Understanding China Today

This book covers numerous areas and aspects of Chinese domestic and external politics and policies, the Chinese economy, Chinese society and culture, and Chinese literature and history. It is divided into four sections, the first of which focuses on China’s place in world politics, including its relations with the European Union, Russia, India, Japan, the United States, and Africa. The second section among others addresses issues and areas related to China’s role in and impact on the international economy, the strategies and positioning of Chinese multinational companies investing in Europe, the problems and challenges of China's banking and financial systems and China's foreign economic strategies. The final two sections are devoted to Chinese politics and society, and Italian views on Chinese culture, language, and literature. The volume is multidisciplinary in nature, with contributions from experts of politics, economics, history, law, literature, gender studies, and the media. It will appeal to a wide range of China scholars and analysts as well as to all who have an interest in international relations, Chinese politics, the Chinese economy, and Chinese society, culture, literature, and history.

This concise, thought-provoking analysis explores the political changes and economic development emblematic of a rapidly rising China. Politics and Government in China is an introduction to Chinese government and politics. The book provides analysis of China's political history; its key leaders and leadership transitions; and its political party, state institutions, and party policies. Moving beyond a strict definition of politics, the book also explores the nation's economic development, social policy, law and order, and foreign relations. Throughout these analyses, the book's primary focus is on modern China, a nation poised to become an economic superpower. It thus explores themes such as China's transition from a traditional society to a modern society, from a less developed to a rapidly growing economy, from a revolutionary regime to a modernizing state, and from the rule of man to the rule of law. Although the transitions are incomplete and the future still uncertain, this book will help readers understand China as it is—and as it may become.

In the early 1990's, the world began to recognize China as a rising economic power to reckon with. China's economy is dynamic ? her human and natural resources are plentiful and her economic growth has been well sustained over the last 16 years. In fact, some have predicted that by the year 2020, China's economic output will be close to half that of the US. It is undeniable that China will be an economic giant, if she is not already one today.In this book, the author has traced China's economic development over the last 16 years. The steps and characteristics of China's economic reform are detailed. The prospects for China's economic growth are studied. The author also attempts to analyze topical issues pertaining to China's economic relations with the US and her integration with the other Asian economies. This book provides the interested reader with a bird's eye view of the Chinese economy over the last 16 years. Most chapters are written for the general reader, while a few are for professional economists. For the questions it answers or for those that it raises, this is an important book to read.

After ten years, John Bryan Starr has thoroughly revised and updated his classic introduction to the background of, the data about, and the issues at stake in China's present and future. In the new edition, Starr seamlessly weaves in additional material on the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, the Chinese government's ongoing efforts to curb the influence of the Internet, and the intensifying trade disputes between the United States and China. Succinct, modest, and refreshingly forthright, Understanding China remains a necessary guide for the uninitiated to everything from the Chinese economy and political system, to its intellectual freedoms and human rights, to its relationship with the rest of the world.

The purpose of Understanding China is to enable any reader to ask and even answer such questions as: What is the capacity of China's political system to deal successfully with the principal problems confronting the nation today - the inflammatory Taiwan issue, the future of Hong Kong, the maintenance of economic growth while the global political climate seems to be changing, the management of an orderly succession in the political leadership? Indeed, how will China be governed?

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.

John Bryan Starr examines changes in China's politics, military history, society, culture and human rights policy. He sticks closely to the facts, avoiding theoretical interpretations that are not tethered to evidence. He identifies the fundamental problems confronting China today and then asks whether the Chinese political system is up to the task of resolving them. By the time he has finished reviewing the problems of environmental degradation, inadequate infrastructure, population growth, failed state-owned enterprises, underfinanced education and the rise in both rural and urban discontent he has no alternative but to reach a cautiously pessimistic position: that the most likely prospect for China is an eventual collapse of the party-state system, a development that he believes could be followed by the People's Liberation Army taking on a semi-praetorian role.