This book studies China’s diplomatic philosophy, strategies and engagements before, during and after the First World War. The author focuses on how pressures from domestic politics shaped the Nationalist government’s foreign policies in the years leading up to the war, the implications of China’s declaration of neutrality at the beginning of the war, and how the government navigated the treacherous international landscape in the early postwar period. Some of the specific issues discussed include the dispatch of the Chinese Labor Corps, diplomatic relations with Germany, troop dispatch to Siberia, and China’s role in the Paris Peace Conference. The book offers a fresh look at China’s efforts to protect its national interests in an uncertain and hostile international environment.

Zhongjun Hou is professor and doctoral supervisor at the School of History, University of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, researcher at the Institute of Modern History of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, and director of the Modern Sino-Foreign Relations History Research Office. Hou heads the eponymous research team at the Chinese Academy of History and is a member of the Academic Committee of the Institute of Frontier Studies of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. Hou has been a visiting scholar at the British Academy and the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. Hou’s research focuses on the history of China’s foreign relations in the modern period and the diplomatic history of New Democracy.