ABSTRACT

This chapter identifies salient emerging trends of growing social unrest in China and evaluates their potential impact on state-society relations and regime transformation in China. The “China miracle” has provided an impressive story for several years now: a tale of a country rising from the remains of a socialist command economy to become the world’s premier manufacturer and trader. No country in history has sustained such a fabulous growth over three decades as China. However, China’s progress has been mordantly selective; its uneven economic growth benefits the elite over the workers and farmers, and promotes the development of cities over the countryside.