Fans pick 100 books like How China Sees the World

By John M. Friend, Bradley A. Thayer,

Here are 100 books that How China Sees the World fans have personally recommended if you like How China Sees the World. Shepherd is a community of 12,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.

When you buy books, we may earn a commission that helps keep our lights on (or join the rebellion as a member).

Book cover of China's Forgotten People: Xinjiang, Terror and the Chinese State

Grayson Slover Author Of Middle Country: An American Student Visits China's Uyghur Prison-State

From my list on the Uyghur Genocide.

Why am I passionate about this?

I traveled to Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in the summer of 2019, where I saw for myself many of the tools of surveillance and control that the Chinese Communist Party has used to turn the region into an open-air prison. Since returning to the United States, I have tried to draw attention to the Uyghur genocide through my published articles and through my book, Middle Country, where I tell the story of the Uyghur genocide by weaving facts, history, and analysis into a narrative account of the week I spent in Xinjiang. I hope that my book can make this profoundly complex and multifaceted issue more accessible to the average person.

Grayson's book list on the Uyghur Genocide

Grayson Slover Why did Grayson love this book?

This book provides the most accessible account of the relationship between the Chinese Communist Party and the native peoples of Xinjiang. Holdstock draws on his own experience living in Xinjiang to show how the CCP’s failure to recognize the genuine grievances of the native peoples of the region helped to drive the terrorism problem that the CCP claims to be addressing today through its genocidal policies.

By Nick Holdstock,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked China's Forgotten People as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

After isolated terrorist incidents in 2015, the Chinese leadership has cracked down hard on Xinjiang and its Uyghurs. Today, there are thought to be up to a million Muslims held in 're-education camps' in the Xinjiang region of North-West China. One of the few Western commentators to have lived in the region, journalist Nick Holdstock travels into the heart of the province and reveals the Uyghur story as one of repression, hardship and helplessness. China's Forgotten People explains why repression of the Muslim population is on the rise in the world's most powerful one-party state. This updated and revised edition…


Book cover of Eurasian Crossroads: A History of Xinjiang

Grayson Slover Author Of Middle Country: An American Student Visits China's Uyghur Prison-State

From my list on the Uyghur Genocide.

Why am I passionate about this?

I traveled to Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in the summer of 2019, where I saw for myself many of the tools of surveillance and control that the Chinese Communist Party has used to turn the region into an open-air prison. Since returning to the United States, I have tried to draw attention to the Uyghur genocide through my published articles and through my book, Middle Country, where I tell the story of the Uyghur genocide by weaving facts, history, and analysis into a narrative account of the week I spent in Xinjiang. I hope that my book can make this profoundly complex and multifaceted issue more accessible to the average person.

Grayson's book list on the Uyghur Genocide

Grayson Slover Why did Grayson love this book?

Eurasian Crossroads is an essential resource for anyone seeking to learn about the complex historical context of the genocide taking place in Xinjiang today. James Millward, who is widely regarded as the leading historian of Chinese Central Asia, provides an accessible-yet-thorough examination of the various peoples and empires that have called the region home. 

By James Millward,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Eurasian Crossroads as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Since antiquity, the vast Central Eurasian region of Xinjiang, or Eastern Turkestan, has stood at the crossroads of China, India, the Middle East, and Europe, playing a pivotal role in the social, cultural, and political histories of Asia and the world. Today, it comprises one-sixth of the territory of the People's Republic of China and borders India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Russia, and Mongolia.

Eurasian Crossroads is an engaging and comprehensive account of Xinjiang's history and people from earliest times to the present day. Drawing on primary sources in several Asian and European languages, James A. Millward surveys Xinjiang's…


Book cover of Made in China: A Prisoner, an SOS Letter, and the Hidden Cost of America's Cheap Goods

Grayson Slover Author Of Middle Country: An American Student Visits China's Uyghur Prison-State

From my list on the Uyghur Genocide.

Why am I passionate about this?

I traveled to Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in the summer of 2019, where I saw for myself many of the tools of surveillance and control that the Chinese Communist Party has used to turn the region into an open-air prison. Since returning to the United States, I have tried to draw attention to the Uyghur genocide through my published articles and through my book, Middle Country, where I tell the story of the Uyghur genocide by weaving facts, history, and analysis into a narrative account of the week I spent in Xinjiang. I hope that my book can make this profoundly complex and multifaceted issue more accessible to the average person.

Grayson's book list on the Uyghur Genocide

Grayson Slover Why did Grayson love this book?

In this book, Amelia Pang examines all aspects of China’s system of forced labor, which she explains has recently been deployed as a tool in the Uyghur genocide but has existed long before the genocide began. Importantly, she explains how Western consumers are complicit in Chinese forced labor through their choices to purchase the cheap goods that this system produces.

By Amelia Pang,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Made in China as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A Most-Anticipated Book of the Year: Newsweek * Refinery29 "Timely and urgent . . . Pang is a dogged investigator." --The New York Times

"Moving and powerful." --Chris Hedges, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author

Discover the truth behind the discounts.

In 2012, an Oregon mother named Julie Keith opened up a package of Halloween decorations. The cheap foam headstones had been five dollars at Kmart, too good a deal to pass up. But when she opened the box, something shocking fell out: an SOS letter, handwritten in broken English.
"Sir: If you occassionally buy this product, please kindly resend this…


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Book cover of Benghazi! A New History of the Fiasco that Pushed America and its World to the Brink

Benghazi! A New History of the Fiasco that Pushed America and its World to the Brink By Ethan Chorin,

Benghazi: A New History is a look back at the enigmatic 2012 attack on the US mission in Benghazi, Libya, its long-tail causes, and devastating (and largely unexamined) consequences for US domestic politics and foreign policy. It contains information not found elsewhere, and is backed up by 40 pages of…

Book cover of China Marches West: The Qing Conquest of Central Eurasia

Grayson Slover Author Of Middle Country: An American Student Visits China's Uyghur Prison-State

From my list on the Uyghur Genocide.

Why am I passionate about this?

I traveled to Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in the summer of 2019, where I saw for myself many of the tools of surveillance and control that the Chinese Communist Party has used to turn the region into an open-air prison. Since returning to the United States, I have tried to draw attention to the Uyghur genocide through my published articles and through my book, Middle Country, where I tell the story of the Uyghur genocide by weaving facts, history, and analysis into a narrative account of the week I spent in Xinjiang. I hope that my book can make this profoundly complex and multifaceted issue more accessible to the average person.

Grayson's book list on the Uyghur Genocide

Grayson Slover Why did Grayson love this book?

Peter C. Perdue gives an exhaustive account of the Qing Dynasty’s conquest of Xinjiang - which, according to many historians, was the first time a Chinese Dynasty consolidated its rule over the whole of the region. This history has important implications for claims regarding the legitimacy of Chinese rule over Xinjiang.

By Peter C. Perdue,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked China Marches West as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

From about 1600 to 1800, the Qing empire of China expanded to unprecedented size. Through astute diplomacy, economic investment, and a series of ambitious military campaigns into the heart of Central Eurasia, the Manchu rulers defeated the Zunghar Mongols, and brought all of modern Xinjiang and Mongolia under their control, while gaining dominant influence in Tibet. The China we know is a product of these vast conquests.

Peter C. Perdue chronicles this little-known story of China's expansion into the northwestern frontier. Unlike previous Chinese dynasties, the Qing achieved lasting domination over the eastern half of the Eurasian continent. Rulers used…


Book cover of The Beautiful Country and the Middle Kingdom: America and China, 1776 to the Present

Bob Davis Author Of Superpower Showdown: How the Battle Between Trump and Xi Threatens a New Cold War

From my list on China by Western journalists.

Why am I passionate about this?

For nearly 40 years I have worked at the Wall Street Journal, largely focusing on international economics. I was part of a team that won a Pulitzer Prize for coverage of the Asian and Russian financial crisis. China has been a particular passion. In 1999, I covered the U.S. negotiations with China over its entry to the World Trade Organization, which included side trips to New Zealand and elsewhere for some of the talks. From 2011 to 2014, I was posted in Beijing where I wrote about the Chinese economy and loved getting out to the countryside. Back in Washington, I reported on the deteriorating U.S.-China relationship, especially during the Trump years.

Bob's book list on China by Western journalists

Bob Davis Why did Bob love this book?

We are used to thinking about how much China has changed in the past 50 years, thanks to the actions of the United States. But we rarely think about China’s historic impact on the U.S. This magisterial book by a former Washington Post reporter with long experience in China corrects that imbalance. There is a reason the author uses 1776 in his subhead. The tea tossed into Boston Harbor was shipped from Xiamen, and America’s founders were inspired by Chinese society which they viewed as a meritocracy. China’s democratic reformers looked to the U.S. for inspiration too.

By John Pompfret,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Beautiful Country and the Middle Kingdom as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A Remarkable History of the Two-Centuries-Old Relationship Between the United States and China, from the Revolutionary War to the Present Day

From the clipper ships that ventured to Canton hauling cargos of American ginseng to swap for Chinese tea, and the Yankee missionaries who brought Christianity and education to China, to the Chinese who built the American West, the United States and China have always been dramatically intertwined. While we tend to think of America’s ties with China as starting in 1972 with the visit of President Richard Nixon to China, the patterns---rapturous enchantment followed by angry disillusionment---were set in…


Book cover of Globalization and Security Relations across the Taiwan Strait: In the shadow of China

Norrin M. Ripsman Author Of Globalization and the National Security State

From my list on globalization and security.

Why am I passionate about this?

I have studied the impact of economics on security for decades. In addition to co-authoring Globalization and the National Security State, I published books on economic interdependence and security, the efficacy of economic sanctions and incentives as tools of foreign and security policy, and the use of economic instruments to promote regional peacemaking. In general, I have always been fascinated by the economic underpinnings of security, from Napoleon’s observation that an army marches on its stomach to the utility of advanced financial sanctions to punish rogue actors in the contemporary era.

Norrin's book list on globalization and security

Norrin M. Ripsman Why did Norrin love this book?

This is a great edited volume that explores the dynamic of globalization and security in a different light through the examination of a single important crisis: PRC-Taiwan Relations.

Through analyses of the challenges of illicit crime networks, cybersecurity, mergers and acquisitions, the semiconductor industry, and a growing bilateral economic relationship, the contributors to this book demonstrate the impossibility of separating the economic from the geopolitical in this strategically important rivalry.


By Ming-chin Monique Chu (editor), Scott L. Kastner (editor),

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Globalization and Security Relations across the Taiwan Strait as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

This book presents an interdisciplinary examination of cross-Taiwan Strait relations and the complex dynamics at play in the region.

Since the election of Ma Ying-jeou as Taiwan's president in 2008, the relationship across the Taiwan Strait-long viewed as one of Asia's most volatile potential flashpoints-has experienced a remarkable detente. Whether the relationship has been truly transformed, however, remains an open question and the Taiwan Strait remains a central regional and global security issue. A return to turbulence in the Taiwan Strait could also add a new dimension of instability in the already tense maritime disputes in the East and South…


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Book cover of Grand Old Unraveling: The Republican Party, Donald Trump, and the Rise of Authoritarianism

Grand Old Unraveling By John Kenneth White,

It didn’t begin with Donald Trump. When the Republican Party lost five straight presidential elections during the 1930s and 1940s, three things happened: (1) Republicans came to believe that presidential elections are rigged; (2) Conspiracy theories arose and were believed; and (3) The presidency was elevated to cult-like status.

Long…

Book cover of Chip War: The Fight for the World's Most Critical Technology

Daniel M. Gerstein Author Of Tech Wars: Transforming U.S. Technology Development

From my list on understanding current tech war future of humanity.

Why am I passionate about this?

Everyone uses technology, but few stop to think about where these technologies come from and what this trajectory means to humanity. During my professional career, I have dedicated myself to public service focused on security and defense as a U.S. Army officer, senior government civilian, and in think tanks, industry, and academia. My journey has taken me to over 60 countries where I have witnessed humankind's best and worst. The difference is often in how our technologies are used—to build cities, feed populations, and develop life-saving vaccines or to oppress peoples or as tools of war. 

Daniel's book list on understanding current tech war future of humanity

Daniel M. Gerstein Why did Daniel love this book?

Extraordinary book that has tapped into the most important hardware of the AI revolution and will be foundational in the emerging Age of Augmented Humanity. This book provides the detail that allows the reader to understand the history and current state of global semiconductor design and the manufacturing community.

It also lays out in exquisite detail the importance of the technology in the future and how it needs to be protected. In no small measure, the book was instrumental in highlighting the importance of semiconductors in todays’ digital world. 

By Chris Miller,

Why should I read it?

9 authors picked Chip War as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

***Winner of the Financial Times Business Book of the Year award***

'Pulse quickening. A nonfiction thriller - equal parts The China Syndrome and Mission Impossible' New York Times

An epic account of the decades-long battle to control the world's most critical resource-microchip technology

Power in the modern world - military, economic, geopolitical - is built on a foundation of computer chips. America has maintained its lead as a superpower because it has dominated advances in computer chips and all the technology that chips have enabled. (Virtually everything runs on chips: cars, phones, the stock market, even the electric grid.) Now…


Book cover of Dangerous Strait: The U.S.-Taiwan-China Crisis

Warren I. Cohen Author Of East Asia at the Center: Four Thousand Years of Engagement with the World

From my list on understanding the coming war with China.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve spent all of my adult life writing about American foreign policy, especially Chinese-American relations.  My America’s Response to China, the standard text on the subject, has gone through 6 editions. I served as a line officer in the Pacific Fleet, lived in Taipei and Beijing. I also served as chairman of the State Department Advisory Committee on Historical Diplomatic Documentation and have been a consultant on Chinese affairs to various government organizations. And I cook the best mapo toufu outside of Sichuan. (where I negotiated the Michigan-Sichuan sister-state relationship in 1982). It was probably my love of Chinese food that accounts for most of the above.

Warren's book list on understanding the coming war with China

Warren I. Cohen Why did Warren love this book?

I attended the conference at which papers presented here were delivered. Participants were leading academic and government analysts. The papers were insightful and precise and the information provided created the foundation for current U.S. policy in the Taiwan Strait.

The concluding essay, by Tucker (my late wife) anticipates today’s question of whether the policy of strategic ambiguity (will the United States intervene if China attacks Taiwan?) is superior to strategic clarity. Her affirmative answer remains persuasive.

By Nancy Bernkopf Tucker (editor),

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Dangerous Strait as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Today the most dangerous place on earth is arguably the Taiwan Strait, where a war between the United States and China could erupt out of miscalculation, misunderstanding, or accident. How and to what degree Taiwan pursues its own national identity will have profound ramifications in its relationship with China as well as in relations between China and the United States. Events late in 2004 demonstrated the volatility of the situation, as Taiwan's legislative elections unexpectedly preserved a slim majority for supporters of closer relations with China. Beijing, nevertheless, threatened to pass an anti-secession law, apt to revitalize pro-independence forces in…


Book cover of Migration in the Time of Revolution: China, Indonesia, and the Cold War

Lorenz M. Lüthi Author Of Cold Wars: Asia, the Middle East, Europe

From my list on Cold War history published recently.

Why am I passionate about this?

During the later Cold War, I grew up in neutral and peaceful Switzerland. My German mother’s family lived apart in divided Germany. I knew as a child that I would become a historian because I wanted to find out what had happened to my mother’s home and why there was a Cold War in the first place. My father’s service as a Swiss Red Cross delegate in Korea after 1953 raised my interest in East Asia. After learning Russian and Chinese, I wrote my first book on The Sino-Soviet Split. When I was finishing the book, I resolved to reinvent myself as a global historian, which is why I wrote my second book as a reinterpretation of the global Cold War as a series of parallel regional Cold Wars in Asia, the Middle East, and Europe.

Lorenz's book list on Cold War history published recently

Lorenz M. Lüthi Why did Lorenz love this book?

Migration in the Time of Revolution pushes the international history of the 20th century into a new and exciting direction. Using the Chinese diaspora in Indonesia as a lens, Taomo Zhou elevates citizens to agents in international relations. On the basis of Chinese archival research and oral history, she explores how Indonesians of Chinese descent lastingly influenced the diplomatic relations between their home country and divided China during the Cold War.

By Taomo Zhou,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Migration in the Time of Revolution as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Migration in the Time of Revolution examines how two of the world's most populous countries interacted between 1945 and 1967, when the concept of citizenship was contested, political loyalty was in question, identity was fluid, and the boundaries of political mobilization were blurred. Taomo Zhou asks probing questions of this important period in the histories of the People's Republic of China and Indonesia. What was it like to be a youth in search of an ancestral homeland that one had never set foot in, or an economic refugee whose expertise in private business became undesirable in one's new home in…


Book cover of The Long Game: China's Grand Strategy to Displace American Order

Pádraig Carmody Author Of Africa's Shadow Rise: China and the Mirage of African Economic Development

From my list on China’s global and African strategies.

Why am I passionate about this?

I became interested in China-Africa relations fifteen years ago when I realised that the rise of the former was going to have major and long-lasting effects on the politics and economics of the continent. In a sense, the rising role of China in Africa foretold its rise to global power and influence. Since then I have been fascinated by the ways in which China has restructured, or been involved in the restructuring, of African economies and politics and the ways in which that country’s global strategies and roles have continued to evolve and their impacts. I have written several books on the impacts of emerging powers in Africa.

Pádraig's book list on China’s global and African strategies

Pádraig Carmody Why did Pádraig love this book?

There is a veritable cottage industry now on books on China and its global strategy and influence. This book by Rush Doshi is one of the best because its analysis is based on extensive analysis of Chinese Communist party documents over decades. Doshi's analysis asks whether or not China has a grand strategy by examining China’s foreign policy concepts, capabilities, and conduct. This makes for a compelling and detailed analysis. 

By Rush Doshi,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Long Game as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Given the turbulence in the international order in recent years, one of the central concerns among observers of world politics is the question of China's ultimate goals. As China emerges as a superpower that rivals the United States, American policymakers grappling with this century's greatest geopolitical challenge are looking for answers to a series of critical questions. Does China have expansive ambitions? Does it have a grand strategy to achieve them? If so,
what is it and what should the United States do about it?

In The Long Game, Rush Doshi draws from a rich base of Chinese primary sources,…


Book cover of China's Forgotten People: Xinjiang, Terror and the Chinese State
Book cover of Eurasian Crossroads: A History of Xinjiang
Book cover of Made in China: A Prisoner, an SOS Letter, and the Hidden Cost of America's Cheap Goods

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