject invested.
Jouissance and Obedience: The evolution of CCP ideology from Mao’s time to the present can even be read in psychoanalytic terms. Scholar Yong Wang (drawing on Lacan via Žižek) describes three stages of Chinese totalitarian ideological subjectivity . In the Maoist “proto-totalitarian” mode, the subject derived jouissance (a deep unconscious enjoyment) from sacrifice – e.g. Red Guards found fervent joy in giving themselves over to the collective revolution, losing individual identity. The slogan “Rebelion is justified” and the cult of self-sacrifice exemplified this; the Sublime object was the Socialist New Man, for whom personal desires meant nothing. In the post-Mao reform era, however, that grand socialist fantasy collapsed. What emerged was a cynical subject: people no longer believed in communism’s sublime ideals, but outwardly they still conformed. According to Wang, this “post-totalitarian subject’s cynical distance from ‘official’ ideology functions as the very support” of the system . Here the enjoyment is inverted – there is a secret pleasure in knowing one is outsmarting the system (not getting too invested), yet materially benefiting from it. Finally, in the “neo-totalitarian” mode of today, the regime has brought the obscene underside of enjoyment to the forefront . Consumerism and nationalism are openly encouraged as rewards; people are told to “enjoy” being Chinese under CCP rule. The propagandistic mandate now is not just work and sacrifice, but also to revel in China’s prosperity, to celebrate the nation’s rise (often through conspicuous consumption or internet patriotism). This corresponds to what Lacanians call the shift from the Superego of prohibition to the Superego of enjoyment – the command “Thou shalt enjoy!”. In practical terms, the Party today permits and even promotes certain pleasures (shopping festivals, military fanfare, Olympic pride) as outlets for jouissance that bind the Han majority closer to the state. By analyzing these dynamics, psychoanalytic thinkers highlight that simply informing people that they are brainwashed is insufficient – one must address the libidinal grips that ideology has on them (their fears, pride, desires). Deep-seated feelings of security, belonging, and historical mission are at play, suggesting that decolonizing the mind will require more than rational critique; it may require a reorientation of desire itself.
Decolonial Thinkers and “Unlearning” the Party Line
Chen Kuan-Hsing’s “De-imperialization”: Asian decolonial theorists like Chen Kuan-Hsing urge Han Chinese to “decolonize” their own minds not only from Western imperial influence but from internal imperialism and Cold War ideology. In Asia as Method, Chen argues that the PRC, despite throwing off foreign colonial powers, never truly underwent an intellectual decolonization because the Cold War framework (Communist vs. Capitalist bloc) “intercepted any possibility of decolonization taking place” . The CCP essentially replaced one grand narrative with another. Chen calls for deimperialization, meaning China must critically examine how both Western imperialism and Chinese statist ideology have shaped its subjectivity . He draws on postcolonial thinkers (he explicitly cites Fanon, Ngugi wa Thiong’o, and others) to suggest strategies for “de-linking” from dominant narratives. One such strategy is “critical syncretism” – rather than a blind nativism or wholesale Westernization, Chinese intellectuals should “interiorize elements of others into the self” in a reflective way . In practice, this could mean reading alternative histories (including those by ethnic minorities or from Taiwan and Hong Kong perspectives) to break the Han-centric, Party-centric worldview. It could also mean dialoguing with global South experiences of decolonization to imagine new futures. Chen believes that agency for Han Chinese lies in recognizing themselves as potentially both colonizer and colonized (for instance, the Han are the majority but have been subalternized under Party authoritarianism). His work implies that “decolonizing Chinese history” involves confronting uncomfortable truths – e.g. acknowledging the violence in China’s modern nation-building and how the Party has often acted as an internal colonizer in places like Tibet or Xinjiang . By critically revisiting these issues, Han individuals can start to see the “coloniality” (the lingering logics of empire and oppression) within their own ideological formation, and thus begin to undo it.
Walter Mignolo and Epistemic Delinking: From a decolonial theory perspective, Walter Mignolo’s ideas about “epistemic delinking” are relevant. Mignolo argues that breaking colonial domination requires breaking from the colonizer’s epistemology – the way of knowing and sense-making imposed by colonial power. In the Chinese context, one might say that Marxist-Leninist-Maoist ideology was in fact a Western import (European Enlightenment radical thought) adapted into a Chinese context. Thus, the epistemology of the CCP – scientistic, teleological Marxism with a Chinese flavor – can be seen as a colonial legacy in itself (despite its anti-imperialist rhetoric). Decolonial thinkers would encourage Chinese subjects to “delink” from this framework by retrieving other intellectual traditions and local knowledge systems. For instance, examining Daoist, Confucian, or Buddhist ideas of governance and selfhood might provide alternative paradigms less tied to colonial modernity. Likewise, engaging with Indigenous or non-Western critiques of state power could help Han Chinese imagine forms of community beyond the Party-state. Mignolo’s concept of “border thinking” – thinking from the perspective of those at the margins – could translate into Han Chinese listening to marginalized voices (ethnic minorities, dissidents, diaspora) to question the dominant ideology. Some contemporary movements, like New Confucianism or certain Chinese feminist and LGBTQ discourses, can be interpreted as attempts to carve out intellectual space not totally defined by CCP Marxism or Western liberalism – effectively decolonial projects in the realm of knowledge. While Mignolo himself writes mostly about Latin America, his call to “epistemically disobey” resonates for any context: Han Chinese seeking to decolonize may need to refuse the terms set by Party ideology (for example, the notion that any dissent is “foreign influenced” – a classic colonial tactic to discredit native agency) and assert the validity of their own critical reasoning and ethical intuition.
Clinical Approaches – Healing the Colonized Psyche: Decolonization is not only political but also psychological. Fanon, a psychiatrist, emphasized that colonized people suffer psychic trauma – inferiority complexes, self-alienation, even communal pathological behaviors – due to prolonged oppression. Analogously, one could argue that decades of ideological campaigns, mass mobilizations, and political traumas (the Anti-Rightist purge, the Cultural Revolution, Tiananmen, etc.) have left a psychological legacy on the Han majority. Chinese psychoanalysts and therapists have noted phenomena such as “post-totalitarian stress” – individuals who lived through Maoist terror often exhibit anxiety, suppressed anger, or difficulty trusting others (a result of years of having to denounce friends or hide one’s true thoughts). There is also a noted split in the self for many Chinese: an external “Party-approved” self and a repressed inner self, which can cause neurosis. Some experimental initiatives in China and among the diaspora use group therapy and narrative therapy to help people articulate their authentic feelings about their upbringing and the state. Telling one’s story truthfully is itself a decolonial act in a society where official lies were omnipresent. For example, memoir literature of the “scar literature” movement in the late 1970s – where authors recounted the traumas of the Cultural Revolution – served as a kind of national psychotherapy, allowing people to work through (in Freudian terms) the damage of ideological fanaticism. On a clinical level, helping individuals dismantle their internal “Party superego” – that harsh voice that invokes guilt or fear when thinking differently – is crucial. Therapists report that some Chinese clients describe a sense of profound guilt or anxiety if they criticize the government even in private, as if an inner Mao were watching. Techniques drawn from psychoanalysis help patients recognize this internal colonizer and gradually empower their own independent ego. The goal is akin to what Lacanians call “subjective destitution” – stripping away the imposed identity to confront one’s own desire. In political terms, this could foster citizens who think for themselves and manage dissenting emotions (anger at injustice, empathy for victims of state violence) in a healthy way, rather than redirecting them into state-sanctioned outlets (e.g. nationalism). While such clinical and micro-level efforts are nascent, they represent the human interior front of decolonization: freeing the individual mind from the residual effects of ideological domination.
Revolt, Creativity, and New Subjectivities: Decolonizing Han Chinese subjectivity also involves the collective dimension – new social movements and creative subcultures that offer alternative ways of being. We see hints of this in PRC society today. The “Lying Flat” (躺平) youth trend, for example, where young people refuse the rat-race and reject official definitions of success, can be read as a silent rebellion against the interpellation of “hardworking socialist worker” – it’s an attempt to reclaim one’s time and body from state and capital imperatives. Similarly, underground art and music scenes often mock or subvert propaganda imagery, eroding its authority. These are acts of cultural decolonization, chipping away at the sacred aura of Party ideology. Intellectual dissent also plays a role: public intellectuals like Liu Xiaobo (before his death) urged people to “live in truth,” echoing Vaclav Havel’s advice to those under totalitarianism. Liu’s Charter 08 manifesto (2008) called for sweeping political liberalization, but its deeper appeal was for Chinese citizens to stop believing the lies and assert their moral autonomy. In a Fanonian sense, one might say Liu was encouraging the colonized mind to stand up and claim humanity beyond the roles the Party assigns (fanatic, consumer, obedient patriot, etc.). Other thinkers, like Xu Zhiyong (a legal activist), explicitly use language of “citizens awakening” – essentially describing decolonization of the self from a legal-rational angle, encouraging Han Chinese to see themselves as rights-bearing citizens rather than grateful subjects. Meanwhile, Chen Kuan-Hsing emphasizes reconciliation and empathy as part of the decolonial process: he suggests that mainland Chinese and Taiwanese, for instance, need to understand each other’s “emotional and psychic terrain” shaped by different regimes . This implies that healing the divides imposed by ideology (Communist patriots vs. “Chiang Kai-shek’s followers”, etc.) will require mutual emotional work – essentially group therapy at a societal scale. Decolonizing the Han self thus has a profound clinical and ethical dimension: it calls for compassion, critical self-reflection, and possibly forgiveness (many Chinese families were torn apart by ideological campaigns, and coming to terms with that is a personal decolonization journey).
Implications for Liberation: Towards a New Han Subjectivity
Breaking the Cycle: Understanding Chinese communist ideology as a colonizing force over the Han majority reframes the challenge of change in China. It is not only a matter of changing institutions or policies; it is about unmaking and remaking subjects. Politically, this means that efforts at democratization or reform must contend with the identities and desires shaped by decades of CCP rule. A population does not shed a colonized consciousness overnight – Fanon warned that the colonized may even initially resist liberation because their very sense of self is tied to the colonizer. In the Han case, this suggests caution: simply toppling the Party (were that to happen) might leave a psychological void or lead to resurgence of other authoritarian beliefs unless accompanied by a conscious project of mental decolonization. Activists and thinkers therefore stress education for critical thinking, uncensored information flows, and building a civic culture where disagreement is allowed – these are tools to decondition the reflexive habits instilled by authoritarianism. On the flip side, the Party’s continuing legitimacy owes much to its effective cultivation of national pride and fear of chaos; undermining that hold may involve de-mythologizing the Party’s historical narratives (e.g. exposing the full truth of past disasters like the Great Leap Famine, which the Party still whitewashes). In seminar discussions, one key takeaway is that psycho-political liberation is integral to any real change. As one book review succinctly put it, “So powerful is the influence of ideology that it even colonizes the rhetoric of those who seek to subvert it”, making genuine resistance hard . Recognizing this is the first step to escaping it.
Toward Decolonized Subjectivity: What would a “decolonized” Han Chinese subject look like? Decolonial theorists envision an individual who is critical, pluralistic, and self-defined. Such a person would be aware of the narratives that have influenced them (Marxist-Leninist, nationalist, Confucian, etc.) but not beholden to any one as absolute. They could draw from China’s rich cultural past and global ideas to form a syncretic but autonomous identity – fulfilling Chen Kuan-Hsing’s idea of “multiple frames of reference in our subjectivity” . This subject would no longer reflexively equate patriotism with Party loyalty; they might see love of country as compatible with criticizing the state. In psychoanalytic terms, the big Other (the Party) would lose its tyrannical hold over the ego – the person would no longer feel that an inner censor stops them from thinking or saying certain things. Clinically, we might observe reduced anxiety and splitting, as people integrate their private truth with their public persona (no more need for doublethink or to “wear a mask” politically). Socially, a decolonized majority could engage with minorities (Tibetans, Uyghurs, etc.) in a spirit of equality rather than a civilizing mission, since they would recognize the colonizer within and reject it. There are small signs of this already: some Han public intellectuals (like Wang Lixiong and Tsering Shakya in dialogue) have started calling for a re-examination of Han-centric histories and empathy for minority experiences – essentially urging Han to decolonize their ethnic chauvinism. In doing so, they echo global decolonial ethics (e.g. Walter Mignolo’s call to dismantle the “colonial matrix of power” in all its forms).
Conclusion – Toward Liberation and Healing: In conclusion, examining Chinese Communist ideology as a colonizing force over the Han majority reveals the profound intertwining of politics, psyche, and culture in China’s modern trajectory. Key thinkers – from Fanon and Althusser to Lacan, Žižek, Mignolo, and Chen – provide tools to unravel how Han subjectivity has been produced and how it might be transformed. The literature suggests that liberation must occur on multiple levels: structurally (loosening the Party-state’s grip on media, education, and surveillance), symbolically (challenging master-narratives and myths), emotionally (overcoming instilled fears and learned gratitudes), and personally (empowering individuals to think and feel for themselves). For seminar discussions, this topic highlights important concepts: interpellation (how power “calls” us into identity), coloniality (how past domination leaves its mark), affective governance (ruling through emotion), and the possibility of “decolonizing the mind” as a revolutionary act. The implications extend beyond China – it invites us to consider how any dominant ideology might colonize a majority, and how people can clinically and politically reclaim their subjectivity. In the Chinese case, the pathway to a freer future lies not only in external change but in an inner revolution: a shedding of the ideological colonizer within, and the emergence of a new, self-determined consciousness among the Han Chinese majority. As Fanon might counsel, this is both a political struggle and a “process of disalienation”, one that will require, in equal measure, critical intellect and compassionate healing .
Sources:
- Althusser, Louis. Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses (1971).
- Sorace, Christian. Shaken Authority: China’s Communist Party and the 2008 Sichuan Earthquake (Cornell University Press, 2017). [Review in PRC History Review highlighting ideology’s pervasive influence ]
- Wang, Yong. “From the Sublime to the Obscene: Modalities of Totalitarianism and Jouissance.” American Journal of Semiotics 23.1/4 (2007): 173–191. [Analyzes Chinese ideological subjectivity via Lacan/Žižek ]
- Sorace, Christian. “The Chinese Communist Party’s Nervous System: Affective Governance from Mao to Xi.” The China Quarterly 248.S1 (2021): 29–51. [On gratitude campaigns and emotional governance ]
- Lu, Xiaoning. “The Might of the People: Counter-Espionage Films and Participatory Surveillance in the Early PRC.” in Surveillance in Asian Cinema (Routledge, 2017). [On 1950s surveillance shaping socialist subjectivity ]
- Chen, Kuan-Hsing. Asia as Method: Toward Deimperialization (Duke University Press, 2010). [Proposes decolonial strategies for Asian societies, engages Fanon and others ]
- Mignolo, Walter. The Darker Side of Western Modernity: Global Futures, Decolonial Options (2011). [Concepts of epistemic delinking and decoloniality applicable to China]
- Fanon, Frantz. The Wretched of the Earth (1961) and Black Skin, White Masks (1952). [Classic analysis of colonization’s psychological effects and the cure of decolonization].
- Žižek, Slavoj. The Sublime Object of Ideology (1989). [Theory of cynical ideology ].
- Critical Han Studies scholars (Thomas Mullaney, James Leibold, et al., eds. Critical Han Studies, 2012) – challenge the notion of a monolithic “Han” and the state’s role in constructing it.
