The Art of Neighbouring refers to examining the viewpoint from China's borderlands of the question: “What does China's rise mean for its immediate neighbours?” (p. 12). An introduction by the editors explains that the aims of this edited volume of ten chapters are to provide cases of “cross-border relations at various scales” and an analytical framework for anthropological investigation of “relatedness, competition, and ways of being … [as] communities become increasingly mobile and connected” (p. 12). Although there are variations in the clarity and success of the chapters, the book meets these two aims.

This review covers six themes that are highlighted in a number of chapters. The first theme is the reversal of strategic national positions, mainly through the rise of China to economic dominance. This reversal features in chapters on borders with Russia, Nepal, Mongolia and India. For example, chapter one, by Franck Billé, offers an elegant illustration of this reversal by describing the history and recent relations between the towns of Heihe in China and Blagoveshchensk in Russia, separated by the Amur River. The Russian side dominated in the Soviet period. Now Heihe is prospering while Blagoveshchensk has stagnated. Russian young people study Chinese to improve their prospects for futures in China. The towns mimic each other in architecture, lighting and music, with each trying to one-up the other in modernity, although Heihe is more successful.

A second theme relates to cross-border traders, who in cases involving Nepal (chapter three by Martin Saxer), Kazakhstan (chapter four by Henryk Alff), India and Burma (chapter eight by Renaud Egreteau) establish long-standing networks of trust with investors, buyers and brokers who differ in ethnicity and nationality. These networks can span long distances, for instance from Altai in Kazakhstan to Beijing, but enable the trade to endure in spite of state border closures, imposition of taxes and tariffs, and formal trade agreements unhelpful to seasoned traders. Long-distance traders crossing the Himalayas see themselves as going “from town to town” rather than from India to China, as noted by Tina Harris in chapter six.

A third theme related to traders is their adaptability to “both skirt and exploit” state efforts to open and close borders (Harris, p. 146). Traders must be quick to change trading partners, routes and goods sold, in order to stay viable in contexts of constant change. Their cunning and ability to endure harsh conditions appear in numerous chapters.

A fourth theme concerns what the editors call “agonistic intensities.” National stereotypes, past violence and current anxieties contribute to mutual distrust between neighbours who deal with each other in person. In chapter nine, Juan Zhang argues that this anxiety contributes to successful trade relations, as each side must compromise, negotiate and cooperate in spite of sudden changes that impede the success of one side or the other. Her case study is a trade fair on the China–Vietnam border, a site of expanding and lucrative trade that both sides want to maintain.

A fifth theme is the prominence of a moral economy among some traders in Humla, Nepal, and in Kazakhstan, who want to provide household items cheaply to poor local people. This finding suggests that traders have multiple roles.

Chapter seven by Chris Vasantkumar examines Tibetans from Gansu who go to India motivated by a mix of “economic, cultural, religious and political” reasons (p. 181), but not as “refugees.” When they return home to enter business they are invisible to scholars. A chapter on Burmese Muslims in Yunnan by Renaud Egreteau explains that migrants come for religious freedom and economic opportunity.

Two chapters present cases that are not covered in any of these themes. The first, chapter five, by Uradyn E. Bulag, explores Mongolia's diplomatic efforts to have good relations with China (and Russia) without being dominated by either. Among other strategies, Mongolia has promoted peace in the Asia region, with Mongolia as the node of peacekeeping. In 2006, Mongolia established a Peacekeeping Training Centre with 22 Asia-Pacific countries. Mongolia seeks to share its “fortune-sovereignty,” in this case its mineral wealth, without being beholden to any buyer.

The second case not included in the themes is chapter ten, by Magnus Fiskesjö. He promotes animals as “neighbours” rather than “friends,” suggesting that neighbours lead parallel lives rather than being adopted as pets or used as beasts of burden. He argues that Chinese statecraft, both Confucian and current, posits humans as superior to animals so as to exploit them. In the face of the loss of endangered species, to provide aphrodisiacs in China, he sees hope in campaigns to protect bears from the extraction of their bile and paws. Seeing bears as neighbours returns them to their own habitat.

A couple of chapters could have used more thought. Chapter two, by Pál Nyíri, is a condensation of a longer article concerning the sovereignty and governance of global spaces of exception. The cases concern casinos in Laos where wealthy Chinese can enjoy gambling, prostitutes and drugs. The author focuses on global dynamics rather than the particular relationship between China and Laos, meaning that this version of the paper is not entirely successful. The chapter on Kazakhstan and Kyrgystan includes too much detail with too little theorization, making it hard to follow.

There is a serious lack of reference to scholars, primarily from North America, who have done excellent work on cross-border relations between China and its neighbours. These include, among others, Sara Davis (China–Thailand); Michael Hathaway (China–Japan); Ann Maxwell Hill (China–Burma–Thailand); Kevin Woods (China–Burma); Ralph Litzinger (China–Thailand); Sara Turner (China–Vietnam); Danielle Tan (China–Laos); and my own work over two decades (China–Burma, China–Laos). The authors in this volume could also have cited the special edition of the Singapore Journal of Tropical Geography (2013) on ethnic minority cross-border relations in the Greater Mekong sub-region and the special edition of Eurasian Geography and Economics (2016) on China's cross-border relations in Central Asia. These omissions reveal a lack of “neighbouring” with North American scholars who have provided a rich literature on China's bordering.