This book examines the various stages of China's development, in the economic, social, and political fields, relating theories and models of development to what is actually occurring in China, and discussing how China's development is likely to progress going forward. It argues that China's modernization hitherto can be characterized as "authoritarian development" - a fusion of mixed economic institutions of varying types of ownership with social stability and political cohesiveness - and that the present phase, where more emphasis is being given to social issues, is likely to lead on to a new phase where a more mature civil society and a more extensive middle class are likely to look for greater democratization. It presents an in-depth analysis of China's changing social structure and civil society, explores the forces for and processes of democratization, and assesses the prospects for further democratization in the light of changing social structures.

This book examines the various stages of China's development, in the economic, social, and political fields, relating theories and models of development to what is actually occurring in China, and discussing how China's development is likely to progress going forward. It argues that China's modernization hitherto can be characterized as "authoritarian development" - a fusion of mixed economic institutions of varying types of ownership with social stability and political cohesiveness - and that the present phase, where more emphasis is being given to social issues, is likely to lead on to a new phase where a more mature civil society and a more extensive middle class are likely to look for greater democratization. It presents an in-depth analysis of China's changing social structure and civil society, explores the forces for and processes of democratization, and assesses the prospects for further democratization in the light of changing social structures.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 15th International Symposium on Spatial and Temporal Databases, SSTD 2017, held in Arlington, VA, USA, in August 2017.The 19 full papers presented together with 8 demo papers and 5 vision papers were carefully reviewed and selected from 90 submissions. The papers are organized around the current research on concepts, tools, and techniques related to spatial and temporal databases.