Book excerpt: This comprehensive study analyzes in detail the evolving political, economic, and diplomatic relationships between China and Denmark since their first contact in 1674. It is an important contribution to the growing literature on China's relations with the West since the beginning of the modern period. Non-Danes will be interested in how the unique nonimperialistic Danish approach to China has shaped a relationship quite different from the patterns of domination and conflict that have characterized the relations between the Middle Kingdom and the traditional great powers of the West.