‘China Unbound’ wins for Star writer
Joanna Chiu, a Vancouverbased journalist covering Canada-China relations and current affairs on the West Coast for the Toronto Star, has won this year’s $25,000 Shaughnessy Cohen Prize for Political Writing for her debut book, “China Unbound” published by House of Anansi Press.
The prize is among the Writers’ Trust of Canada literary programs and was presented at the 35th anniversary of the Politics and the Pen fundraising gala on Tuesday night in Ottawa. It rewards a book of literary nonfiction about a political subject and “relevant to Canadian readers that has the potential to influence thinking on Canadian political life,” the trust said.
Chiu said she took the win as “positive affirmation” Canadians support the idea that foreign issues and protecting vulnerable communities who may be targeted by foreign state actions are central to our politics and political discussions.
Chiu said it’s a lifelong passion of her to study all aspects of Chinese society and history. As a foreign correspondent in Beijing for seven years, Chiu said she heavily covered issues on politics, human rights crackdown and prosecution against minorities.
“I realized that the China story was a very global story that affects obviously Canadians, not only the two Michaels,” Chiu said of when she joined the Vancouver bureau of the Star in 2018. “So my book is as much of an attempt to investigate root causes of China’s growing human rights crackdown, both at home and abroad and also an examination of how we got to this point.”
Chiu’s book was described as a “sweeping portrait of a rising superpower that is essential reading for any follower of Canadian politics.”
The jury consisted of Ottawa journalist Charelle Evelyn, past prize finalist Jacques Poitras, and former Conservative Party of Canada deputy leader Lisa Raitt.
Chiu’s work has also appeared in the Guardian, Foreign Policy, the Atlantic and Newsweek. Chiu runs a non-profit, NüVoices, a network of female China experts who support and promote each other through an online magazine and podcast.
The other Shaughnessy Cohen Prize finalists were Mike Blanchfield and Fen Osler Hampson for “The Two Michaels,” Stephen Poloz’s “The Next Age of Uncertainty,” Flora MacDonald and Geoffrey Stevens for “Flora! A Woman in a Man’s World” and Jody WilsonRaybould’s “‘Indian’ in the Cabinet: Speaking Truth to Power.”
“Political journalism tends to be so white. Because this unconscious biases where if you don’t have lived experience, it’s hard to really be sensitive,” Chiu said.