Remaking China Policy

“The authors of this book…studied China, including its language, and acquired a proper humility. During a decade of work on China policy they have trained themselves to think like historians…dealing with the future, since policy is the effort to influence the future before it becomes history. What they offer us is a case study of ‘how to make policy in conditions of great uncertainty.’ …They are men worth following… They offer to teach us a way of thinking about China policy, a way that is imaginative, thorough, and as objective as possible… Remaking China Policy, in short, is a seminal study that sets in motion ideas that may outdistance even the authors… Plainly they are hardbitten optimists, determined to keep on trying, good men to go along and argue with.”—John K. Fairbank, Director of the East Asian Research Center, Harvard University

“Remaking China Policy is a unique and valuable book. It…is in essence a memorandum for the President… As such a paper should—but too seldom does—it analyzes almost brutally the complexity, the uncertainties, the political constraints and risks involved in the course of action suggested… This book [gives] the general public a rare insight into the process whereby important decisions of foreign policy are made… It should suggest that there is—or at least can be— an objective, reflective, and rational decisionmaking process… Both Mr. Moorsteen and Mr. Abramowitz are experienced bureaucrats as well as China experts… Both have been directly responsible for foreign policy decisions of the United States… Whether [the president] agrees with [this book’s] conclusions or not, he is much too perceptive to ignore them.”—Nicholas deB. Katzenbach, former Undersecretary of State