A discussion of protest in China, spanning the Imperial, Republic and Communist eras. It introduces Chinese patterns and provides a forum to consider ways in which contentious politics in China might serve to reinforce, refine or reshape theories derived from western cases.

Elizabeth J. Perry is Director of the Fairbank Center for East Asian Research and Henry Rosovsky Professor of Government at Harvard University. Born in China, she was educated at William Smith College (B.A. summa cum laude), The University of Washington (M.A.), and the University of Michigan (Ph.D.). Before moving to Harvard, she taught at the universities of Arizona, Washington, and California (Berkeley). Professor Perry has written widely on Chinese popular movements from the nineteenth century to the present. Her previous books include Rebels and Revolutionaries in North China, 1845-1945 (1980); Shanghai on Strike: The Politics of Chinese Labor (1993); Proletarian Power: Shanghai in the Cultural Revolution (with Li Xun) (1997); and Popular Protest and Political Culture in Modern China (with Jeffrey Wasserstrom) (1994).

Chapter 1 Predators and Protectors: Strategies of Peasant Survival; Chapter 2 Protective Rebellion: Tax Protest in Late Qing China; Chapter 3 Heterodox Rebellion? The Mystery of Yellow Cliff; Chapter 4 Predatory Rebellion: Bai Lang and Social Banditry; Chapter 5 Skilled Workers and the Chinese Revolution: Strikes Among Shanghai Silk Weavers, 1927-1937; Chapter 6 Labor Divided: Sources of State Formation in Modern China; Chapter 7 Contradictions under Socialism: Shanghai's Strike Wave of 1957; Chapter 8 Working at Cross-Purposes: Shanghai Labor in the Cultural Revolution; Chapter 9 Rural Violence in Socialist China; Chapter 10 Casting a Chinese "Democracy" Movement: Legacies of Social Fragmentation;