2025-10-30
6 分钟The Economist Hello, Rosie Bloor here,
co-host of The Intelligence, our daily news and current affairs podcast.
You're about to hear an article from the latest edition of The Economist, read aloud.
We hope you enjoy it.
Those hoping to pay their respects to Jiang Zemin, a deceased former president of China, will not find a tombstone.
As befits a leader of the Communist Party,
he was a "thoroughgoing materialist" (read: unsentimental), according to official media.
So after he died in 2022 he was cremated and his ashes scattered into the ocean off Shanghai.
The city is now hoping more people will follow Jiang's example.
This month it said it would give 3,000 yuan ($420) to residents who agree to give their deceased relatives a "sea burial".
Until recently, such a thing would have been taboo.
Chinese families have often spent grandly on tombs that honour dead relatives.
Every year they return to clean the tomb and burn offerings.
In rural China some farmers still prepare their own coffins and gravesites well in advance.
In Chinese, the phrase "to die without a burial spot" is used as a curse (and is often the fate of villains in novels).
But a change in attitudes is under way.
The party has long seen elaborate tombs as a backward tradition and, worse, a waste of good land—which is in short supply in cities.
In rural areas it could otherwise be used to plant crops.
The party has banned tombs outside authorised cemeteries.
In built-up areas it has (in theory) made cremations compulsory.