Book Description
"Let China sleep, for when she wakes, she will shake the world." Napoleon's words seem eerily prescient today, as the shock waves from China's awakening reverberate across the globe. In China Shakes the World, the former China bureau chief of the Financial Times, James Kynge, traces these tremors from Beijing to Europe to the Midwest as China's ravenous hunger for jobs, raw materials, energy, and food -- and its export of goods, workers, and investments -- drastically reshape world trade and politics.
Delving beyond mere recitation of by-now-familiar statistics, Kynge's on-the-ground reporting provides alternative explanations for China's explosive transformation, revealing many of the usual reasons given for its growth to be myths. Most important for the future, he details China's deep, systemic weaknesses -- rampant fraud, crippling environmental crises, a corrupt banking system, faltering government institutions, a rapidly aging population -- that threaten even greater global disruptions. And he demonstrates the profound consequences of those weaknesses for American manufacturers, oil companies, banks, and ordinary consumers.
Through dramatic stories of entrepreneurs and visionaries, factory workers and store clerks at the heart of this global phenomenon, China Shakes the World explains how China's breakneck rise occurred, the extraordinary problems the country now faces, and the consequences of both for the twenty-first century.
Customer Reviews:
It is shaking me up now.......2007-10-16
I am Chinese, and of course I am attracted by the title. Finally, China get to shake the world a little too, what an accomplishment. Well, as I read the book, it is making me less and less proud of my motherland. The counterfeit product, the stealing of high-tech information, degradation of environment and the insitutionalized corruption are making my stomach turn. When 1/2 of the population is going at 80 miles an hour in the globalized world, the other half is being left behind by their own country. It makes me wonder, what will happen if the economy slow down in China? What will the people who had already tasted the fast world will do, and what will the ultra-dictatorship of the Ruling Communist party do, and what will the other half of the population that had been left behind do. This is a question worth pondering. Maybe, China is not as rosy as it projected to the rest of the world, and maybe people, or investors should listen to not just the official talking head, but what the people are doing. This is a good read, it will help with my school project too.
An enormous shift in geopolitical power.......2007-10-08
James Kynge analyzes and illustrates brilliantly the emergence of China as a major geopolitical power. He shows that the drastic shift in economic policies under Deng came from rural farmers who used creatively the concept `collective' to found private capitalist companies. The result is now a schizophrenic one party communist State with a capitalist economy. Its social stability can only be maintained with fast economic growth and job creation for its enormous population created by Mao's demographic policy.
The actual industrialization process causes massive population and gender shifts (urbanization resulting in a higher status for women), colossal energy demands (one Italy every year) and huge environmental problems (water, air). In a one party State, corruption and nepotism (with stolen identities) cannot be eradicated and provoke a declining trust in government.
Economically, corporations are mainly concerned with market share, not profits. They continue to (over) produce for the next surge in demand after every dip. They are also beginning to build consumer loyalty by branding their own products.
Internationally, the Chinese voracity created energy and commodities price surges worldwide. The end is not in sight. On the other hand, the bulk of the profits made with China's low cost factory army (no welfare) goes into the pockets of Western retail giants and their shareholders, leaving only 10 to 15 % for their Chinese counterparts. In the meantime, the deindustrialization of the Western world continues with massive job losses in the textile, car, computer and even the service industry.
Overall, however, China's economic development continues to benefit enormously world trade, notwithstanding the regularly surfacing accusations of protectionism, currency manipulation and rampant piracy. Politically, the problem of Taiwan is still not solved.
Mencius''ren' (benevolence) is not a basic ingredient of Chinese foreign policy, but the author believes that ultimately pragmatism and flexibility will have the upper hand.
This book is a must read for all those who want to understand the world we live in.
MBA Mom.......2007-07-15
I am full time Mom and just recently visited Beijing with my 2 young children and husband. As a result of our travels, all the news in the media regarding China, and my own personal experience with respect to my shopping purchase power and selection in the last many year, I was very interested in the "China story." This book is an easy read, and provides a good big picture. It reminds me of the center column in the Wall Street Journal... Too boot, well written, and excellent use of vocabulary.
Mom
Well written, informative book.......2007-06-01
This book is money and time well spent if you're interested in a contemporary survey of China.
Kynge really does an outstanding job with a complex topic. He has a journalist's nose for a story, is well connected in China, and the length of time he lived in the country allows him to really portray his observations in a sophisticated cultural and historical context. He nicely weaves in statistics and facts throughout the book without distracting from the narrative.
A Journalist's Eye.......2007-05-24
I've loved the lyrical quality of this book. It looks at the many problems facing China from the ground up and individual journalist's eyes. For a big picture view that is based more on economic analysis, see my own book: The Coming China Wars: Where They Will Be Fought and How They Can Be Won
Book Description
Once a sleeping giant, China today is the world's fastest growing economy--the leading manufacturer of cell phones, laptop computers, and digital cameras--a dramatic turn-around that alarms many Westerners. But in China: The Fragile Superpower, Susan L. Shirk opens up the black box of Chinese politics and finds that the real danger lies elsewhere--not in China's astonishing growth, but in the deep insecurity of its leaders. China's leaders face a troubling paradox: the more developed and prosperous the country becomes, the more insecure and threatened they feel. Shirk, a former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State responsible for China, knows many of today's Chinese rulers personally and has studied them for three decades. She offers invaluable insight into how they think--and what they fear. In this revealing book, readers see the world through the eyes of men like President Hu Jintao and former President Jiang Zemin. We discover a fragile communist regime desperate to survive in a society turned upside down by miraculous economic growth and a stunning new openness to the greater world. Indeed, ever since the 1989 pro-democracy protests in Tiananmen Square and the fall of communism in the Soviet Union, Chinese leaders have been haunted by the fear that their days in power are numbered. Theirs is a regime afraid of its own citizens, and this fear motivates many of their decisions when dealing with the U.S. and other foreign nations. In particular, the fervent nationalism of the Chinese people, combined with their passionate resentment of Japan and attachment to Taiwan, have made relations with these two regions a minefield. It is here, Shirk concludes, in the tangled interactions between Japan, Taiwan, China, and the United States, that the greatest danger lies. Shirk argues that rising powers such as China tend to provoke wars in large part because other countries mishandle them. Unless we understand China's brittle internal politics and the fears that motivate its leaders, we face the very real possibility of avoidable conflict with China. This book provides that understanding.
Customer Reviews:
China's fragility lies elsewhere.......2007-09-09
Honestly, China - Fragile Superpower caught my attention as well as curiosity. How fragile is China? This is my very first question before reading the book. The poor rural peasants, increasing laid-off workers, the rise of civil and democratic consciousness among Chinese citizens, the legitimacy of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)...? I have thought about various reasons for a fragile China.
Unexpectedly, a "fragile China" is not the comment or viewpoint from the west, but from the Chinese president Hu Jintao, "although China looks like a powerhouse from the outside, to its leaders it looks fragile, poor and overwhelmed by internal problems". Indeed, everyone knows that the Chinese leaders are facing numerous internal problems, apart from dealing with poor peasants and laid-off workers, environmental degradation, the Chinese product safety, the gap between the rich and the poor as well as the income gap between coastal and inland are also the imminent challenges to the rise of China.
Susan L. Shirk is the former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State in managing US-China relations. She has another perspective towards a "fragile China" - the rise of internet and mass media. The whole threatening mechanism begins with the young "netizens". The "netizens" search the foreign website in getting the uncensored international news and post it to the local forums. Other "netizens" start to discuss the issue and post some radical responses like protesting the Japanese prime minister's visit to the Yasukuni Shrine. Shirk also studies the similar cases such as the US bombardment on Chinese embassy in Belgrade in 1999, the clash of aircraft between China and the US near South China Sea in 2001 and the provocative issue such as Taiwan. Since the Chinese leaders seek to get the collective consensus (to avoid personal responsibility) before formally reacting to international crisis, their replies always come late. In the meantime, the Chinese leaders cannot control the spreading news, especially those from the internet. In order to remain the legitimacy of the government, the Chinese leaders are forced to address according to the public opinion. This is the reason why China reacts toughly towards Japan, the United States and Taiwan even though the Chinese leaders treasure the economic interdependences between China, Japan and the United States as well as the positive image of mainland China among Taiwanese.
Besides, by interviewing some Chinese military generals, Shirk finds that the Chinese leaders have compromised to the People's Liberation Army (PLA) for regime security. Some PLA generals heavily criticized Jiang Zemin's leadership in dealing with foreign countries. For example, Jiang is regarded as too pro-American, too soft on Japan while too optimistic towards the unification of Taiwan. To pacify the discontents among the PLA generals, Jiang enlarged the PLA's budget with an increase of double digit percentage annually. Not surprisingly, the west believes that the rise of Chinese military power is a potential threat to the Asia-Pacific region, not because of the modernization of the PLA, but for the growing influence of the Chinese military generals who are not accountable to the civilian government.
Therefore, according to Shirk, China is a fragile superpower because there are too many constrains on the Chinese leaders in making both their domestic and foreign policy. Even worse, as Shirk writes, "The CCP's ability to control the information that reaches the public is declining at the same time as the country's military capabilities are improving. And these two trends combine dangerously to intensify the pressure to use force to defend China's honor".
Though Shirk develops a model in explaining the dilemmas of the Chinese leaders in facing the demands of public opinion and the belligerence of military generals, it seems that the role of the internet in China is a bit exaggerated. In fact, many foreign websites are blocked in China. Even though there are limited occasional cases which the "netizens" posted uncensored news on local website, these news were removed within hours. There is a doubt whether a concrete public opinion can be formed within a few hours via internet. Shirk also admits that the huge Chinese demonstration against the US for the bombardment of Belgrade in 1999 and the clash of Chinese and American aircrafts in 2001 were acquiesced if not encouraged by the Chinese government. The Chinese government kept the demonstrations under control in order to get better bargaining position over the US. However, Shirk should also take into account that there was a call up of anti-Japanese demonstration in April 2005 on the internet for the Japanese prime minister Kozumi's visit to the Yasukuni Shrine. But this time, the Chinese government firmly prohibited the demonstration since the previous anti-Japanese demonstrations went radically by attacking the Japanese stores. Also, the Chinese leaders want to send a signal to Japan that China is willing to restore their bilateral relations. The point here is that no demonstration can be appeared without the consent of the Chinese government, no matter the demonstration is called up through the internet or not. Besides, Shirk believes that the CCP will stand firm towards Japan, Taiwan and the US because the Qing and the Kuomintang government lost their regime for failing to expel foreign aggressions. It is indeed too early to justify whether the ordinary Chinese will overthrow the CCP only because of its soft stance towards Japan, Taiwan and the US, given that the situation is not the same for the CCP now when compare the previous regimes.
China is a fragile rising power, but its fragility lies on the peasants who have no land to farm and the laid-off workers who have no social security net to rely on rather than the public opinion on the internet.
Understanding China.......2007-08-02
Few fields of academic endeavor are as determinedly pc as the study of communist China. China academics and intelligence analysts over the years have strived with some success to portray the communist regime in a more benign light than probably is warranted.
Fortunately Susan Shirk''s book--the best work yet to appear on contemporary China-- provides a balanced and thoughtful perspective on the contradictory impulses driving Chinese leadership behavior.As Shirk ably documents, pressures of rapid economic transformatiion, fraying political controls and rabid nationalist sentiment pose difficult challenges for the regime, increasing the potential for conflict with the United States. Shirk pleads for a U.S. China policy based on a better understanding of these constraints, both to lower the risk of war and to improve prospects of Sino-U,S, collaboration on issues of global concern.
This is a perfectly good argument as far as it goes and is relevant not just to China. Russia --economically emergent and increasingly nationalistic-- represents a comparable problem for U.S. policy.The U.S. penchant for Russia-bashing needlessly provokes Russian leaders and publics, heightening East-West tensions and clouding the outlook for peace and security in Europe.
Perfect understanding, of course is not a sure-fire recipe for conflict- avoidance. Washington can "lavish respect on China's leaders" (in the author's words) but there is a host of contentious issues on which it must pursue its own priorities: trade imbalances, contaminated food exports, software piracy, China's military build-up, Taiwan security, massive Chinese espionage operations in the United States, human rights violations and more. Hostilities with China, while obviously not desirable , could break out nonetheless. Following Shirk's line of analysis, should China emerge the clear loser, the regime would suffer loss of legitimacy and possibly collapse altogether. Whether anything better would emerge in its place, though, is an open question.
Notes by an insider.......2007-07-22
The main point about this book is that it's by someone who personally participated in many of the events that she describes. Many of her sources are Chinese with whom she interacted personally, as opposed to books by other Westerneres, although she does mention these, specifically Minxin Pei's Trapped Transition. She has a very readable style. People may differ with her conclusions but she came to them through her own experience.
China at Times Its Own Worst Enemy.......2007-07-09
Susan Shirk gives her readers some useful tools to better assess the future behavior of a fast-resurging China after being "humiliated" for a century and a half (pp. 153 - 55, 185 - 87). Shirk clearly explains that Chinese communist power has two faces. China wants to be seen as behaving responsibly to foster economic growth and social stability (pp. 105 - 139). Shirk correctly states that actions rather than words will make it more credible. Establishing this reputation requires China to accommodate its neighbors, to be a team player in multinational organizations, and to use economic ties to make friends (pp. 109, 199, 223, 257 - 61).
In case of a major crisis, especially one involving Taiwan, Japan or the United States, China could show its other face by acting irresponsibly due to the absence of effective checks and balances of the Chinese system. Party leaders could recklessly play the nationalistic card again as they did with Taiwan in 1996 or with Japan in 2005 if they need to look strong domestically with other leaders, the mass public, and the military (pp. 10 -12, 43, 63, 69, 77, 139, 151, 173, 179 - 80, 186 - 90, 197, 205, 219).
The Communist Party has bet on jingoism since the 1990s because communism in China is a dying ideology in which almost no Chinese believes (pp. 11, 63 - 64, 145, 148, 164 - 70, 186). The Party implausibly claims that ordinary Chinese are unworthy of Western democracy because their country, unlike India, does not have religion to manage them responsibly (p. 53). Chinese leaders know that Chinese nationalists can turn against the Party if they appear too weak to deal with foreign pressures (pp. 61, 66, 173, 180).
Economic interdependence has had a somewhat moderating effect on the relationship of China with the outside world, including Taiwan, Japan, and the U.S. (pp. 24, 96, 145 - 46, 190, 195, 233, 241, 247). Due to their fear of widespread instability and their lack of political legitimacy, Party leaders, however, have not displayed much courage in taking unpopular measures such as enforcing intellectual property rights or stopping currency manipulation in trading abroad (pp. 26 - 27, 53 - 54, 60, 73 - 74). Chinese leaders are well aware that the increased protectionism in the U.S. against the fast-growing trade deficit with China and the rampant piracy of U.S. products in China are not politically sustainable, especially in case of a majority change in Washington in 2009 (pp. 25 - 26, 248). At the same time, Shirk correctly points out that the ongoing fiscal profligacy of the U.S. is weakening the country at the profit of China (pp. 26, 249).
Of all China's challenges, the need for "social stability" overrules all other considerations, even it means sacrificing long-term diplomatic objectives for short-term domestic political gains (pp. 38, 52 - 54, 109, 148, 183 - 87, 197, 224, 234, 254 - 55). For the Chinese communist leaders and their families, losing power could result in the loss of their possessions or even their death (pp. 7 - 9). To keep its authoritarian grip on power, the Communist Party has articulated a three-pronged policy (p. 39):
1) Avoid public leadership splits
Shirk gives a useful overview of the "selectorate," the group of Party members who have the power to choose the leaders, and the modus operandi of the Party (pp. 39 - 52). The Communist Party is not known for its openness in framing domestic and foreign policies (pp. 43 - 44). Patronage is essential for keeping the Party in power, which feeds an endemic corruption from which many communist bigwigs enrich themselves at the expense of ordinary Chinese (pp. 60, 68 - 69). Party leaders learn from the Tiananmen fiasco that destabilizing internal dissent can undermine the Party's grip on power (pp. 48, 53, 162). Keeping elite contests for power hidden from the public is increasingly difficult as the audience-driven media are testing the limits on what can be reported (pp. 39, 50, 52, 55, 78, 183). Although China is a still a long way from having free mass media, resourceful Chinese increasingly give the Communist Party a hard time for censoring "undesirable news (pp. 82 - 83)."
2) Prevent large-scale social unrest
Shirk demonstrates with conviction that Communist China's obsession with internal stability paradoxically makes the Party very sensitive to public opinion due to the lack of any democratic institution to allow ordinary Chinese to express themselves peacefully (pp. 52 - 53, 66). Shirk overviews with mastery the multiple possible threats to one-party-rule and which means the Party uses to either neutralize or reduce these threats (pp. 52 - 69). Paradoxically, the more developed and rich China becomes, the more insecure and threatened Communist Party leaders feel (p. 5).
3) Keep the People's Liberation Army on the side of the Party
Unlike their predecessors, Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping, Communist Party leaders Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao are less politically secure and have a greater need to keep the military satisfied to safeguard them from domestic rebellion (pp. 46, 73, 77, 158 - 60, 202). Communist Party leaders seem to have a harder time saying no to the military demands for weaponry buildups and aggressive policies (pp. 70, 75 - 76, 222 - 23). The senior leadership of the PLA uses the Taiwan issue as the paramount factor for getting more "toys" approved (p. 74). By covering foreign policy, audience-driven media are making it harder for Communist Party leaders not to treat foreign policy as domestic politics (pp. 78 - 104, 140 - 254). Furthermore, history is not on the side of China because rising powers are likely to provoke war (pp. 4, 9 - 10, 210 - 11, 219, 243 - 45, 261 - 69). All of these factors undermine the credibility of the "peaceful rise" that Jintao - Wen Jiabao have promoted since 2002 (pp. 108 - 09, 252).
To summarize, China's behavior cannot be correctly understood without a proper grasp of the tectonic forces that have molded the country's history, geography, and culture.
Easily 5 Stars!.......2007-07-05
It's a beautifully written book by Ms. Susan Shirk. Her credentials as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State during the Clinton administration responsible for relations with China speak for themselves. Her understanding of the interrelation between domestic and international principles is well highlighted.
This book captures the fickleness of the Chinese government in their need to suppress public distraught, and how their desire to raise nationalist views has been counterproductive to their international mission of keeping foreign partners from viewing them as a dangerously rising power.
She gives you the facts of China's past and current state of development and reviews the United States' and other countries' positions on the rising power, and allows you to determine for yourself whether China will be a real danger or a humble superpower willing to lend a hand for the betterment of the international sector.
This is an absolutely wonderful book that simply has to be read more than once.
Amazon.com
China has the world's most rapidly changing large economy, and according to Ted Fishman, it is forcing the world to change along with it. "No country has ever before made a better run at climbing every step of economic development all at once," he writes, in China, Inc.: How the Rise of the Next Superpower Challenges America and the World. China is currently the largest maker of toys, clothing, and consumer electronics, and is swiftly moving up the ladder in car production, computer manufacturing, biotechnology, aerospace, telecommunications, and other sectors thanks to low-cost, high-tech factories. China is also where the world is investing. In 2004, for instance, the city of Shanghai alone attracted over $12 billion in direct foreign investment, roughly the same amount as all of Indonesia and Mexico received. In tracing China's ascendancy over the past 30 years (with annual growth of an astonishing 9.5 percent), Fishman presents a flood of facts, figures, forecasts, and anecdotes and examines the implications of this unprecedented growth for China, the U.S., and the rest of the world.
Calling China's huge population "arguably the greatest natural resource on the planet," Fishman details how hundreds of millions of peasants have migrated from rural to urban areas to find manufacturing jobs, providing an unlimited, low-wage workforce to power China's economy. In the process, this shift has changed both Chinese culture and the global business climate in significant ways. Simply put, American companies can't compete with wages as low as 25 cents an hour and lack of regulation and oversight, so are forced to move their operations to China or completely change the focus of their business. And it's not just a problem for the U.S.--even Mexico is outsourcing to China. Though it remains to be seen whether this will truly be the "Chinese Century" as Fishman asserts, China, Inc. is a brisk and informative look at why so many American corporations, and American jobs, are heading to China. --Shawn Carkonen
Book Description
China today is visible everywhere -- in the news, in the economic pressures battering the globe, in our workplaces, and in every trip to the store. Provocative, timely, and essential -- and updated with new statistics and information -- this dramatic account of China's growing dominance as an industrial superpower by journalist Ted C. Fishman explains how the profound shift in the world economic order has occurred -- and why it already affects us all.
How has an enormous country once hobbled by poverty and Communist ideology come to be the supercharged center of global capitalism? What does it mean that China now grows three times faster than the United States? Why do nearly all of the world's biggest companies have large operations in China? What does the corporate march into China mean for workers left behind in America, Europe, and the rest of the world?
Meanwhile, what makes China's emerging corporations so dangerously competitive? What will happen when China manufactures nearly everything -- computers, cars, jumbo jets, and pharmaceuticals -- that the United States and Europe can, at perhaps half the cost? How do these developments reach around the world and straight into all of our lives?
These are ground-shaking questions, and China, Inc. provides answers.
Veteran journalist Ted C. Fishman shows how China will force all of us to make big changes in how we think about ourselves as consumers, workers, citizens, and even as parents. The result is a richly engaging work of penetrating, up-to-the-minute reportage and brilliant analysis that will forever change how readers think about America's future.
Download Description
"China today is visible everywhere -- in the news, in the economic pressures battering america, in the workplace, and in every trip to the store. provocative, timely, and essential, this dramatic account of china's growing dominance as an industrial super-power by journalist Ted C. Fishman explains how the profound shift in the global economic order has occurred -- and why it already affects us all. How has an enormous country once hobbled by poverty and Communist ideology come to be the supercharged center of global capitalism? What does it mean that China now grows three times faster than the United States? That China uses 40 percent of the world's concrete and 25 percent of its steel? What is the global impact of 300 million rural Chinese walking off their farms and heading to the cities in the greatest migration in human history? Why do nearly all of the world's biggest companies now have large-scale operations in China? What does the corporate march into China mean for workers left behind in America, Europe, and the rest of the world? Meanwhile, what makes China's emerging corporations so dangerously competitive? What could happen when China will be able to manufacture nearly everything -- computers, cars, jumbo jets, and pharmaceuticals -- that the United States and Europe can, at perhaps half the cost? How do these developments reach around the world and straight into the lives of all Americans? These are ground-shaking questions, and China, Inc. provides answers.Veteran journalist and former commodities trader Ted C. Fishman paints a vivid picture of the megatrends radiating out of China. Fishman's account begins with the burgeoning output of China's vast low-cost factories and the swelling appetite of its 1.3 billion consumers, both of which are being driven by historically unprecedented infusions of foreign capital and technological know-how. Traveling through China's frenetic landscape of growth, Fishman visits the factories, markets, streets, stores, towns, and cities where the story of Chinese capitalism is being lived by one-fifth of all humanity. Fishman also draws on interviews with Chinese, American, and European workers, managers, and executives to show how China will force all of us to make big changes in how we think about ourselves as consumers, workers, citizens, and even as parents. The result is a richly engaging work of penetrating, up-to-the-minute reportage and brilliant analysis that will forever change how readers think about America's future. "
Customer Reviews:
Lacks critical analysis, nothing more than a collection of (incomplete) stories .......2007-09-04
Half of the book is like a PR campaign for Shanghai, saying how fascinating the city is without really critically examining its glories. It seems like the author has not ventured far away from Shanghai (even Zhejiang Province is bordering Shanghai) and to really delve into the rest of China. It is just like reading a book on U.S. economy while all it talks about is New York. Projecting New York for the rest of the U.S. is laughable, so is thinking Shanghai epitomizes the entire China.
Shanghai's success, at least in the past, critically relied on the extremely favorable national policies steered by Jiang Ze-ming, the former mayor of Shanghai who became the president after 1989 Tiananmen. Such biased national policies are highly questionable, and its impact on Shanghai long-term economic sustainability is also open for debate.
It's also weird for a book on China's economic transition to exclude meaningful discussion of the economic reforms in the Pearl River Delta area where all of the initial economic reforms started, and which is still one of the most important economic regions in China. Also, China's attempts to balance economic development between the coastal region and the inland region are largely ignored in the book (except some very light discussions here and there).
The second half of the book is not very organized and it is not clear what message the author was trying to get across. Overall, the book is nothing more than a collection of stories you can easily find in Economist. A better book for a quick intro and analysis of China's rise is The World is Flat, side by side is an analysis of India as a bonus...
Could have been at least 100 pages shorter.......2007-07-15
A lot of insights from the book but at the same time a lot of non-insights.
The book covers the movement of Chinese people from the farms to the cities and the attitude towards rapid modernization including piracy. However, you cannot FEEL it from first person point of view. You feel very detached reading the book.
It could have been more straight to the point and a lot of pages bored me.
The Tom Wolfe of China.......2007-05-24
This a kaleidoscopic view of the most dynamic country today on the planet. Sit down, strap up, and read the Electric Kool Aid Acid Test of the 21st Century. For a harder analytical edge, read my own volume The Coming China Wars: Where They Will Be Fought and How They Can Be Won
Please blame everything on China, is this a new trend to cover up American "disastrous" foreign policy? .......2007-05-11
So with all due respect:
1) If China is so bad, don't do business there, no one is forcing you
2) All American CEO who deals with China are unpatriotic Americans
3) All American CEO who outsource to China and India are immoral capitalist
4) All American CEO who deal with China should pay a fine or go to Jail. -But they are not! And as matter of facts, they are getting big bonuses.
5) Don't blame the Chinese, they are providing a service (cheap) but American consumers and executives are the ones knocking on their doors.
6) You can't have both ways; you can't try to use cheap labor in 3rd world countries and then turn around and point fingers at the people you are doing business with.
7) Stop bringing up the WWII theory on some of these comments, just because the USA fought and won WWI -which is GREAT! It does not mean the USA is correct FOREVER...common sense.
Excellent reference background............2007-04-11
My team at work does a lot of business with China and after one of the engineers read the book, we ordered about 15 copies for the entire department to read, we felt it was so worthwhile!
Product Description
The Rise of Modern China
Customer Reviews:
A Great Work.......2007-10-20
I needed a book for my university studies on China, and this was by far the best. It is detailed, sharp and well written. I cannot see much bias either way, or if there is the other side is shown.
A very good treatment on the subject.
Definitive work to the rise of China as a superpower.......2007-02-20
This is the definitive work by Prof. C.Y. Hsu of the University of Californai, Santa Barbara.
It is a highly acclaimed history book which tells the rise of modern China which begins with her occupation by the alien power - the Manchus - from the border of north China and rules the country with an iron grip from 1644 to 1912.
The Manchus were an alien, warlike race which had an eye for China (just like the barbaric Japs in 1935) for a while, and according to Prof. Hsu and his marvellous research, the appropriate time came sooner than expected which altered the future course of China and eventually led it to become a world power a century later.
The Manchus enticed the Ming Dynasty General Wu San Kwei who was then guarding the walls at San Hai Kwan Pass (Mountain and Sea Pass) which effectively blocked the entrance of these warlike aliens to which the weaken Ming Dynasty couldn't well resist. Then internal political turmoil caused the last Ming Emperor to commit suicide and the rise of the rebel Li Zhi Cheng which looted and subsequently occupied Peking. Fatefully, Li abducted the mistress named Chen Yuan Yuan of Gen. Wu which compelled him to open the massive wall-gate and allowed the Manchus to enter Peking to chastise the rebel who was eventually captured and beheaded after many battles.
Then the Manchus began to establish their Manchu or Ch'ing Dynasty from 1644-1912 with ten succeeding emperors and one notorious empress named Tzi Hsi.
China, weakened by internal unrest and revolts and external pressure from the foreign powers - notably Great Britain, France, Imperial Japan, Germany, Italy, Germany, Russia and etc., almost brought the country to total ruin, division and a multiple foreign colony. China was forced to signed many unequeal treaties after she was militarily defeated which included the tranforming of Hong Kong into a British colony in losing two Opium Wars. With the country politically and militarily divided and huge areas curved out by foreign powers, the educated people along with the farmers rose up to try to overthrow the decadent Manchus. Then came the devasting and most barbaric war of conquest by the Imperial "bungsai" troops which climaxed in the so-called Rape of Nanking, whereby some 300,000 innocent and unarmed Chinese civilians were tortured, robbed, raped and summarily executed in cold blood by the contesting samurai swords. Iris Chang told this holocaust in her acclaimed book called THE RAPE OF NANKING (It is also sold by amazon.com too).
Eventually, after many local rebellions against the alien Manchus, Dr. Sun Yat Sen succeeded in overthrowing them and formed the Republic of China and eventually the founding of the People's Republic of China by Mao and Co.
Then in the 1970s, the Chinese people were proud to witness the entry of China into the United Stations and occupied a seat in the U.N. Security Council. China then started diplomatic releations with its once arch-enemy, the United States after the historical state visit of President Nixon. (The Chinese still consider Nixon as their friend today!)
Today, the rise of China as both an economic and military power owes its origin to the resolve of the innovative and determined Chinese people led first by Dr. Sun Yat Sen (Father of the Chinese Revolution) to Deng Xiaoping (Father of the Chinese Economy), which brought China to become a peaceful and superpower power - respected and feared by both friends and foes alike.
Prof. Hsu's thousand page long history book, well-researched and written in an understable language should be in the homes of all English educated Chinese people and those foreigners who are friends of China.
So please go for this highly recommended and worthy history book if you, the reader, has been to China and marvel at its seven thousand years of history, culture, civilization, inventions, battles and peace and rise to become a peaceful superpower of today. Cheers & thanks.
I wish every Chinese could read this book!.......2006-07-17
Having grown up in mainland China, having read most of the Chinese history books available, and having steeped with all comtemporary arts and media propaganda as well as serious scholar works, I thought that I have a full grasp of the modern Chinese history until I read this book half through, of which I bought the fifth edition several years ago but collecting dust on the book shelf. I could not help to wait the finish of my reading of the whole book but to write this. So far, this is a book I read with such fascination better than reading any book in my life, including those page turner best seller fictions. Originally I picked up to read this book as some kind of obligation to read those books I bought but never opened, following my successes with those Hemingway and Mark Twain, and pessimistically planned to spend the rest of July to finish it, and this was only three days ago and I'm already half through. When I read this book for the past few days, I cannot help to notice the connections between the events in the past and those events more recently. For example, Kang You-Wei's reform and four modernization; Tai Ping Tiang Guo and the lang reform of the 50's; the list goes on. Overall, I highly recommend anyone, especially those of us oversee Chinese from mainland China, to read this book. I will be anxious to know whether any attempt has been made to translate this book into Chinese so that every Chinese could read it. Not knowing the difference between the fifth and the sixth edition, I would offer a suggestion to consider for the seventh edition: to add a list of Chinese for those names used in the text, since it's very hard to remember all the names in the out dated old spelling, in addition to correspond each with the correct Chinese name.
A classic- indispensable!.......2006-05-06
I recently took a course on the history of modern China in university, which covered the era spanning from the late Qing to 21st century. Initially I was rather daunted by the size and thickness of this book, but I ended up reading this book 3 times by the end of the course because it was so readable. Immanuel Hsu's analysis is clear and obviously up to par. I highly recommend this book to anyone who is taking a similar course. If you're keen to understand China particularly in the light of current affairs, you need to know about its recent history as well. There is no better place to start than with "The Rise of China" by Immanuel Hsu.
Excellent work by one of the best scholars of Modern Chinese History.......2005-10-28
This is the best single-volume history of Modern China that you could own. It covers the history of China from the Ch'ing (Qing) dynasty to the emergence of China as a global superpower at the beginning of the 21st century. Scholarly, yet immensely readable. This work will remain a lasting memorial to Professor Hsü, a preeminent scholar of Modern Chinese History, whom I had the great privilege to know.
Average customer rating:
- Occasionally insightful, but generally uninspired
- Important book
- What we should have learned in school about the world...
- Very informative reading
- Debunking the global warming myth!
|
Why Geography Matters: Three Challenges Facing America: Climate Change, the Rise of China, and Global Terrorism
Harm de Blij
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
 Economics
| Business & Investing
| Subjects
| Books
| Agricultural
| Commercial Policy
| Comparative
| Consolidation & Merger
| Cooperatives
| Debt & Deficits
| Development & Growth
| Econometrics
| Economic Conditions
| Economic History
| Economic Policy & Development
| Exports & Imports
| Free Enterprise
| Inflation
| International
| Labor & Industrial Relations
| Macroeconomics
| Microeconomics
| Money & Monetary Policy
| Natural Resources
| Privatization
| Public Finance
| Statistics
| Sustainable Development
| Theory
| Unemployment
| Urban & Regional
Relations
| International
| Politics
| Nonfiction
| Subjects
| Books
Terrorism
| Current Events
| Nonfiction
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Political Science
| Social Sciences
| Nonfiction
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Earth Sciences
| Science
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Geography
| Earth Sciences
| Science
| Subjects
| Books
Climate Changes
| Climatology
| Earth Sciences
| Science
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Science
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Earth Sciences
| Professional Science
| Professional & Technical
| Subjects
| Books
Geography
| Earth Sciences
| Professional Science
| Professional & Technical
| Subjects
| Books
Look Inside Nonfiction Books
| Trip
| Specialty Stores
| Books
Look Inside Science Books
| Trip
| Specialty Stores
| Books
Similar Items:
-
The Little Ice Age: How Climate Made History, 1300-1850
-
Before We Were Free (Readers Circle)
-
Empires of the Word: A Language History of the World
-
Floods, Famines, and Emperors : El Nino and the Fate of Civilizations
-
Unstoppable Global Warming: Every 1,500 Years
ASIN: 0195315820 |
Book Description
Over the next half century, the human population, divided by culture and economics and armed with weapons of mass destruction, will expand to nearly 9 billion people. Abrupt climate change may throw the global system into chaos; China will emerge as a superpower; and Islamic terrorism and insurgency will threaten vital American interests. How can we understand these and other global challenges? Harm de Blij has a simple answer: by improving our understanding of the world's geography. In Why Geography Matters, de Blij demonstrates how geography's perspectives yield unique and penetrating insights into the interconnections that mark our shrinking world. Preparing for climate change, averting a cold war with China, defeating terrorism: all of this requires geographic knowledge. De Blij also makes an urgent call to restore geography to America's educational curriculum. He shows how and why the U.S. has become the world's most geographically illiterate society of consequence, and demonstrates the great risk this poses to America's national security. Peppering his writing with anecdotes from his own professional travels, de Blij provides an original treatise that is as engaging as it is eye opening. Casual or professional readers in areas such as education, politics, or national security will find themselves with a stimulating new perspective on geography as it continues to affect our world.
Customer Reviews:
Occasionally insightful, but generally uninspired.......2007-08-29
I would describe this book as the rambling--but occasionally insightful--musings of a thoughtful scholar. Unfortunately, many, if not most, of Blij's arguments are not made from a geographic perspective. For instance, his chapter on the European Union rambles on for page after page about the history of the EU from the European Coal and Steel Community, to the European Economic Community, to the European Community, and, finally, to the European Union. That's not to say that's not and interesting and important history lesson for people who are unfamiliar with EU history, but its not geographic! I was hoping for a book of theories explaining human events using reasoning built on spatial orientations or location. Why Geography Matters had some of that, but Blij could have, in my view, omitted much of the voluminous background information. Doing some would have made his book more concise and allowing his genuine insights to be featured more prominently.
And for what its worth, the book could have used a better editor. For instance, on p.160 it refers to "South Ossetia" as a Russian Republic instead of North Ossetia. I noticed a couple errors like this.
Perhaps, I would be more positive about this book if its last chapter hadn't been the low point. The chapter on Africa had absolutely nothing original to say (AIDS is bad, we need to do more to stop it; colonization and slavery were bad too; Africa has been plagued by bad leadership; etc.).
Important book.......2007-08-28
This is an exceptional and needed introduction to Geography and how it relates to world problems.
What we should have learned in school about the world..........2007-05-27
This is essential reading for anyone who should have a sound foundation of knowledge to back up one's social commentary, but doesn't. Geography can be understood and used to understand our world with great clarity. Everyone who watched Al Gore's movie should read this book if only to know that Harm de Blij has been explaining geographic issues for decades better than nearly anyone.
The US Department of Education needs to buy and issue a copy of this book to every teacher in America.
Very informative reading.......2007-05-13
This is definitely a quality work in the field of Geography with an emphasis on Politics i.e. GeoPolitics. However, it is important to point out a couple of incorrect facts I found while reading this work.
1. On page 190 we have the statement, "On an aircraft carrier off the coast of California, President Bush declared "mission accomplished.", regarding the war in Iraq. If you read the speech that President Bush gave, you will find that he never uttered the words "mission accomplished." The author just regurgitated this line from the biased print media i.e. The NYTimes, Time, Newsweek, etc... Intuitively, if you think about it, George Bush, assigns the mission to the military and after assigning the mission to the military he is not going to turn around and say good "mission accomplished. That is what the military's response, will be, to the President, after they have completed the mission. This is reflected by the fact that the military hung a banner up on the aircraft carrier that said "Mission Accomplished."
2. On pages 193-194 The author states. "The American invasion severly damaged the city, which was for months afterward, and remains as of this writing, without a reliable water supply, power, medical facilities, or schools." It is very true that much of the infrastructure in Iraq is severly damaged, but the author has tried to blame this on American firepower and it is simply not true. The precision guided weapons our U.S. forces utilized were excellent at avoiding collateral damage. The truth is more damning for the Saddam regime. THE INFRASTUCTURE DAMAGE WAS CAUSED BY 30 PLUS YEARS OF NEGLECT ON THE PART OF THE BAATH PARTY AND NOT AMERICAN MILITARY MIGHT. Also, the military planners who provided for getting the infrastructure back online, after the war, grossly underestimated the level of the existing infrastructure of Iraq, before the U.S. military even set foot inside the country.
Overall I recommend this work, but it cannot be given five stars due to these errors.
Debunking the global warming myth!.......2007-03-08
This is an excellent book based on scientific fact debunking the "global warming" myth.
I highly recommend this book.
Customer Reviews:
Another self-fulfilling prophersy of China Threat.......2005-11-28
China cannot be trusted and Robert Sutter tells us why. In pages after pages, the author gives ample reasons that, as a rising power, China has to be watched carefully.
According to Sutter's theory, historically, China has had hegemonic ambitions. Not only she portrays her own struggles as of universal significance, she also keeps a close watch of countries around her periphery as if they are naturally within her sphere of influence. Her political leaders are hypersensitive to criticisms and tend to behave defensively. The Chinese plot their policies and strategies, not much guided by principles but mainly on a case-by-case bases. They are more likely to go after short-term gains than for long-term benefits. As a result, Chinese foreign policy tends to be capricious and disruptive. In Sino-US relations in particular, China has been long suspicious of U.S. ulterior motives and is actively hedging against U.S. policies through bilateral and regional actions.
In the same vein, Sutter views China's recently totted "peaceful rising" with suspicion. Whether China has truly renounced aggressive posture in her international dealings, or she just says so to "bid time" in order to secure economic growth, remains to be seen. As how to engage a rising China, Sutter sees Bush administration's approach as a potential model: keep her at arms length, do not give any unwarranted expectations (as Clinton administration has purportedly done), and stand firm.
My personal observation is, although there is some truth to many of his assertion, Sutter's ultimate fallacy is that he uses a liberalist standard to criticize China in order to justify U.S. own realist strategy.
For example, Sutter interprets China's proposal of opening its agricultural market to ASEAN countries as a way to undercut Japanese or Korean positions (p82). This is so anti-liberal for its Machiavellian motive, he seems to argue, it is yet another example of why China cannot be trusted. But even if we put aside the merit of such a decision in itself, and to look at parallels in U.S. policies, such a criticism is as unjustified as it is hypocritical. Since the WTO meeting in Cancun, U.S. Trade Representative has repeatedly offered to cut U.S. domestic agriculture subsides, not only to advance American agenda, but also to put pressure on the Europeans. The consensus in this case, however, is that America is exerting her leadership role in promoting Free Trade.
In his "China's International Relations" essay in Samuel Kim's book, Alastair Iain Johnston observed that some of the "China Threat" talks are self-fulfilling prophesies (has anyone mentioned Cuba being a victim of such prophesy?) I'd argue China Skeptics such as Sutter are no different. China's in U.S. crosshair today is not entirely her own fault, it is more or less because what she is or what she can be, especially in a world according to the U.S. For example, other world powers-that-be, like the European Union, is never that concerned about China's potential as another USSR. Other than some spousal disputes like economic matters, E.U. and China are getting along just fine---if not too close to U.S.'s liking, as in the recent case of proposed lifting of arms sales ban by the E.U. Even the herbivore countries living along the fringe of the dragon's cave are not so concerned with impending subjugation as a result of China's rise---as Sutter implies what could happen. On the contrary, some of them are acting as brakes to U.S. check on China. Even Australia told U.S. not to automatically count on her support had a conflict in Taiwan Strait broke out.
If Sutter does not consider himself as part of the China bashing gang, he must hold a very high standard of who is--- maybe the likes of University of Chicago's John Mearsheimer? Around the same time I read this book, I heard a media interview with James McGregor, a businessman/author. Although his criticism of China is no less harsh at times, he is at least coherent---China is just another business opportunity. If your objective is to make profit, you will have to learn to live with reality. Unfortunately, for analysts like Mr. Sutter, their job is to constantly look out for the surreal.
Written by a true China expert.......2005-06-27
I had the privilege of having Robert Sutter as my professor at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service. This scholar possesses a truly incredible grasp of China and the issues surrounding her Rise in Asia. I can earnestly recommend anyone remotely interested in Asian affairs to purchase this book and take advantage of Professor Sutter's expertise in the region.
Product Description
Behind the acupuncture, herbal remedies and sophisticated diagnostics of Chinese medicine lies a congenial system of healing that embodies unification of body and mind, spirit and matter, nature and man, philosophy and reality. In this comprehensive and ground-breaking presentation, based on long experience as physician, psychiatrist, and practitioner of Chinese medicine, Leon Hammer offers a new model for appreciating the traditional healers effective and profound respect for individual integrity and energetic balance. Explaining, and moving beyond, the five phase (element) system, he shows that this Eastern practice is as much a spiritual science as a physical one. Accessible to the layman, yet a resource for the professional in any healing art, this book examines the natural energy functions of the human organism as a key to mental, emotional and spiritual health. It offers new insight into disease, showing how it is not merely an invasion from the outside, but rather a byproduct of a persons unsuccessful attempt to restore ones own balance.
Customer Reviews:
This dragon flies!.......2007-01-19
"Dragon Rises, Red Bird Flies" demystifies the Chinese Five Element Theory and other Eastern energy medicine basics in a readable format. As a practitioner of one of the Oriental modalities, I'm finding my understanding and teaching enhanced, as I enjoy Leon Hammer's expressive style.
Average customer rating:
- A Wonderfully rich and palatable sketch..........
- Five Elements and Psychology
- Two stars for five element book (that's a pun ;-)
- It's All About Integration
|
Dragon Rises, Red Bird Flies: Psychology, Energy and Chinese Medicine
Leon, M.D. Hammer
Manufacturer: Station Hill Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
General
| Alternative Medicine
| Health, Mind & Body
| Subjects
| Books
Healing
| Alternative Medicine
| Health, Mind & Body
| Subjects
| Books
Chinese Medicine
| Alternative Medicine
| Health, Mind & Body
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Psychology & Counseling
| Health, Mind & Body
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Health, Mind & Body
| Subjects
| Books
General
| New Age
| Religion & Spirituality
| Subjects
| Books
Reference
| New Age
| Religion & Spirituality
| Subjects
| Books
Basic Science
| Medicine
| Subjects
| Books
| Anatomy
| Biochemistry
| Embryology
| General
| Genetics
| Histology
| Immunology
| Microbiology
| Nosology
| Pathophysiology
| Physiology
General
| Medicine
| Subjects
| Books
Look Inside Health Books
| Trip
| Specialty Stores
| Books
Look Inside Religion & Spirituality Books
| Trip
| Specialty Stores
| Books
Look Inside Science Books
| Trip
| Specialty Stores
| Books
Similar Items:
-
Five Elements, Six Conditions: A Taoist Approach to Emotional Healing, Psychology, and Internal Alchemy
-
Between Heaven and Earth
-
The Web That Has No Weaver : Understanding Chinese Medicine
Accessories:
-
RESPeRATE Blood Pressure Lowering Device
-
Airborne Effervescent Health Formula, Original Orange, 10 Tablets (Pack of 3)
ASIN: 0882681338 |
Book Description
alternative medicine
Customer Reviews:
A Wonderfully rich and palatable sketch.................2002-11-19
I have read this book a few times, and in each reading, I find concepts and "observations", that are profoundly rich in their effort to put the reader in touch with some of the most difficult to grasp ideas about non-Traditional Chinese Medicine. Dr. Hammers background is much deeper and wider than what is taught in the schools here and in China. (If you don't know what I mean by that, explore what happened to the practice of indigenous Chinese Medicine during the cultural revolution.)
This is not a book for folks who are unfamiliar with the basic "tenets" of Chinese Medicine. It is a bit more "esoteric" in it's reach, and really tries to conceptualize "in the minds eye" relationships and interactions, energetically or "psychologically" if you prefer, that the TCM model attempts to form poorly, or not at all.
I must, respectfully, take the reviewer from Seattle to task about it being "dark". I certainly know what he means, but the only way to find fault in the extremes of the book, is if you didn't happen to read Dr. Hammers admission within the book, that he has exaggerated the conditions he describes, and that the patients are not real people. Rather, they are constructs of clients, created for the sake of fleshing out the concepts presented in the book. Though sometimes portions need a re-read, I just can't find fault with Dr. Hammer for doing what he suggests I should be aware he is going to do.
As another reviewer has said, this is one you'll return to over and over. A most wonderful book!!
Five Elements and Psychology.......2002-04-12
I bought this book as a first year acupuncture student and have referred to it many times. As the other reviewer says, it is quite dark and does discuss extremes, but then mental illness is about extremes. It is really useful to look at the extreme yin or yang aspect of an Element and its Officals to fully understand how the Element can manifest when out of balance. I don't know of any other book which provides such an in depth picture of each of the 5 Element types. Sounds heavy, but is in fact relatively easy to read if you have a reasonable understanding of psychology. Definately one of my top 5 Chinese Medicine books, this is a book that you read again and again.
Two stars for five element book (that's a pun ;-).......2001-01-13
With the caveat that I'm not a practitioner, but merely a reasonably well-informed patient, I found this book overly **dark.** It was interesting, to a point, but also scary, and always tending towards the negative. I think the fact that the author is a psychiatrist may have something to do with that, but it seemed to take the exaggerated form of any of the five element's characteristics and show what it would look like, taken to the ultimate extreme--and, somehow, that was always bad. While I found a superbly fitting description of a difficult person in my life that helped me get some perspective on him by reading this book, at the same time, when I read items about my own element, I found them exaggerated and bizarre; as they would be in mental illness but not in real life. Apparently the author is almost "psychic" about being able to uncover the health-based Achille's heel in his patients, but I didn't find reading about it a nourishing or uplifting experience. Not that a book has to be, but this one was uniformly dark, and I had to believe that came from the author's perspective, and was no accident. Odd!
It's All About Integration.......2000-05-19
The question of mind-body duality has fueled many long and heated debates. Dr. Hammer, who is well trained in traditional Western medicine and psychology, recognized the importance of working with the person, and not just a part of that person. In an effort to be true to his view, and to the patients he treated, he trained in and added Traditional Chinese Medicine to his treatment skills, thus allowing him to treat the whole person in an integrated, rather than a fragmented manner. This book presents Dr. Hammer's integrated understanding of how the body impacts the mind, and the mind impacts the body. In a clear and concise manner, and with useful clinical examples, Dr. Hammer takes the reader through fundamental principles and concepts of Traditional Chinese Medicine, and then applies them to the specific area of Psychology. This is not a "how to" book, rather it is a thought provoking volume on how to integrate two seemingly disparate fields of health care (Traditional Chinese Medicine, and Western Psychoanalytic thought). Through his examination of these models and his description of how he thinks, as he works with his patients, the reader is able to gain insight into this integrated process. While the book is by no means an exhaustive treatise on the subject, it lays a solid foundation on which others can easily build, both academically and in clinical practice. I look forward to reading more of Dr. Hammer's writings in the future, and hope that other clinicans will follow his lead.
Amazon.com
For a good, spicy read about colonial Asia's most decadent city, this is the book. Stella Dong, a second-generation Chinese-American living in New York, tells the story of Old Shanghai in racy style: readers expecting tales of drugs, prostitution, and gang warfare will not be disappointed. Her scholarship is sound, however, and at the end of each chapter she provides bibliographies of drier, more academic studies for those wishing to delve deeper.
The Treaty of Nanking that ended the First Opium War between Britain and China in 1842 granted trading concessions in Shanghai to the European powers. The international currents shaping the city over the next hundred years were complex: British merchants, Chinese warlords, Russian emigrés, Sephardic Jews, and German spies exploited its extraterritorial status to make Shanghai a hotbed of greed, vice, and intrigue. Opium was crucial to the city's extraordinary wealth and lawlessness, though Dong also relates the rise of its criminal gangs to the development of coastal steamships and consequent loss of inland-transportation jobs. Foreign participation in the opium trade was not confined to the British: the role of the French Concession in Shanghai is described in well-researched detail. The flamboyant personalities that prospered in the city's unfettered environment come alive, characters like Pockmarked Huang, who combined the post of police chief in the French Concession with leadership of the Green Gang. Dong explores Shanghai's political significance both as the source of Chiang Kai-shek's fortunes and as a center of Communist revolutionary activity. As the city again becomes the leading commercial metropolis of a dynamic national economy, Shanghai 1842-1949 successfully documents its unique role in the development of modern China. --John Stevenson
Book Description
Transformed from a swampland wilderness into a dazzling, modern–day Babylon, the Shanghai that predated Mao's cultural revolution was a city like no other: redolent with opium and underworld crime, booming with foreign trade, blessed with untold wealth and marred by abject squalor.
Journalist Stella Dong captures all the exoticism, extremes, and excitement of this legendary city as if it were a larger–than–life character in a fantastic novel.
Customer Reviews:
Entertaining History of Shanghai.......2007-07-10
I read this shortly after my return from a trip to Shanghai and found it to be an engrossing, fast read. I prefer travel literature to straight history, so I'm not overly concerned with whether something is perfectly accurate (which no history is, anyhow). If you want to get a flavor for Shanghai as it was and pick up a number of entertaining facts (or factoids) along the way, read this.
Easy Reading .......2007-04-11
Very informative, easy ready, learned a lot in just the first 10 pages. Great author.
Decadent pleasures.......2006-03-09
Stella Dong's bid to enter the ever-burgeoning world of "lite" cultural histories of important world cities (such as the city studies of Jan Morris) is nothing if not entertaining, and her account of life in the "Old Shanghai" from between the Opium War and the Communist Revolution moves along with a wealth of all sorts of interesting social tidbits about a city that was notorious site of decadence and pleasure-seeking for decades in the West and East alike. Because the work is somewhat gossipy and lightweight in nature it might have benefitted from a sharper sense of humor and irony, or from a more personal point of view (all of which we see in Jan Morris's work). At the very least, it needs at least some photographs of its primary locales and figures, and also clearer chapter subdivisions--at times, the book just seems to grind along somewhat from topic to topic with little direction. But it still is a fun overview of a very fascinating site for the colonialist imagination
Misses the mark, but has its positives.......2005-08-03
I live in Shanghai part time and this book is interesting to me because I can walk around the city and imagine... but the book seems very biased and is more interested in sensationalizing the city then a true analysis of the wonder that is Shanghai. In a way I am saddened by her reflection because it runs down the same path as most 'Westernized' views of China; I realize that this sells books, but when will authors take the responsibilty of serious reflection about place and significance rather than feed the reader with exotic half-truths. Before I ramble more (my highscool grammar teacher will cry if she reads this), I would suggest that one decide what they want out of a this book before purchasing... If you want a decently engaging story - this is ok... If you want to know about Shanghai's 'essence' look elsewhere, Stella Dong misses the real story and the real city.
Casablanca on the Yangste.......2005-04-27
"Shanghai", the book, is a good history of one of the world's great crossroads. Stella Dong follows the fortunes of Shanghai for 107 years and enlivens the chronicle with hundreds of its colorful and sometimes truly unsavory denizens. From its main formative event, the Opium War of 1839-42, to the closing of an era with the takeover of the communists in 1949, Shanghai was filled and refilled with sharpers and refugees from around the globe.
The Opium War, less a war than a program of intimidation conducted by the British to protect the "right" of Scottish magnates and Iraqi Jews and others to sell opium in Chinese ports, led to a treaty in 1842 which provided for the establishment of a foreign section in Shanghai. Here, the British and other nationalities could operate without being subject to the laws of China.
So, like Hong Kong, the foreign section became a piece of Europe grafted onto China. The British, then the Americans and the French, operated what amounted to microcolonies almost completely devoted to commerce. The opium trade was foremost, followed by cotton, but the trade in human beings was also big in Shanghai, so much so that the very name of the city was given to the practice of abducting Chinese. American, British, and French companies kidnapped or "Shanghaied" Chinese men and took them away in ships resembling slave ships to work in mines and plantations in the Americas under conditions very similar to slavery.
Christian missionaries, who had operated in China for centuries, now had more clout and a safe base of operations from which to wield it. They started drives to abolish prostitution and foot-binding, the latter being a thousand-year-old practice peculiar to the Chinese. They were successful, according to Dong, in eradicating foot-binding in a relatively short period of time (30 years). I had heard of foot-binding before, and I knew that at some point it had stopped, but before reading this book I didn't know that missionaries had started the drive to abolish it. If true, it certainly counterbalances some of the less humane things the missionaries are known for.
The Japanese showed up in Shanghai in 1894 after winning a war with China, and demanded the same sort of privileges as the Europeans and Americans. Not content with just a part of Shanghai, however, they would shortly return for all of it. In the mean time, the Bolsheviks triumphed in Russia, and White Russian refugees flooded into Shanghai from Vladivostok to the north. Dong notes that this was a type of European the Shanghainese had not seen before: destitute and desperate. Yet just as they blended into the other cities of the Russian exodus such as Berlin and New York, the Russians were soon an integral part of Shanghai, thriving chiefly in the various realms of nightlife: cabarets, tearooms, restaurants, dance halls...
By 1920 all the elements were assembled for a scene as glamorous and decadent as any the world has seen, and it played out in Shanghai against the backdrop of one of the world's oldest monarchies changing into a republic. Like all great parties, however, it lasted but a moment. The Japanese came and shut things down in 1937. After they were defeated, the Shanghainese had only four short years to recover before the Chinese Communists came and put an end to any sort of foreign influence that remained.
Dong keeps strictly to 1949 as her endpoint, and one can't fault her for that. Still, it would be very interesting to know the fate of all the capitalist enterprises that thrived in the city. Is there any connection at all, for example, between any of the old merchant houses and the burgeoning Chinese communist/capitalists who work there now? After all, there was only about 30 years from 1949 to the time that Deng proclaimed "to get rich is glorious". Perhaps more than just the buildings on the Bund survive.
Book Description
This comprehensive history of the northern frontier of China through the first millennium B.C. details the formation of two increasingly distinct cultural areas: the sedentary Chinese and the northern nomads. Nicola Di Cosmo explores the tensions existing between these two worlds as they became progressively more polarized, with the eventual creation of the nomadic Hsiung-nu empire in the north, and of the Chinese empire in the south. Di Cosmo investigates the origins of the antagonism between early China and its "barbarian" neighbors.
Customer Reviews:
Dense, not for the average reader........2007-05-02
This reads like a PhD thesis, so dense and wordy that it's exhausting to read it. I finally got through it and can say that I was it was very enlightening by the end. I guess for content I would rate it worth four stars, but I'm pretty sure that it could have been more accessible and fun to read, so it loses a star.
A carefully researched and superbly presented history.......2002-12-09
Ancient China And Its Enemies: The Rise Of Nomadic Power In East Asian History by Nicola Di Cosmo (Senior Lecturer in Chinese History at the University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand) is a carefully researched and superbly presented history of the northern frontier of China from 900 to 1000 B.C., combining both Chinese historical texts and archaeological evidence. From the rise of pastoral nomadism in Eurasia, to the first contacts between horse-riding nomads and Chinese states, to a large-scale political shift in China from appeasement to military engagement, Ancient China And Its Enemies is a fascinating, detailed, scholarly, and very strongly recommended historical survey and analysis.
Books:
- Come Into My Trading Room: A Complete Guide to Trading
- Cradle of Flavor: Home Cooking from the Spice Islands of Indonesia, Singapore and Malaysia
- Cuba: A Revolution in Motion
- Economic Reforms in New Democracies: A Social-Democratic Approach
- Enterprise Architecture As Strategy: Creating a Foundation for Business Execution
- Evaluating Practice: Guidelines for the Accountable Professional (5th Edition)
- Factory Physics Second Edition
- Financial Markets & Corporate Strategy
- Free to Choose: A Personal Statement
- From Puerto Rico To Philadelphia
Books Index
Books Home
Recommended Books
- Managing New Product and Process Development: Text and Cases
- Botany in a Day: The Patterns Method of Plant Identification
- The Purpose Driven Life: What on Earth Am I Here For
- Rum & Reggae's Grenadines: Including St. Vincent & Grenada
- Understanding Your Living Will: What You Need to Know Before a Medical Emergency
- Celebration of Discipline: The Path to Spiritual Growt
In Spite of the Gods: The Strange Rise of Modern India
China The Balance Sheet: What the World Needs to Know Now About the Emerging Superpower (Institute International Econom)
The Coming China Wars: Where They Will Be Fought and How They Can Be Won
The Wal-Mart Effect: How the World's Most Powerful Company Really Works--and How It's Transforming the American Economy
China: Fragile Superpower: How China's Internal Politics Could Derail Its Peaceful Rise
