A nuanced yet accessible primer on the forces that shape Chinese economic policies.
A former business executive surveys the history of Chinese economic growth.
As a marketing executive with Comcast and other television broadcast providers, Taylor struggled to make inroads with the “American Chinese” customer. Recognizing the general ignorance of Western advertisers regarding Chinese consumers, the author came to understand that the Confucian value of frugality requires businesses to prioritize the value of their products. Combining her decades of experience in the business sector with subsequent research and trips to China, Taylor offers American readers a primer on understanding Chinese economic growth and its underlying ideological basis. While much of the last half century has been shaped by Chinese/U.S. coexistence (in which “America provided the innovative breakthroughs” and China dominated manufacturing “by creating and controlling the world’s largest factory floor”), the two nations are divided by their underlying ideologies, asserts the author. While the American free enterprise system prioritizes capitalism and democracy, China’s economic philosophy, per Taylor, combines state capitalism with censorship and “digitally managed authoritarianism.” Divided into three parts, the book begins with an overview of Xi Jinping, who joins Deng Xiaoping as the major architect of China’s post-Mao economic boom. Leveraging his personal backstory, Xi tapped into a national hunger for the “Chinese Dream,” promising a new era of status and economic prosperity to a growing middle class. The book’s second section takes readers through a history of China from the Qing Dynasty (whose imperial might gave way to a “Century of Humiliation” at the hands of Western colonizers) to the economic programs of Mao, Deng, and Xi. Behind the Chinese Dream, Taylor notes, is an emphasis on “saving face” as Chinese leaders harken back to a pre-colonial era of Chinese cultural, political, and regional supremacy. The book’s final section offers a multi-chapter analysis of contemporary China, surveying the intersection of economic expansion with environmental degradation, human reproductive policies, and other issues.
This is a well-researched, insightful commentary on Chinese economic history and philosophy, informed by Taylor’s business savvy and supported by more than 500 endnotes. The author balances her keen observations with an accessible writing style. The text (minus endnotes) comes in at just over 200 pages and is accompanied by a wealth of graphs, charts, and other visual aids. Equally valuable is the book’s robust appendix, which features case studies on the Chinese production of entry-level sport utility vehicles and the clashes between globalism and censorship that characterize China’s relationships with Hollywood and the National Basketball Association. A selection of essays highlights the myriad of strategies, follies, and contradictions that drive Chinese economic policies. The author should be particularly commended for her emphasis on nuances that challenge broad Western assumptions about Chinese worldviews. Taylor’s analysis of Chinese communist leaders, for example, reveals striking differences between the outlooks of Mao and his successors, who were willing to accept economic inequalities as a mainstay of the national economy (“Some will get rich first,” the communist leader Deng once proclaimed as he embraced consumerism). The author also makes a convincing argument that it is imperative for Western businesses and policymakers to understand the ideologies that drive Chinese leaders as the world enters into a fourth industrial revolution centered on technology, global trade, and information.
A nuanced yet accessible primer on the forces that shape Chinese economic policies.Pub Date: Oct. 22, 2024
ISBN: 9798990803909
Page Count: 338
Publisher: TGM
Review Posted Online: Nov. 4, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A short, smart analysis of perhaps the most famous passage in American history reveals its potency and unfulfilled promise.
Words that made a nation.
Isaacson is known for expansive biographies of great thinkers (and Elon Musk), but here he pens a succinct, stimulating commentary on the Founding Fathers’ ode to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” His close reading of the Declaration of Independence’s second sentence, published to mark the 250th anniversary of the document’s adoption, doesn’t downplay its “moral contradiction.” Thomas Jefferson enslaved hundreds of people yet called slavery “a cruel war against human nature” in his first draft of the Declaration. All but 15 of the document’s 56 signers owned enslaved people. While the sentence in question asserted “all men are created equal” and possess “unalienable rights,” the Founders “consciously and intentionally” excluded women, Native Americans, and enslaved people. And yet the sentence is powerful, Isaacson writes, because it names a young nation’s “aspirations.” He mounts a solid defense of what ought to be shared goals, among them economic fairness, “moral compassion,” and a willingness to compromise. “Democracy depends on this,” he writes. Isaacson is excellent when explaining how Enlightenment intellectuals abroad influenced the founders. Benjamin Franklin, one of the Declaration’s “five-person drafting committee,” stayed in David Hume’s home for a month in the early 1770s, “discussing ideas of natural rights” with the Scottish philosopher. Also strong is Isaacson’s discussion of the “edits and tweaks” made to Jefferson’s draft. As recommended by Franklin and others, the changes were substantial, leaving Jefferson “distraught.” Franklin, who emerges as the book’s hero, helped establish municipal services, founded a library, and encouraged religious diversity—the kind of civic-mindedness that we could use more of today, Isaacson reminds us.
A short, smart analysis of perhaps the most famous passage in American history reveals its potency and unfulfilled promise.Pub Date: Nov. 18, 2025
ISBN: 9781982181314
Page Count: 80
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Aug. 29, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
A familiar format, but a timely reminder that cities are made up of individuals, each with their own stories.
Portraits in a post-pandemic world.
After the Covid-19 lockdowns left New York City’s streets empty, many claimed that the city was “gone forever.” It was those words that inspired Stanton, whose previous collections include Humans of New York (2013), Humans of New York: Stories (2015), and Humans (2020), to return to the well once more for a new love letter to the city’s humanity and diversity. Beautifully laid out in hardcover with crisp, bright images, each portrait of a New Yorker is accompanied by sparse but potent quotes from Stanton’s interviews with his subjects. Early in the book, the author sequences three portraits—a couple laughing, then looking serious, then the woman with tears in her eyes—as they recount the arc of their relationship, transforming each emotional beat of their story into an affecting visual narrative. In another, an unhoused man sits on the street, his husky eating out of his hand. The caption: “I’m a late bloomer.” Though the pandemic isn’t mentioned often, Stanton focuses much of the book on optimistic stories of the post-pandemic era. Among the most notable profiles is Myles Smutney, founder of the Free Store Project, whose story of reclaiming boarded‑up buildings during the lockdowns speaks to the city’s resilience. In reusing the same formula from his previous books, the author confirms his thesis: New York isn’t going anywhere. As he writes in his lyrical prologue, “Just as one might dive among coral reefs to marvel at nature, one can come to New York City to marvel at humanity.” The book’s optimism paints New York as a city where diverse lives converge in moments of beauty, joy, and collective hope.
A familiar format, but a timely reminder that cities are made up of individuals, each with their own stories.Pub Date: Oct. 7, 2025
ISBN: 9781250277589
Page Count: 480
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: Aug. 1, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2025
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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