The engineering state as superpower

Cheap, capricious, unreliable.

- SNEHA PATHAK

Reading the words “Made in China” on a product brought these words to mind not so long ago. But no more. With China now a hub of production and manufacturing for major companies across the globe, things today are different. Dan Wang's Breakneck: China’s Quest to Engineer the Future shows how far China has come in the fields of manufacturing and infrastructure and the price paid by its people to reach this point. It also compares China and America as they race towards embracing (in the case of China) and maintaining (in the case of the US) their role as global leaders and superpowers.Wang is a Canadian citizen who migrated from China at a young age with his parents, and later went on to work in the Silicon Valley. This, coupled with the fact that he has also lived and worked in China in the recent past, gives him a unique vantage point. He uses his firsthand knowledge of China and America to talk about both nations, and provides his readers with a glimpse of where these countries stand today and where they might go from here.