China’s economic malaise is causing disillusion among the young

THE CROWD did not seem excited to see George Michael and Andrew Ridgeley. When Wham! became the first Western pop group to perform in Communist China, the audience was instructed to stay in their seats. It was 1985 and, despite appearances, the young people in attendance were in fact joyous. The country around them was by no means free, but it was starting to reform and open up. Over the next three decades the economy would grow at a rapid pace, producing new opportunities. An increasing number of Chinese travelled and studied abroad. Even the Communist Party showed signs of relaxing (a bit). Those brought up during this period had high hopes for the future.

Today, reality is falling short of expectations. A dark cloud hangs over Chinese born in the 1990s and 2000s. Since Xi Jinping won power in 2012, the government has grown more repressive and society less vibrant. Censors have turned the internet into a drearier place, while letting nationalist trolls drum in the state’s talking-points. At university students must grapple with Mr Xi’s forbidding personal ideology. Worst of all for some, China’s economy is stagnating. The unemployment rate for those aged 16 to 24 in cities is over 21%—a number so disheartening that earlier this month the government stopped publishing the data, pending a review.