If you are going to read one book about China’s perilous transition from the eighteenth to the nineteenth centuries, it should be Wang’s White Lotus Rebels and South China Pirates. Clearly written and theoretically informed, the book does far more than its title promises. In showing how the court of the Jiaqing Emperor (1796–1820) responded to the crises of the turn of the nineteenth century, it explains how the Qing dynasty turned away from the grandly assertive style of the Qianlong reign (1736–1796) to the more restrained and ultimately effective political style of the nineteenth century. Throughout their rule in China, the Manchus, leaders of the Qing dynasty, demonstrated an ability to adapt Chinese political institutions to meet the needs that they perceived, and this account amply demonstrates their continued ability in the early nineteenth century.
Like all good imperial history, this book describes both the center and the...