Reconstructing Twentieth-Century China State Control, Civil Society, and National Identity

by Brødsgaard, Kjeld Erik; Strand, David

• ISBN13: 9780198293118
• ISBN10: 0198293119
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1998-11-12
• Publisher: Clarendon Press

Summary

This book, the result of a collaborative effort between scholars from Europe, Asia, and the US, argues that the central underlying theme of China's development trajectory in this century is 'reconstruction' or jianshe, a keyword in twentieth-century Chinese political discourse. The impulse toreform and rebuild has erupted on a national scale every several years and include The May Fourth Movement, the Nanjing decade of 192737, The Yan'an reconsolidation and expansion of communism, the Great Leap Forward, the 1980 reforms, the Democracy Movement, and most recently, China's explodingeconomy. The contributions examine how a range of actorspolitical leaders, village reformers, government bureaucrats, entrepreneurs, women of child-bearing age, intellectuals, members of ethnic minorities, and local cadreshave reacted to these movements and transitions. They also highlight theimportance of the state at the local and central level and discuss the prospects for the continuous search for a national identity balanced between powerful nationalist traditions and manifest cultural diversity. In examining these crucial aspects the contributors rely on new material in the form oforiginal research and extensive fieldwork.

Table of Contents

List of Contributors	ix
Introduction	1	(32)
Kjeld Erik Brodsgaard
David Strand
I. STATE CONTROL
Calling the Chinese People to Order: Sun Yat-sen's Rhetoric of Development	33	(36)
David Strand
The Essence of Contemporary Chinese Bureaucracy: Socialism, Modernization and Political Culture	69	(23)
Ryosei Kokubun
Control as Care: Interaction between Urban Women and Birth Planning Workers	92	(21)
Cecilia Milwertz
Ownership and Community Interest in China's Rural Enterprises	113	(26)
Susan Young
II. CIVIL SOCIETY
Reconstructing Society: Liang Shuming and the Rural Reconstruction Movement in Shandong	139	(24)
Stig Thogersen
Bases for Civil Society in Reform China	163	(26)
Thomas Gold
State and Society in Hainan: Liao Xun's Ideas on `Small Government, Big Society'	189	(27)
Kjeld Erik Brodsgaard
Is a Participant Culture Emerging in China?	216	(37)
Torstein Hjellum
III. NATIONAL IDENTITY
Party Policy and `National Culture': Towards a State-Directed Cultural Nationalism in China?	253	(27)
Soren Clausen
Fostering `Love of Learning': Naxi Responses to Ethnic Images in Chinese State Education	280	(30)
Mette Halskov Hansen
China Deconstructs? The Future of the Chinese Empire-State in a Historical Perspective	310	(37)
Harald Bockman
Index	347