Bøger af Joshua Zhang

Using a social movement perspective, this monograph demonstrates the differences between the Return to the City Movement by the Chinese educated youths - the only successful social movement by the Chinese people since the establishment of the communist regime - and the Down to the Countryside Campaign by the Chinese Communist Party.Grounded in data collected via an unprecedented survey research effort involving respondents who lived through these historic events, the monograph explores the emotional impact upon the educated youths of being forced to the countryside, the directions and forms of their resettlement, work, income, mentality, marriage/love, and relationship with local peasants while in the countryside, timelines and methods involved in returning to the city, their final occupations, children's fulfillment, current perceptions of urban life, evaluation of the campaign and their experiences in the countryside. The authors also summarize the lessons learned from the Return to the City Movement, providing references for Chinese social movements in the future.

Using a social movement perspective, this monograph demonstrates the differences between the Return to the City Movement by the Chinese educated youths - the only successful social movement by the Chinese people since the establishment of the communist regime - and the Down to the Countryside Campaign by the Chinese Communist Party.Grounded in data collected via an unprecedented survey research effort involving respondents who lived through these historic events, the monograph explores the emotional impact upon the educated youths of being forced to the countryside, the directions and forms of their resettlement, work, income, mentality, marriage/love, and relationship with local peasants while in the countryside, timelines and methods involved in returning to the city, their final occupations, children's fulfillment, current perceptions of urban life, evaluation of the campaign and their experiences in the countryside. The authors also summarize the lessons learned from the Return to the City Movement, providing references for Chinese social movements in the future.

Based on a large-scale survey, it is found that during the Cultural Revolution masses took part in the movements to either improve their social status or maintain their social positions. In the provinces immersed in class based struggles, there was strong relationship between faction alignment and family background. Nevertheless, in the provinces involved in non-class based sectarian struggles, the association between the two was nil. The social conflict school failed to notice the sectarian internecine fights among rebels while the political process school failed to pay attention to the fundamental social conflicts in China. The book summarizes the lessons learned from the self-destruction of the mass movements and points out pitfalls for the future social movements in China.

This book recounts the elections in 2012 from different perspectives, one from an ordinary voter, one from an election researcher and one from a redistricting insider. Many officials, representatives and senators are elected from their districts. "One person one vote principle" dictates that the election districts should be redrawn every ten years after the census. During the redistricting, in order to win an upper hand over the opponents, partisan gerrymandering is quite popular with packing and cracking tricks. Whoever wins in redistricting wins the elections for the next ten years. In many cases, the election outcomes are decided before the election starts. Redistricting transforms the ideal of "people electing their representatives" to the reality of "representatives choosing their constituents".