China's Uncertain Future

Drawing on his experience both as a scholar and as a diplomat stationed in China, Jean-Luc Domenach consults a wealth of archival and contemporary materials to examine China's current place in the world. He brings an intimate knowledge of the country to bear on a range of crucial issues, such as the growth (or deterioration) of China's economy, the government's ever-delayed democratization, the potential outcomes of a national political crisis, and the possible escalation of a revamped authoritarianism. His finely nuanced analysis captures the difficult decisions now confronting China's elite, who are under tremendous pressure to support an economy based on innovation and consumption, to establish a political system founded on law and popular participation, to rethink their national identity and spatial organization, and to define a more positive approach to the world's problems. Domenach ultimately reveals China to be much less secure than many would believe.

Based on his experience as a scholar and diplomat stationed in China, Jean-Luc Domenach consults a wealth of archival and contemporary materials to examine China's place in the world. A sympathetic yet critical observer, Domenach brings his intimate knowledge of the country to bear on a range of crucial issues, such as the growth (or deterioration) of China's economy, the government's ever-delayed democratization, the potential outcomes of a national political crisis, and the possible escalation of a revamped authoritarianism.

Domenach ultimately reads China's current progress as a set of easy accomplishments presaging a more difficult era of development. His finely nuanced analysis captures the difficult decisions now confronting China's elite, who are under tremendous pressure to support an economy based on innovation and consumption, establish a political system based on law and popular participation, rethink their national identity and spatial organization, and define a more positive approach to the world's problems. These leaders are also besieged by corruption among their ranks, an increasingly restless urban population, and a sharp decline in the country's demographic growth. Domenach taps into these anxieties and the attempt to alleviate them, revealing a China much less confident and secure than many would believe.

Jean-Luc Domenach is research director at Centre d'Etudes et de Recherche Internationales (CERI). He lived in Tokyo from 1970 to 1972 and served as the French cultural attaché in Hong Kong from 1976 to 1978. A former policy analyst at the Policy Planning Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, former director of CERI, and former vice president for research at Sciences Po, he spent five years in Beijing, where he created and led the Antenne Franco-Chinoise de Sciences Humaines et Sociales at Tsinghua University. Domenach is a regular columnist for Ouest-France, a member of the editorial board of Vingtième siècle, and a correspondent for L'Histoire, as well as a regular contributor to Politique internationale, Critique internationale, Pacific Review, and Asia Europe Journal.

Domenach's in-depth exploration of the complex issues facing China makes this a welcome addition to the literature.

Informed, accessible, engaging... highly recommended.

David A. Palmer, author of Qigong Fever: Body, Science, and Utopia in China:
This is the best general introduction to contemporary China I have read. Written for the layman in a lively, engaging style, China's Uncertain Future is grounded in solid scholarship and benefits from the perceptive eye of one of Europe's leading China experts.

Now that the world's most populous country has ceased to be an abstraction... French books are suddenly among the most down-to-earth. The latest is Jean-Luc Domenach's excellent La Chine m'inquiète, written after his stay in the country from 2002 to 2007. Through a hailstorm of statistics, an outline of contemporary China appears.... Domenach has a sharp nose for Chinese paradoxes.