In addition to cracking down on China’s media outlets, the current administration in Beijing also wants university professors to toe the party line. Profs are being monitored and disciplined if they stray from permitted subjects.

Just months after Xi {JinPing] took power last year, Chinese authorities outlined seven topics that professors shouldn’t talk about in their classes, including judicial independence, civil society and the wealth of government officials, according to Xia Yeliang, a former Peking University economics professor who was fired last year for supporting democratic reforms in China.

In addition to Xia, at least two other Beijing-based professors have been disciplined for their teachings about sensitive topics such as the Arab Spring uprisings and constitutionalism in China, Zhang said.

Economics professor Ilham Tohti was even sentenced to life in prison in September on separatism charges in part for championing the rights of the country’s Muslim Uighur minority during his lectures at Minzu University in Beijing. That sentence was upheld by a higher court Friday.

“I don’t think there’s any question we’re in the midst of a renewed crackdown on dissent,” said David Bandurski, a researcher at the University of Hong Kong-based China Media Project, which studies the practice of journalism in the country. “It seems there is a broader attempt to limit discussion on a whole range of issues in academia and in the press that the party regards as sensitive.”

More: Correction: China-Professors Monitored Story - Yahoo News

The crackdowns are not limited to faculty. Students of Tohti who helped him maintain his website may also face long prison sentences. thinkprogress.org