"In this hard-hitting exposé, Ian Williams demonstrates how the Chinese Communist Party’s obsession with exercising uncontested power has led to pervasive corruption and unintended consequences for China's own population and the world at large." — Nigel Inkster, former director of operations and intelligence, MI6

State capitalism. Socialism with Chinese characteristics. A socialist market economy. There have been numerous descriptions of the Chinese economy. However, none seems to capture the predatory, at times surreal, nature of the economy of the world’s most populous nation – nor the often bruising and mind-bending experience of doing business with the Middle Kingdom.

Rules and agreements mean little. Markets are distorted, statistics fabricated, foreign industrial secrets and technology systematically stolen. Companies and entrepreneurs, at home and abroad, are bullied – often with the collusion of the victims themselves. The Party is in every boardroom and lab, with businesses thriving or dying at its will.

All this is part of realising President Xi Jinping’s ambition of China becoming the world’s pre-eminent economic, technological and military power.

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• 1. The Death Star Canteen
• 2. The Myth of ‘Reform and Opening’
• 3. The Counterfeit Culture
• 4. Lies, Damned Lies and Communist Party Statistics
• 5. Ghostly Monuments to Economic Madness
• 6. To Get Rich is Glorious – and Dangerous
• 7. Escape to Singapore
• 8. China’s Criminal Empire on the Mekong
• 9. Smash the Sparrows!
• 10. A Thousand Grains of Sand
• 11. The Long Reach of the Party
• 12. Kicking the China Habit
• 13. The Limits of ‘Made in Vietnam’
• 14. Apple’s China Addiction
• 15. China Rocks!
• 16. Hong Kong’s Descent into Tyranny
• 17. The Humiliation of the World’s Local Bank
• 18. Football Fantasy
• 19. Can China Innovate?
• 20. Carbon Capture
• 21. Autocrats United
• 22. The Vampire State
• Notes
• Index