During the recent Olympic Games a common cliché was to talk about China’s “coming out party,” meaning that China was finally opening out to the world. The key point of my book is that China has been fully open to the world before, even if an avalanche of propaganda has managed to consign a very complex and dynamic pre-revolutionary regime to oblivion. The term “warlord” immediately conjures up a time of chaos, war, famine, invasion, rampant inflation and instability. Sympathetic observers of China’s current regime all too easily forget how village elections, free speech, women’s suffrage, the rule of law and a multi-part system were all firmly entrenched before the advent of communism. China before Mao was not a model republic—it suffered from government crises open for all to see. But China before Mao compared well with other countries at the time—and was more open and accountable than China today.Participatory politics and political diversity expanded hugely from 1900 onwards, starting with an electorate of 40 million in 1912 - a popular representation of some 10 per cent of the population which would not be achieved by Japan until 1928 and by India until 1935. Chinese provinces held legislative elections with electorates of varying sizes and complexities. This culminated, despite many setbacks, in a fully democratic constitution by 1947. Despite many abuses of judicial independence – openly noted and discussed by contemporary critics – important strides were also made in implementing legal reforms and building the rule of law. China produced a crop of jurists with international renown, some serving as judges at the International Court of Justice in The Hague.The openness of China’s borders meant that both people and ideas flowed back and forth, creating an air of cosmopolitanism. There was a craze for foreign languages. A foreign lawyer noted at the time that “There is certainly no capital in continental Europe where so many members of the government speak English fluently.” Not surprisingly: many had degrees from Cambridge, Oxford, Columbia or Berkeley. They enthusiastically participated in various international forums, such as the League of Nations, and pushed for the country’s adherence to unusually liberal agreements - for instance in the treatment of prisoners.The roll call of important intellectuals from pre-revolution China, including leading women physicists, is by any measure impressive. Where sociology would be snuffed out by the dogma of Marxist-Leninism after 1949, the field was on par with those in Europe and the United States. The art scene flourished, including film and photography, jazz being so popular that Shanghai was seen as the jazz Mecca.Recent research simply does not support the previous image of China as ravaged by “imperialism” and “economic collapse.” Modern factory methods were imported, commercial law was created, and a stock exchange opened in 1921. Openness contributed to sustained economic growth over almost half a century in both the city and the countryside, until the outbreak of the Sino-Japanese War in 1937.There is no denying that the Sino-Japanese War from 1937 onwards was horrendous. But the real destruction was to follow in the years after 1945, as the forces gathered under Mao with the support of Stalin would have finished off even the best of governments.