Christopher Harding

Examines the privileged yet tightly controlled lives of North Korea’s elite as described in Jieun Baek’s book, highlighting luxurious living conditions contrasted with extreme surveillance, fear and internal psychological conflict. Interview testimonies reveal how elites navigate a system that rewards loyalty while punishing dissent, showing limited prospects for internal regime change despite growing dissatisfaction. The review notes Baek’s methodical approach, occasional academic dryness and the value of her insights into how the regime maintains stability through control, incentives and fear.

Kerry Brown’s biography of Mao Zedong explores the contradictions of the Chinese leader’s personality, ideology and rule, highlighting his talent for mass mobilisation, his rejection of compromise and the catastrophic consequences of his policies, including the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution. While Brown provides clear historical context and insight into Mao’s methods of shaping public consciousness, the review argues that the book lacks a vivid personal portrait and deeper psychological exploration. Despite its strengths in clarity and research, the biography leaves Mao elusive, reflecting the enduring difficulty of defining his motivations and legacy.

North Korea’s nuclear capabilities have grown dramatically over the past three decades, prompting Joel S Wit’s detailed examination of how US policy failed to prevent this outcome. His book traces six presidential administrations, criticizing Barack Obama for limited engagement and Donald Trump for impulsive diplomacy that derailed key talks in Hanoi. The collapse of negotiations led to renewed North Korean weapons testing, closer ties between Kim Jong-un and Vladimir Putin, and regional escalation in South Korea and Japan. While future diplomatic openings remain possible, prospects for North Korean denuclearisation are effectively nonexistent, with best-case scenarios limited to arms control and improved communication channels.

Gareth Williams’s book highlights the overlooked role of British scientists in the creation of the atomic bomb, arguing that early breakthroughs and significant contributions from figures such as Frisch, Peierls, and Chadwick were essential to the Manhattan Project’s success. The narrative weaves scientific development with wartime politics, depicting tensions in early Anglo-American cooperation and the urgency felt by refugee scientists fearing Nazi progress. Williams’s archival research supports the view that British expertise was indispensable to the bombs detonated in 1945, and the book is praised for its clarity, engaging explanations, and historical significance.

Richard Overy’s Rain of Ruin examines why US leaders believed the devastating firebombing and atomic attacks on Japan were necessary in 1945, tracing the strategic thinking, racial attitudes and moral rationalisations behind them. The book highlights how incendiary tactics were developed and justified, how atomic weapons were framed as military strikes, and how postwar revelations forced leaders to reconsider their earlier claims. It also explores Japan’s fractured leadership as the war neared its end. The reviewer finds Overy’s account compelling and morally probing, noting its relevance to ongoing debates about civilian targeting in warfare.

A new biography by Fyodor Tertitskiy argues that Soviet leaders’ early selection of Kim Il-sung shaped decades of repression, war and famine in North Korea. Drawing on multilingual sources, the book portrays Kim as an unremarkable man who became a dominant political figure through opportunism, nationalism and ruthless consolidation of power. It traces his navigation of Soviet and Chinese influence, his failed invasion of South Korea and his establishment of a hereditary regime that endures into the nuclear-armed present. The review praises the work’s clarity and depth while noting its limits in reconstructing Kim’s inner life.

A review of Jonathan Clements’s Rebel Island highlights Taiwan’s fragmented and contested history, tracing shifting control among indigenous groups, Chinese dynasties, Japanese colonial authorities and Nationalist forces. The book offers a counterpoint to modern portrayals of Taiwan as solely threatened by China, emphasizing long-standing external claims over the island and recent efforts to incorporate indigenous histories into Taiwan’s identity. Contemporary political tensions under Xi Jinping and Taiwan’s recent election underscore the island’s ongoing vulnerability despite attempts to assert a more inclusive national narrative.

Kawabata’s newly translated novel follows two half‑sisters navigating personal desires and shifting values in post‑war Japan, set against a backdrop of cultural transition in Kyoto. Through understated prose and scenes of natural beauty, the story captures a family’s tensions as older traditions fade and a new society emerges, offering a portrait of a country undergoing profound change.

A review of Chun Han Wong’s book examines Xi Jinping’s consolidation of power, anti‑corruption campaigns, legal reforms and increasing Party domination over Chinese society. It highlights the use of the CCDI as a central political tool, suppression of civil society, reshaping of historical narratives, and the severe consequences faced by critics such as Ren Zhiqiang. The review notes the book’s breadth and clarity while concluding that deeper insights into elite Chinese politics remain inaccessible due to pervasive state control.

A concise assessment of Lawrence James’s study of Sino‑British relations highlights the book’s swift narrative pace, balanced treatment of imperial history, and vivid character sketches spanning two centuries of diplomacy and conflict. The review notes occasional outdated terminology and limited attention to China’s internal cultural dynamics but praises the author’s clarity, focus and integration of wider geopolitical forces. The work’s restraint in forecasting future relations underscores its emphasis on historical patterns of power and realpolitik, leaving readers with a sober reflection on recurring global dynamics.

A review of Victor D Cha and Ramon Pacheco Pardo’s history of North and South Korea describes how geography, external powers and divergent political systems shaped the peninsula after 1945. It highlights the immense human and economic cost of division, contrasts the North’s early industrial coherence with the South’s later development, and examines scenarios for potential reunification. The authors note China’s strategic reluctance to relinquish its North Korean ally while identifying emerging market activity inside the North as a possible catalyst for change. The book argues that, despite major obstacles, unification could yield significant economic and geopolitical benefits.

A review of Mark Sedgwick’s survey of Traditionalism outlines the movement’s origins in René Guénon’s metaphysics, its critique of modernity, and its renewed political relevance through figures such as Aleksandr Dugin and Steve Bannon. The book maps Traditionalism’s core themes of self‑realisation, religion, and politics, along with its influence on thinkers including Julius Evola, Frithjof Schuon and Ananda Coomaraswamy. While praising Sedgwick’s clarity, the review notes that his caution limits deeper exploration of the movement’s metaphysical claims. The work is credited with clarifying connections between diverse contemporary figures such as Jordan Peterson and broader political currents, presenting Traditionalism as an enduring influence in current cultural and geopolitical debates.

Philip Snow’s history of Sino‑Russian relations traces four centuries of fluctuating cooperation and rivalry, showing how security interests and pragmatic self‑interest consistently shaped interactions more than ideology. Early diplomatic encounters, shifting power balances, cultural exchanges and the dynamics between key leaders such as Mao and Stalin illustrate a relationship marked by caution and periodic tension yet persistent strategic alignment. Under Putin and Xi, the partnership has deepened despite growing asymmetry, though emerging frictions remain. The book is presented as a thorough, readable account that offers historical grounding for understanding the modern geopolitical relationship.

British views of China shifted from 18th‑century admiration for chinoiserie to racialised stereotypes epitomised by Fu Manchu, a shift explored through Hannah Lowe’s poetry collections. Lowe examines the cultural legacy of Chinatown in Limehouse, the politics of Chinese wallpaper in historic estates and her own mixed Chinese‑Jamaican heritage. Her search for family roots highlights themes of migration, identity and the distortions created by Western fantasies about China.

Kevin Rudd’s book examines how Xi Jinping views China’s strategic priorities, arguing that many traits associated with his rule stem from deeper post‑Tiananmen political forces. It outlines China’s domestic imperatives, its expanding global ambitions, military modernization, and longstanding distrust of American intentions. Rudd warns that Taiwan remains the central flashpoint, with either conflict or failed deterrence posing grave risks to both China and the United States.

Testimonies and research presented in two books detail the structure and conditions of Xinjiang’s re‑education camps, describing surveillance technologies, forced ideological instruction and harsh confinement. Gulbahar Haitiwaji’s memoir offers a personal account of detention, interrogation and psychological strain, while Darren Byler’s analysis traces the state‑industry system enabling mass incarceration and pervasive monitoring. The accounts illustrate the scale of repression, the impact on Uyghur identity and the unresolved question of whether China’s re‑education strategy will achieve its intended aims.

The review examines Jing Tsu’s book on the challenges of adapting Chinese script to modern technologies from the 19th century to the digital age, highlighting difficulties posed by telegraphy, typewriters and computing, as well as cultural and political debates over Romanisation and simplification. It describes key innovators such as Zhao Yuanren and explores how China transformed linguistic and technological friction into a profitable modern system, reflecting renewed cultural confidence.

A review of two histories on the aftermath of the Pearl Harbor attack highlights how the strike was interpreted differently by Allied and Axis leaders, shaped by incomplete information and geopolitical uncertainty. Takuma Melber’s account examines Japan’s internal divisions and the miscalculations that led to war, while Brendan Simms and Charlie Laderman’s book argues that Hitler’s subsequent declaration of war on the United States proved more consequential than the attack itself. Both works explore global reactions, racial assumptions, and political anxieties as nations assessed the implications of America’s entry into the conflict.

A review of Gavin McCrea’s novel The Sisters Mao highlights its intertwining narratives of 1960s European radicalism and Jiang Qing’s political maneuvering in 1970s China. Through the stories of sisters Iris and Eva and the revolutionary actress Jiang Qing, the book explores the allure of radical ideologies and the blending of political, personal, and performative life. The review praises McCrea’s characterisation, dialogue, and ability to revitalize well‑known historical moments while allowing readers to interpret the parallels between East and West independently.

Ai Weiwei’s memoir pairs his 2011 detention with his father Ai Qing’s persecution under Mao, presenting parallel struggles for artistic freedom amid political repression. The book highlights the role of curiosity, integrity and activism in both men’s lives while vividly portraying the harshness of the Chinese security state and the Cultural Revolution. Although the narrative’s moral clarity is strong, the review notes that a fuller engagement with opposing perspectives could have deepened the work.