China's rapid and complex political and socioeconomic changes provide fertile ground for pioneering analysis, but they also present daunting theoretical and practical challenges. This reader takes up the challenge, offering the most comprehensive assessment of Chinese domestic politics available by bringing together the best recent scholarship in the field. The anthology focuses on the origin, content, and significance of the post-1989 phase of China's reform and opening to the world, commonly known in the PRC as "deep reform." This period has been unfolding in interaction with globalization, marketization, privatization, political institutionalization, as well as with financial and legal changes. Deep reform includes new policy initiatives that have penetrated political, legal, economic, and social sectors untouched by previous initiatives as reformers have been forced to deal with the consequences--intended and unintended--of earlier reforms. These carefully selected essays by leading scholars have been revised and updated for this text. In addition, a substantive introduction and conclusion place the articles in their broader context for readers new to the subject. With the successful transition of the leadership of the party, state, and military since 2002, the time is ripe for a comprehensive evaluation of China's deep reform as it enters a new stage. This timely reader will offer students, scholars, and policymakers invaluable insights into the dynamics of change in one of the world's emerging political and economic dynamos. Contributions by: Marc Blecher, Bruce J. Dickson, Lowell Dittmer, Joseph Fewsmith, Ting Gong, Baogang Guo, William Hurst, Cheng Li, Guoli Liu, Andrew J. Nathan, Kevin J. O'Brien, Veronica Pearson, Randall Peerenboom, Yingyi Qian, Tony Saich, Tianjian Shi, Edward S. Steinfeld, Shaoguang Wang, Lynn White, Yu-Shan Wu, and Guobin Yang

The Chinese economy has entered a new phase of development in which sources of growth are not so much dependent upon pure increases in labour, investment and credit expansion, but from productivity improvement, structural changes, technological progress and the benefits from improvement of the social security and welfare improvement. When market functions are fully established to become a main channel for allocating resources, the entrepreneurship will flourish engaging in more innovative activities, workers will move more freely and have more incentives to improve their skills, firms will become more productive through market entry and exit, the economic structure will become more balanced because of the improved resource allocation, and in the end, growth will become more spontaneous and sustainable. In this sense, reforms could deliver ‘dividend’ by raising China’s potential economic growth rates. For China to confront all the challenges it faces at present, the reforms undertaken now have to be deep, comprehensive and far-reaching in order to succeed in paving the way for China to complete the task of transformation in the long-term. There is no better alternative than deepening the market-oriented reform in advancing the course of China’s modernisation for future development and prosperity and lifting China to the status of a developed economy in the next two decades. The recent China update books have covered the topic of reform from different angles and this new book is another attempt to address this important issue.

This in-depth volume explains China's residential construction boom and reviews how some established trends are likely to challenge its housing market in coming years. It draws on household surveys and public data in China and provides important lessons about housing policy for China and other countries.

A planned economy system was set up in China after the establishment of the PRC in 1949, and its reform was launched in 1978. The reform has gone on for 20 years and has achieved globally recognized success. China's economy is now in the course of transforming from a planned economy into a socialist market economy. This book summarizes the successful experiences and points out the difficulties of the deep reform and the prospects for the 21st century. Rich in historical data and material, it provides valuable information for readers from universities, institutions and enterprises as well as government officials — whoever is interested in China and its economic reform.The author, a famous Chinese economist, has been involved in the leadership of the Chinese economic system's reform since its launch in 1979. In 1998 he was invited by the World Bank to give a series of seminars on China's economic reform, and most of the contents of those seminars are included in this book.

China has become deeply integrated into the world economy. Yet, gradual marketization has facilitated the country’s rise without leading to its wholesale assimilation to global neoliberalism. This book uncovers the fierce contest about economic reforms that shaped China’s path. In the first post-Mao decade, China’s reformers were sharply divided. They agreed that China had to reform its economic system and move toward more marketization—but struggled over how to go about it. Should China destroy the core of the socialist system through shock therapy, or should it use the institutions of the planned economy as market creators? With hindsight, the historical record proves the high stakes behind the question: China embarked on an economic expansion commonly described as unprecedented in scope and pace, whereas Russia’s economy collapsed under shock therapy. Based on extensive research, including interviews with key Chinese and international participants and World Bank officials as well as insights gleaned from unpublished documents, the book charts the debate that ultimately enabled China to follow a path to gradual reindustrialization. Beyond shedding light on the crossroads of the 1980s, it reveals the intellectual foundations of state-market relations in reform-era China through a longue durée lens. Overall, the book delivers an original perspective on China’s economic model and its continuing contestations from within and from without.

China's People's Liberation Army (PLA) has embarked on its most wide-ranging and ambitious restructuring since 1949, including major changes to most of its key organizations. The restructuring reflects the desire to strengthen PLA joint operation capabilities- on land, sea, in the air, and in the space and cyber domains. The reforms could result in a more adept joint warfighting force, though the PLA will continue to face a number of key hurdles to effective joint operations, Several potential actions would indicate that the PLA is overcoming obstacles to a stronger joint operations capability. The reforms are also intended to increase Chairman Xi Jinping's control over the PLA and to reinvigorate Chinese Communist Party (CCP) organs within the military. Xi Jinping's ability to push through reforms indicates that he has more authority over the PLA than his recent predecessors. The restructuring could create new opportunities for U.S.-China military contacts.

All societies face a key question: how to empower governments to perform essential governmental functions while constraining the arbitrary exercise of power. This balance, always in flux, is particularly fluid in today's China. This insightful book examines the changing relationship between that state and its society, as demonstrated by numerous experiments in governance at subnational levels, and explores the implications for China's future political trajectory. Ann Florini, Hairong Lai, and Yeling Tan set their analysis at the level of townships and counties, investigating the striking diversity of China's exploration into different governance tools and comparing these experiments with developments and debates elsewhere in the world. China Experiments draws on multiple cases of innovation to show how local authorities are breaking down traditional models of governance in responding to the challenges posed by the rapid transformations taking place across China's economy and society. The book thus differs from others on China that focus on dynamics taking place at the elite level in Beijing, and is unique in its broad but detailed, empirically grounded analysis. The introduction examines China's changing governance architecture and raises key overarching questions. It addresses the motivations behind the wide variety of experiments underway by which authorities are trying to adapt local governance structures to meet new demands. Chapters 2–5 then explore each type of innovation in detail, from administrative streamlining and elections to partnerships in civil society and transparency measures. Each chapter explains the importance of the experiment in terms of implications for governance and draws upon specific case studies. The final chapter considers what these growing numbers of experiments add up to, whether China is headed towards a stronger more resilient authoritarianism or evolving towards its own version of democracy, and suggests a serie