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The history of Harbin, ruled by the Russians, by an international
coalition of allied powers, by Chinese warlords, by the Soviet
Union and finally by the Chinese Communists - all in the course of
100 years - is presented here as an example of Chinese
local-history writing.
The history of Harbin, ruled by the Russians, by an international
coalition of allied powers, by Chinese warlords, by the Soviet
Union and finally by the Chinese Communists - all in the course of
100 years - is presented here as an example of Chinese
local-history writing.
Doing fieldwork inside the PRC is an eye-opening but sometimes also
deeply frustrating experience. Fieldwork-based studies form the
foundation for our understanding of Chinese politics and society,
but there are conspicuously few detailed descriptions in the China
literature of how people actually do their fieldwork, and of the
problems they encounter. This lack of public methodological debate
not only undermines academic standards of openness: it also stalls
constructive discussion on coping strategies to shared problems,
and it leaves graduate students going to the field for the first
time with a feeling of being the only ones to encounter
difficulties. In this volume, scholars from around the world
reflect on their own fieldwork practice in order to give practical
advice and discuss more general theoretical points. The
contributors come from a wide range of disciplines such as
political science, anthropology, economics, media studies, history,
cultural geography, and sinology. The book also contains an
extensive bibliography. This work is of relevance to post-graduate
students from the social sciences and humanities who plan to do
fieldwork in China; to experienced scholars who are new to the
China field; and to experienced China scholars with an interest in
methodological issues.
During the early 1980s China embarked on what can be seen as one of
the world s largest social experiments ever. Decollectivization
meant much more than the reorganization of agricultural production
into family based farming. It signalled significant changes to
rural social relations, when privatization, marketization and
increased geographical mobility started tearing apart the economic
and social institutions that had structured collective village life
under Mao. The focus of this book is on how rural society has been
reorganized in the 21st century. The first chapters outline the
basic organizational structure of rural China and can be used as an
introduction to the topic in a classroom setting. They show how the
state and its social scientists draw up plans to overcome the
perceived lack of rural social organization, and discuss the often
problem-ridden implementation of their ideas. The second section
presents case studies of institutions that organize key aspects of
rural life: Boarding schools where rural children learn to accept
organizational hierarchies; lineage organizations carving out new
roles for themselves; dragonhead enterprises expected to organize
agricultural production and support rural development, and several
others. The book is of theoretical interest because of its focus on
the re-embedding, or reintegration, of individuals into new types
of collectivities, which are less predetermined by tradition and
habit and more a matter of, at least perceived, individual choice.
Most chapters are based on extensive fieldwork and contain vivid
examples from daily life, which will make the book attractive to
anyone who wants to understand how Chinese villagers experience the
extraordinary social changes they are going through.
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