or wrong tides of history to take comfort in. While Mao had contempt for ancient Chinese customs, in the 1980s the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) began to use traditional themes and prominent classical vocabulary. A prominent example is "harmonious society" (Chinese: 和谐社会; pinyin: héxié shèhuì), used as a socioeconomic vision in China and to deflect the problems of social inequality. Delury traces the history and usage of the Chinese word "harmonious" and is critical of the CCP, calling this usage "the pseudo-Confucianism of the CCP." He notes that Xi's political program of austerity is a reflection of a traditional political precept, dating from Confucius. Views on North Korea Traveling in North Korea evoked for Delury the sensation of time travel; Kim's charismatic dictatorship and the socialist ethos of Mao on the one side, with the grassroots marketization and consumer revolution of Deng's China on the other. As with the history of China, it is important to know the North Korean history, and he is critical of American officials who know little about this subject. Without this knowledge it is unlikely for American officials to understand and realistically deal with North Korea's nuclear weapons program, a highly complex problem with a lot of variation over time.It takes years to understand that history and you can't read in a book even if you had time, you have to meet the people.Delury has several significant disagreements with President Trump's North Korea policy. President Trump has relied on China's influence on North Korea to exert pressure on the regime to give up its nuclear weapons, using trade with China as an inducement. Delury notes that since 1958 China has not had any meaningful impact on North Korea's foreign policy. Delury has described the sanctions as futile and counterproductive. He has argued that they are unenforceable and unlikely to stop North Korea's nuclear weapons program. He has a more conciliatory approach, suggesting that the best chance for them to give up its nuclear weapons is by helping North Korean economic development. He recommends a gradual elimination of the sanctions. As a deeply isolated autarkic society, he feels North Koreans "will eat grass" before succumbing to sanctions. Talk of a preventive war had become part of the mainstream debate before the recent thaw in U.S.-North Korea relations; Delury feels that this should not be an option. Delury has been described as the media's "go-to expert" on