Joanna Chiu has won the 2022 Shaughnessy Cohen Prize for Political Writing for her debut book, China Unbound: A New World Disorder.

The Vancouver-based reporter and author for the Toronto Star was awarded the $25,000 prize on Tuesday in Ottawa at the 35th annual Politics and the Pen gala, a fundraiser to support the Writers' Trust of Canada's literary programs.

The Shaughnessy Cohen Prize recognizes a book of literary nonfiction on a political subject relevant to Canadian readers that has the potential to influence thinking on Canadian political life. The award was established in 2000 in honour of Cohen, an outspoken and popular Member of Parliament from Windsor, Ont.

In China Unbound, Chiu — who spent a decade tracking China's propulsive rise — examines the country's growing global influence and the implications for stability, prosperity and civil rights around the world.

"The rise of China is the geopolitical story of the 21st century, and Joanna Chiu has expertly charted the country's efforts to extend its power around the globe," the prize jury wrote. "China Unbound is a sweeping portrait of a rising superpower that is essential reading for any follower of Canadian politics."

"The China story I wanted to demonstrate is international," Chiu said in a Writers' Trust video this week. "It was taking place in these rich, developed Western countries where there is real concern about Chinese influence just flying under the radar."

Chiu is a senior journalist for the Toronto Star and an internationally recognized authority on China. Her work has appeared in The Guardian, Foreign Policy, The Atlantic and Newsweek. In 2012, she won a Human Rights Press Award for her story on refugees in Hong Kong.

The winner and finalists were selected by a jury composed of Ottawa journalist Charelle Evelyn, author and past prize finalist Jacques Poitras, and past Conservative Party of Canada deputy leader Lisa Raitt.

The four remaining finalists each received $2,500. This year's finalists included The Two Michaels: Innocent Canadian Captives and High-Stakes Espionage in the U.S.-China Cyber War by Mike Blanchfield and Fen Osler Hampson; Flora!: A Woman in a Man's World by Flora MacDonald and Geoffrey Stevens; The Next Age of Uncertainty by Stephen Poloz; and Indian in the Cabinet by Jody Wilson-Raybould.

Founded in 1976 by writers Margaret Atwood, Pierre Berton, Graeme Gibson, Margaret Laurence and David Young, The Writers' Trust of Canada is an organization that supports Canadian writers through literary awards, fellowships, financial grants, mentorships and more.

It also gives out seven prizes in recognition of the year's best in fiction, nonfiction and short story, as well as mid-career and lifetime achievement awards.

Last year's Shaughnessy Cohen Prize winner was Ronald J. Diebert for his Massey Lectures on technology, Reset: Reclaiming the Internet for Civil Society.

Other past winners include Kamal Al Solaylee, Jane Jacobs and Roméo Dallaire.