Using interviews, newspaper articles, online texts, official documents, and national surveys, Lei shows that the development of the public sphere in China has provided an unprecedented forum for citizens to organize, influence the public agenda, and demand accountability from the government.
"China, a modernizing and authoritarian state, is determined to contain a politically awakened citizenry keen to expand its access to information in a contentious, unauthorized public sphere. Ya-Wen Lei delineates this paradoxical drama with remarkable skill, sensitivity, and fluency. With a wealth of resources, she deploys an impressive mix of methods and strategies to unravel this globally significant problem. This brilliant book is indispensable not only for specialists and laymen interested in China's political development, but also for students of the state and civil society."--Orlando Patterson, author of Freedom: Freedom in the Making of Western Culture
"Demonstrating the existence of an unruly public sphere in China's authoritarian state, this important book argues that this sphere grew paradoxically from the nation's imperative to modernize itself in the post-Mao era, through the institutionalization of modern law, commercialization of media, and embracing of new information technologies. This sophisticated, balanced, and wide-ranging book makes significant contributions to the political and media sociology of China, and offers insights for rethinking liberal theories of the public sphere and the realities of public expression in authoritarian regimes."--Guobin Yang, University of Pennsylvania
"Ya-Wen Lei has written an important and exciting book that ought to be read by anyone interested in the interplay of politics, law, and media not just in China and other authoritarian countries, but anywhere in the world. Much of what's written about the digital revolution will prove to be of ephemeral interest. This book offers a model for a more durable understanding of the forces shaping the public sphere."--Paul Starr, Princeton University
"Ambitious and accomplished, this is a major interpretive synthesis concerning the public sphere in China--complete with valuable new findings. The book's arguments are clear, competent, and original and it should stir interest, debate, and rethinking."--Michael Schudson, author of The Rise of the Right to Know
"Winner of the 2018 Gordon Hirabayashi Human Rights Book Award, Human Rights Section of the American Sociological Association"
