Adam Taylor writes in The Washington Post:
Dan Washburn, perhaps the foremost Western expert on golf in China and author of “The Forbidden Game: Golf and the Chinese Dream,” says that the idea that golf has been made legal is a misinterpretation of the previous guidelines: Golf was never actually illegal in China for either average citizens or party members, he argues. “As is common in China, the regulation’s language does seem vague, perhaps purposefully so,” Washburn writes in an email. “It doesn’t explicitly say that Party members are forbidden to play golf, just that they can’t own golf memberships.”