A single image dominates Western perceptions of the regime in China since the Tiananmen massacre of 1989: that of a government willing to crack down mercilessly on any protest or resistance. This image has been reinforced by the recent confrontation between the government and the practitioners of Falun Gong. According to this picture, Chinese citizens are trapped by an ever-watchful and inflexible dictatorship.
These are gross oversimplifications of modern Chinese society. In fact, the government has been forced to respond and sharply redirect its policies in the face of the popular will. But as long as such images have currency, and as long as Chinese leaders respond to questions about these social problems with their time-honored refusal to explain -- "that is an internal affair of our own country" ("zhe shi womenguode neizheng") -- balanced and reliable accounts of modern China will remain hard to come by.
This collection of essays on Chinese society, edited by Elizabeth Perry and Mark Selden, part of the Routledge series Asia's Transformations, offers a corrective to the standard understanding. The essays usually include data only up to 1998, but they offer useful and balanced elucidations of some of China's most pressing social dilemmas, the complexity of which is often underestimated outside the mainland.