This chapter examines the human dimension of China’s Outbound Academic Translation Initiative (COATI) by analysing the agency of translators, authors, and other actors, and the networks formed in the process of translating Chinese scholarship into English. Drawing on three case studies—COATI Book 1, Book 2, and Book 3—it explores how agency is exercised, relationships negotiated, and networks constructed within COATI’s sociopolitical context. The analysis of COATI Book 1 is distinctive in its reflexivity: as principal translators, we were both participants and observers, documenting our negotiations, challenges, and decision-making throughout the translation process. The chapter employs Archer’s theory of agency and structure, Bourdieu’s concepts of habitus and capital, and actor-network theory, applied to empirical data from translated texts, interviews, and fieldwork journals. By combining ethnographic and autoethnographic approaches, it demonstrates how translation emerges at the intersection of individual agency and institutional structures, shaping the circulation of Chinese scholarship globally.