Spring has finally arrived in Beijing and the CCSP team is organizing a range of activities. As a key component of the Contemporary China Studies Program, every semester first-year students visit several government organizations, research institutions, enterprises, and rural sites in order to gain a solid and applied understanding of contemporary China.

The first visit of this semester was to the Beijing Academy of Social Sciences (BASS).

The director of the department of foreign affairs welcomed our students and gave an introduction of the organization and the objectives of BASS. He explained how even municipality-level research institutes are engaged in national projects: at the moment, one of the main research areas of the academy is to build city-to-city cooperation between the cities along the Belt and Road.

In the second part of the visits, our students attended a lecture by an expert on Beijing culture that was followed by an interesting Q&A session.

In the past, many CCSP students closely cooperated with this academy by both attending and organizing lectures. Most recently, a BASS publication included papers by CCSP alumni.

This was also a great networking opportunity for students that wish to publish their research in the future.