Thirty Years of Reform and Social Changes in China is translated from the original Chinese to provide a look into how scholars in China have been assessing their country's recent societal and political history. This volume and the others in the SSRC series, provide western scholars with an accessible English language look at the state of current scholarship in China on the interplay of the country's political and economic reforms with the society and daily life of its people.

China Development Research Foundation is one of the leading economic think tanks in China, where many of the details of China’s economic reform have been formulated. Its work and publications therefore provide great insights into what the Chinese themselves think about economic reform and how it should develop. This book presents a comprehensive survey of China’s reforms of the last thirty years. Its coverage includes macroeconomic policy; banking, finance, capital markets and tax; trade; labour markets; price reform; social security; and much else. Overall, it provides an invaluable assessment of the reforms from the perspective of experts within China, including an appraisal of how extensive the reforms have been, what consequences have turned out, and how far the reforms have been successful.

Europe and China have a long intermingled history reaching back to the earliest phases of the shift to the modern world. In the twenty-first century Europe and China are rediscovering their interlinked histories and reestablishing relationships. One aspect of this process involves cutting through received images of China and this book presents a clear, concise, scholarly review of the logic of Chinese politics.

China, with the world's largest population, numerous ethnic groups and vast geographical space, is also rich in languages. Since 2006, China's State Language Commission has been publishing annual reports on what is called "language life" in China. These reports cover language policy and planning invitatives at the national, provincial and local levels, new trends in language use in a variety of social domains, and major events concerning languages in mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan. Now for the first time, these reports are available in English for anyone interested in Chinese language and linguistics, China's language, education and social policies, as well as everyday language use among the ordinary people in China. The invaluable data contained in these reports provide an essential reference to researchers, professionals, policy makers, and China watchers.

Examining the impact of economic reform on everyday life in China, this book explores how changes in the employment relationship have affected the enterprise performance, the quality of working life and the livelihood strategies for individual households and families in China.

In recent years China has experienced intense economic development. Previously a rapidly urbanising industrial economy, the country has become a post-industrial economy with a service sector that accounts for almost half the nation’s GDP. This transformation has created many socio-political changes, but key among them is social mobilisation. This book provides a full and systematic analysis of social mobilisation in China, and how its use as part of state capacity has evolved.

An exploration of the transformations of contemporary China, firmly grounded in both disciplinary and China-specific contexts.

This book places the topic of the state and society in the context of modern development in China over the past century, investigating the dynamic relation and internal tension between the state’s power enhancement and society’s vitality activation instead of simply regarding the country and society as two separate entities. Building a modern country and activating the people’s vitality involves three closely linked and mutually supporting aspects: establishing the identity recognition of the people to unite the nation; adjusting the organizational system of the society to promote mobilization and institute a social incentive system; and determining dominant strategies and means for the interaction between the country and society to address social-governance issues. This book carefully sheds light on the logic behind China’s roundabout strategy for building a modern country and motivating the vitality of its people.

Despite the significant progress it had achieved in the past 60 years, especially in the past 30 years since Deng Xiaoping's reform initiatives in the late 1970s, China faces daunting challenges today. These challenges include, among others, a rigid political system that does not match economic vibrancy, uneven economic growth and widening income gap, a graying population, environmental degradation, potential social instability, ethnic tensions and separatist movement, poor international image, and military modernization. Based on papers originally presented at an international conference held at Bucknell University in Pennsylvania to mark the 60th anniversary of the People's Republic of China (PRC), this book provides an up-to-date, comprehensive, and authoritative assessment of the PRC's political, economic, social, ethnic, energy, security, military, diplomatic and other developments and challenges today. Contributed by scholars and experts in political science, international relations, economics, public administration, history, mass communication, psychology, and diplomacy, the book focuses on the efforts needed by China to grow in a sustainable manner and to become a respected global power. With each chapter addressing a different and yet an inter-related issue of the PRC's development, this book aims to make a significant contribution to the understanding of key challenges the country faces today as it strives to become a global power.

Social Stratification in Contemporary China raises and debates major sociological issues of modern and present-day China from a historical perspective. Such topics as “equality and inequality"and “acceptability of defined inequality"have been dealt with in a broad historical context since 1949 when the People’s Republic was founded. The work is widely accepted as one of the most important studies trying to clarify the difficult perceptions of policy of reform and opening up that was formulated and implemented in the early 1980s in China. Professor Li Qiang is one of the leading sociologists in China.