This is the first book-length treatment of the political causes and consequences of the Great Leap Famine (1959-61), one of the worst tragedies in human history

This book examines a wide range of governance reforms in the People's Republic of China, including administrative rationalization, divestiture of businesses ope

Thaxton argues that the memory of the great famine under Mao shaped villagers' resistance to the socialist state.

Winner of the Samuel Johnson Prize An unprecedented, groundbreaking history of China's Great Famine that recasts the era of Mao Zedong and the history of the Pe

Drawing on previously closed archives that have since been made inaccessible again, this volume contains the most crucial primary documents concerning the fate