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Breaking the Engagement

How China Won & Lost America

Shambaugh

$54.95

Hardback

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English
Oxford University Press
20 November 2025
An internationally recognized scholar provides a powerful explanation of the Breaking the Engagement: How China Won & Lost America between the United States and China.

For over five decades following the 1972 rapprochement between the United States and China, the two countries seemed to be steadily building a sound relationship, even accounting for periodic setbacks like the Tiananmen Square massacre. The last decade, though, has seen a sharp increase in tensions and a complete reorientation of American policies toward ChinaDLfrom ""engagement"" to ""competition.""

What happened? In Breaking the Engagement: How China Won & Lost America, esteemed scholar David Shambaugh examines the evolution, expansion, and disintegration of the American engagement strategy towards China.

Shambaugh attributes the recent sharp deterioration of relations to a combination of China's actions and American expectations. Xi Jinping's increasingly assertive foreign policy and domestic repression has directly challenged American interests. More deeply, he argues that the real underlying cause is America's longstanding paternalistic approach to transform China into a liberal state and society which conforms with the US-led global liberal order. When China has generally evolved in this directionDL politically, economically, socially, intellectually, and internationallyDLit corresponds with American aspirations and the two could cooperate. But when Beijing pushes back against this transformative strategyDLwhich Beijing sees as subversionDLAmericans become disillusioned and U.S. policymakers see China as a malign regime, which must be countered.

By focusing on the role of perceptions and U.S. expectations in fueling the shift towards competition and rivalry in the last decade, Shambaugh provides a unique new perspective on this critical global relationship.
By:  
Imprint:   Oxford University Press
Country of Publication:   United States
Weight:   1g
ISBN:   9780197792421
ISBN 10:   0197792421
Publication Date:  
Audience:   Professional and scholarly ,  Undergraduate
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Active

David Shambaugh is an internationally recognized scholar and award winning author on contemporary China and the international relations of Asia. An active public intellectual and educator, he serves on numerous editorial boards, and has been a consultant to governments, research institutions, foundations, universities, corporations, and investment funds. He is currently the Gaston Sigur Professor of Asian Studies, Political Science, and International Affairs at George Washington University,and Distinguished Visiting Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University. He previously was Reader in Chinese Politics at the University of London's School of Oriental & African Studies (SOAS), where he also served as Editor of the prestigious journal The China Quarterly.

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