Scholarly interest in the multi-faceted subject of opium in modern China has experienced a resurgence in the past decade, spearheaded primarily by scholars who attended the May 1997 Conference on Opium in East Asia, sponsored by the Joint Centre of Asia Pacific Studies of the University of Toronto and York University. Li Xiaoxiong's new book Poppies and Politics in China: Sichuan Province, 1840s–1940s falls into the category of a “second wave” of publications that have followed in their wake. His goal is laudable: to investigate the social, economic, and political ramifications of the narcotic on China's most prolific opium-growing province during its heyday since the extant historiography “at the regional or provincial levels – and especially Sichuan – is conspicuously lacking” (p. 20).

There are a few new insights offered by Li's research with respect to Sichuanese exceptionalism. He convincingly argues that the main reason for the upsurge in poppy cultivation during the late Qing was not the inability of Beijing to control unruly minorities living in the remote frontier regions, but the legalization of the drug nationwide in the last four decades of the nineteenth century “coupled with increasing market demand for opium products” (p. 30). Li also examines the relative success of Kuomintang prohibition efforts under the auspices of the Six-Year Plan (chapter four), and how this progress was constantly challenged after the Japanese invasion of 1937 by increased production in the border zones beyond the reach of Chiang Kai-shek's Chongqing administration (chapter five).

Despite the book's potential to make a significant contribution to the growing academic literature on opium, there are just too many pitfalls in its research methodology, narrative structure and writing to fulfil that potential. For instance, Joyce Madancy's superb local study, The Troublesome Legacy of Commissioner Lin: The Opium Trade and Opium Suppression in Fujian Province, 1820s to 1920s (Harvard University Asia Center, 2004), was not cited nor listed in the bibliography. Crucial Kuomintang primary sources housed in the Number Two Archive in Nanjing, including invaluable documents detailing the Nanjing government's relationship with the opium trade in Sichuan (located in the files of Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of the Interior's Opium Suppression Committee) were likewise overlooked. Most of the narrative, moreover, was constructed by piecing together bits of information taken from previously published Western and Chinese works on opium in the Qing and Republican periods.

Editorial discipline is notably absent as this book is plagued by the misspelling of names and terms in both pinyin and traditional Cantonese or Wade-Giles Romanization systems, sloppy citations, and the failure to acknowledge ideas, concepts, or conclusions drawn by other scholars. For example, the venerable anti-opium crusader Lin Zexu is misspelled as Lin Zexue (pp. 26, 28, 304), while revolutionary patriarch Sun Yat-sen has multiple personalities as Sun Yet-son, Yat-son or Yet-sen (pp. 77, 154–55, 307). Certainly the most troubling passages in Poppies and Politics were the ones that looked eerily familiar to this reviewer's writing style found in Opium, State, and Society (University of Hawai‘i Press, 2001). I have discovered nine instances of mystifying similarity, some with citations and others without. An example of the former can be found on the bottom of page 97: “In addition, he operated a fleet of four small steamers out of Yibin under the name Xinhua Shiye Gongsi (New China Industrial Company) that in the late 1920s and early 1930s monopolized the flow of opium downriver to Chongqing.” My words were “The warlord Liu Wenhui at Yibin operated a fleet of four small steamers under the name of the Xinhua Shiye Gongsi (New China Industrial Company) and monopolized the transport of opium downriver to Chongqing” (Opium, State and Society, p. 21). As for the latter – and more egregious in my opinion – uncited borrowing, on page 139 Li discusses the Teye Gonghui (Special Business Associations) that were established in key ports along the Yangtze River in the 1920s-1930s: “By negotiating tax rates, collecting taxes and fees on behalf of local governments, and monopolizing the wholesale markets, the leaders of these associations established close relationships with local and provincial authorities that increased their political influence. Warlords and local officials routinely formed partnerships with big opium merchants in joint-stock opium firms with the financial backing of large banks.” I wrote “[b]y negotiating tax rates, collecting taxes on behalf of local governments, and monopolizing the wholesale trade of local markets, leaders of the associations earned potent political capital as well… Furthermore, warlords and local officials commonly formed partnerships with the opium kings in joint-stock transport, wholesale firms, and modern and native banks involved in financing the trade” (Opium, State and Society, pp. 51–52).

For the reasons described above, it would be extremely difficult to recommend Poppies and Politics in China to readers of The China Quarterly. And on a personal note, this certainly has been the most agonizing review that I've ever been asked to write.