Claws of the Panda tells the story of Canada’s failure to construct a workable policy towards the People’s Republic of China. In particular the book tells of Ottawa’s failure to recognize and confront the efforts by the Chinese Communist Party to infiltrate and influence Canadian politics, academia, and media, and to exert control over Canadians of Chinese heritage. Claws of the Panda gives a detailed description of the CCP’s campaign to embed agents of influence in Canadian business, politics, media and academia. The party’s aims are to be able to turn Canadian public policy to China’s advantage, to acquire useful technology and intellectual property, to influence Canada’s international diplomacy, and, most important, to be able to monitor and intimidate Chinese Canadians and others it considers dissidents. The book traces the evolution of the Canada-China relationship over nearly 150 years. It shows how Canadian leaders have constantly misjudged the reality and potential of the relationship while the CCP and its agents have benefited from Canadian naivete.

Jonathan Manthorpe is the author of three books on international relations, politics, and history, including the national bestseller and Globe and Mail Top 100 Books of 2019, Claws of the Panda: Beijing’s Campaign of Influence and Intimidation in Canada. His previous books include Forbidden Nation: A History of Taiwan and The Power and the Tories: Ontario Politics 1943 to the Present. In recent years he has written columns for a wide variety of publications in Canada and overseas. Over his fifty-year career as a journalist, he has been the foreign correspondent in Asia, Africa, and Europe for Southam News, the European Bureau Chief for the Toronto Star, and the national reporter for The Globe and Mail. In 1981 and 1982, Manthorpe was an advisor in London to Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau on the patriation of the Canadian constitution. For the last few years, he has been based in Victoria, British Columbia.

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• Short-listed, Hubert Evans Non-Fiction Prize