The following individuals have been selected to participate in Sixth Tone Fellowship 2020. They will conduct field research in six Chinese provinces, exploring China's grassroots response to the call for rural revitalization. Congratulations!

The theme of the 2020 Sixth Tone Fellowship is “Social Innovation and Rural China.”

The economic reforms of the past forty years stimulated China’s economy and unleashed an array of productive economic forces, but for years gains were largely concentrated in the country’s urban areas. Recently, however, new social organizations have sprouted up across the Chinese countryside, bringing with them innovative approaches and ideas for revitalizing China’s rural hinterland. The question now becomes: Can non-state actors and social organization reinvigorate rural China? And if so, how?

With academic support from our partner, the Fudan Development Institute at Fudan University, Sixth Tone will fund young professionals from around the world to explore how China’s grassroots are responding to the country’s call for rural revitalization. Beginning in May 2020, Sixth Tone Fellows will spend six weeks in China, conducting research and performing fieldwork in locations all over the country.