Picnics Prohibited Diplomacy in a Chaotic China During the First World War

World War I came at an inopportune time for China. The country had joined a number of international organizations and ratified the Hague Conventions, but found its diplomatic efforts hampered by its young, inexperienced leadership, its factional regional divisions, and its foreign-controlled treaty ports and concessions. Unfortunately for the Chinese, representatives of combatant nations navigated a diplomatic tightrope between carrying out their patriotic duty to support war efforts and making sure their "hosts", the Chinese, did not take advantage of the turbulence to upset the colonial pecking order.

Frances Wood is former curator of Chinese Collections at the British Library. She is the author of China's First Emperor and His Terra Cotta Warriors, The Diamond Sutra, and The Silk Road.