Recasting the Imperial Far East: Britain and America in China, 1945-1950 (review)

Reviews 575 traits, but they give a sense ofcontext, and with captions they show, for the first time, the names and faces the people who maintain the tradition ofjiangnan sizhu. Since most ofthe readers ofthis monograph will be ethnomusicologists, the attention to the perspective ofthe traditional, amateur Jiangnan sizhu musicians is all the more important. It is easy for folk musicians to get lost in the exchange between American ethnomusicologists and scholars in Chinese conservatories when both are engaged in research among the "masses." Witzleben, thankfully, does not allow that to happen, and offends no one while objectivelylifting the silk curtain and giving us a peek inside to what this ensemble music really means to the Chinese people who are the tradition bearers. Terry Liu Terry Liu researched erhu ar the Shanghai Conservatory ofMusic in 1984-1985, and has since worked as a "public sector" ethnomusicologist at the National Endowment for theArts, Folk and Traditional Arts Program. In November 1996, he began serving as TraditionalArts Coordinatorfor the Public Corporationfor theArts, LongBeach Regional Arts Council, in LongBeach, California. mi Lanxin Xiang. Recasting the ImperialFarEast: Britain andAmerica in China, 1945-1950. Armonk, New York: M. E. Sharpe, 1995. xi, 259 pp. Hardcover $65.95, 1SBN 1-56324-459-4. Paperback $24.95, ISBN 1-56324-460-8. Few areas ofresearch in the history ofinternational relations pose more difficulties than postwar China because ofthe latter's unique geopolitical position in relation to the origins ofthe Cold War in East Asia. Historians ofthis era usually focus their research on the Soviet-American rivalry, but the end of the Cold War now challenges the dominant historiography with questions about the involvement ofother countries with China at the beginning ofthis period. Recasting the Imperial Far East offers a timely new perspective in understanding international relations with China from the end ofWorld War II to the founding of the People's Republic. Based on extensive multiarchival research utilizing British Foreign Service records and U.S. State Department documents, Lanxin Xiang moves y niversity ^ stU(jy away C101n fae usuai q0\¿ War approach and instead focuses on the relatively neglected area ofAnglo-American relations. With its fresh insights into the activities ofthe United States in East Asia, this book should be read by both ofHawai'i Press 576 China Review International: Vol. 3, No. 2, Fall 1996 specialists and nonspecialists who have an interest in U.S. foreign policy toward China or in international relations in East Asia generally. The book follows a historical approach, beginning in the first chapter with an examination of the "strong China" controversy in early 1945, showing that the United States and Great Britain did not collaborate on a China policy due to their different long-term interests and strategic visions: the United States was engaged in a quest for hegemony while Britain desired "to restore the balance ofpower" in East Asia (p. 31). Xiang argues that the British viewed America's anti-empire campaign as "foreign" interference in Britain's "domestic" affairs. His second chapter deals with the Japanese surrender, when the Anglo-American dispute "entered a new phase" in which the Americans did not want to see the British in China, even though the British at the end of 1945 decided "to play second fiddle" (p. 69). The Marshall Mission to China, British-American economic competition in Shanghai, and their different policies toward Southeast Asia in 1946 are the topics of the next chapter. Chapter 4 is devoted to the Chinese civil war, Chiang Kai-shek's regime, and the difficulties faced by his Nationalist Party in 1947, "a period of great uncertainty ," involving many regional problems in such areas as Hong Kong, Manchuria , and East China. Comparing the policies of the United States and Britain, Xiang believes that Britain had a "more flexible and realistic China policy—one that was tantamount to letting the Chinese stew in their own juice" (p. no). Although 1948 saw the Communist Party expand its strength and influence in China, the fifth chapter reveals that the Soviet Union "was not actively involved" in China's internal strife and "contributed surprisingly little to this Anglo-American dispute over China" (p. 142). An open split between the...