Society

Chinese director Jia Zhangke has earned a reputation for making films about potentially controversial issues with a strong point of view. Giving voice to those who might not otherwise be heard “is more important than to remain in silence,” he says.

The 40-year-old director describes himself as “like an orphan anxious to learn the truth about where he comes from.” His latest film, “I Wish I Knew,” looks at Shanghai’s sometimes turbulent history from the 1930s to the present. Blending documentary and fictional narrative, 18 people from different walks of society describe their lives during China’s civil war, the Cultural Revolution and other historical events.

Mr. Jia, who studied at the Beijing Film Academy, is a prominent figure among China’s “sixth-generation” movie directors—independent filmmakers exploring realistic themes. His films focus on the immense changes taking place in Chinese society and their effect on ordinary citizens. “Platform” (2000) delved into China’s modernization; “Still Life” (2006) looked at the social impact of the Three Gorges Dam; and “24 City” (2008) examined urban development.

China’s southern boom town of Shenzhen is seen as the embodiment of late Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping’s exhortation to “let some people get rich first.” Now the city finds itself at the center of a heated debate about whether the country has taken Deng’s suggestion too far.

Late last week, not long after Chinese Communist Party leaders conceded the need for fairer economic development, some of China’s richest men were found on a list of people due to receive housing subsidies from the Shenzhen municipal government.

With many in China already frustrated over skyrocketing real estate prices, the news exploded across Chinese blogsites and newspapers, drawing harsh complaints from pundits and regular people alike.

Ghana's state-owned oil company and China's Cnooc Ltd. made an unsuccessful joint bid of $5 billion for a U.S. company's stake in one of Africa's most promising oil regions, an official of the Ghanaian company said Monday.

The offer was for a 23.5% stake in Ghana's Jubilee field, one of the continent's largest oil deposits, and other nearby assets. The field, thought to contain 1.5 billion barrels of crude, is scheduled to start producing oil in December, heralding Ghana's entry into the ranks of Africa's major oil producers.

The stake is owned by Dallas-based Kosmos Energy LLC, which previously held talks with Exxon Mobil Corp. about the oil-field stake.

Kosmos Energy, majority owned by private-equity firms Blackstone Group LP and Warburg Pincus LLC, "has now decided to remain [in Ghana]. That is for sure," said Gabriel Q.A. Osatey, chief geophysicist of Ghana National Petroleum Corp., or GNPC, on the sidelines of an oil conference in New Delhi.

China's national census, which aims to update the official count for the world's largest population, will also illustrate the increasingly mobile society's growing sense of privacy—and distrust of their government.

Communist Party leaders hope the ten-yearly survey, set to begin Monday, will provide an unprecedented amount of information about the lives of its citizens, who numbered 1.3 billion in 2000. In particular, the government will try to calculate exact figures for the tens of millions of migrant workers who have flooded into cities from the countryside, and for the millions of children who have been born in violation of China's one-child policy.