Hidden Harmonies China Blog

If I have to pick three books for Western readers that best explains modern China, I would recommend Shaun Rein‘s recently released book, “The End of Cheap China: Economic and Cultural Trends That Will Disrupt the World.” (Also, see my interview with the author earlier this year.) The book draws heavily on Rein’s personal experience working and living in China. During one of his early trips in China in the 90s, visiting Changchun, he recounts being propositioned by a beautiful prostitute. Over the years, he has noticed a gradual “uglification” of the prostitution pool. He attributes that to the general trend of economic expansion in China where women are increasingly finding better job opportunities. Read more…

We recently noticed a peculiar phenomenon over at the China Law Blog. Since about two weeks ago, they started publishing a series of articles with the title, “The End of Cheap China,” followed by something else. We also know Shaun Rein has been marketing his book for months now – “The End of Cheap China.” (Allen will be writing a review, by the way.) The interesting thing is that the China Law Blog makes no mention of the book whatsoever in their series of articles.

Now, do a search on “The End of Cheap China” on Google. Unsurprisingly, the book shows up at the top due to Amazon’s, Rein’s, and the publisher’s marketing efforts. However, look at the next five top search results (#2 through #6) from Google (results were at the time of this writing): Read more…