Tea War

“Mr Liu ranges widely in his carefully researched and well-crafted narrative. He is most concerned with the conduct and impact of the tea trade, but punctuates the story of profit and exploitation with fascinating cultural titbits.”—The Economist

“Maritime historians interested in capitalism studies will find it rewarding to read Liu’s brilliant (re)interpretations of political-economy theories.”—Dan Du, International Journal of Maritime History

“Liu’s analysis is thoughtful and based upon a careful study of a specific industry in specific localities. . . . Liu’s views offer a clear and well-structured discussion of the tea industry in both countries, as well as the larger issues of global capitalism and colonialism in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.”—Morris Rossabi, Journal of Chinese Studies

“Liu’s account also shows how a sensitivity to the way the Global South historically experienced capitalism pushes us to rethink what capitalism essentially is. . . . [His] analysis enables us to detect the entanglements between anti-imperial nationalism and capitalism in the Global South.”—Yueran Zhang, Jacobin

“Thoroughly engaging. . . . Liu’s work is both highly original and commendable. In the way he has both transcended area studies and challenged conventional notions of global capitalism, Liu has provided a blueprint for other scholars.”—Steven Ivings, Middle Ground Journal

“Tea War has much to offer. . . . [Its] greatest strength is its rooting of the development of Chinese philosophical and nationalist economic theories in the changes in south and east Asian economies over the time period.”—Kit Wainer, World History Connected

Winner of the 2022 Ralph Gomory Prize, sponsored by the Business History Conference

Longlisted for the International Convention of Asia Scholars’ Prize for the Best Book in the Humanities, sponsored by the International Convention of Asia Scholars (ICAS)

“Tea War is not only a detailed comparative history of the transformation of tea production in the 19th and early 20th centuries, but it also intervenes in larger debates about the nature of capitalism, global modernity, and global history.”— Alexander F. Day, Occidental College

“In Tea War, Andy Liu grapples with the question of how to write the history of capitalism beyond the North Atlantic. His comparative study of two Asian frontier regions presses us to rethink the conventional signposts around which the history of capitalism has conventionally been written. He shows how careful empirical inquiry and social theory can inform each other in innovative and exciting ways.”—Andrew Sartori, New York University

“Andy Liu’s Tea War opens worlds by closing in on the processes of tea production in nineteenth-century India and China. Liu’s contentions about capitalism provoke; his meticulous empirical excavations persuade.”—Rebecca E. Karl, New York University