ABSTRACT
A civic environmental movement has been in the making in urban China since the mid-1990s. In contrast to earlier popular protests, civic environmentalism has an organizational base of non-governmental organizations (NGOs), a set of new practices, and a new language. It is largely routinized and non-disruptive, and yet has gained considerable influence at home and abroad. These features are indicative of important institutional change. China’s civic environmental movement is a central element of the new social formations which are the subject of this volume. It is also part of the broader field of collective social action, which, as the editors point out, “is a prime mover of change.”
