Making China Modern

A panoramic survey of Chinas rise and resilience through war and rebellion, disease and famine, that rewrites Chinas history for a new generation. It is tempting to attribute Chinas recent ascendance to changes in political leadership and economic policy. Making China Modern teaches otherwise. Moving beyond the standard framework of Cold War competition and national resurgence, Klaus Mhlhahn situates twenty-first-century China in the nations long history of creative adaptation. In the mid-eighteenth century, when the Qing Empire reached the height of its power, China dominated a third of the worlds population and managed its largest economy. But as the Opium Wars threatened the nations sovereignty from without and the Taiping Rebellion ripped apart its social fabric from within, China found itself verging on free fall. A network of family relations, economic interdependence, institutional innovation, and structures of governance allowed citizens to regain their footing in a convulsing world. In Chinas drive to reclaim regional centrality, its leaders looked outward as well as inward, at industrial developments and international markets offering new ways to thrive. This dynamic legacy of overcoming adversity and weakness is apparent today in Chinas triumphsbut also in its most worrisome trends. Telling a story of crisis and recovery, Making China Modern explores the versatility and resourcefulness that matters most to Chinas survival, and to its future possibilities.