Abstract

Against the background of a high incidence of social conflicts since the 1990s, the author conducted in-depth comparative analyses of several cases to understand the changes in goals, driving forces, and operating systems in acts of contentious politics in rural China. The author also examined the changes in techniques and strategies of the government's efforts to maintain stability, as well as the complicated social and political consequences brought about by these changes.

This book applies the concept of “qi” in the Chinese culture to understand contemporary rural contentious politics, in an attempt to overcome the oppositions between reason and emotions and between right and morality in studies of contentious politics. And such a perspective successfully overcomes the long-standing theoretical impasse in debates about how to explain the phenomenon. This work is an important contribution toward research on contentious political theories and rural societies.