A
China Bibliography
A China Bibliography
(12/21/07draft)
An introductory bibliography about Chinese history, politics and
economics
Prepared by Joseph Gerson
American Friends Service Committee
***Armitage Nye Report, U.S.-Japan Alliance: Getting Asia
Right Through 2020
http://www.csis.org/media/csis/pubs/070216_asia2020.pdf.
This is essential reading. This is the second Armitage Nye Report. Representing
the "liberal" elites of both the Republican and Democratic parties,
this bipartisan report is seen as the foundation of U.S. Asia policy for the coming
decade, and certainly for the next presidential administration.
Foreign Affairs January/February 2008 issue "Changing China."
China is the special focus of this publication of the Council on
Foreign Relations elite. The articles can be accessed at http://www.foreignaffairs.org/current.
**China list serve. To subscribe writealbertsargis@comcast.net.
This list serve provides information and analysis of political and
policy developments in China.
South China Morning Post. The best daily English language
newspaper in China (Hong Kong.) Headlines news can be scanned for
free, subscriptions required. http://www.scmp.com/portal/site/SCMP
Books
Richard Baum Burying Mao: Chinese Politics in the
Age of Deng Xiaoping. The political transition
of China from Mao's communism to authoritarian capitalism
C. Fred Bergsten, Bates Gill, Nicholas R. Lardy, and Derek Mitchell. China:
The Balance Sheet - What the World Needs to Know Now About the
Emerging Superpower, Public Affairs Press,
2006. A helpful primer about China's economy, political transformation,
and Chinese foreign and military policy as seen by the U.S.
Center for Strategic and International Affairs.
Gordon H. Chang Friends and Enemies: The United States,
China, and the Soviet Union, 1948-1972. Stanford
University Press, 1990. Reviews U.S.- Chinese relations from
the victory of the Communist revolution to the creation of the
tacit U.S.-Chinese alliance against the Soviet Union.
**Jung Chnag Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China,
Anchor Books, 1991. From its first sentence, this is a compelling
- and now classical - history of 20th century China organized
around the lives of three generations of the Jung Chang's family.
**John King Fairbank China: A New History comprehensive
history of China from the Paleolithic era through the Deng era.
This is one of the classics, and there is likely to be a more recent
edition.
The United States & China, Harvard University
Press, 1979. A Comprehensive history of U.S.-Chinese relations.
This is a classic, and there are probably more recent editions than
mine.
Francine R. Frankel & Harry Harding, eds. The India
China Relationship: What the United States Needs to Know,
Colombia University Press , 2004. The Rise of Chinese and Indian
economic - and increasingly military - power is transforming
the human condition and challenging U.S. global hegemony. The
book's essays provide a history of Chinese- Indian relations
from the earliest of times through their rise as nuclear powers.
Yoichi Funabashi Alliance Adrift, Council
of Foreign Relations Press, 1999. Written by one of Japan's most
influential journalists, this book provides a Japanese elite perspective
on the U.S.-Japan military alliance and challenges it faced at the
dawn of the Bush era.
Joseph Gerson The Sun Never Sets: Confronting
the Network of U.S. Foreign Military Bases, New
Society Publishers 1991. I have a chapter which provides a
history of the Cold War U.S.-Japanese military alliance, which
is a prime concern to Chinese leaders.
Empire and the Bomb: How the U.S. Uses Nuclear Weapons
to Dominate the World, Pluto, 2007. Includes the
history of U.S. nuclear threats against China, Vietnam and Korea.
Bruce Gilley China's Democratic Future: How It Will
Happen and Where It Will Lead, Columbia University
Press, 2004, Gilley, long a journalist for Far Eastern
Economic Review argues that transition to a democratic China
is inevitable and will be turbulent.
Tiger on the Brink: Jiang Zemin and China's New Elite,
University of California Press, 1998. A history of the rise of the
post Deng Xiaoping elite and a description of the people and values
who have overseen China's transformation in the 1990s and early
21st century.
**Peter Hessler Oracle Bones: A Journey Between China's
Past and Present, Harper Collins 2006. This is an amazingly
constructed, and very well written, introduction to 21st century
China rooted in ancient and modern Chinese history and culture.
It's descriptions of preparations for the 2008 Olympics will
also be helpful for delegation members.
River Town: Two Years on the Yangtze, Harper Collins,
2001. This is an intriguing memoir of Hessler's two years teaching
English in Fuling, a city in China's interior. It provides wonderful
descriptions of Chinese college students lives, hopes, and preparations
to travel to China's 21st century rising coastal industrialized
cities.
**Shintaro Ishihara The Japan That Can Say No: Why
Japan Will Be First Among Equals, Simon and Schuster,
1989 This controversial book shook the U.S. and Chinese elites
when it was initially released. It is an unvarnished expression
of the Japanese nationalism that continues to concern Chinese
leaders.
**David C. Kang China Rising: Peace, Power and Order
in East Asia, Columbia University Press, 2007.
In a book rooted in history, culture and political culture,
Kang Kang reviews China's relations with East Asian nations
and argues that 21st century China is a force for
stability in the region. He also explores the implications of
China's rise for the United States.
John Kenneth Knaus Orphans of the Cold War: America and
the Tibetan Struggle for Survival, Public Affairs,
1999.This is a history - a memoir - of U.S. encouragement and
support for the armed resistance of Tibetan nationalists following
the Chinese revolution and military intervention and occupation
of Tibet. It is written by the CIA agent who coordinated the
training and arming of Tibetan resistance fighters. (His first
daughter, for whom I baby sat when I was a student, is the God
daughter of the Dalai Lama.)
**James Kynge China Shakes the World: A Titan's Breakneck
Rise and Troubled Future - and the Challenge for America,
Houghton Mifflin, 2006. This is a very readable introduction
to China's economic revolution And peaceful rise written by
the former Beijing bureau chief of the Financial Times.
**Walter LaFeber The Clash: U.S. Japanese Relations Throughout
History, W.W. Norton,1999. This is the best history
of the history of U.S.-Japanese relations - including the military
alliance - that is available. Of necessity, it provides an overview
of history U.S. ambitions and imperial initiatives in the Asia-Pacific.
Chae-Jin Lee China and Korea: Dynamic Relations,
Hoover Press, 1996. A history of Chinese-Korean relations from the
Korean War to the end of the 20th century.
**James Mann About Face: A History of America's Curious
Relationship with China, From Nixon to Clinton, Alfred
A. Knopf, 1998. This is a highly Readable history of the restoration
of U.S.-Chinese relations and of U.S.- Chinese collaborations
since the "Nixon shock."
Andrew J. Nathan and Bruce Gilley China's New Rulers: The
Secret Files, New York Review Books, 2002, Assembled
and written on the eve of the trasition From Xiang Jemin's rule
to the Hu Jintao era, this book provides insight into the experiences,
ambitions and commitments of the fourth generation of Chinese
Communist rulers.
**Andrew J. Nathan and Robert S. Ross The Great Wall
and the Empty Fortress: China's Search for Security,
W.W. Norton, 1997. Although this book is now a decade old and
doesn't address China's military build up since it was written,
it provides an excellent introduction to how China's leader
viewed their strategic situation and their foreign and military
policy responses to their strategic environment.
High E. Richardson Tibet & Its History, Shambala
Books, 1984. This history, sympathetic to Tibetan nationalism, traces
the history of the Tibetan nation its culture from early in the
2nd century BCE through the late 20th century.
Murray A. Rubinstein, ed. Taiwan: A New
History, M.E. Sharpe, 1999. Readings on Taiwan's history
from its aboriginal origins through the end of the 20th century.
Orville Schell Virtual Tibet: Searching for Shangri-la
from the Himalayas to Hollywood, Metropolitan Books,
2000. Schell plays conoclast, provides a history of Tibet in
the U.S. imagination as contrasted with the realities of Tibetan
history and life.
Orville Schell and David Shambaugh, eds. The China Reader:
The Reform Era, Vintage "Books, 1999, a collection
of articles and statements on China from the Deng and Deng era's
economic, political, military and ecological developments and
policies.
Andrew Scobell China's Use of Military Force: Beyond the
Great Wall and the Long March, Cambridge
University Press, 2003 This is a history and Analysis of
20th century China's uses and approaches to military
force. Helpful in thinking about its 21st century
uses and approaches.
**Susan L. Shirk China: Fragile Superpower, Oxford
University Press, 2006. Written by the Clinton era Deputy Assistant
Secretary of State responsible for U.S-Chinese relations, and endorsed
by Madeleine Albright, Brent Scowcroft, William Perry, and other,
it provides the liberal U.S. Establishment view of China's rise,
the challenges that poses to U.S. power, and recommendations for
future U.S.-China policies that could augment the 2007 Armitage-Nye
report.
Edgar Snow Red Star Over China, Grove Press. Multiple
editions. First written in 1938 it provides a sympathetic introduction
to the Chinese Revolution
The Battle for Asia, Random House, 1941. This
may not be easy to find, but it provides a history of Chinese and
Chinese Communist resistance to the Japanese invasion written in
the midst of the war and revolution.
Jonathan D. Spence The Search for Modern China,
W.W. Norton, 1990. A comprehensive history of China from 1600 to
the late 20th century written by one of the United States'
leading China scholars.
**Robert G. Sutter and William R. Johnson, eds. Taiwan
in World Affairs. Westeview Press, 1994. Among the
best resources for understanding Taiwan's history and the continuing
crisis over Taiwan's identity and future.
Han Suyin Eldest Son: Zhou Enlai and the Making of Modern
China 1898 - 1976, Random House, 1994. This is a sympathetic
biography of one of the two primary leaders of the Chinese Communist
revolution
Ross Terrill The New Chinese Empire: And What it Means
for the United States. Basic Books, 2003. Terrill,
has long been an important China scholar, and he has turned
more critical in recent years, raising questions about where
the country's authoritarian communist leadership can survive
the transition to post-modern capitalism. This book traces the
rise of the Chinese empire (which has 14 nations on its periphery)
and its foreign policies in the era of "Half-Empire and
Half-Modern Nation."
Ezra F. Vogel Living with China: U.S.-China Relations in
the Twenty-first Century, W.W. Norton, 1997. This is
the view from the heights of the Clinton Administration and
U.S. foreign policy elite. Vogel served as head of Intelligence
for Asia during the first Clinton Administration. He speaks
for much of the ostensibly liberal elite.
Michael Yahuda The International Politics of the Asia-Pacific
1945-1995, Routledge, 1996. This is a very readable
history U.S. dominance of the Asia-Pacific and of U.S.-Chinese-Russian
relations, policies and confrontations throughout the era.
Suisheng Zhao, ed. Across the Taiwan Strait: Mainland China,
Taiwan and the 1995- 1996 Crisis. Routledge,
1999. Taiwan remains one of the tinderboxes most likely to trigger
a U.S.-Chinese war, possibly a nuclear war. This is the history
of the most recent U.S.-Chinese nuclear confrontation over Taiwan.
Among other things, it describes how U.S. and Chinese leaders
approached and managed the crisis.
^ Top of page |
Email this page