Twenty years ago, the study of modern China in the west was heavily focused on rural China. It used the rise to power of the Chinese Communist Party as its overarching narrative, and treated the communist victory of 1949 as a watershed. This review surveys several recent trends in the writing of Chinese history in the west which have challenged these models. Among the changes of emphasis in the field that are noted are: a new interest in China's place in global history, urban history, and the history of consumption; a rethinking of the significance of nationalism and imperialism; warfare as a vehicle of sociocultural change; and a reinterpretation of Chinese modernity that stresses the similarities, as well as the differences, between the Chinese Communist Party and its predecessors, the Nationalists, and also stresses continuities as well as changes across the ‘barrier’ date of 1949. The review highlights areas of interest to non-specialists in Chinese history, and concentrates on studies of the Republican period (1912–49) published since the 1990s, although it also covers work covering topics in the late imperial and early People's Republic periods.