Publisher promises to defy censorship

Cambridge University Press has agreed to restore more than 300 politically sensitive articles that had been removed from the publisher’s website in China at the behest of authorities, the editor said Monday.

Tim Pringle, editor of the China Quarterly, said the publisher agreed to repost the articles immediately. The action followed a petition circulating among academics calling on the university press to turn down censorship requests from the Chinese government.

“I am delighted by the support of the international academic community,” Pringle said.

Cambridge University Press said Friday that it had complied with a request to block certain articles from the China Quarterly within China. They touch on politically sensitive subjects, including the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown, the 1966-76 Cultural Revolution and the status of Tibet.

“Access to published materials of the highest quality is a core component of scholarly research,” Pringle wrote in a post on Twitter announcing the decision. “It is not the role of respected global publishing houses such as CUP to hinder such access.”

The furor comes against a tightening of controls by Chinese President Xi Jinping’s government over a wide range of groups that could feed opposition to the ruling Communist Party, including lawyers who take on sensitive cases, nongovernmental organizations and churches.

Christopher Balding, an associate professor in economics at Peking University HSBC Business School in Shenzhen, said he started the petition to bring pressure on not just CUP, but also universities and academics who interact with China as well as Chinese universities and academics “to stand up to” censorship by the Chinese government.