Zhang Ziyi and China’s Celebrity–Philanthropy Scandals
In January 2010, the internationally acclaimed Chinese actor, Zhang Ziyi, became a focus of public criticism for allegedly defaulting on a pledge to donate one million yuan to the 2008 Sichuan earthquake disaster-relief fund. That earthquake not only killed 70,000 people and left five million homeless, but also produced a dramatic rise in individual and corporate philanthropy in China. Philanthropic donations in 2008 amounted to a total figure of 100 billion yuan, exceeding the documented total for the preceding decade. Zhang’s ‘failed pledge’ led fans and critics to accuse her in interactive media forums of both charity fraud and generating a nationwide crisis of faith in the philanthropic activities of the rich and famous. Dubbed ‘donation-gate’, the ensuing controversy obliged Zhang Ziyi to hire a team of USA-based lawyers, to give an exclusive interview to the China Daily, and to engage in renewed philanthropic endeavours, in an effort to clear her name. Hence, contrary to claims that celebrity philanthropy is an apolitical mode of philanthropy, an examination of the Zhang Ziyi scandal and its disaster-relief precursors demonstrates that celebrity philanthropy in the People’s Republic of China is a political affair.
Peng Liyuan’s humanitarianism: morality, politics and eyeing the present and past
Celebrity in China is booming, yet the patterns, meanings and monitoring of Chinese celebrity and cause adoption both share and differ from western forms, history and phenomenon. Using a case study of Peng Liyuan, China’s most recent first lady, folk singer and military entertainer, this article addresses some of the key moral and political functions that Peng is helping both reinforce and remake. I show how history and China’s current modernisation narratives shape understandings of and possibilities for celebrities in public and political life.
Annual Reports
Links [1] https://isc.idaho.gov/annual2015 [2] http://www.isc.idaho.gov/annual2014 [3] http://www.isc.idaho.gov/annual2013 [4] https://isc.idaho.gov/../annual2012 [5] https://isc.idaho.gov/../annual2011 [6] https://isc.idaho.gov/../annual2010 [7] https://isc.idaho.gov/../annual2009 [8] https://isc.idaho.gov/../annual2008 [9] https://isc.idaho.gov/../annual2007 [10] https://isc.idaho.gov/../annual2006 [11] https://isc.idaho.gov/../annual2005