Jump to content

Portal:China

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the second-most populous country after India, representing 17.4% of the world population. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and borders fourteen countries by land. With an area of nearly 9.6 million square kilometers (3,700,000 sq mi), it is the third-largest country by total land area. The country is divided into 33 province-level divisions: 22 provinces, five autonomous regions, four municipalities, and two semi-autonomous special administrative regions. Beijing is the country's capital, while Shanghai is its most populous city by urban area and largest financial center.

China is considered one of the cradles of civilization: the first human inhabitants in the region arrived during the Paleolithic. By the late second millennium BCE, the earliest dynastic states had emerged in the Yellow River basin. The eighth to third centuries BCE saw a breakdown in the authority of the Zhou dynasty, accompanied by the emergence of administrative and military techniques, literature, philosophy, and historiography. In 221 BCE, China was unified under an emperor, ushering in more than two millennia of imperial dynasties including the Qin, Han, Tang, Yuan, Ming, and Qing. With the invention of gunpowder and paper, the establishment of the Silk Road, and the building of the Great Wall, Chinese culture flourished and has heavily influenced both its neighbors and lands further afield. However, China began to cede parts of the country in the late 19th century to various European powers by a series of unequal treaties.

China is a unitary one-party socialist republic led by the CCP. It is one of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council; the UN representative for China was changed from the ROC to the PRC in 1971. It is a founding member of several multilateral and regional organizations such as the AIIB, the Silk Road Fund, the New Development Bank, and the RCEP. It is a member of the BRICS, the G20, APEC, the SCO, and the East Asia Summit. Making up around one-fifth of the world economy, the Chinese economy is the world's largest economy by GDP at purchasing power parity, the second-largest economy by nominal GDP, and the second-wealthiest country, albeit ranking poorly in measures of democracy, human rights and religious freedom. The country has been one of the fastest-growing major economies and is the world's largest manufacturer and exporter, as well as the second-largest importer. China is a nuclear-weapon state with the world's largest standing army by military personnel and the second-largest defense budget. It is a great power, and has been described as an emerging superpower. China is known for its cuisine and culture, and has 59 UNESCO World Heritage Sites, the second-highest number of any country. (Full article...)

This is a featured article, which represents some of the best content on English Wikipedia.

Did you know (auto generated)

  • ... that marketers try to turn a women-only script in China into a branding device for "high-end potatoes" in the documentary Hidden Letters?
  • ... that the release of Mario Kart: Super Circuit in China was cancelled because of excessive video-game piracy in the country?
  • ... that Luo Wenzao became the first Catholic bishop from China in 1685, after initially declining the appointment in 1677?
  • ... that the New York City-based fashion label Sandy Liang is inspired by grandmothers in Chinatown, and often features Liang's own grandmother as a model?
  • ... that Chinese scholar Liang Tingnan suggested that China should emulate the United States to avoid the upheavals of dynastic change?
  • ... that Canadian pentathlon champion J. Howard Crocker introduced volleyball to China?

More did you know

War memorial hall commemorating the First Sino-Japanese War on Liugong Island

Selected cuisine or food - show another

Edible bird's nest

Edible bird's nests, also known as swallow nests (Chinese: 燕窝; pinyin: yànwō), are bird nests created from solidified saliva by edible-nest swiftlets, Indian swiftlets and other swiftlets of the genera Aerodramus, Hydrochous, Schoutedenapus and Collocalia, which are harvested for human consumption. Swiftlet nests have been used as a delicacy for over 400 years, most often as soup. They are particularly prized in Chinese cuisine due to the rarity, high protein content and rich flavor, and are among the most expensive animal products consumed by humans, with prices up to about $4,300 per pound ($9,500/kg) depending on grading. The type or grading of a swiftlet nest depends on the bird species, as well as the shape and colour of the bird's nest. It is usually white in colour, but there also exists a red version that is sometimes called 'blood nest' (血燕). According to traditional Chinese medicine, it promotes good health, especially for the skin. (Full article...)


East Asia


Other Countries

  Good article - load new batch

This is a good article, an article that meets a core set of high editorial standards.

Selected picture

Anniversaries for November 6

General images - load new batch

The following are images from various China-related articles on Wikipedia.

Topics

Categories

Category puzzle
Category puzzle
Select [►] to view subcategories

In the news

5 November 2024 –
Two Chinese nationals are shot at a factory in Karachi, Pakistan. (ABC News)
1 November 2024 –
The People's Republic of China revises its regulations for foreign investors in its listed companies, seeking to attract more such investment by expanding eligibility criteria and easing financial requirements. (CNBC)
31 October 2024 –
The European Commission opens an investigation into Chinese e-commerce company Temu for its sale of illegal and counterfeit products and its addictive design, which violate the EU's Digital Services Act. (DW)
23 October 2024 – China–Holy See relations
China and the Holy See agree to extend their 2018 provisional agreement on the appointment of Catholic bishops in China for a further four years. (Vatican News)
23 October 2024 – China–India relations
Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi holds a bilateral meeting with President of China Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the 16th BRICS summit in Kazan, Russia. This is the first bilateral meeting between India and China in five years and comes in the aftermath of the 2020 border skirmishes between Indian and Chinese troops. (India Today)
21 October 2024 – China–India relations
India and China reach a breakthrough in discussions on disengagement and border patrol along the disputed Line of Actual Control. (Zee News) (DW)

Recognized content

Extended content

Good articles

A-Class articles

Things you can do


Here are some tasks awaiting attention:

China's Politics

Emblem of the Communist Party of China
Emblem of the Communist Party of China
Xi Jinping
Xi Jinping

The General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, officially General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, is head of the Chinese Communist Party and the highest-ranking official within China, a standing member of the Politburo and head of the Secretariat. The officeholder is usually considered the paramount leader of China.

According to the Constitution, the General Secretary serves as an ex officio member of the Politburo Standing Committee, China's de facto top decision-making body. Since the early 1990s, the holder of the post has been, except for transitional periods, the Chairman of the Central Military Commission, making the holder the Commander-in-chief of the People's Liberation Army.

The current General Secretary is Xi Jinping (pictured), who took the office at the 18th National Congress on 15 November 2012.

National Emblem of the Republic of China
National Emblem of the Republic of China
Tsai Ing-wen
Tsai Ing-wen

The President of the Republic of China is the head of state of the Republic of China (ROC).

The Constitution names the president as head of state and commander-in-chief of the Republic of China Armed Forces (formerly known as the National Revolutionary Army). The president is responsible for conducting foreign relations, such as concluding treaties, declaring war, and making peace. The president must promulgate all laws and has no right to veto. Other powers of the president include granting amnesty, pardon or clemency, declaring martial law, and conferring honors and decorations.

The current President is Lai Ching-te (pictured), since May 20, 2024. Lai is a Taiwanese politician and former physician, who is currently serving as the eighth president of the Republic of China under the 1947 Constitution and the third president from the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP).

Wikipedias in languages found in China

粵語 / 广东话 (Cantonese)           古文 / 文言文 (Classical Chinese)           赣语 (Gan)           Hak-kâ-fa (Hakka)           قازاق تىلى (Kazakh)           中文 / 普通话 (Mandarin) (Now unable to access in China Mainland because of the Great Firewall)           闽东语 (Min Dong)           闽南语 (Min-nan)           བོད་ཡིག (Tibetan)           ئۇيغۇرچە (Uyghur)           吴语 (Wu)           Sawcuengh (Zhuang)

Incubator
wiki incubator Xiang (湘语) wiki incubator Pu-Xian Min (莆仙话) wiki incubator Min Bei (闽北语)
wiki incubator lahu (拉祜族,拉祜语) wiki incubator Nuosu (彝族,彝语) wiki incubator hmong (苗族,苗语)
wiki incubator Bouyei (布依族,布依语) wiki incubator manchu (满族,满语) wiki incubator Xong (苗族,湘西苗语)
wiki incubator Daw (苗族,白苗苗语) wiki incubator xibo (锡伯族,锡伯语) wiki incubator salar (撒拉族,撒拉语)
wiki incubator цзинпо (景颇族,景颇语) wiki incubator Tai Nüa (傣族,德宏傣语) wiki incubator Amis (阿美族,阿美語)
wiki incubator Western Yugur (裕固族,西部裕固语) wiki incubator northern tujia (土家族,北部土家语)


Associated Wikimedia

The following Wikimedia Foundation sister projects provide more on this subject:

Discover Wikipedia using portals

Purge server cache