Very informative and enjoyable. And Objective. A lot of depth into social, economic, and political issues in China through vivid interviews and revealing statistical data. The author is an American professor spending two years of social study in China. He did not stay in fancy hotel while in China, but rather went to rural areas, rode public transportation, and interviewed the working class as well as billionares. The author exposed some serious social issues in China, nevertheless one can sense his passion for this country. As a Chinese I am very proud of Professor Li and his work. This is a great book for Americans who are interested in China and who would like to know more about real China that has been somewhat twisted by the popular western media.

The author of "Rediscovering China: Dynamics and Dilemmas of Reform" brings a unique perspective to his book, namely the viewpoint of one who has experienced both Chinese and American cultures firsthand. Born in Shanghai, Li Cheng came to the United States to study, later returning to China to write a series of articles, the updated versions of which form the basis of this book. The experiences he relates contain much more depth, much more richness of human interaction than comparable books written by native Western authors. He eloquently points out flaws in American stereotypical thinking about China, as well as criticizing Chinese leadership. I think Jiang ZeMin would do well to heed some of Li Cheng's recommendations.

This book was one of the first to look closely at how Chinese Communism really worked, rather than guessing based on readings of Mao's works and Party propaganda. Barnett interviewed at great length emigres who had just come from China to Hong Kong to form a picture of how the bureaucracy worked in a central ministry and at three different levels of local government. Despite the small number of interviews conducted, most of Barnett's findings have held up quite well over time. Many of the party and government structures he described still exist, even in the New New China.

There is no central argument to the book, since at this stage of China studies scholars were still trying to form a picture of the basics. Rather, the book should be used as a kind of encyclopedia, a reference work from which to draw details of political structure as needed.

Disclaimer: Barnett was my PhD advisor's advisor's advisor, so I may be biased. However, I believe my opinion reflects the general consensus.

It's too bad this book is out of print, and so expensive, because it's a most enlightening book for those interested in 20th Century China and the immense changes it has undergone. Presumably libraries are the main customers for this book. Yet while it's very intelligent, it's not a dry academic book, so has broad appeal beyond scholarly libraries. The fact that this book focuses on an often neglected region of China (Shaanxi, Gansu, Qinghai, Tibet, Xinjiang, Yunnan, etc.) makes it all the more important. It would be interesting to see the ratio of books published on the SE coast vs. the far West.

A. Doak Barnett, a legendary China scholar, toured these areas in
1948 and again in 1988. He paints a rich picture by interviewing a wide range of people: government officials high and low, blue-collar workers, peasants, a former labor camp prisoner, etc. As well as, of course, adding his own observations of the changes.

The consensus among all is that the positive economic transformation in these 4 decades is enormous, yet poverty remains widespread (it could hardly be any other way). Many told Barnett that the biggest positive changes in their lives, materially, came in the 1980s. This is doubtlessly true, because only in the reform period did the government give up its obsession with heavy industry and allow the production of consumer goods and petty retail market activity to flourish. But it's also likely, and one can infer this from Barnett's observations and interviews, that the capabilities for reform period growth were enhanced by productive capacity investments in the pre-reform era, which were underutilized.

The biggest current problem in urban economic reform remains the "third front" industries. These are defense industries that were placed in the far west for strategic purposes during the cold war, but now are unneeded duplicates that lose money, yet at the same time provide employment for many. The main rural problem is how to diversify (diets are much more grain-heavy/homogeneous than in the central and eastern regions) and raise yields in a difficult geographic and economic environment. Yields went through a surge in the 1978-83 period, yet gains since have been slow.

Those with an interest in China's minorities will especially want to read this book. For instance the lay reader might not know that as many Tibetans live outside of Tibet than live in it. Barnett discusses the history of and meets the Tibetans of Sichuan, Gansu, and Qinghai; as well as the many other minorities in the West.

It would be great to update this book with a third visit.