Making Erhai Lake Bloom Again: A Story of China’s Ecological Transformation by Tings Chak https://countercurrents.org/2025/02/making-erhai-lake-bloom-again-a-story-of-chinas-ecological-transformation/ The restoration of Erhai Lake is a concrete example of China’s ecological transformation of recent years, which aims to correct the environmental damages that came with rapid economic expansion while setting a new course in the transition to a new energy economy. In recent years, President Xi Jinping has emphasised the concept of “ecological civilisation” as one of the key elements of China’s socialist modernisation and promoted “green mountains and clear waters”, a guiding vision that sees the protection of the environment as a necessary foundation to economic and social prosperity, rather than being at odds with it. Erhai Lake is a good example of how a central government vision gets translated into practice at the local community level, combining scientific investigation, Party-led mobilisation, and grassroots democracy.