Public Opinion And Political Change In China

This book describes through case studies how various factors, such as the single-party political system, traditional culture, market reform, and industrialization, shape public opinion and mass political behavior in urban China. Case studies focus on the process of conducting public opinion polls in China’s political environment, regime legitimacy and reform support, media control and censorship, interpersonal trust and democratization, mass political participation, labor relations and trade unions, and the role of intellectuals in political change. The book draws most of its empirical evidence from twelve Chinese public opinion surveys conducted between the late 1980s and the late 1990s. The same questions repeated in many of these surveys provide a rare opportunity to examine the changing pattern of the Chinese public mind during this period. The book ends with the provocative conclusion that China’s authoritarian political system proved to be less effective than traditional culture, marketization, and industrialization in shaping public opinion and mass political behavior. Liberal ideas and bottom-up political participation can emerge even in the absence of direct elections.

Populist Authoritarianism focuses on the Chinese Communist Party, which governs the world's largest population in a single-party authoritarian state. Wenfang Tang attempts to explain the seemingly contradictory trends of the increasing number of protests on the one hand, and the results of public opinion surveys that consistently show strong government support on the other hand. The book points to the continuity from the CCP's revolutionary experiences to its current governing style, even though China has changed in many ways on the surface in the post-Mao era. The book proposes a theoretical framework of Populist Authoritarianism with six key elements, including the Mass Line ideology, accumulation of social capital, public political activism and contentious politics, a hyper-responsive government, weak political and civil institutions, and a high level of regime trust. These traits of Populist Authoritarianism are supported by empirical evidence drawn from multiple public opinion surveys conducted from 1987 to 2015. Although the CCP currently enjoys strong public support, such a system is inherently vulnerable due to its institutional deficiency. Public opinion can swing violently due to policy failure and the up and down of a leader or an elite faction. The drastic change of public opinion cannot be filtered through political institutions such as elections and the rule of law, creating system-wide political earthquakes.

Authored by Professor Yu Keping, a famous Chinese political scholar, this book focuses on the core issues of democracy and the rule of law in China. It provides the readers with insights into China's political development in the past 60 years and the changes in China's governance in the past 30 years, especially pertaining to democracy in China's governance. The book encapsulates Prof Yu's reform ideas on political development in China, and gives the readers a glimpse into the future of China's democracy. Contents:Democracy:Human Rights and DeomcracyDemocracy in China: Challenge or Opportunity?Democracy or Populism: The Politics of Public Opinion in ChinaPushing Forward Orderly DemocracyGovernance:Governance and Good GovernanceGood Governance and LegitimacyModernizing State Governance: Restructuring the Relationship between the State, the Market and Society Since the reform in ChinaLearning, Training and Governing: The CCP's Cadre Education since the reformGlobalization:Globalization and State SovereigntyGlobalization and the "Chinese Model"Citizenship and Institutional Change at the Global Age: the New Migration Movement in China Readership: Researchers, students and the general public who are interested in China's political development in the past 60 years.Key Features:The author, Professor Yu Keping, is a prominent scholar in the study of democratic polity and political democracy in ChinaThe book captures not only the history of China's democracy, but also provides the readers with insights into the future of China's democracy

This book examines different dynamics such as marketisation, globalisation and new media technologies that have driven the transformation of China''s media industry OCo one of the primary battlegrounds where ideological, social and economic struggles are fought OCo against the backdrop of the growing tensions between economic growth, globalisation, and political control in China.

Since the Chinese were officially plugged into the virtual community in 1994, the usage of the internet in the country has developed at an incredible rate. By the end of 2008, there were approximately 298 million netizens in China, a number which surpasses that of the U.S. and ranks China the highest user in the world. The rapid development of the online Chinese community has not only boosted the information flow among citizens across the territory, but has also created a new form of social interaction between the state, the media, various professionals and intellectuals, as well as China's ordinary citizens. Although the subject of this book is online Chinese nationalism, which to a certain extent is seen as a pro-regime phenomenon, the emergence of an online civil society in China intrinsically provides some form of supervision of state power-perhaps even a check on it. The fact that the party-state has made use of this social interaction, while at the same time remaining worried about the negative impact of the same netizens, is a fundamental characteristic of the nature of the relationship between the state and the internet community. Many questions arise when considering the internet and Chinese nationalism. Which are the most important internet sites carrying online discussion of nationalism related to the author's particular area of study? What are the differences between online nationalism and the conventional form of nationalism, and why do these differences exist? Has nationalist online expression influenced actual foreign policy making? Has nationalist online expression influenced discourse in the mainstream mass media in China? Have there been any counter reactions towards online nationalism? Where do they come from? Online Chinese Nationalism and China's Bilateral Relations seeks to address these questions.

As China is increasingly integrated into the processes of economic, political, social, and cultural globalization, important questions arise about how Chinese people perceive and evaluate such processes. At the same time, international communication scholars have long been interested in how local, national, and transnational media communications shape people’s attitudes and values. Combining these two concerns, this book examines a range of questions pertinent to public opinion toward globalization in urban China: To what degree are the urban residents in China exposed to the influences from the outside world? How many transnational social connections does a typical urban Chinese citizen have? How often do they consume foreign media? To what extent are they aware of the notion of globalization, and what do they think about it? Do they believe that globalization is beneficial to China, to the city where they live, and to them personally? How do people’s social connections and communication activities shape their views toward globalization and the outside world? This book tackles these and other questions systematically by analyzing a four-city comparative survey of urban Chinese residents, demonstrating the complexities of public opinion in China. Media consumption does relate, though by no means straightforwardly, to people’s attitudes and beliefs, and this book provides much needed information and insights about Chinese public opinion on globalization. It also develops fresh conceptual and empirical insights on issues such as public opinion toward US-China relations, Chinese people’s nationalistic sentiments, and approaches to analyze attitudes toward globalization.

Thirty years ago, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) made a fateful decision: to allow newspapers, magazines, television, and radio stations to compete in the marketplace instead of being financed exclusively by the government. The political and social implications of that decision are still unfolding as the Chinese government, media, and public adapt to the new information environment. Edited by Susan Shirk, one of America's leading experts on contemporary China, this collection of essays brings together a who's who of experts--Chinese and American--writing about all aspects of the changing media landscape in China. In detailed case studies, the authors describe how the media is reshaping itself from a propaganda mouthpiece into an agent of watchdog journalism, how politicians are reacting to increased scrutiny from the media, and how television, newspapers, magazines, and Web-based news sites navigate the cross-currents between the open marketplace and the CCP censors. China has over 360 million Internet users, more than any other country, and an astounding 162 million bloggers. The growth of Internet access has dramatically increased the information available, the variety and timeliness of the news, and its national and international reach. But China is still far from having a free press. As of 2008, the international NGO Freedom House ranked China 181 worst out of 195 countries in terms of press restrictions, and Chinese journalists have been aptly described as "dancing in shackles." The recent controversy over China's censorship of Google highlights the CCP's deep ambivalence toward information freedom. Covering everything from the rise of business media and online public opinion polling to environmental journalism and the effect of media on foreign policy, Changing Media, Changing China reveals how the most populous nation on the planet is reacting to demands for real news.