Brent Fulton

Brent Fulton is the founder of ChinaSource.

Dr. Fulton served as the first president of ChinaSource until 2019. Prior to his service with ChinaSource, he served from 1995 to 2000 as the managing director of the Institute for Chinese Studies at Wheaton College. From 1987 to 1995 he served as founding US director of China Ministries International, and from 1985 to 1986 as the English publications editor for the Chinese Church Research Center in Hong Kong.

Dr. Fulton holds MA and PhD degrees in political science from the University of Southern California and a BA in radio-TV-film from Messiah College.

An avid China watcher, Dr. Fulton has written and taught extensively on the church in China and on Chinese social and political phenomena. He is the author of China's Urban Christians: A Light That Cannot Be Hidden and co-authored China's Next Generation: New China, New Church, New World with Luis Bush.

Dr. Fulton and his wife, Jasmine, previously lived in Hong Kong from 2006 to 2017. They currently reside in northern California.

He is currently facilitating a network of member care professionals serving missionaries sent out from China. He also consults with other organizations on the impact of China's religious policy.

Latest

Deconstructing China’s Jerusalem?

Reading Cao Nanlai’s classic Constructing China’s Jerusalem  in light of the highly publicized attacks on Wenzhou churches, the obvious question is whether the “Wenzhou model,” as Cao describes it, is still intact, or whether government intervention has significantly altered the formula of church growth and cultural transformation.

Assessing Political Reform in China

More than 35 years after Deng Xiaoping’s ascendancy to power, a sober assessment of the political implications of Deng’s reforms is much needed. China’s Political Development: Chinese and American Perspectives proposes to fill this gap by bringing together the insights of two dozen eminent scholars, twelve each from China and the United States, to address key aspects of governance reform since 1978.

3 Questions: Carol Lee Hamrin

A ChinaSource "3 Question" interview with Dr. Carol Lee Hamrin about China’s National Security Commission.

Chinese Supply Chains and the Gospel

Tainted milk, diseased pigs sold on the market, 40-year-old meat discovered in a warehouse in Hunan, and lead-contaminated water in a newly built Hong Kong housing estate­—these are just a few examples of the food scare nightmares that have come to light in China in recent years. More such stories continue to surface, seemingly on a weekly basis.

Chinese Christian Entrepreneurs

An experienced business leader in China remarked that, while there is the expectation that Christians should somehow conduct business differently, the question of what exactly this should look like remains a difficult one.

When All Roads Lead to Beijing

China’s foreign policy under Xi Jinping has witnessed a significant shift. Formerly focused on China’s relationship with the world’s major powers, China’s leaders are now redirecting their attention to relations with the nations around China, as well as to those nations beyond with which China seeks to develop closer economic ties.

Continuing Class Struggle and the Politics of Religion in China

In a recent post I wrote about the paradoxical treatment of religion in China’s Constitution. On the one hand, Article 36 of the Constitution guarantees freedom of religion. On the other hand, the same article puts clear conditions on this freedom, making it subject to the needs of the state as defined by the Communist Party of China.

Explaining China’s “Religious Awakening”

Rodney Stark and Xiuhua Wang’s new book, A Star in the East, combines data from a major study on religion in China conducted during the past decade together with keen sociological insights in order to explain the factors behind China’s phenomenal church growth.