In this book, Fallows attempts to give us panoramic views of contemporary China.
Here's the summary from Spence's review:
What then is of enduring interest in Fallows’ observations about China? First, he has created portraits that illuminate the fragility and hustle of the Chinese pattern of growth, its constantly shifting boundaries, reminding us that nothing of this current growth should be seen as permanent. Fallows rightly emphasizes the deeply rooted poverty and the accompanying perils and opportunities that are present in China’s bypassed far-western regions. He shows us — for China’s economic life as a whole, and in response to global patterns — that China’s strength is not just that it is cheap but that it is fast. He shows us how unclear China’s goals are, how opaque its political system remains, how messy and ineffective and arbitrary its social controls can be. At the same time, he shows the remarkable inventiveness and energy that China’s entrepreneurs can bring to global competition. Perhaps most important to Fallows (and to us), he shows that the worst thing the United States can do is to cut itself off from China’s skills and opportunities.
For Fallows, the effort that the United States should (and must) make is to open itself to the Chinese, to develop the areas where mutual cooperation is feasible and valuable, to respect China’s brainpower and do everything possible to recreate the United States in Chinese minds as a focus for research and a potential source of fruitful collaboration. The venues for this collaboration range from basic agriculture to banking, from global warming and the conservation of natural resources to the reconfiguring of Chinese views of their own future. If China has taught him one key thing, Fallows suggests, it’s that a meeting of the minds from both societies is essential to the well-being of all.
