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Sales rank 65,746
Customers rating (based on 49 reviews)
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Mr. China tells the rollicking story of a young man who goes to China with the misguided notion that he will help bring the Chinese into the modern world, only to be schooled by the most resourceful and creative operators he would ever meet. Part memoir, part parable, Mr. China is one man's coming-of-age story where he learns to respect and admire the nation he sought to conquer.
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| Publisher | Harper Paperbacks | | Release date | 03/2006 | | Availability | Usually ships in 24 hours | | Edition | Paperback |
| | List price | $14.95 | | Our price | $10.76 (you save 28.03%) | | Used price | from $3.47 |
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 China
The book is billed as "funny," but its detail makes it tedious. Funny is better ascribed to "Lost on Planet China."
 Very good introduction to the "Chinese system"
I really liked this book. The author describes in details the traps on the way of foreign investors in China. He worked on a huge US investment project that was also described in other books by other authors.
But it is more than that. It is about the "system" behind Chinese business, and how foreigners will never fully understand it with their own logic. The analyses of Chinese culture and the awareness of the Chinese people as part of an exclusive club ring very true, too.
An entertaining and insightful read.
For a truly insightful and entertaining look into business in China just as China was opening up her market to the world -- in the early 80's and 90's -- give this book a try. Even non-business types will enjoy hearing about Clissold's travails as he wields multi-million dollar contracts into the gauntlet of Chinese capitalism, intent on being the Mr. China of his generation. What he didn't count on, however, was the craftiness of his Chinese business allies turned rivals, as they try every trick to gain an upper-hand in their business dealings. Some of these struggles are truly epic, and Clissold can't help but come out of these dealings a changed man. However, instead of being bitter and jaded, he comes out with respect, empathy, and appreciation for China and its people. This is a book that reminds us, even in the face of cultural differences, we are all the same.
Investing in Chinese Factories
"Mr. China" is a collection of vignettes of real-life misadventures by Wall Street in its drive to invest and profit from China's production abilities in the 1990's; attempts to make profit from investing in the "one billion three." Here, the author is the first person protagonist as he tries to supervise his many venture factories.
Every possible disaster ensued: flooding; national economic downturns; international incidents. Personnel problems topped the list. The Chinese directors manage to do everything possible to sink their own ships perhaps while making new ones: resist modern efficiency; embezzle; set up competing businesses; spend millions on fruitless unauthorized enterprises and to play the government and the courts against their foreign partners. The disasters drove the author, via stress, to near death.
The book is an effort to convey and to understand what happened. The surprising conclusion of the book is that the author believes the business mismatch of East and West, when looked at from the Chinese perspective, shows, in fact, the strength of the Chinese character: in times of trouble, to look to the short term and seize advantage when offered. In the end the author became life long friends with many of his adversaries.
The book seemed long on disasters and short on solid insight. But the book can serve well as a cautionary tale to today's investors in China's industries.
Great For Any Developing Country Direct Investor
Mr. China, with great humor, is what happens when direct investors become infatuated with (1) the 'development potential' of a stable, intelligent, resource-laden emerging market country (particularly a communist one) and (2) their own messiah-like potential to bequeath prosperity to the country's impoverned people. With a terribly poor understanding of Chinese law enforcement, politics/communism, culture and very limited Chinese relationships, they begin rapidly investing in China eager to beat others to the punch. Inevitably they learn that (1) 'controlling investor' entails more than 51% equity ownership, (2) only enforceable rules count, (3) rules aren't enforceable unless you're better connected to the CCP, (4) communism isn't just a theory; it's a lifestyle, (5) if you are a well-intentioned humanist on the inside but look/act like a reincarnated imperialist, guess what people see, and (6) yes, all the normal precautions of private equity investing in fact cannot be ignored for the sake of speed, culture or quasi-charity.
Great read for anyone interested in direct investing / business management in China or simply emerging markets in general.
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