As a consensus develops that China is the main strategic competitor to the United States and poses a paramount security threat to the West, a realistic understanding of China's political economy is more important than ever. Over the past four decades, Western policymakers and analysts have been more often wrong than right in their forecasts about China.
A cottage industry of books has warned of a coming showdown or second Cold War with China. As U.S. President Joe Biden considers how to formulate a more nuanced China policy to replace the failed strategy of his predecessor, President Donald Trump, two recent books provide well-informed insights into China's political economy: Thomas Orlik's "The Bubble That Never Pops," and Grzegorz W. Kolodko's "China and the Future of Globalization: The Political Economy of China's Rise."
