Zhang Weiwei

Zhang Weiwei is a Chinese professor of international relations at Fudan University and the director of its China Institute. Zhang is also an Internet celebrity, spreading his political ideas through online video platforms such as Xigua Video, Bilibili, TikTok and YouTube.

Zhang is a strong defender of China's political and economic system. Therefore, he is favored by Chinese leader Xi Jinping. Some of his political views, such as the "superiority of the China Model" and that the Belt and Road Initiative is a "major transformation unprecedented in five thousand years" have been criticized by scholars such as Xiang Lanxin for not being in line with historical facts.

Early life Zhang is the youngest of six siblings in his family. During the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976), his older siblings all went to the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps while he stayed in Shanghai because of a policy. In 1975, at the age of 17, he was recruited into the No.2 Shanghai Carving Factory as a worker and jade carving apprentice.

Education Soon after, the college entrance examinations resumed with the end of the Cultural Revolution, and in 1977 Zhang was admitted to the foreign languages department of Fudan University, where he persuaded the dean to sit in on courses in international politics. From 1981 to 1983, Zhang was a postgraduate student at Beijing Foreign Studies University, studying translation.

In 1988, Zhang went to the University of Geneva-affiliated Graduate Institute of International Studies for a master's degree in international relations (1990) and then pursued a PhD, which he received in 1994.

Career

Interpreter From 1983 to 1988, Zhang was one of many English interpreters of the Chinese Foreign Ministry, worked for some Chinese leaders, including Deng Xiaoping and Li Peng, in the mid-1980s.

Academia Zhang has written extensively in English and Chinese on People's Republic of China's reform and opening up and political reform, China's development model and comparative politics. Zhang is among the major proponents of a "Chinese model", which he defines as a blend of a planned economy with market mechanisms and a top-down governance structure complemented by some grassroots electoral participation.

He expanded on the concept of a civilization state with his book The China Wave: Rise of a Civilizational State (2012).

Zhang is a Senior research fellow at the Chunqiu Institute, a think tank in Shanghai.

Zhang is the head of Fudan University's China Institute.

TV Since 2019, Zhang has been the host of "This is China" , a lecture on the virtues of the Chinese government, launched by Dragon Television, a state-run TV channel.

Reception Zhang's Bilibili channel has more than 1.28 million subscribers as of 2 March 2026.

The New York Times characterized Zhang as a propagandist-academic.

Political views

Zhang emphasizes what he sees as the unique features of China's political practices and culture. He encourages Chinese to develop "self-confidence" in these areas and to "no longer be subservient to the Western discourse." According to Zhang, Chinese should be more vocal in praising their country's system and its benefits tell China's story with pride in order to increase its discourse power.

On May 17, 2016, Zhang attended the National Symposium on the Work of Philosophy and Social Sciences chaired by CCP general secretary Xi Jinping. On May 31, 2021, Zhang gave a lecture to the Politburo of the CCP on strengthening China's international propaganda.

Works

Books

Articles Zhang, W. (2005). Overseas Chinese and the Concept of "Greater China". Refugee Survey Quarterly, 24(4), 65–73. Zhang, W. (2006). Long-term Outlook for China’s Political Reform. Asia Europe Journal, 4(2), 151–175.

Essays