Men in the Middle

There is no time period or theme that promotes more engagement, by both Chinese historians and historians of China, than what the Peoples Republic of China describes as "the century of humiliation," the period of the "unequal treaties," in which first Qing and then Republican China found themselves penetrated systematically by external Great Powers – which then integrated China, on terms largely not of its own choosing, into a now global political economic order. This created the modern "China Question": how would an emerging China fit into a new world order that it entered through the intercessions of others? But there is at least one very important dimension that remains underexplored: the perceptions, policies, views, and agendas of the "metropolitan authorities" among the external Great Powers. This book will argue that it is enlightening to examine a particular kind of individual involved: one who worked in China, either as a sojourner or for a career, and, while in China, had a direct responsibility that moved in two directions: having to answer up to some sort of higher authority or body in their "home country," while also exercising direct responsibilities in China, including daily contact with the Chinese population.