Why Mark Zuckerberg is reading Hank Paulson's new book about China

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mark zuckerberg chinese new year

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Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg wishes a happy Chinese New Year.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg's 2015 New Year's resolution was to read an important book every two weeks and discuss it with the Facebook community as they read.

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Zuckerberg's book club, A Year of Books, has focused on big ideas that influence society and business. For his eighth selection, he's chosen the new book "Dealing with China" by Hank Paulson.

He's hoping it will give him more insight into modern Chinese culture. This may also aide his ongoing quest to persuade the Chinese government to grant its 1.4 billion citizens access to his social network.

Paulson served as the US Treasury Secretary during the financial crisis and previously as the CEO of Goldman Sachs. Since 2011, he has headed the Paulson Institute, an organization dedicated to fostering relationships between American and Chinese businesses.

In his book, Paulson argues that the US's bilateral relationship with China is its most important, and that the US has a responsibility to cooperate with China as it competes with China, or else risk debilitating conflict.

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Last October, Zuckerberg conducted an interview entirely in Mandarin at Tsinghua University School, expressing his desire to see Facebook utilized to its fullest in China, noting the appeal to businesses. This February, he broke out his Mandarin again to wish the world a happy Chinese New Year in a video posted on his Facebook page.

Zuckerberg explains his latest book-club pick on his personal Facebook page:

This book is about Paulson's experience working with Chinese leaders over two decades as US Secretary of the Treasury and as head of Goldman Sachs.

Over the last 35 years, China has experienced one of the greatest economic and social transformations in human history. Hundreds of millions of people have moved out of poverty. By many measures, China has done more to lift people out of poverty than the whole rest of the world combined.

I've been personally interested as a student of Chinese culture, history and language. I'm looking forward to reading Paulson's perspective on what China's rise means for the world.

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It would be a huge win for Facebook to tap the Chinese market. "We want to help other places in the world connect to China," Zuckerberg said at Tsinghua University last fall.

"A Year of Books" so far:

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