China's surging political, economic, and social relations with the developing world have sparked considerable attention and even generated alarm in some national capitals. The chapters in this volume, written by an international ensemble of scholars from Europe, Taiwan, and the United States, provide generally balanced and invaluable historical and current background on China's exploding relations with Africa, Central Asia, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, and other regions, simultaneously illuminating the causes and consequences of these ties and correcting some of the distortions present in the contemporary academic, journalistic, and policymaking communities' treatment of these topics.
