Events

The conference is generously supported by the project Infrastructures of Faith: Religious Mobilities on the Belt and Road (BRINFAITH) at the Asian Religious Connections research cluster of the Hong Kong Institute for the Humanities and Social Sciences (HKIHSS), University of Hong Kong (HKU), and jointly organized by HKIHSS; Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore; and Center for Global Asia, New York University Shanghai.

Discussions on the rise of Global China, through the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and beyond, have focused on physical infrastructures, financial investments, commerce, and geopolitics. What about the religious dimension of China’s deepening entanglements with the world? Religion is central to the culture and national identity of most BRI and adjacent countries, and, often, their political system and ideology as well. These religions include Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, and Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox Christianity, among others. What are the religious implications and consequences of these circulations and frictions? The growing presence of China in countries of the Global South may increase the importance of China in the imagination, strategies, or missionizing goals of religious organizations, movements, political parties and ideologies in those countries. These imaginations, strategies and identity formations may be inflected by a resurfacing of historical imaginations and networks. At the same time, growing links offer opportunities for the international expansion of Chinese religious and spiritual networks and organizations. This increased circulation may impact on China’s religious ecology and complicate China’s internal religious policy as well as its management of religious exchanges in the service of diplomacy and soft power.

This international conference will bring together scholars working on different regions and disciplines, to map out the contours of the religious dimensions and implications of Global China, through discussion of empirical studies and testing of different analytical frameworks.

Scholars are invited to submit paper proposals on empirical studies touching on one or more of the following topics:

• The circulation and penetration of religious networks, personnel and practices between China and other countries, including countries of the BRI and beyond, including through migration, trade or missionary movements;
• Religious entanglements and responses to Chinese-invested infrastructure projects;
• Evolving religious and civilizational discourses, identities and imaginaries as a consequence of intensified relationships between China and other nations;
• State management and control, whether by China or other countries, of increased religious flows in a context of securitization and geopolitical tensions;
• Religious factors in national politics or geopolitics involving China.

CONFERENCE SESSIONS

SESSION 1 | 17-18 August 2023 (in-person) | hosted by the University of Hong Kong
SESSION 2 | 22-23 August 2023 (online) | hosted by the National University of Singapore
SESSION 3 | 27-28 October 2023 (online) | hosted by the New York University Shanghai

PROGRAMME (22-23 AUG)

For more information about the conference programme, please visit HKU’s website at https://asiar.hku.hk/event/global-china-in-a-religious-world/
For any inquiry, please contact Dr Michel Chambon at mchambon@nus.edu.sg.

REGISTRATION

Registration is closed, and instructions on how to participate in this online event has been sent out to registered attendees. Please write to valerie.yeo@nus.edu.sg, if you would like to attend the workshop.

CONVENORS

Prof David A. Palmer | Hong Kong Institute for the Humanities and Social Sciences, The University of Hong Kong
Prof Tansen Sen | Center on Global Asia, New York University Shanghai
Dr Michel Chambon | Initiative for the Study of Asian Catholics, Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore
Dr Emily Hertzman | Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore