Sukhee Lee's book Negotiated Power is a welcome addition to the existing scholarship on the local history of Mingzhou (modern-day Ningbo) during the Southern Song (1127–1279) and Yuan (1271–1368) dynasties. In a broader sense, it contributes to our understanding of the relations and dynamics between the state and local elite society in middle-period China by identifying in Mingzhou a “constant process of negotiation in which these poles mutually influence each other in various fields of local governance” (p. 3). Challenging the conventional model of a “zero-sum” competitive relationship between state power and local elite interest, Lee argues that the connectedness of established and aspiring social elites to the state, rather than their separation from it, and the presence of the state in local affairs, rather than its absence, were the crucial factors in the development of local elite society and the rise of Mingzhou as one of the cultural, economic, and intellectual centers during this period of time.

Lee's study utilizes a wide range of primary sources, such as local gazetteers, genealogies, literary anthologies, anecdotal collections, monographs by native writers, collections of memorials, official histories, funerary texts, and stele inscriptions. Many of these are sources extant from the twelfth to fourteenth centuries, including some 280 epitaphs written for Mingzhou residents of the time. Lee utilizes a variety of methods, including quantitative analysis of large amounts of data, sociohistorical contextualization, and textual research. The study draws on more than 260 secondary studies in Japanese, Korean, Chinese, and Western languages ranging from as early as 1954 to as recent as 2012. Acknowledging that “Mingzhou should not be taken to represent the period as a whole more than any other locality of the time” (p. 3), Lee puts his findings in constant dialogue with existing studies on the local histories and elite societies in other areas. In particular, Robert Hymes's studies on the elite society of Fuzhou during the Song (960–1279) and Yuan times are taken almost as reference points to which Lee frequently returns.

The core of the book is comprised of four chapters. Chapter 1 defines the local elites of Mingzhou against the background of the prefecture's rapid development during the Southern Song. Lee points out that the state-recognized status of “office-holding household” functioned to bring various practical benefits to the elite families within their local setting. He argues that the social elites of Mingzhou were none other than the office-holding statesmen, while at the same time, the status of local families could change over just a few generations due to both upward and downward social mobility. The official careers of members of the established elite families also proved to be a main factor in forming regional and trans-local marriage ties.

Chapter 2 demonstrates the strong presence of the state in many aspects of local governance, such as local defense and security, as well as the construction of local infrastructure. After the fall of the Northern Song (960–1127), the state, while maintaining its substantial leverage in negotiations with local families, often accommodated elite interest and participation in local governance according to the principle of “mutual convenience of the public and the private” (p. 142).

Chapter 3 explores the interactions between the elite community and the local government in three areas: the building and maintenance of local official schools, the revival of the practice of the community drinking ceremony, and the administration of the community's charitable estate and charitable service. Rather than “elite activism” alone playing a leading role in local affairs, Lee's study shows that local activism was in fact enabled by the state's strong presence in local society and its cooperation with local elites even though “the two parties' visions of activism were always in tension” (p. 200).

Chapter 4 examines the transformations that the Yuan dynasty brought to Mingzhou elite society. The social status of the literati elite was now to be defined by the state through the “Confucian household” registration system. Cast outside governmental service, local elites viewed the connectedness to the state as a “rare commodity” and strived to reaffirm their ties to local officials and their status as leaders of the local community (p. 258). Therefore, although state control weakened during the Yuan and relied much on the trust and financial contributions of local elites, the relations between the state and local elites were still maintained through a kind of redefined negotiation of power and status in various aspects of local governance.

In sum, in Negotiated Power Lee demonstrates the “continued importance of the state in elite strategies” (p. 266) in Southern Song and Yuan Mingzhou and contributes to our understanding of the complex dynamics in the negotiations between state power and local elite interests in middle-period China. The book will surely benefit both students and researchers, stimulate scholarly discussions, and open up new directions of investigation.