Mr.Thaxton BrandeisUniversity
Politics 147 Fall 2015
GOVERNMENT AND POLITICS OF CHINA
This course is an introduction to the history and politics of China. It is designed to help you understand China's political history from 1840 to the present. Our goal is to develop a working knowledge of the how politics works in the People's Republic of China, and we are especially interested in understanding the origins and nature of state power and legitimacy in contemporary post-Mao China.
The course is divided into three parts. Part I (1840-1911) is devoted to understanding the collapse of the last dynasty--the Qing. Part II (1911-1949) is focused on the reasons for the success of the revolution led by the Chinese Communist Party under Mao Zedong. Part III (1949-2013) is concerned with the performance of the socialist government that has ruled China since the 1949 revolution. We will pay special attention to the causes and consequences of the Great Leap Forward, the Cultural Revolution, and the Tiananmen Protest Movement of 1989, and to the origins of the crisis of state legitimacy in present day China. We will compare China's crisis to that of other failed socialist systems, and we will explore whether China is a stable or unstable country. Lectures, readings, and class discussions will cover the entire modern period, but in this fall 2015 edition of Politics 147 we will focus mainly on the 1911 to 2014 period.
There will be a two-partmid-term exam (40 per cent of grade), one out-of-class research exercise in which you will be asked to explore an important issue in Chinese politics (20 per cent of grade), and one ten-page term paper (40 per cent of grade). I will announce the dates of the two-part mid-term exam in class. Your term paper is due in e-mail by 10 a.m. on Thursday December 3.
There are five required books for the course (Mo Yan, Bianco, Meisner, Thaxton, and Qiu Xiaolong). We will hold class discussions on several of the main books. Small "discussion teams," composed of three to six students, will cooperate in leading the discussion on assigned books. There also will be several films, and you are encouraged to participate in theanalysis and discussion of each film.
Please be advised that this course has four learning goals:
1) To teach you to think critically about politics.
2) To help you reason clearly and effectively when constructing arguments and counter-arguments.
3) To help you grasp the importance of fine-grained empirically-grounded research (and the vale of the method of deep case study).
4) To introduce you to important frameworks and concepts in political science, and to understand why they are or are not useful in understanding the history and politics of China.
Required Books and Key Readings:
1. Mo Yan, Sandalwood Death: A Novel (Winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature) (Oklahoma)
2.Bianco, Origins of the Chinese Revolution (Stanford)
3. Meisner, Mao's China and After (Free Press)
4. Thaxton, Catastrophe and Contention in Rural China (Cambridge)
5. Qiu Xiaolong, The Death of A Red Heroine (Soho)
*6. Miles, The Heritage of Tiananmen (Michigan) (Do not purchase this book.
Read only Chapter 5)
Politics 147a, Fall 2015, Mr. Thaxton
The following four books are recommended:
Frederic Wakeman, Jr., The Fall of Imperial China.
Jonathan Spence, Mao Zedong.
Ralph A. Thaxton, Jr., Salt of the Earth.
Cheng Li, Rediscovering China.
Jonathan Unger, The Transformation of Rural China.
Reading Schedule
Weeks 1-2
Introduction. Lectures on Chinese geopolitics and on the fall of Imperial China.
Mo Yan, all.
Weeks 3-4
Mo Yan, all.
Bianco, all.
Film: “ChinaYellow, China Blue,” Two Part Series, to be viewed per my instructions.
Film: “The Mao Years,” Three Part Series.
Week 5
Bianco, again for Thaxton Critique of Bianco.
Week 6
Film: “To Live”
Meisner, Chapters 1-7.
Week 7
Meisner, Chapters 8-13, especially on the
Great Leap Forward and its Famine.
Thaxton, Chapters 1-4.
Weeks 8-9
Meisner, Chapters 14-20.
Thaxton, Chapters 5-9, Conclusion.
.
Politics 147a, Fall 2015, Mr. Thaxton
Weeks 10-11
Film: Gu Hua's “HibiscusTown.”
Miles, Chapter 5 (“The Virus of Corruption”).
Week 12
Meisner, Chapters 21-25 (especially 22 and 23), on the Reform Era.
Ralph A. Thaxton, Jr. (Handout) "The Violent Dawn of Reform."
Film: “The Accused”
Film: "The Story of Qiu Ju"
Week 13
Qiu Xiaolong, all and class discussion.
The Crisis of Legitimacy in Beijing:
(1) "Lanxin Xiang," The Bo Xilai Affair and China's Future," in Survival: Global Politics and Strategy, Vol. 54, No. 3, June-July, 2012, 59-68.
(2) Edward Wong, "Flamboyant Crime Fighter Now May Face Chinese Justice Over Role in Scandal," New York Times/Asia Pacific, August 18, 2012.
Week 14
Martin King Whyte, Chapter 3, "What Do Chinese Citizens See as Fair and Unfair about Current Inequalities?" and Chapter 4, "Chinese Views on Inequality in Comparative Perspective," both in
Whyte, Myth of the Social Volcano,StanfordUniversity Press, 2010.
Bruce J. Dickson, "Political Instability at the Middle and Lower Levels: Signs of a Decaying CCP, Corruption, and Political Dissent," Chapter 4, in David Shambaugh, ed., Is China Unstable? M.E. Sharpe, 2000.
Film: "China's Unnatural Disaster: The Tears of
SichuanProvince," or alternative film on an important topic in contemporary China. (TBA)
Ralph A. Thaxton, Jr., Lectureon "China's Dangerous Future." (Mandatory
Attendance). Followed by Class Discussion about State Power and Political Legitimacy in
Contemporary China.
My office address is 116 Golding. Please feel free to meet with me during my office
hours (TBA), or at a mutually agreeable time. My e-mail address is
If you are a student with a documented disability on record at BrandeisUniversity and wish to have a reasonable accommodation made for you in this class, please see Prof. Thaxton immediately after class.