China Law Blog

About two months ago, in Part I of this series, I promised we would go through our blogroll and justify and expound upon each blog, five by five. About a month ago, I did part II of this series. This is the third of this slowly running series where I explain, in alphabetical order, why it is that each blog managed to qualify for our blogroll under our admittedly "slippery, vague, and subjective criteria:"

Our blogroll basically consists of those blogs we like and which we think our readers will like or should be reading. We tend to like blogs that are unique in their content, well written, or consistently helpful. If we really like a blog, it makes it on no matter what. The less we like the blog, the more we have to believe it can be helpful to our readers. If a blog has not posted for a couple of months, we start seriously consider removing it from the rolls. Three months and it is usually removed. We obviously focus on China related blogs and, within that, we generally focus on those blogs related to law or business.

So without further ado, the third five in our alphabetical list:

China Business Blog. This blog is written by Jeremy Gordon, a true China veteran. Jeremy has been in the thick of China business for more than a decade and before that he was in Hong Kong as an officer with Britain's Brigade of Gurkhas. My law firm has worked with Jeremy and his company on a number of China business intelligence and China business investigatory matters. True to its title, Jeremy's blog focuses mostly on matters impacting business in China. Lately, it has about every week posted on the top ten twitter tweets on China business.

The China Beat. Cleverly subtitled, "Blogging How the East is Read, this blog, according to its "about" page, "provides context and criticism on contemporary China from China scholars and journalists. Based around a group of active contributors at the University of California, Irvine, including co-founders Kenneth Pomeranz and Jeffrey Wasserstrom, the blog draws on a global group of China watchers in the U.S., China, the U.K., Australia, Japan, Canada, Taiwan, and many other locations." All true, but despite being written by a bunch of legitimate China scholars, it actually makes for a consistently interesting and down to earth read.

ChinaBizGov. Talk about scholarly....This blog is one of the most intellectual China blogs in the blogosphere, but I still absolutely love it. It is the brainchild of G.E. Anderson, who describes himself as a "China specialist, former CFO, and PhD Candidate in Political Science at UCLA. Research focuses on state-owned enterprises, corporate governance and China's auto industry." I love it for two reasons. First, it provides great coverage on China's auto industry, which in turn provides great insight into Chinese business in general and to the relationship between business and government in China. Second, it provides great coverage of the relationship between business and government in China, which, is, for most industries, absolutely critical information to have.

China Business Blog and Podcast. This blog makes the list for pretty much the same reason as the ones that precede it here today: because I am 100% confident that the person behind it knows whereof he speaks. This blog is written by Kent Kedl of Technomic Asia and I have known and worked with and been impressed by Kent and his company for many years. Kent has been working in China (now based in Shanghai) since forever, though he still (for some unknown reason) prides himself on being a Minnesotan. His blog does a consistently superb job focusing on the big picture of doing business in China. With the allegedb"hiatus" of Will Moss over at ImageThief, Kent has to now be the undisputed funniest/most clever China blogger out there.

China Bystander. This is a true sleeper blog. It is been around since July, 2007, quietly and putting out a short sparse post on China just about every day. I do not even know who is behind this blog, as its about page consists only of the following: "A curious glance from an old China hand or two as the country develops before our eyes." But it is a damn good blog, written by someone who clearly understands economics. It typically sparsely (I am intentionally using that same word twice in this paragraph) focuses on one big (yet overtimes under-covered) issue each day. I cannot tell you how many times I have first heard of an important China economic or business issue on this blog. If you do not have this on your RSS feeder, you are making a mistake.

More to come....

What do you think?

UPDATE: Kent Kedl has proven the point regarding humor and brilliance by doing a post, entitled, "Aw, shucks … stop it. You’re embarrassing us!" extolling this humble blog (which the "cool kids" apparently call CLB).