Virtual Tibet: Searching for Shangri-la from the Himalayas to Hollywood by Orville Schell;The Search for the Panchen Lama by Isabel HiltonReview by: Lucian W. PyeForeign Affairs, Vol. 79, No. 5 (Sep. - Oct., 2000), p. 129Published by: Council on Foreign RelationsStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20049896 .

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Recent Books

out what can and cannot be expected? and what American multinational corpo rations should and should not be doing in China. Santoro distinguishes between

corporations attracted to China for cheap labor (i.e., for cost-minimizing reasons)

and those seeking to build markets there.

As sensitive to the bottom line as he is

to human rights, Santoro also has useful

things to say about the issues that vex ceos

dealing with China. By bringing clarity to the ongoing debate about the respon sibilities of multinationals for advancing human rights, he has produced a book of interest not just to the concerned citizen

but also to those currently engaged in

business in China or contemplating

becoming involved there.

Virtual Tibet: Searchingfor Shangri-la from the Himalayas

to Hollywood,

by

orville schell. New York: Henry

Holt, 2000,340 pp. $26.00.

The Search for the Ranchen Lama, by

isabel hilton. NewYork: W. W.

Norton, 2000,336 pp. $25.95. Both these books capture the magic of

Tibet by combining personal experiences with detailed historical and religious expositions. Schell was smitten early in

life with yearnings for Tibet. He first made a disillusioning visit to Lhasa and then

went to the Argentine Alps, where

Hollywood was filming Heinrich Harrar's Seven Years in Tibet, the book that had

ignited Schell's youthful imagination. But for all of its magical powers of enchant

ment, which included reproducing Lhasa in the Andes, Hollywood was not up to preserving the illusions of Tibet. To

make matters worse, as filming began it

was revealed that the Austrian Harrar, a

sympathetic champion of Buddhism, had

in fact been a dedicated Nazi and S.S.

trooper. And modern Lhasa, which until

1979 had been seen by only a handful of Western visitors, has seen its Holiday Inn

overrun with foreign tourists and its

streets filled with Han Chinese. The British journalist Hilton tells a

mystery tale of her secret role in the exiled

Dalai Lama's scheme to get the Chinese

to accept the boy he chose to be the rein

carnation of the Panchen Lama. The

plot failed, the Chinese were alerted, and

the boy and his family have not been seen since. Hilton fills out this story with

an informative account of the history of

Tibetan Buddhism and culture. One is left wondering whether Tibetan Buddhism

will survive if the selection of the next

Dalai Lama falls into the hands of the Chinese rather than those of dedicated

Tibetan monks. Both Schell and Hilton

bring home the tragedy of Tibet's current

domination by China. The old Tibet

probably could not have survived the

challenges of modernity, but the authors

show that the country certainly would

have made a more graceful adjustment to the twenty-first century under the

wise leadership of the Dalai Lama than under the Chinese gun.

Negotiating on the Edge: North Korean

Negotiating Behavior, by scott

snyder. Washington: United States

Institute of Peace Press, 1999,

213 pp. $17.50 (paper). For some time, Washington has con

vinced itself that North Korea is "crazy." After carefully reviewing the record of

Pyongyang's negotiating behavior, Snyder concludes that it is in fact rational?and

that the North Korean negotiators have

"shown remarkably consistent style,

FOREIGN AFFAIRS September/October 2000 [l2?]

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