China Decode: Why China is Sorting Kids into “Genius Camps”
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I believe China may be more meritocratic today than America is. Given this system, given the way in which education and scholastic intelligence are lionized, I would say that China today is probably more meritocratic than the U.S. Welcome to China Decode, I'm Alice Han.
And I'm James King.
In today's episode of China Decode, we're discussing digging inside China's genius pipeline, Trump accusing China of secret nuclear testing, plus the revival of China's underground club scene and Bad Bunny topping the charts in China. That's all coming up, but first, let's do a quick check-in with how the Chinese markets are starting the week. On Monday, the Shanghai A-share index and the Hang Seng H-share index closed up 1.4% and 1.8% respectively, as investors shipped back to risk-on mode after last week's sell-off. Potmart, the company behind the Labubu, rallied about 6% on news of strong growth expectations and expansion overseas. And tech giants Alibaba and Tencent both closed up over 2%. How are you feeling, James?
I know it sucks to be sick. kind of getting there sorry about this my voice is not great but you still got the voice for radio all right let's get right into it there's been a viral narrative floating around about china running some shadowy all-powerful genius factory but the reality is both less conspiratorial and way more interesting china isn't mass producing prodigies it's running a small brutally selective pipeline that spots extreme talent early and pushes it fast And a surprising number of the people behind China's biggest tech and AI companies and breakthroughs came through these genius programs. James, you've lived in China for many years. I'm sure you've met people who have been in these genius camps that can tell us a little bit about what it was like on the ground.
Yeah, I have actually, Alice. I've known some kids who are in these genius camps. You know, this is one of these stories that people who've lived in China know very well. People outside China find really fascinating for very good reasons, I think. You know, this is so different from what people might imagine happens in a country that is governed by a party that calls itself communist. but is in fact anything but egalitarian. This is, as you said, Alice, this is brutally competitive. It is the very antithesis of egalitarianism. What happens in this process is that the authorities skim off the very brightest kids. And then they put them in a class with other super bright kids. And then they skim that cohort again until at the end of this process, you end up with a few classes in the very best universities full of trapezoids.
truly genius-level talent. And these genius-level talent, as you've said, Alice, they all, well, most of them anyway, go on to lead some of China's extraordinary technological advances. And I think this program says a lot about what China is all about. It says a lot about what China prioritizes, what drives its people, what society is all about, and it reveals a crucial motivator for of China's extraordinary success. When I lived in Beijing, we had a family friend, and she lived in what's called the Hutong area of Beijing. Those are the old alleyways that sort of cluster around the Forbidden City in the center of Beijing. And families live kind of cheek by jowl. It's not a wealthy area.
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