We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
To save content items to your account,
please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies.
If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account.
Find out more about saving content to .
To save content items to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected]
is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings
on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part
of your Kindle email address below.
Find out more about saving to your Kindle.
Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations.
‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi.
‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.
How, practically speaking, is the Chinese polity - as immense and fissured as it has now become - actually being governed today? Some analysts highlight signs of 'progress' in the direction of more liberal, open, and responsive rule. Others dwell instead on the many remaining 'obstacles' to a hoped-for democratic transition. Drawing together cutting-edge research from an international panel of experts, this volume argues that both those approaches rest upon too starkly drawn distinctions between democratic and non-democratic 'regime types', and concentrate too narrowly on institutions as opposed to practices. The prevailing analytical focus on adaptive and resilient authoritarianism - a neo-institutionalist concept - fails to capture what are often cross-cutting currents in ongoing processes of political change. Illuminating a vibrant repertoire of power practices employed in governing China today, these authors advance instead a more fluid, open-ended conceptual approach that privileges nimbleness, mutability, and receptivity to institutional and procedural invention and evolution.
Embedded Courts is laden with tension. Chinese courts are organized as a singular and unified system yet grassroots courts in urban and rural regions differ greatly in the way they use the law and are as diverse as the populations they serve. Based on extensive fieldwork and in-depth interviews, this book offers a penetrating discussion of the operation of Chinese courts. It explains how Chinese judges rule and how the law is not the only script they follow - political, administrative, social and economic factors all influence verdicts. This landmark work will revise our understanding of the role of law in China - one that cannot be easily understood through the standard lens of judicial independence and separation of powers. Ng and He make clear the struggle facing frontline judges as they bridge the gap between a rule-based application of law and an instrumentalist view that prioritizes stability maintenance.
Why would the removal of authoritarian institutions in some developing countries lead to sustained socio-economic crisis, while others experience explosive growth despite 'persisting' informal, insecure and rent-seeking institutional arrangements? A key to solving this enigma lies in understanding China, a country where the paradoxes of development are highly visible. Peter Ho argues that understanding China's economy necessitates an analytical refocusing from Form to Function, detached from normative assumptions about institutional appearance and developing instead a 'Credibility Thesis'. In this reading, once institutions endogenously emerge and persist through actors' conflicting interactions, they are credible. Ho develops this idea theoretically, methodologically, and empirically by examining institutions around the sector that propelled, yet, simultaneously destabilizes development: real estate - land, housing and natural resources. Ho shows how this sector can further both our understanding of institutions and issues of capital, labor, infrastructure and technology.
East Asia is richer, more integrated and more stable than ever before, whilst East Asian defense spending is now roughly half of what it was in 1990 and shows no sign of increasing. There is no evidence of any Asian arms race. All countries in the region are seeking diplomatic, not military solutions with each other. Yet this East Asia reality still runs counter to a largely Western narrative that views China's rise as a threat and the region as increasingly unstable. In this important book, David C. Kang argues that American grand strategy should emphasize diplomatic and economic relations with the region, rather than military-first policies. Using longitudinal and comparative data, statistical analysis, and intensive research in selected East Asian countries, he suggests that East Asia is in sync with the American desire to share burdens and that the region may in fact be more stable than popularly believed.
Can authoritarian regimes use democratic institutions to strengthen and solidify their rule? The Chinese government has legislated some of the most protective workplace laws in the world and opened up the judicial system to adjudicate workplace conflict, emboldening China's workers to use these laws. This book examines these patterns of legal mobilization, showing which workers are likely to avail themselves of these new protections and find them effective. Gallagher finds that workers with high levels of education are far more likely to claim these new rights and be satisfied with the results. However, many others, left disappointed with the large gap between law on the books and law in reality, reject the courtroom for the streets. Using workers' narratives, surveys, and case studies of protests, Gallagher argues that China's half-hearted attempt at rule of law construction undermines the stability of authoritarian rule. New workplace rights fuel workers' rising expectations, but a dysfunctional legal system drives many workers to more extreme options, including strikes, demonstrations and violence.