China A Modern History

by Dillon, Michael

• ISBN13: 9781780763811
• ISBN10: 1780763816
• Edition: Reprint
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2012-09-15
• Publisher: I.B. Tauris

Summary

China's transformation in the last few decades has been perhaps the most remarkable - and most controversial - development in modern history. Barely a century removed from the struggling and outdated Qing Empire, China has managed to reinvent itself on an unprecedented scale: from Empire, to Communist state, to hybrid capitalist superpower. Yet the full implications of China's rapid march to modernity are not widely understood - particularly, the effects of China's meteoric rise on the nation's many ethnic minorities. China: A Modern History is the definitive guide to this complex contemporary phenomenon. Deng Xiaoping's 1980s policy of 'reform and opening', which saw China enter the world market, is only the most recent in a series of dramatic shifts that have transformed Chinese society over the past 150 years. China: A Modern History explores these contrasts in detail, while also highlighting the enduring values which have informed Chinese identity for millennia. Michael Dillon's China: A Modern History is essential reading for those interested in the past, present and future course of one of the world's great nations. Clearly and compellingly written, this will stand as the best introduction to this spectacular and still-unfinished story.

Author Biography

Michael Dillon was founding Director of the Centre for Contemporary Chinese Studies at the University of Durham, where he taught modern Chinese history. He is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and the Royal Asiatic Society and was Visiting Professor at Tsinghua University in Beijing in 2009.

Table of Contents

"The most up-to-date history of modern China. [Dillon] provides a well structured narrative from the 'First Opium War' to the coming to power of the 'fourth generation' of Communist leaders in China." - Steve Tsang, Louis Cha Fellow and University Reader in Politics, St Antony's College, Oxford"An excellent book that reduces a vast mass of complex data and specialist scholarship to manageable proportions. Professor Dillon has written a lucid and penetrating history of China that achieves both breadth and depth. Students will benefit from the author's clear-headed approach and plain yet eloquent style. This is one of the best single texts on modern Chinese history yet to appear." - Gregor Benton, Professor of Chinese History, Cardiff University