China’s Long March to Freedom: Grassroots Modernization

(Transaction Publishers) Exploring the ongoing grassroots social revolution in China, Zhou shows how the country’s movement toward a more liberal society has resulted from both far-reaching international influences and the explosion of information available to the public — especially through the Internet. Although China continues to be governed by a single party, the emergence of clear differences between the people and the government speaks to the fact that true liberalization cannot be imposed from above. The movement, which has met with phenomenal success thus far, is ultimately a transformative process in which the Chinese government reacts rather than leads. Zhou is an associate professor of political science at the University of Hawaii and a fellow at the National Endowment for Democracy. She is the author of How the Farmers Changed China: Power of the People .