LAUSR

made-in-China” twelve-thousand-ton hydraulic forging press in 1962, when Chinese engineers lacked the advanced facilities to cast, ovens to heat, and cranes to lift its huge columns and beams; the success spoke to the ingenuity of Chinese socialist business. My two main criticisms of Scranton’s book are its limited consideration of the “fear factor” behind socialist enterprises and its lack of spatial analysis. Apprehension—of being reported as “unrevolutionary/ unproductive”—could drive people into hard work as effectively as inspiration during the Mao years. Furthermore, although the book mentions over one hundred enterprises named after cities or towns, there is little spatial discussion as to where these factories and farms are concentrated within China’s twelve macroeconomic and frontier regions. The lone map in the book only shows general provincial boundaries and capitals. These flaws aside, this eleventh book of Scranton’s exemplifies a veteran scholar’s efforts to lead by example. Mining the newly available online archival collections, Scranton speaks with joy that “the wall obstructing scholarly access has crumbled,” and he answers his own critique of Western-dominated business history field by demonstrating the considerable scope of insights that business historians could provide despite language barriers (p. 384). His studies on Mao-era Chinese trials and errors humanize the “communists”who seemed feverishly self-dependent and unbusinesslike. Finally, his research strikes a chord in Generation Z-ers who grew up witnessing challenges to America’s world leadership and are naturally interested in China and the non-Western trajectory it embodies. Taking Scranton’s lead, we readers probably have little excuse to not step out of our comfortable territories and flex our brains.