Yuen Yuen Ang's other book, _How China Escaped the Poverty Trap_, is excellent. Did you read Studwell's _How Asia Works_? This book is that, but for China. The export incentivization that China practiced turns out to be quite different in some ways from that in, say, South Korea. Strongly recommended.
Less relevant but also great:
Pettis & Klein's _Trade Wars are Class Wars_ is excellent for explaining the "trade surplus and consumption repression for economic stabilization" policies of China, Germany and others, and the underlying structural problems that creates -- driving many of China's current problems. (Pettis' _Avoiding the Fall: China's Economic Restructuring_ is related and more China-specific, but the core ideas aren't as well expressed as in _Trade Wars are Class Wars_.)
_Red Roulette_ by Desmond Shum is the autobiography of a man who, with his wife, literally became fixers for the family of Premier Wen Jibao. Colorful, personal inside look at the high-rolling set in China, on the eve of Xi Jinping's takeover.
You should read Yuen Yurn Ang's "How China Escaped the Poverty Trap" before her book "China's Gilded Age" imo. The former was written first and basically outlines her whole mental model of the process of Chinese growth since 1978. "Gilded Age" is taken from a few pages of that first book.
A fiction book on modern Chinese society that I would suggest is the short story collection "Land of Big Numbers" by Te-Ping Chen.
I would also strongly recommend the documentary "Ascension", which focuses on the rising Chinese middle class, it was really eye-opening and engaging, you can find it on Paramount+.
Suggestions: The Party and the People (Bruce Dickson), China's Good War (Rana Mitter), or The World According to China (Elizabeth Economy -- article version available on Foreign Affairs).
"China's Second Continent", about Chinese investment in Africa, is excellent although maybe not domestically focused enough for Noah's purposes. And "Blockchain Chicken Farm", about the use of IT in Chinese agribusiness, is pretty high on my list though I haven't read it yet.
I've taken to reading quite a bit about China recently. I really enjoy reading books on how the Chinese see themselves, so of course I recommend Xi's trilogy. I also recommend reading "Socialism with Chinese Characteristic: a Guide for Foreigners" ( https://workers.today/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Socialism_With_Chinese_Characteristics.pdf ) Which is probably the most systematic of the CCP Apologetics out there in the English language.
Also, there's a wonderful blog called "Reading the China Dream" ( https://www.readingthechinadream.com/ ) which translates several Chinese articles every week or so for English speakers to peruse. Not to sound Orientalist, but it's actually fairly surprising how much diversity of thought there is among Chinese intellectuals with regards to political and economic policy.
Hi Noah, Carl Minzer's "End of an Era", Scott Rozelle and Natalie Hell's "Invisible China", Ho-fung Hung's "The China Boom" and "Protest with Chinese Characteristics", Jiwei Ci's "Democracy in China: the Coming Crisis" are all good recent books that (mostly) address the new period from a critical, non-essentialist perspective.
The thing I didn't realise until very recently about the Jiang to Hu transition was that it was orchestrated Deng. Before he gave up power he didn't just pick Jiang as his successor, he picked Hu as Jiang's successor, with the idea that Jiang would pick Hu's successor and Hu the successor after that. I don't know to what degree that's happened - Xi is part of the princeling faction that Jiang led and was a close ally of his so maybe it did.
Thanks for a great list. The Party is the best book i’ve read on the subject, and I have started the same author’s Xi JInping: the Backlash, though it is significantly shorter.
Desmund Shum’s Red Roulette is colorful but the vein of Red Notice (to those who read); crony capitalist cries when the corrupt game that brought him up brings him (or others around him really, in both cases) down. The main details of Ping An’s holdings by Wen Jibao’s family have been covered by the NYT and BBerg etc so not that surprising.
If anyone finds a decent biography of Xi that would be fascinating to share with others interested in this important… topic :)
Wealth and Power: China's Long March to the Twenty-first Century by Orville Schell. The book is almost 10 years old, so doesn't get into the Xi period (the George Magnus book is very good on that), but in his sweep of Chinese history, Schell's account is tremendous. And he must be on to something, because Beijing will not allow him into the country any longer.
I would add Rush Doshi’s “The Long Game” to your reading list. Rush Doshi is a brilliant scholar (he currently works in the Biden administration) who analyzes thousands of pages of CCP writings, speeches, think tank papers, etc. to paint a picture of Chinese grand strategy.
Guys this comment section is looking like a great resource for finding China books to read! I love Noahpinion comment sections
Yuen Yuen Ang's other book, _How China Escaped the Poverty Trap_, is excellent. Did you read Studwell's _How Asia Works_? This book is that, but for China. The export incentivization that China practiced turns out to be quite different in some ways from that in, say, South Korea. Strongly recommended.
Less relevant but also great:
Pettis & Klein's _Trade Wars are Class Wars_ is excellent for explaining the "trade surplus and consumption repression for economic stabilization" policies of China, Germany and others, and the underlying structural problems that creates -- driving many of China's current problems. (Pettis' _Avoiding the Fall: China's Economic Restructuring_ is related and more China-specific, but the core ideas aren't as well expressed as in _Trade Wars are Class Wars_.)
_Red Roulette_ by Desmond Shum is the autobiography of a man who, with his wife, literally became fixers for the family of Premier Wen Jibao. Colorful, personal inside look at the high-rolling set in China, on the eve of Xi Jinping's takeover.
You should read Yuen Yurn Ang's "How China Escaped the Poverty Trap" before her book "China's Gilded Age" imo. The former was written first and basically outlines her whole mental model of the process of Chinese growth since 1978. "Gilded Age" is taken from a few pages of that first book.
A fiction book on modern Chinese society that I would suggest is the short story collection "Land of Big Numbers" by Te-Ping Chen.
I would also strongly recommend the documentary "Ascension", which focuses on the rising Chinese middle class, it was really eye-opening and engaging, you can find it on Paramount+.
I find Martin Jacques at the LSE and his Twitter feed, good value on China
Suggestions: The Party and the People (Bruce Dickson), China's Good War (Rana Mitter), or The World According to China (Elizabeth Economy -- article version available on Foreign Affairs).
"China's Second Continent", about Chinese investment in Africa, is excellent although maybe not domestically focused enough for Noah's purposes. And "Blockchain Chicken Farm", about the use of IT in Chinese agribusiness, is pretty high on my list though I haven't read it yet.
I've taken to reading quite a bit about China recently. I really enjoy reading books on how the Chinese see themselves, so of course I recommend Xi's trilogy. I also recommend reading "Socialism with Chinese Characteristic: a Guide for Foreigners" ( https://workers.today/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Socialism_With_Chinese_Characteristics.pdf ) Which is probably the most systematic of the CCP Apologetics out there in the English language.
Also, there's a wonderful blog called "Reading the China Dream" ( https://www.readingthechinadream.com/ ) which translates several Chinese articles every week or so for English speakers to peruse. Not to sound Orientalist, but it's actually fairly surprising how much diversity of thought there is among Chinese intellectuals with regards to political and economic policy.
Hi Noah, Carl Minzer's "End of an Era", Scott Rozelle and Natalie Hell's "Invisible China", Ho-fung Hung's "The China Boom" and "Protest with Chinese Characteristics", Jiwei Ci's "Democracy in China: the Coming Crisis" are all good recent books that (mostly) address the new period from a critical, non-essentialist perspective.
Glad to see you have Yuen Yuen Ang lined up. I would also recommend anything by Peter Hessler, Leslie Chang’s husband.
The thing I didn't realise until very recently about the Jiang to Hu transition was that it was orchestrated Deng. Before he gave up power he didn't just pick Jiang as his successor, he picked Hu as Jiang's successor, with the idea that Jiang would pick Hu's successor and Hu the successor after that. I don't know to what degree that's happened - Xi is part of the princeling faction that Jiang led and was a close ally of his so maybe it did.
I recommend "Chinese Politics in the Xi era" by Li, I thought it was very good. My number one book is "Deng Xioaping and the transformation of China".
Some other China books worth a read:
Yuen Yuen Ang, How China Escaped the Poverty Trap
Bruce Dickson, The Party and the People
Howard French, Everything Under the Heavens
Cheng Li, Middle Class Shanghai
John Pomfret, The Beautiful Country and the Middle Kingdom
Rory Truex, Making Autocracy Work
Thanks for a great list. The Party is the best book i’ve read on the subject, and I have started the same author’s Xi JInping: the Backlash, though it is significantly shorter.
Desmund Shum’s Red Roulette is colorful but the vein of Red Notice (to those who read); crony capitalist cries when the corrupt game that brought him up brings him (or others around him really, in both cases) down. The main details of Ping An’s holdings by Wen Jibao’s family have been covered by the NYT and BBerg etc so not that surprising.
If anyone finds a decent biography of Xi that would be fascinating to share with others interested in this important… topic :)
Wealth and Power: China's Long March to the Twenty-first Century by Orville Schell. The book is almost 10 years old, so doesn't get into the Xi period (the George Magnus book is very good on that), but in his sweep of Chinese history, Schell's account is tremendous. And he must be on to something, because Beijing will not allow him into the country any longer.
I would add Rush Doshi’s “The Long Game” to your reading list. Rush Doshi is a brilliant scholar (he currently works in the Biden administration) who analyzes thousands of pages of CCP writings, speeches, think tank papers, etc. to paint a picture of Chinese grand strategy.