Revolution, Resistance, and Reform in Village China

by Edward Friedman, Paul G. Pickowicz, and Mark Selden

• ISBN13: 9780300108965
• ISBN10: 0300108966
• Format: Trade Book
• Copyright: 2005-12-12
• Publisher: Yale University Press

Summary

Drawing on more than a quarter century of field and documentary research in rural North China, this book explores the contested relationship between village and state from the 1960s to the start of the twenty-first century. The authors provide a vivid portrait of how resilient villagers struggle to survive and prosper in the face of state power in two epochs of revolution and reform. Highlighting the importance of intra-rural resistance and rural-urban conflicts to Chinese politics and society in the Great Leap and Cultural Revolution, the authors go on to depict the dynamic changes that have transformed village China in the post-Mao era. This book continues the dramatic story in the authors' prizewinningChinese Village, Socialist State. Plumbing previously untapped sources, including interviews, archival materials, village records and unpublished memoirs, diaries and letters, the authors capture the struggles, pains and achievements of villagers across three generations of social upheaval.

Author Biography

EDWARD FRIEDMAN is professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. PAUL G. PICKOWICZ is professor of history and Chinese studies at the University of California, San Diego. MARK SELDEN is professor of sociology and history at Binghamton University and professorial associate, East Asia Program, at Cornell University.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	ix
Prelude	1	(5)
Back from the Brink	6	(22)
Memory and Myth	28	(18)
Socialist Education	46	(13)
A Whiff	59	(12)
Riding High	71	(13)
The Stench	84	(28)
Whatever Chairman Mao Says	112	(20)
War Communism	132	(19)
Sprouts of Reform	151	(23)
Stalemate	174	(24)
Tremors	198	(24)
Earthquakes	222	(18)
Reform	240	(22)
Reform and Its Discontents	262	(25)
Appendix of Tables	287	(14)
List of Abbreviations	301	(2)
Notes	303	(20)
Index	323