Chinese University of #HongKong ( #CUHK) issues statement regarding the rumoured reorganization of the University Services Centre and its library "CUHK clarifies unfounded rumour," https://www.cpr.cuhk.edu.hk/en/press_detail.php?1=1&1=1&id=3458 中大澄清不實傳聞 https://www.cpr.cuhk.edu.hk/tc/press_detail.php?1=1&id=3458 #香港 #中文大學

In 2005, The #China Journal published an article on the 40th anniversary of the USC's founding on its history & importance to the field of Chinese studies; Harvard University's Ezra Vogel, who sadly passed away last week, wrote the forward: https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.2307/20065989

Ezra Vogel noted that, in the still-heated turmoil of post-McCarthyism in the US, then MIT professor Lucian Pye, suggested that a centre for research & study on #China be set up in #HongKong, "a neutral ground amidst the US intellectual battles of the day." #香港 #中文大學

The ACLS and SSRC set up scholarly committees, with the Carnegie, Ford & Mellon Foundations signalling their willingness to play a role. @jeromeacohen 孔傑榮(柯恩), then on leave & in #HongKong, quickly set up offices in the Marco Polo Court attached to the Peninsula Hotel #香港

As Ezra recalled, "It is now hard to recapture the scale of our ignorance about mainland #China
when the USC opened its doors...We did not even know #China's simple organizational charts...

"As much as we wanted to build bridges to #China & build up objective scholarship on China, we were seen at the time as part of the enemy, a thinly disguised institute for spying." How very sad, on this Christmas Day, to watch history repeat itself.

Most of us think of #China as having opened to the West after Mao's death in 1976, or certainly by 1978, with Deng Xiaoping's announcement of 改革开放. But Ezra reminds us that it was in 1971, during Mao's lifetime, that the first group of American scholars were allowed to visit.

They were members of the Committee of Concerned Asian Scholars, a group whose roots & experiences in the field were detailed by @lanzafab in his 2017 The End of Concern https://www.dukeupress.edu/the-end-of-concern

They were also-- all of them-- young researchers affiliated with the USC, whose first reports upon their return from #China were delivered to fellow USC scholars in #HongKong #香港

A decade later, in the 1980s, US foundations began withdrawing their funding for the USC, which was already well established as a mecca for scholarship on #China. Former Registrar of Chinese University of #HongKong F.C. Chen approached USC board members about moving to #CUHK

By the late 1980s, top #CUHK faculty members made the case to the #HongKong govt that when HK was returned to Chinese rule in 1997, "the support of the international community would provide an important guarantee of continued objective research" on #China

"In 1988 the Centre closed its old home at 155 Argyle Street and gradually moved all of its books to a beautiful new setting at the Chinese University" of #HongKong #香港

“By the 1980s, scholars from the mainland began coming to #HongKong to use the Centre's materials. Some collections in #China had more materials of
certain kinds than the USC library, but no collection was better organized, easier to use or more complete..."

Ezra said of the group that founded the USC that in 1963, "We hoped that scholars at the USC might develop a deeper understanding of what was happening in #China, to be passed on to students
around the world, and that the field of contemporary Chinese studies would flourish..."

"We hoped that #China might begin to open up and that our research might enable us to be a bridge as China began to join the world community. We
hoped that some day we would be able to work together with Chinese scholars in enhancing mutual understanding..."

Writing in 2005, Ezra concluded: "Now, forty years later, it has all come to pass." It is nothing short of heartbreaking, having only just lost such a luminary in field, to watch one of the legacies he contributed to us all being dismantled by #CUHK.

According to an RFA report, the director of the USC-- Pierre Landry-- has resigned upon hearing the plans for the Centre's "reorganisation." It seems that the #CUHK is planning to transfer control over the USC and its holdings to CUHK's main library.

"In January 2021, Zhao Zhiyu, of #China's National Philosophy and Social Sciences 'Thousand Talents Program' & dean of the School of Social Sciences, at #CUHK, will coordinate the restructuring & reconstruction" of the USC.

The "rumour" that the #CUHK administration is seeking to dispel is that the reorganisation is being called for externally because the USC is believed to be "colluding with foreign forces," an offence punishable under #China's new NSL for #HongKong #香港

RFA: 中大重组「中国研究服务中心」　中心主任请辞惹打压猜测　中大：绝无其事 https://www.rfa.org/cantonese/news/htm/hk-chinacenter-12242020060946.html?encoding=simplified

More on the proposed "reorganization" of Chinese University of £HongKong's University Services Centre from BBC 中文 (h/t @ChongJaIan ) : 香港中文大學中國研究中心面臨「重組」，學者憂「中國研究的麥加」將不復存在 https://www.bbc.com/zhongwen/trad/world-55441519.amp