Jiang Xueqin | |
|---|---|
| 江学勤 | |
 | |
| Born | 1976 (age 49–50) |
| Citizenship | Canada[2] |
| Education | Yale University (BA) |
| Occupations | Educator, YouTuber, blogger |
| Substack information | |
| Newsletter | |
| YouTube information | |
| Channel | |
| Subscribers | 2.6 million |
|---|---|
| Views | 77 million |
Last updated: April 13, 2026 Predictive HistoryIn his Foundation series, Isaac Asimov proposed that the science of "psycho-history" will help humanity understand its past, predict its future, and control its present. This channel is dedicated to exploring if "psycho-history" is indeed possible. This channel seeks to answer the following three questions: 1. What models, theories, and paradigms help us best understand world history? 2. What does history teach us about our current predicament? 3. How much of the future can be predicted? | |
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Jiang Xueqin (Chinese: 江学勤; pinyin: Jiāng Xuéqín;[ph 1] born 1976),[ph 2] is a Chinese-born Canadian educator and commentator. In the 2000s, he was involved in education reforms in China.[3][4] From 2022 to 2026, he worked as a teacher at Moonshot Academy high school in Beijing.[5] He is also known for his YouTube channel Predictive History, on which he styles himself as "Professor Jiang".[6][7]
Early life and education
Jiang Xueqin was born in Guangdong, China. His father was a high school teacher. At the end of the Cultural Revolution, Jiang's family emigrated to Canada, where they settled in Toronto. His father became a short-order cook, and his mother worked as a seamstress. Jiang recalled in 2026 that he had a poor childhood.[8][9]
Jiang graduated from Yale University with a Bachelor of Arts in English literature in 1999.[10][11][12][13] As an undergraduate, he worked as a teacher at the Affiliated High School of Peking University in Beijing in 1998.[4] He began an interest in guanxi while studying at Yale.[8]
Jiang is a Canadian citizen.[4][1]
Career
After graduating from Yale, Jiang began working for foreign news outlets as a journalist focusing on China. He unsuccessfully applied to multiple major news outlets, including The New Yorker. In 2000, Jiang moved to Beijing where he worked small stints as a freelance journalist.[3][8] Jiang wrote for publications such as the American Christian Science Monitor and the Hong Kong-based Far Eastern Economic Review.[1]
In 2001, Jiang was contracted to conduct an undercover U.S.-funded PBS documentary about the labor movement in China.[14][15] While filming one such protest in Daqing, Jiang was arrested and detained for two days before he was deported from China on 5 June 2002. A friend claimed that he was accused of "making illegal video recordings" and suspected of spying. No charges were filed.[1]
In 2003, Jiang was allowed by Chinese officials to return to China, where he decided to abandon freelance journalism and pursue educational reform instead at "high-profile schools".[15][9]
In 2008, Jiang initiated educational reforms at Shenzhen Middle School in a push for a more liberal system of learning with focus on creativity.[3][4]
Jiang has since held senior administrative and teaching positions at several prominent Chinese secondary schools, including:
- Deputy Principal, Shenzhen Middle School (2008–2010)[3]
- Program Director, Peking University High School International Division (2010–2012)
- Tsinghua University's Affiliate High School (2014)[4]
- History and Philosophy Teacher, Moonshot Academy Beijing (2022–present).[ph 1]
He was a researcher with the Global Education Innovation Initiative at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts (RSA), and has served on the selection committee for the Global Teacher Prize.[16]
His writing has appeared in The New York Times (Chinese edition), CNN, China Youth Daily, The Wall Street Journal, and The Chronicle of Higher Education.[17]
YouTube channel
In 2023, Jiang created the YouTube channel Predictive History, in which he styles himself as "Professor Jiang" despite not teaching at the university level. The initial intention was recording his classes for his students to review. He describes his channel as employing structural historical analysis, game theory, and concepts inspired by Isaac Asimov's fictional psychohistory to interpret and predict important geopolitical developments.[ph 3][18] Jiang also has a course, Western Philosophy, which he has recorded and uploaded to his YouTube channel.[18]
Jiang's Geo-Strategy episode, "The Iran Trap" (2024), has attracted international attention, predicting the re-election of Donald Trump in 2024 and escalating U.S. involvement in a conflict with Iran (cf. the 2025 and 2026 conflicts) and eventual U.S. loss in a prolonged conflict, the first two of which have come true as of 2026.[18][19] According to India Today, other analysts had made similar predictions but "Jiang packaged them early and memorably."[8]
After his channel went viral amid the 2026 Iran war, he started appearing on podcasts and online news shows like Piers Morgan Uncensored and The Tucker Carlson Show.[9]
Reception
While some media outlets described Jiang's lecture on Iran in 2024 as prophetic (earning him the moniker "Nostradamus of China"),[9] others criticized the predictions for relying on selective historical analogies, not showing his game theory work, and untestable assumptions.[18] India Today said that his geopolitical analysis glaringly do not feature Chinese foreign policy or internal problems of China even though he resides in the country.[8] In an interview with Mehdi Hasan on Zeteo he said that he uses VPN to get past the internet censorship in China to access YouTube and other blocked websites, adding "I do not talk to reporters in China because I'm conscious that whatever I say online could be used against me."[7] The South China Morning Post noted that he is mainly popular outside of China, though some of his English-language lectures have been translated and uploaded onto Chinese social media.[9]
The Free Press described Jiang as a conspiracy theorist who has promoted conspiracy theories through his YouTube channel about the Illuminati, Freemasons, Jesuits and Sabbateans controlling the Western world.[6] According to the South China Morning Post, which described some of his lectures as "veering into well-trodden conspiracy theories on shadowy secret societies", in "Pax Judaica", the concluding lecture about Greater Israel of his Secret History series, Jiang has presented a theory that after the US is forced from the Middle East, the Illuminati, an organization comprised of Freemasons, Jesuits and Sabbateans, would control the world from Jerusalem.[9] Yang Meng, assistant professor at Peking University, argued that Jiang has promoted the notion that Israel has practiced ritual child sacrifice in the Gaza war.[20] Daniel Tutt of Triple Ampersand also referred to Jiang as a conspiracy theorist and an anti-communist, criticizing him for stating "we don’t actually have any concrete evidence for the Holocaust" and stating that communism was a continuation of Frankism.[21]
"Professor" moniker
Jiang's usage of the moniker "Professor", as a high school teacher, has also been described as misleading.[8] He has defended the usage saying that he did not initially name his channel as such and only started using the title after fans started calling him by that name.[7]
