Includes bibliographical references and index.

Steam and Istmus canals -- Planters, traders and labour in the South Pacific -- Fiji: the start of Anglo-German rivalry in the Pacific -- The Somoa conflict -- Germany enters the colonial race -- The New Guinea protectorates -- Great Britain, Russia and the Central Asian question -- Samoa remains a source of international tension -- The emerging economic world powers -- Great Britain, France and Southeast Asia -- The French-expansion westwards into Southeast Asia -- Russia, Japan and the Chinese empire -- Thailand and beyond -- The scramble for China: the Bay of Jiaozhou and Port Arthur -- The British reaction: Wei-Hai-Wei -- The scramble for China continues: Guangzhouwan and Tibet -- The failed annexation of Hawaii -- The United States becomes a colonial empire -- The partition of Samoa -- The Russo-Japanese war -- Great Britain's search for secure colonial frontiers -- The United States, Japan and the Pacific Ocean -- Epilogue.

In the late 1800s and early 1900s, colonial powers clashed over much of Central and East Asia: Great Britain and Germany fought over New Guinea, the Bismarck Archipelago, Fiji, and Samoa; France and Great Britain competed over control of continental Southwest Asia; and the United States annexed the Philippines and Hawaii. Meanwhile, the possible disintegration of China and Japan's growing nationalism added new dimensions to the rivalries. Surveying these and other international developments in the Pacific basin during the three decades preceding World War I, Kees van Dijk traces the emergence of superpowers during the colonial race and analyzes their conduct as they struggled for territory.

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