Speakers:
Mark Elliott, Vice Provost for International Affairs; Mark Schwartz Professor of Chinese and Inner Asian History, Harvard University
William Kirby, T. M. Chang Professor of China Studies, Harvard University; Spangler Family Professor of Business Administration, Harvard Business School
Rana Mitter, S. T. Lee Professor of U.S.–Asia Relations, Harvard Kennedy School
Meg Rithmire, F. Warren McFarlan Associate Professor of Business Administration, Harvard Business School
Mark Wu, Director of the Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies, Harvard University; Henry L. Stimson Professor of Law, Harvard Law School

In conjunction with the exhibition Objects of Addiction: Opium, Empire, and the Chinese Art Trade, Harvard faculty in Chinese history, business, politics, and law will take part in a roundtable discussion on the 19th-century Opium Wars and the legacy of the opium trade in U.S.–China relations.

Objects of Addiction: Opium, Empire, and the Chinese Art Trade (September 15, 2023–January 14, 2024) explores the entwined histories of the opium trade and the Chinese art market between the late 18th and early 20th centuries. These two commodities—acquired through both legal and illicit means—had profound effects on the global economy, public health, immigration law, education, and the arts that are reverberating still today.