An assessment of the impact of the post-Mao market-orientated reforms in China on the Chinese state and its relations with economy and society. It investigates the political and social consequences of an economic strategy which aims to introduce markets into a centrally-planned socialist economy.

Part 1 The economic role of the State: Maoist roots of economic reforms, central planning and local participation in rural industrialization, Christine P.W.Wong; macro-economic management and system reform in China, Barry Naughton; the changing role of the state in Chinese agriculture, Zhu Ling; a Soviet specialist's view of the Chinese reforms, David Dyker; the State and the open door policy, Jude Howell. Part 2 Politics and the national state: the Chinese Communist Party - policies and prospects for reform, Tony Saich; a Janus-faced army? the military and reform policies in China?, Eberhard Sandschneider; law, the state and economic reform in China, Donald C.Clarke. Part 3 Decentralization and the local state: basic-level government and economic reform in urban China, Gordon White; political institutionalization at the basic level of government in China, Robert Benewick; developmental state, entrepreneurial state - the political economy of socialist reform in Xinji municipality and Guanghan country, Marc Blecher. Part 4 State and society: the state and the single child policy, Elisabeth J.Croll; privatization and politics in rural China, Daniel Kelliher.