英文好的可以看一看：The Silencing of a Harvard Pioneer:

The Silencing of a Harvard Pioneer: How a Rogue Faction in China Targeted One of Its Brightest Minds

In 1994, Lin Chen became the first Chinese national to earn a PhD from Harvard Kennedy School, an institution famed for cultivating presidents, ministers, and public servants committed to democratic values and evidence-based policy. With degrees from the University of Science and Technology of China, Stanford, and Harvard, and deep expertise in computational finance, astrophysics, and public administration, Chen was not just an academic prodigy—he was poised to become a transformative figure in China's evolving global identity.

His return to China in May 2002, to head a private university in Shandong Province, made national headlines. It was a triumph of China’s then-forward-looking policy to bring back overseas talent. Xinhua and China News Service heralded his homecoming. CCTV aired interviews. People’s Daily’s overseas edition and China Newsweek ran features. Regional papers across Beijing, Shanghai, and even Fujian joined the chorus of acclaim. For a brief moment, Chen represented the promise of a modern China—global, meritocratic, and open to reform.

Then the attacks began.

A State Media Coup

In mid-2002, China Youth Daily (CYD), a national outlet affiliated with the Chinese Communist Youth League, launched a series of front-page stories accusing Chen of fabricating every aspect of his resume—his Harvard degree, teaching roles, consulting engagements, and even rumors of consideration for a leadership role at China’s central bank. The centerpiece of this campaign was a headline: “Why Should We Believe He’s a Harvard PhD?” It falsely claimed that Robert Merton, a Nobel laureate allegedly listed as Chen’s advisor, had denied knowing him.

But CYD’s accusation collapsed almost immediately. Within a week, Beijing Youth Daily exposed the fabrication. Harvard itself confirmed Chen’s degree in a letter dated 2002. CYD’s journalists had misrepresented their own sources. And yet—astonishingly—they continued. No internal investigation, no retraction, no accountability. Instead, the same reporters were allowed to escalate the attack.

Meanwhile, Chen was removed from his post as university president the very day the first CYD article dropped. Job offers from the Ministry of Education, Peking University, and the industrial giant Shougang Group were rescinded. With no public platform to defend himself, Chen was effectively silenced. CYD, a state-affiliated paper, had destroyed a private citizen’s life based on claims already exposed as false.

Defamation, Exile, and a Chilling Silence

What began as character assassination turned into a sustained campaign of suppression. Articles that countered CYD’s narrative were censored across Chinese media. Attempts to post rebuttals on Chinese-language Wikipedia, LinkedIn, and even Reddit were deleted or quietly deindexed. Google results for “Chen Lin Harvard” stopped showing his professional pages. On LinkedIn, his posts became invisible to followers. In 2024, the German government formally recognized this as political persecution—a rare and damning acknowledgment of state-linked harassment.

In summer 2023, the harassment turned violent. Chen was stalked and narrowly escaped an attempted attack in New York City, which he reported to both the NYPD and FBI. The pattern was no longer media-driven—it had become existential.

Factionalism Over Merit

Why target someone the state had once celebrated? The answer lies in the byzantine world of Chinese political factions. CYD is the media arm of the Communist Youth League (or Tuanpai), historically aligned with former President Hu Jintao and ex-Premier Li Keqiang. While Tuanpai presents itself as youthful and progressive, its internal politics are notoriously insular and defensive. In the early 2000s, while the Communist Party officially promoted the return of overseas talent, CYD ran op-eds questioning this very policy, with titles like “Why Prioritize Returnees?”

To Tuanpai, Chen was not just a returning scholar—he was a rival. A Kennedy School graduate with global credentials and widespread public support posed a symbolic and possibly political threat. CYD’s campaign was not an institutional directive from the Party. It was a rogue operation by a faction that viewed Chen’s prominence as a liability.

The Media’s Red Guard Moment

Chen’s experience invites uncomfortable parallels with the Cultural Revolution, when accusations alone could dismantle lives. CYD never permitted a formal response from Chen, nor did it allow follow-up reporting from rival outlets. The pattern is damning. When the core accusation—the degree fraud—was disproven, why not retract the article? Why allow the same reporters to proceed, unsupervised? Even in criminal justice, suspects have the right to speak. But Chen, neither a suspect nor a public official, was denied that most basic right: to answer his accusers.

CYD’s disregard for journalistic ethics—its refusal to fact-check, its selective censorship, its insistence on using Chen’s full name while peddling discredited allegations—should have triggered oversight by China’s National Press and Publication Administration. It didn’t. And that silence is telling.

A Global Implication

Chen’s case is not simply a domestic scandal. It reveals the vulnerabilities of international systems—from search engines and social platforms to immigration processes—when targeted by coordinated, faction-driven state media. It also highlights the dangers of mistaking youth and Western-style rhetoric for reformist intent. Western observers often view Tuanpai figures like Li Keqiang as more liberal-minded. But the faction’s record on media integrity and personal freedoms tells another story.

Chen’s story has gone largely untold in the West. But it’s emblematic of a larger truth: in a system where informal factions can weaponize state resources, no one—no matter how credentialed—is safe.

As China courts global leadership in science, technology, and academia, it must confront the rogue forces within its own institutions. The smear campaign against Lin Chen was not just a personal injustice—it was an assault on meritocracy, intellectual freedom, and the very idea of a rules-based society. CYD owes Chen more than an apology. It owes him a future.