When a Billion Chinese Jump: How China Will Save Mankind -- Or Destroy It (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9781416580768)

As a young child, Jonathan Watts believed if everyone in China jumped at the same time, the earth would be shaken off its axis, annihilating mankind. Now, more than thirty years later, as a correspondent for The Guardian in Beijing, he has discovered it is not only foolish little boys who dread a planet-shaking leap by the world's most populous nation. When a Billion Chinese Jump is a road journey into the future of our species. Traveling from the mountains of Tibet to the deserts of Inner Mongolia via the Silk Road, tiger farms, cancer villages, weather-modifying bases, and eco-cities, Watts chronicles the environmental impact of economic growth with a series of gripping stories from the country on the front line of global development. He talks to nomads and philosophers, entrepreneurs and scientists, rural farmers and urban consumers, examining how individuals are trying to adapt to one of the most spectacular bursts of change in human history, then poses a question that will affect all of our lives: Can China find a new way forward or is this giant nation doomed to magnify the mistakes that have already taken humanity to the brink of disaster?

Author: Jonathan S. Watts
ISBN-10: 141658076X
ISBN-13: 9781416580768
Publisher: Scribner Book Company
Language: English
Published: 10/26/2010
Pages: 448
Format: Paperback
Weight: 0.97lbs
Size: 8.97h x 6.04w x 1.03d

Review Citation(s):
Publishers Weekly 07/19/2010
Kirkus Reviews 08/15/2010
Booklist 09/15/2010 pg. 8
Library Journal 11/01/2010 pg. 80
Choice 09/01/2011