Barred scholar Chen Hong’s deep connections to Australia

Chen Hong’s recent columns and articles highly critical of Australia appeared in stark contrast to his love of visiting.

Former prime minister Bob Hawke with Chen Hong when he acted as his translator in 1994.

Shanghai-based academic Chen Hong has been a frequent visitor to Australia, with an interest in the country that dates back to his scholarship of Patrick White in the 1980s and has included a role as a translator for former prime minister Bob Hawke in the 90s.

Chen, who has had his visa to visit Australia revoked, along with Australian studies scholar Li Jianjun, is one of the most well-known academics in the network of Australian studies centres around China.

While writing frequent articles critical of Australia in publications such as China’s nationalistic Global Times, Chen enjoyed his regular visits to Australia, where he had many contacts and friends dating back to his first visit in 1991.

His columns and articles critical of Australia appeared in stark contrast to his love of visiting the country, particularly in recent times.

Urbane, friendly and fluent in English, Chen headed the chair of Australian studies at the East China Normal University in Shanghai, using it as a base for his frequent international travel.

As political ties between Australia and China worsened, he wrote articles critical of federal government policy that irritated Australian diplomats but would have gone down well with China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Chen began studying Australian literature at East China Normal in the 1980s, deciding to become an expert on White after reading The Tree of Man.

He did his masters thesis on White’s Voss, based on the experience of explorer Ludwig Leichhardt, which he credited with giving him an insight into the Australian outback.

He did a PhD on White and translated David Marr’s biography of White into Chinese.

Giving a paper on White at an Australian studies conference in China in 1990, he met former Australian prime minister Gough Whitlam, who arranged for him to visit Australia in 1991.

Chen spent time at La Trobe University in Melbourne, beginning a lifetime of building up contacts in academia in Australia.

In 1994, he was asked to translate for former prime minister Bob Hawke during a visit to China.

In 2001, he took over as director of the Australian studies centre at his university, building it up as one of the most active and well-known of more than 30 Australian studies centres across China.

In an interview with The Australian in Shanghai last year, he said the centre’s mission was to “promote a better understanding between the two countries and people”.

Chinese professor Chen Hong with former Labor foreign minister Bob Carr, left, and NSW Labor MP Shaoquett Moselmane

While he described Australia as his “second home”, he argued that his criticism of Australia was like Kevin Rudd, who famously decided to speak out about China’s human rights shortcomings in a speech in Mandarin at Peking University on his first visit to China as prime minister.

“When Kevin Rudd was in Beijing, he said if you want to be a true friend of China, you do not just compliment China, you speak out when you see something you don’t agree with,” Chen told The Australian.

On a visit to Australia last year, he said he was looking to recruit junior academics from Australia with an interest in China to work at his university in Shanghai.

He expressed his concern at what he saw a growing “anti-China hysteria” in Australia.

He argued that Australian universities saw Chinese students as a “money tree” and warned that there was a danger that the Chinese student market in Australia was being taken for granted.

Also denied a visit was Li, another senior Chinese academic with a longtime interest in Australia.

Li is director of the Australian Studies Centre at Beijing Foreign Studies University and has been secretary-general of the Chinese Association for Australian Studies since 2014.

He has also been managing editor of the Chinese Journal of Australian Studies published by the Social Sciences Academic Press (China). He was a visiting scholar at Griffith University in 2002 and a visiting research fellow at Menzies Centre for Australian Studies at King’s College London in 2016 and was a recipient of the BHP Billiton Australia China Scholarship in 2017.

He has been working on a PhD at the Western Sydney University’s Writing and Society Research Centre, researching Australian writers in China in the 1950s and 1960s.