Dealing with China: An Insider Unmasks the New Economic Superpower

by Henry M. Paulson Jr.

superlatives.

much a source of concern as a source of awe. We find ourselves increasingly at cross purposes with an ever more competitive China as it flexes its newfound muscles in world markets and in bitter territorial disputes with its neighbors, while it seeks to challenge the U.S.-led order in Asia and in aspects of the system of global governance that has prevailed since World War II. Its government appears unwilling or unable to prevent the cybertheft of intellectual property from U.S. companies, and it is tightening its grip on Chinese society through an authoritarian, one-party system of government that Americans don’t understand and don’t like.

immutable

throngs

With savvy, willpower, and relentless pragmatism, he had shucked ideological chains to devise a unique brand of “socialism with Chinese characteristics,” introduced market principles, and encouraged individual enterprise throughout the economy, starting with agriculture and extending into industrial and financial areas.

eulogy

in the apparatus of the state

domiciles.

assiduously

unprepossessing

vermilion

sycamores

conifers,

m...

installed

austerity

exuded

choreography

ubiquitous

notch.”

revamp

interlocutors,

succinctly

Maneuvering to hold on to power,

For the first two-thirds of my life, China was as far from my mind as it was from my hometown of Barrington, Illinois (population 5,012). My grasp of the country was shallow and ill informed.

jackets buttoned to the neck,

harrowing.

bulldozers

These ideals and rights may or may not come, but they are more likely to be achieved with prosperity than with grinding poverty.

sucker

ardent

sideshow.

piggyback

venerable

incisiveness

iterations

nepotism

meritocracy

flabbergasted

minutiae

daunting

collegial

inertia.

impeccable

preternatural

dismissively

galling,

wily

rapport

Prospective