China Matters: Getting It Right for Australia

'Cuts through the volatile mix of hype, hysteria and complacency surrounding the Middle Kingdom in Australia to sketch out a nuanced road map for dealing with Asia's rising super power.' --Richard McGregor 'Australians must learn to live with China's power. This is simply the best all-round guide we have for how to do this.' --Hugh White 'For all its modern gloss, China is scarcely less strangely and severely governed by today's communist elite than it was under imperial dynasties. Yet its connections and influence have already become ubiquitous in Australia today, bringing great opportunity but also risk. This should command the educated attention of all Australians. That is why China matters. That is why China Matters matters.' --Rowan Callick, author of Party Time: Who Runs China and How 'For an Australia increasingly divided between a reliance on China for its future prosperity, and an apprehension about what a powerful China means for its security and values, China Matters is a timely intervention. Deeply knowledgeable, engagingly argued, and most importantly wise and balanced, this book should be read by all Australians who think seriously about their country's future.' --Michael Wesley, author of Restless Continent: Wealth, Rivalry and Asia's New Geopolitics 'Jakobson and Gill avoid the common twin traps of China analysis. They are not romantic or rabid. They offer a timely realism. This book helps brace Australia for a tricky future with a great, rising power that we need to understand.' --Peter Hartcher, author of The Sweet Spot: How Australia Made Its Own Luck - And Could Now Throw It All Away

Linda Jakobson is an award-winning, internationally recognised author of six books on China. A Mandarin speaker, she worked as a researcher and policy adviser in China for 22 years before moving to Sydney in 2011 to become East Asia Program Director at the Lowy Institute. In 2015 she founded China Matters, an Australian public policy initiative. A Finnish national she is a permanent resident of Australia.

introduction: why this book? by bates gill and linda jakobson, 1-the china dream: return of the middle kingdom by linda jakobson, 2-social change: will the political fabric unravel? by linda jakobson, 3-china's economic transition: will it succeed? by arthur r. kroeber, 4-the soft side of chinese power: projecting influence abroad by bates gill, 5-chinese hard power: how will china use its growing strength? by bates gill, 6-getting it right for australia by bates gill and linda jakobson