The Paradox of China's Post-Mao Reforms (Harvard Contemporary China Series, No. 12) - Softcover

Barry Naughton; Joseph Fewsmith; Paul H. B. Godwin; Murray Scot Tanner; Lianjiang Li; Kevin J. O'Brien; Tianjian Shi; Martin King Whyte

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0674654544 ISBN 13: 9780674654549

Publisher: Harvard University Press, 1999

Synopsis

China’s bold program of reforms launched in the late 1970s―the move to a market economy and the opening to the outside world―ended the political chaos and economic stagnation of the Cultural Revolution and sparked China’s unprecedented economic boom. Yet, while the reforms made possible a rising standard of living for the majority of China’s population, they came at the cost of a weakening central government, increasing inequalities, and fragmenting society.

The essays of Barry Naughton, Joseph Fewsmith, Paul H. B. Godwin, Murray Scot Tanner, Lianjiang Li and Kevin J. O’Brien, Tianjian Shi, Martin King Whyte, Thomas P. Bernstein, Dorothy J. Solinger, David S. G. Goodman, Kristen Parris, Merle Goldman, Elizabeth J. Perry, and Richard Baum and Alexei Shevchenko analyze the contradictory impact of China’s economic reforms on its political system and social structure. They explore the changing patterns of the relationship between state and society that may have more profound significance for China than all the revolutionary movements that have convulsed it through most of the twentieth century.

About this title

About the Authors

Merle Goldman was Professor of History, Emerita, at Boston University and Associate of the Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies at Harvard University.

Roderick MacFarquhar was Leroy B. Williams Professor of History and Political Science, and Professor of Government, Harvard University.

Edition details

• Publisher: Harvard University Press
• Publication date: 1999
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0674654544
• ISBN 13: 9780674654549
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 462
• Editor: Merle Goldman, Roderick MacFarquhar