I finished reading Mr. China by Tim Clissold and I found it quite interesting.

It is the story of an investment fund that lost hundreds of millions of dollars in China in the 1990s. The author describes in great details the traps his company fell into and what solutions they found. At that time, the only form of investment that was allowed was doing joint ventures with Chinese partners.

But some comments are also useful for importers trying to resolve a conflict with a Chinese supplier.
About halfway through the book, Clissold admits there is no point in trying to change China. He goes on to explain that imported solutions usually don’t work well there. He takes an example where letters of credit were opened without their permission:

The Chinese solution would have been to transfer most of the money out of the bank account quietly and in small amounts, until the bank noticed and froze the account or until there was no money left to argue about. We had done the exact opposite and precipitated a crisis by blustering into the bank’s head office. [.] There had been a knee-jerk reaction from the US to hire battalions of private investigators and lawyers in a highly sophisticated response that was completely useless in dealing with the actual problem.

I think there is simple takeaway: if you have problems in China (or, better, if you want to know how to avoid problems), don’t ask your legal counsel back home. Get someone with real experience dealing with Chinese matters.