{"id":13468,"date":"2024-01-02T06:30:02","date_gmt":"2024-01-02T06:30:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/focus.cbbc.org\/?p=13468"},"modified":"2025-04-23T09:03:26","modified_gmt":"2025-04-23T09:03:26","slug":"best-china-books-2023","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/focus.cbbc.org\/best-china-books-2023\/","title":{"rendered":"The best books about China from 2023"},"content":{"rendered":"

Every month at FOCUS, we look at a different new book on China and talk to the author. From history to economics, business case studies to geo-politics \u2013 the successful business person in China needs to grasp all these elements. So this year, we\u2019ve examined books ranging in topic from Xiconomics to local entrepreneurship, Big Tech to China\u2019s changing cities \u2013 and even some Christmas food ideas from Fuchsia Dunlop. Read on for a handy summary all in one place …<\/p>\n

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January<\/strong> \u2013 We started the year chatting with Ning Ken, author of Zhong Guan Village: Tales from the Heart of China’s Silicon Valley<\/em><\/a>, about the birth, development and future of a village on the periphery of China\u2019s capital that has become a major cluster of tech and innovation to rival California\u2019s Silicon Valley.<\/p>\n

February<\/strong> \u2013 We talk a lot about Big Tech in China, but since the start of the reform and opening up process in 1978, it\u2019s often been local entrepreneurs, many in obscure and remote rural locations, that have driven the economy by using technology to reinvent their businesses and themselves. So we spoke with Lin Zhang, author of Labor of Reinvention, Entrepreneurship in the New Chinese Digital Economy<\/em><\/a>, about everything from co-working spaces to \u201cTaobao Villages\u201d.<\/p>\n

March<\/strong> \u2013 China\u2019s cities continue to grow, sprawl and burgeon, but they\u2019re also changing in subtle but important ways. Weiping Wu and Qin Gao\u2019s collection China Urbanizing: Impacts and Transitions<\/em><\/a> looks at how everything from demographic shifts to climate change are affecting China\u2019s megalopolises.<\/p>\n

April<\/strong> \u2013 The relationship between China and Russia remains one that goes through ups and downs \u2013 from becoming a potential bloc against the \u201cWest\u201d to hard and fast Frenemies. The war in Ukraine and China\u2019s slowing economy are both shaping that relationship. Philip Snow produced a massive history of the relationship this year, entitled China and Russia: Four Centuries of Conflict and Concord<\/em><\/a>, and we talked about the tensions between Moscow and Beijing post-USSR, the era of Xiconomics and Putin\u2019s war in Ukraine.<\/p>\n