Yuan Yang Keynote Speaker

FT's first Europe-China Correspondent
Co Founder of 'Rethinking Economics'
Author of 'Private Revolutions- Coming of Age in a New China'

Yuan Yang's Biography

Yuan Yang was elected as a Labour MP for Earley and Woodley in the 2024 UK Parliamentary elections. She is a member of the Treasury Committee, which scrutinises economic policymaking as well as bodies such as the Bank of England.

Before entering politics, Yuan was the Financial Times’ first Europe-China correspondent covering geopolitics, trade and supply chains, as well as writing a monthly column. During this time, she spent six years in Beijing, where she was the FT’s deputy bureau chief and briefly ran the bureau during the pandemic. Before joining the FT, Yuan wrote about economics at The Economist, supported by the Marjorie Deane Financial Journalism Foundation. Yuan became best known for narrative long-form writing that humanises complex economic issues, such as in a FT Magazine cover feature on the working conditions behind China’s tech boom; for investigations, such as on Chinese state surveillance over Hong Kong activists abroad; for delving into economic and industrial policy, such as in this analysis of the European solar power market

Yuan’s 2024 book – ‘Private Revolutions‘, published by Bloomsbury in the UK and by Penguin Viking in the USA, illustrates the rise and stumble of social mobility in China, told in a novelistic style through the stories of four Chinese millennial women, born during the reform era of the 1980s and 1990s as China pivoted towards capitalism. These individuals represent the juncture between China’s patriarchal past, its authoritarian capitalist present, and the rumblings of a feminist future. Her view is that, if we are to understand how China will shape the 21st century, we must start with the stories of the people shaping the country’s new social order today. There was a four way auction to secure the rights to publish the book. The book was shortlisted for the 2025 Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction and nominated for the Royal Society for Literature’s prestigious Ondaatje Prize.

She is the co-founder of ‘Rethinking Economics’, a charity that campaigns to make economics teaching more relevant to the 21st century. Yuan has also served as the Vice-President of the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of China, defending press freedoms in the country, and has been a regular contributor to BBC Radio 4 and BBC World Service.

Yuan Yang was born in China, and moved with her parents to the UK at the age of four. She has a degree in philosophy and economics from Oxford University and a master’s degree in economics from the London School of Economics.

Risks facing foreign companies operating in China

China's impact on the world economy

The geopolitics of China's relationship with Europe

European and American industrial policy responses to China in the green transition

China’s Millennial Backlash - how today's young will change China's future

She brings a rare dual vantage point as a serving Labour MP and Treasury Committee member, helping leaders understand how Westminster scrutiny of economic policy and the Bank of England is likely to shape decisions and markets.
She translates China’s geopolitics, trade and supply chain realities into clear strategic insight, drawing on years as the Financial Times’ Europe China correspondent and deputy Beijing bureau chief.
She gives audiences a human, ground-level understanding of China’s social and economic transformation, shaped by the reporting and narrative craft behind her book Private Revolutions, shortlisted for the 2025 Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction.
She challenges leaders to rethink orthodoxies and communicate economic change more credibly, informed by her work as co-founder of Rethinking Economics and her regular contributions to BBC Radio 4 and the BBC World Service.