Dylan Loh Wins the 2026 The Hague Journal of Diplomacy Book Award
The Hague Journal of Diplomacy is delighted to announce the winner of the 2026 HJD Book Award: Dylan Loh, China’s Rising Foreign Ministry: Practices and Representations of Assertive Diplomacy (Stanford University Press, 2024).
The jury from the HJD international advisory board and senior researchers awarded China's Rising Foreign Ministry as the best book on the theory and practice of diplomacy published in 2023-25. The diverse and global jury, whose members are from five continents, recognized this work as a landmark contribution to diplomatic studies, combining rare ethnographic access, rigorous theoretical grounding in practice theory, and timely empirical insight into Chinese diplomacy under Xi Jinping.
Praise from the jury included:
“Loh’s book makes an important contribution to diplomatic studies by offering a rare ethnographic account of Chinese diplomacy under Xi Jinping, a domain that remains both understudied and poorly understood […] the book makes a clear theoretical contribution by showing the analytical value of practice theory when employed with political and empirical sensitivity.”
“One of the book’s major strengths lies in its depth of empirical research, particularly its use of ethnographic methods, which are difficult to carry out in this context. This allows the analysis to move beyond general accounts and instead show how diplomatic practice is actually produced on the ground.”
“An excellent work in terms of the importance of the subject studied, the mode of analysis, and the counter-intuitive nature of the thesis.”
Congratulations to Dylan Loh on this outstanding achievement.