Breakneck: China's Quest to Engineer the Future

“Breakneck reads as a warning. The book’s title seems to refer to China’s speedy growth. But it might also apply to the US; after all, it’s what can happen when you slip.”
― Christopher Beam, Bloomberg

“For a political center struggling to reconcile fear and envy, Dan Wang’s Breakneck may be a breakthrough.”
― n+1

“[Wang] deftly mixes data-rich analysis with vivid personal anecdotes and punchy opinions. His book is both a fascinating exploration of China’s strengths and weaknesses, as well as a searing critique of how a self-harming American leadership could lose the technological arms race to its rival. “
― John Thornhill, Financial Times

“Urgent… It forces Americans to confront a lingering question: How did the U.S. lose its ability to build, and can it reclaim that capacity today? It’s a book with China in the title, but America at its heart. “
― Vincent Ni, NPR

“A landmark work. . . Wang’s writing is lucid, his insights are original, and his ability to bridge empirical observation with philosophical reflection makes this book essential reading for anyone concerned with the strategic implications of China’s rise.”
― Jean-Thomas Nicole, The Cipher Brief

“If you want to know what is driving today’s China or America, Chinese-Canadian analyst Dan Wang’s new book is an indispensable guide. Wang shows that the world’s most urgent and challenging twenty-first-century task may be to forge a synthesis of the best of China and America, while avoiding the worst of each.”
― J. Bradford DeLong, Project Syndicate

“Easily one of the best books on China published this year… Wang has written that rare thing: a book on China that avoids the clichés and conventions of the genre and that is based on first-hand knowledge instead of impressions gleaned from reading English-language sources from abroad.”
― Yuan Yi Zhu, The Times

“A new theory of China’s rise… Illuminating… The “engineering state” is a useful way to think about industrial competition between America and China. “
― Economist

“Wang brings curiosity, open-mindedness and intellectual rigour to this book, along with a sympathy and admiration for both China and the US.”
― Denis Staunton, Irish Times

“An illuminating account of China’s dizzying rise and its deepening pathologies.”
― Chris Miller, author of Chip War

“The best recent book on China, on China and America, and arguably the best book of the year flat out. It is marvelously written and brilliantly understands the dilemmas of our modern world.”
― Tyler Cowen

“Dan Wang is an indispensable voice on China issues because he has the rarest combination of precious resources: deep knowledge and unflinching judgment. Half of his mind runs on philosophy; the other half runs on engineering. If Dan did not already exist, we would need to invent him for precisely this day and age.”
― Evan Osnos, author of Age of Ambition

“Dan Wang is able to illuminate China like no one else, and his annual letters have long been mandatory reading in Silicon Valley. Breakneck expands this analysis and delivers a simultaneously riveting and revelatory account of one of the most important topics of our time.”
― Patrick Collison, CEO of Stripe

“Simply one of the best China writers out there. . . an incredibly thoughtful, holistic and engaging work on one of the biggest stories of our time.”
― Tracy Alloway, co-host of Bloomberg’s Odd Lots podcast

“In analyzing China, Wang’s vivid, often autobiographical reporting delivers.”
― City Journal

“A timely meditation on technology and governance―and a rollicking read, to boot.”
― Eva Dou, author of House of Huawei

“A must-read book on the intense competition between the United States and China for global leadership in the twenty-first century.”
― Julian Gewirtz, former White House Senior Director for China and Taiwan Affairs and author of Never Turn Back

“A brilliant book about how China got ahead, how the United States stagnated, and the challenges that both will face in the future.”
― Odd Arne Westad, professor of history at Yale University and co-author of The Great Transformation: China’s Road from Revolution to Reform

“Dan Wang comes bearing an uncomfortable truth that Americans need to hear: China builds, while America argues. And if we don’t change that situation, and learn how to build things again, China is going to win the next century.”
― Noah Smith, writer at Noahpinion

“Dan Wang is one of the deepest thinkers and most careful observers of the world that I know. His letters are extremely thought-provoking and worth the read.”
― Ben Thompson, founder of Stratechery

“China outpaces and outproduces the United States in a growing number of high-tech fields. With his trademark mix of personal observation and objective analysis, Dan Wang explains not only what is happening, but why. The result is a tour de force essential for policymakers, academics, investors and entrepreneurs.
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― Rush Doshi, assistant professor of security studies at Georgetown University and C.V. Starr senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations