Long described as lost, this report was the result of Mao Zedong's investigation in 1930 of the people, economy, society and history of the obscure rural county of Xunwu in South China. An extraordinary document that far exceeds in scope and depth Mao's other investigative reports on rural China, the report is a rich source of information on rural administration, commerce, transportation, communication, education, land tenure, taxation, religion, diverse social relations and practices and struggle in one obscure area that was a microcosm of China. Thompson has translated and presented Mao's report with extensive notes. The book is designed to be accessible to non-specialists, and it will be welcomed by those interested in the Chinese countryside, comparative revolution and historical anthropology. Because Mao's report on Xunwu was part of a revolutionary programme, the report raises complex questions about academic and activist readings of social realities.
Based largely on nineteenth and twentieth-century representations of Chinese dress as traditional and unchanging, historians have long regarded fashion as something peculiarly Western. But in this surprising, sumptuously illustrated book, Antonia Finnane proves that vibrant fashions were a vital part of Chinese life in the late imperial era, when well-to-do men and women showed a keen awareness of what was up-to-date. Though foreigners who traveled to China in the early decades of the twentieth century came away with the impression that Chinese dress was simple and monotone, the key features of modern fashion were beginning to emerge, especially in Shanghai. Men in blue gowns donned felt caps and leather shoes, girls began to wear fitted jackets and narrow pants, and homespun garments gave way to machine-woven cloth, often made in foreign lands. These innovations marked the start of a far-reaching vestimentary revolution that would transform the clothing culture in urban and much of rural China over the next half century. Through Finnane's meticulous research, we are able to see how the close-fitting jacket and high collar of the 1911 Revolutionary period, the skirt and jacket-blouse of the May Fourth era, and the military style popular in the Cultural Revolution led to the variegated, globalized wardrobe of today. She brilliantly connects China's modernization and global visibility with changes in dress, offering a vivid portrait of the complex, subtle, and sometimes contradictory ways the people of China have worn their nation on their backs.
Militant Acts presents a broad history of the concept and practice of investigations in radical political struggles from the nineteenth century to the present. Radicals launched investigations into the conditions and struggles of the oppressed and exploited to stimulate their political mobilization and organization. These investigations assumed a variety of methodological forms in a wide range of geographical and institutional contexts, and they also drew support from the participation of intellectuals such as Marx, Lenin, Mao, Dunayevskaya, Foucault, and Badiou. Marcelo Hoffman analyzes newspapers, pamphlets, reports, and other source materials, which reveal the diverse histories, underappreciated difficulties, and theoretical import of investigations in radical political struggles. In so doing, he challenges readers to rethink the supposed failure of these investigations and concludes that the value of investigations in radical political struggles ultimately resides in the possibility of producing a new political "we."
This collection of documents covers the rise to power of the Chinese communist movement. They show how the Chinese Communist Party interpreted the revolution, how it devised policies to meet changing circumstances and how these policies were communicated to party members and public.
This book explores a Zhuang native chieftaincy enfranchised under the Chinese tusi system, and its relationship with the Chinese imperial state. It sheds critical light on the social and political organization of the strategic Chinese-Vietnamese border area over 600 years.
Forging Leninism in China is a re-examination of the events of the Chinese revolution and the transformation of the Chinese Communist Party from the years 1927 to 1934. Describing the transformation of the party as 'the forging of Leninism', Joseph Fewsmith offers a clear analysis of the development of the party. Drawing on supporting statements of party leaders and a wealth of historical material, he demonstrates how the Chinese Communist Party reshaped itself to become far more violent, more hierarchical, and more militarized during this time. He highlights the role of local educated youth in organizing the Chinese revolution, arguing that it was these local organizations, rather than Mao, who introduced Marxism into the countryside. Fewsmith presents a vivid story of local social history and conflict between Mao's revolutionaries and local Communists.
"Among the biggest challenges facing leaders of the newly established People's Republic of China (PRC) was how much they did not know. In 1949, at the end of a long sequence of wars, the government of one of the largest states in the world committed to fundamentally re-engineering its society and economy via socialist planning while having almost no hard, reliable statistical data about their own country. This book is a history of attempts made to resolve this "crisis in counting." Drawing on a wealth of official, institutional, and private sources culled from China, India, and the United States, the author explores the choices made and the effects they engendered through a series of vivid encounters with political leaders, professional statisticians, academics, ordinary statistical workers, and even literary figures. Early reliance on Soviet-inspired methods of enumeration became increasingly untenable in China by the middle of the 1950s. A series of unprecedented and unexpected exchanges with Indian statisticians followed, as the Chinese sought to learn about the then exciting new technology of random sampling. These developments were, in turn, overtaken by the tumult of the Great Leap Forward (1958-1961), when both probabilistic and exhaustive methods were rejected and statistics was refashioned into an essentially ethnographic enterprise. The author argues that this history, usually narrowly described as a universal, if European history, cannot be understood without acknowledging Soviet and Indian influences which not only revises existing models of Cold War science but also globalizes the wider developments in the history of statistics and data. For historians of China and social science, and political scientists, sociologists, and anthropologists studying modern China"--
This projected ten-volume edition of Mao Zedong's writings provides abundant documentation in his own words regarding his life and thought. It has been compiled from all available Chinese sources, including the many new texts that appeared in 1993, Mao's centenary.
Meet the overnight tech success stories of China’s globalizing business landscape In the last few years, we have seen a meteoric rise of Chinese tech companies across the world. Alibaba stock price movements unnerved investors globally, venture capitalists searched for the next Meituan or Pinduoduo in Southeast Asia and Latin America, and of course, Tik Tok, the most popular content platform in the world today, originated from China. The founders of such companies are typically credited with the “tenacity to rough it out,” the “courage to venture into the unknown,” and the “vision to take their companies to new heights.” However, the same can be said about Silicon Valley founders, or any successful entrepreneur. So, what gives Chinese founders and their companies the advantage in becoming multi-billion global enterprises? How does their leadership set strategies? How do they motivate their people? How do they move so fast and defend their turf in China’s hyper-competitive tech market? When they expand overseas, how do they determine what they keep and what they need to let go of? And most importantly, what do these things mean to you as a competitor, investor, regulator, or even as an executive or customer of such companies? Seeing the Unseen: Behind Chinese Tech Giants’ Global Venturing answers these questions and delves into the fascinating world of Chinese logic that shapes how tech leaders make and implement decisions, many of which are seldom seen outside China. In this book, you will gain an accurate, concise understanding of Chinese tech companies' reflections as they scale. You will understand the different generations of Chinese tech giants from Alibaba, Tencent, Baidu and Huawei to Pinduoduo, Meituan, ByteDance, Xiaomi and more. In this Seeing the Unseen, the analysis behind the success and lessons learned is summarized into a unique framework that touches on People, Organization, and Product and Leadership (POP-Leadership). The book covers: How Chinese history, folklore and Mao Zadong’s political strategies have shaped the strategies of Chinese tech leaders, even today The mindsets of Chinese tech and internet companies and how they have evolved over the last two decades The unique business culture and leadership styles that steered these companies through uncertain and ultra-competitive periods How Chinese companies structure their organizations and products and how they remain agile as they scale The limitations of Chinese POP-Leadership, and what these companies must shed to keep up with international players in global markets How Chinese POP-Leadership is now becoming international, and how international players are leveraging these learnings How the worldwide expansion of Chinese companies will alter the business landscape in the coming decades Chinese firms undertaking overseas ventures can challenge our thinking on global strategy and implementation. This book gives you a better understanding of these emergent players in the global arena.
