Calamity and Reform in China: State, Rural Society, and Institutional Change Since the Great Leap Famine

Yang, Dali L.

ISBN 10: 0804734704 / ISBN 13: 9780804734707

Published by Stanford University Press, 1998

About this Item

Very Good - Crisp, clean, unread book with some shelfwear/edgewear, may have a remainder mark - NICE PAPERBACK Standard-sized.

Seller Inventory # M0804734704Z2

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Calamity and Reform in China: State, Rural Society, and Institutional Change Since the Great Leap Famine
• Publisher: Stanford University Press
• Publication Date: 1998
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0804734704
• ISBN 13: 9780804734707
• Binding: paperback
• Condition: Very Good

About this title

Synopsis

China's Great Leap Famine of 1959-61 resulted in 30 million deaths, making it easily the worst famine in human history. Yet unlike the Cultural Revolution - that other massive catastrophe of Mao's rule - the Great Leap Forward has received scant scholarly attention. This is partly because victims of the ensuing famine were inarticulate farmers and partly because many key players in that inglorious era are members of the current elite who tightly guard the archives. Despite these impediments, the author has marshalled an impressive array of historical documents to provide the first comprehensive treatment of the political causes and consequences of the Great Leap Famine. The Famine is important because it furnished the crucial historical motives for dismantling the rural collective institutional structure in post-Mao China two decades later and motivating tens of millions of ordinary Chinese to enact the reforms.

About the Author

Dali L. Yang is Professor and Chairman in the Department of Political Science at the University of Chicago.