In a mountain town in China’s southwest, drifters and tarot card readers rub shoulders with tech entrepreneurs and artists. Many are former city-dwellers in search of an elusive prize in authoritarian China: space for open discussion and exchange of ideas.
In one coworking space, a group of young adults asked questions about the effect of former US president Donald Trump’s populism on US media during a discussion led by a Chinese journalist about Washington’s position on the Israel-Gaza conflict. In a nearby cafe, others discussed art, sexual harassment and the listlessness of China’s youth.
As Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) tightens his grip on the restricted personal freedoms of Chinese citizens and the economy stutters, exacerbating a youth unemployment crisis, Dali in Yunnan Province has become a haven for those seeking to escape the pressure. They are drawn by the cheap rents, mild climate, stunning scenery and a history of relative tolerance, which were popularized by a television drama this year about a “digital nomad.”
Photo: Reuters
Dali’s Old Town district, administratively part of a city of 650,000, has attracted culture workers since the late 1990s, said Ling Minhua (凌旻華), an expert on Chinese migration at the Geneva Graduate Institute, adding that the normalization of remote work and Dali’s less restrictive policies during China’s “zero COVID-19” crackdown also increased its appeal.
This month, searches for “Dali” on WeChat rose 7 percent from a year earlier, after surging 290 percent on one day in late July, when many Chinese were booking summer trips.
Thirteen Chinese migrants to Dali described it as a refuge on the fringes of mainstream society, but also one that implicitly challenges Xi’s “China Dream” of a prosperous nation ideologically loyal to the Chinese Communist Party. Many of them spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of government retaliation.
“When younger generations are materially sufficient but spiritually lost, of course they will seek personal growth and freedom,” said Bai Yunxi, a Dali-based 33-year-old civil servant-turned-astrologer.
Six of the people expressed concern about increased police scrutiny of their activities, citing abrupt cancelations of large-scale events and police raids.
Dali city’s propaganda bureau did not respond to a faxed request for comment on the crackdowns and Dali’s efforts to attract young skilled workers.
With youth unemployment at a record high this summer — when China stopped releasing the statistic — and a stagnant rural population due to low birthrates and urban migration, Beijing has tried to enlist young people in “rural revitalization.” Xi has urged graduates to “return to their hometowns” and “actively seek hardships,” alluding to his experience during the Cultural Revolution.
The message does not appear to resonate with urban youths who grew up with expectations of prosperity, but now find social mobility hard to attain.
Dali, where several people interviewed said they found an escape from the conservative social values of rural China, is an exception to the flight of young people to large cities that has occurred since China’s economic modernization.
Bai moved to Dali in September, quitting her government job to give online astrology readings. She shares a three-story house with her partner, a friend and three cats.
“My living situation provides enough space to develop my career and personal life without interference from others,” she said.
She also referenced Dali’s nickname, “Ideal Kingdom” — a pun on its Chinese characters that also reflects its 10th-century status as an independent state — as part of its appeal.
Recruitment start-up founder Chen Zhengyun, 37, said that living in Dali freed him from societal pressure to marry early, as state calls for matrimony grow louder amid China’s demographic crisis.
“There are some personal topics that you can’t bring up elsewhere that you can talk about here,” Chen said, adding that the concentration of like-minded young people, social events and tolerance for diverse lifestyles allowed him to explore open relationships.
The local government has sought to attract young tech talent and in September asked digital nomads for input on policies, two community organizers said.
However, the town’s population also includes many young people who say they are skeptical of Beijing’s attempts to shape their personal lives.
A large digital nomad conference with art and tech-related seminars was abruptly canceled on Nov. 2, a week before its scheduled start, due to “deep consideration of various factors,” the organizer, coworking space NCC, wrote on social media.
NCC declined to elaborate publicly, citing sensitivities.
During a recent visit, Reuters saw a police surveillance camera trained on NCC’s main communal area. Three people familiar with event organizers in Dali said the forum — like another conference on decentralized Internet technologies planned last year — was canceled after the government abruptly withdrew funding and support.
Many digital nomads who use coworking spaces are involved with technologies such as blockchain, which has drawn scrutiny from local authorities, organizers said.
Two other coworking spaces were shut down unexpectedly for months, with one also visited by local police earlier this year, three people familiar with the matter said.
China banned cryptocurrency mining and trading in 2021, part of a broader crackdown on the tech sector.
“We are more low-key and don’t emphasize digital nomads in our marketing anymore,” one coworking space staffer said, adding that conservative local governments in rural towns such as Dali are “cautious of emerging technologies.”
Such state monitoring efforts are unsurprising, Ling said.
Since digital nomads, unlike university students, “are not subject to structured discipline, they are harder to manage,” she said.
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