
- English
- PDF
- Available on iOS & Android
About this book
The gap between those living in the city and those in the countryside remains one of China's most intractable problems. As this powerful work of grassroots history argues, the origins of China's rural-urban divide can be traced back to the Mao Zedong era. While Mao pledged to remove the gap between the city worker and the peasant, his revolutionary policies misfired and ended up provoking still greater discrepancies between town and country, usually to the disadvantage of villagers. Through archival sources, personal diaries, untapped government dossiers and interviews with people from cities and villages in northern China, the book recounts their personal experiences, showing how they retaliated against the daily restrictions imposed on them while traversing between the city and the countryside. Vivid and harrowing accounts of forced and illicit migration, the staggering inequity of the Great Leap Famine and political exile during the Cultural Revolution reveal how Chinese people fought back against policies that pitted city dwellers against villagers.
Frequently asked questions
- Essential is ideal for learners and professionals who enjoy exploring a wide range of subjects. Access the Essential Library with 800,000+ trusted titles and best-sellers across business, personal growth, and the humanities. Includes unlimited reading time and Standard Read Aloud voice.
- Complete: Perfect for advanced learners and researchers needing full, unrestricted access. Unlock 1.4M+ books across hundreds of subjects, including academic and specialized titles. The Complete Plan also includes advanced features like Premium Read Aloud and Research Assistant.
Please note we cannot support devices running on iOS 13 and Android 7 or earlier. Learn more about using the app.
Information
Table of contents
- Cover
- City versus Countryside in Mao’s China
- Title
- Copyright
- Contents
- Maps
- Tables
- Acknowledgments
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- 1 The City Leads the Village
- 2 Eating, Moving, and Working
- 3 Tianjin's Great Leap
- 4 The Great Downsizing of 1961–1963
- 5 The Four Cleanups and Urban Youth in Tianjin's Hinterland
- 6 Purifying the City
- 7 Neither Urban nor Rural
- 8 Staging Xiaojinzhuang
- Epilogue
- Appendix
- Selected Bibliography
- Index