Why read The Specter of "the People"?

Book cover of The Specter of "the People": Urban Poverty in Northeast China

Book description

Despite massive changes to its economic policies, China continues to define itself as socialist; since 1949 and into the present, the Maoist slogan "Serve the People" has been a central point of moral and political orientation. Yet several decades of market-based reforms have resulted in high urban unemployment, transforming the…

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Why read it?

1 author picked The Specter of "the People" as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

Dorothy J. Solinger

Author

This is a brilliant anthropological field study of how rural migrants and laid-off Chinese workers cope with their lot in a region where factories have shut down and there are few ways of earning money.

The two competing groups are both very poorly served by the government and they are forced to live among trash with little to no welfare. There are here, again, copious quotations from the people involved and you can learn a lot about the varying conditions that mark the different lives of these two groups of people.

From Dorothy's list on The best books on poverty and social welfare in the US and China.