For many years now China's economy has seemed unstoppable. A slow appreciation of the renminbi in 2007 brought wave upon wave of liquidity into China and allowed its companies and banks to raise hundreds of billions in dollars via stock market listings. State banks that had started the new century as bankrupt relics of a communist past became the darlings of international investors.

Even the collapse of Lehman Brothers in 2008 and the ensuing global financial crisis seemed to have little impact on China as the government quickly responded with a huge stimulus package. But the Lehman collapse was a dramatic wake up call to the Chinese leadership. This model of bank and capital market reform had been studiously emulated for more than a decade and had brought great benefits to China. But now, although they believed it to be bankrupt, the Chinese government were bereft of new ideas. In the face of the global financial crisis the government returned to what it knows best, massive state intervention via the banking system. Ten years of banking and capital market reforms were dead.

In Red Capitalism, Carl Walter and Fraser Howie detail how the Chinese government reformed and modeled its financial system in the 30 years since it began its policy of engagement with the west. Instead of a stable series of policies producing steady growth, China's financial sector has boomed and gone bust with regularity in each decade. The latest decade is little different. Chinese banks have become objects of political struggle while they totter under balance sheets bloated by the excessive state-directed lending and bond issuance of 2009.

Looking forward, the government's response to the global financial crisis has created a banking system the stability of which can be maintained only behind the walls of a non-convertible currency, a myriad of off-balance sheet arrangements with non-public state entities and the strong support of its best borrowers--the politically potent National Champions--who are the greatest beneficiaries of the financial status quo.

China's financial system is not a model for the west and, indeed, is not a sustainable arrangement for China itself as it seeks increasingly to assert its influence internationally. This is not a story of impending collapse, but of frustrated reforms that suggests that any full opening and meaningful reform of the financial sector is not, indeed cannot be, on the government's agenda anytime soon.

卡爾. 沃爾特， 在中國生活瞭20年，並積極參與瞭多項金融改革工作，他在1992年的中國企業首例海外IPO和1994年首批中國國有企業在紐約證券交易所上市過程中發揮瞭重要作用。他是中國第一傢也是最成功的閤資投資銀行——中國國際金融有限公司的管委會成員，在那裏，他支持瞭一批中國主要企業的股票和債券的發行。最近，他幫助全球主要投資銀行創建瞭最成功和最有利可圖的安全貨幣交易業務。他能說流利的普通話，畢業於北京大學，並擁有普林斯頓大學博士學位。現居紐約，是獨立顧問。

弗雷澤. 豪伊， 曾在劍橋大學學習自然科學（物理），在北京語言文化大學學習中文。近20年來他一直從事亞洲股票交易和市場的分析、寫作，同時在香港工作，在信托銀行和摩根士丹利從事股權交易。1998年到中國，在中國國際金融有限公司銷售和交易部門工作，後進入中國 M&A 管理公司。他曾加盟南華早報、亞洲華爾街日報、中國經濟研究季刊和中國經濟評論，並為CNBC、BBC、半島電視颱和彭博社撰寫評論。他是一傢幫助國際投資者在印度和中國市場投資的新加坡亞太經紀公司的董事總經理。

祝捷，特許金融分析師（CFA）。先後就讀於中國人民大學、北京大學光華管理學院、紐約大學斯特恩商學院，獲工商管理碩士學位。曾就職於中國建設銀行、中國金融期貨交易所，兼職於北京懋源投資有限公司、中銀國際（亞洲）有限公司。現任渣打銀行（中國）有限公司投資策略分析師。

劉駿，特許金融分析師（CFA）和注冊風險管理師（FRM）。先後就讀於南京大學、耶魯大學、約翰·霍普金斯大學商學院，獲經濟碩士、金融理學碩士學位，曾就職於中國銀行、世界銀行總部，現在加拿大聯邦住房及信貸公司工作。