From the Soil

The ‘But China!’ Dilemma Driving the A.I. Race

The Ezra Klein Show, 15 September 2026. The book comes up at 1 hr 7 min in.

Matt Sheehan recommends From the Soil as one of the most insightful books about Chinese culture. He describes its author, Fei Xiaotong, as a Chinese sociologist trained in the West who applied Western sociological frameworks to studying Chinese villages and agriculture in the 1930s and 40s. Sheehan says he rereads it every three or four years.

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