"Documenting China’s Borderlands – Episode 1: From Empire to Nation" a podcast with CWP alum Maria Adele Carrai

The People’s Republic of China’s national territory today is roughly equivalent to that of the Qing empire—with the notable exceptions of outer Mongolia, Taiwan, and portions of Siberia. Two hundred years ago, the Qing’s borderlands included the Manchu, Tibetan, Hmong, Mongol, and Hui (Turkic-speaking Muslim populations of the western regions). Today, twenty neighbors share a land or a maritime border with China.

This first episode of the Borderlands Podcast Miniseries travels back in time to better understand how the imperial borderlands have been integrated within China’s national territory at the turn of the 20th century. With contributions from Professor Nicola Di Cosmo (Institute for Advanced Study) and Maria Adele Carrai (NYU Shanghai).

Materials cited in the recording

Joseph W. Esherick, “How the Qing Became China,” in Empire to Nation: Historical Perspectives on the Making of the Modern World, ed Joseph W. Esherick (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 2006)

Maria Adele Carrai, Sovereignty in China: A Genealogy of a Concept since 1840 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2019)

Borderlands - August 25, 2025 - https://www.podbean.com/ep/pb-2jbhs-193ec03

Maria Adele Carrai is an Assistant Professor of Global China Studies at NYU Shanghai. Her research explores the history of international law in East Asia and investigates how China’s rise as a global power shapes norms and redefines the international distribution of power. She co-leads the Research Initiative 'Mapping Global China,' and is the author of Sovereignty in China. A Geneology of a Concept since 1840 (CUP 2019) and co-editor of The China Questions 2 - Critical Insights into US-China Relations (HUP 2022). Before joining NYU Shanghai, she was a recipient of a three-year Marie-Curie fellowship at KU Leuven. She was also a Fellow at the Italian Academy of Columbia University, Princeton-Harvard China and the World Program, Max Weber Program of the European University Institute of Florence, and New York University Law School.

Photo Credit: https://strategicspace.nbr.org/documenting-chinas-borderlands-episode-1-from-empire-to-nation/