Abstract: In its reconstruction of evolving US positions on key issues in the relationship with China, this book is able to explain the change in American–Chinese relations after 1949 from hostility to rapprochement, and to the full normalization of ties in 1979. The author then goes on to examine the relationship after normalization, a period when the United States has come to view China as less of a challenge, but still resistant to certain norms of the current international order. After an introductory chapter, the next three chapters of the book examine US efforts to build, and then maintain an international and domestic consensus behind its China policy, noting the steady erosion of support in both policy arenas. The next four chapters look at changing US perceptions of China’s capabilities, and show how US officials came to have a deeper appreciation of the overall restraints on Beijing’s power, especially as a result of the Sino-Soviet rift and the failure of policies associated with the Great Leap Forward. Finally, in the last chapter, it examines the effects on the relationship of China’s fuller exposure after 1979 to the ideas and values that predominate in the global system. Whilst many previous explanations of US relations with China have given primacy to the conditioning influence of the strategic triangle, this book recognizes the need to embed an understanding of American–Chinese relations within a wider structure of relationships at the global and domestic levels.

Keywords: American—Chinese relations, China, domestic policy, Great Leap Forward, history, international policy, Sino-Soviet rift, United States