The Chinese Communist Party: Made (partly) in Japan
One underappreciated aspect of the Chinese Communist Party's history, particularly its early history, is how much of it was influenced by Japan.
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Reexamining Chinese economic reform from the 1980s to present
A new book by Isabella Weber, “How China Escaped Shock Therapy: The Market Reform Debate,” challenges conventional wisdom about China’s crucial decade of economic reforms.
When the PRC won the ‘China’ seat at the UN
China — the Republic of China — had been an original signatory to the UN Charter in 1945. But the autumn of 1971 witnessed the climax of a long drama over which Chinese government deserved the UN seat.
How Britain used a small pirate ship to spark the Second Opium War
For years after the conclusion of the First Opium War, Britain felt annoyed by lingering unresolved issues with China’s Qing Empire. The British needed a casus belli, a cause for another war — and found just that in the form of a small boat manned by pirates.
Lord Macartney, China, and the convenient lies of history
In popular understanding, the Qianlong Emperor's rejection of Lord Macartney and King George III was an act of hubris, a failure to recognize the military might of Britain and the West, the last prideful act of a waning empire before a "century of humiliation." But what if our understanding is all wrong?
How the legacy of China’s Boxer Uprising fuels anti-Asian racism even today
September 7 marks the anniversary of the Boxer Protocol, signed in 1901, an “unequal treaty” that signaled the end of the Boxer Uprising, itself a major chapter in the development of the “yellow peril” trope. The contested legacy of the Boxers is with us still, and can be seen in how we talk about the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Taiwan Strait Crisis of 1954-55 and specter of nuclear war
Before the Cuban Missile Crisis, there was real fear during the First Taiwan Strait Crisis of 1954 that nukes might be deployed. The conflict — including an eight-month bombardment of Nationalist-controlled Jinmen Island — is largely a footnote in contemporary cross-strait relations, though it hasn't been forgotten by the residents who lived through it.
The great China floods of 1931
This week, we look back to 1931, when maybe the worst of China's recent floods inundated an area the size of New England, affecting up to 50 million people.
The murder of Ma Xinyi
Who was Ma Xinyi? A governor-general born to a Muslim family and one the most powerful officials in the realm, Ma coordinated the exchange of technology and methods from Western advisers to the Qing army. On the morning of August 22, he was assassinated in Nanjing — for reasons that remain unconfirmed to this day.