Presents an account of Chinese history, from prehistoric times through the post-Revolution era.

This book provides a comprehensive overview and explanation of China’s population, analyzing its special characteristics and patterns of growth over the past 2,000 years. Topics include its composition, distribution, migration, and deep analysis into China’s historical population. The author aims to answer complicated questions such as how China’s population was formed, when China started its earliest population surveys, how China’s population migrated and was distributed historically, and how existing population data should be evaluated and used now? In addition, the author explores the influence of natural and human-caused disasters, censuses, tax policies, and economic development on China’s population changes. The work also offers a span of rich historical detail related to population control. The book will be a great read to students and scholars of population studies, Chinese studies, ethnology, and those who are interested in Chinese history, archaeology, geography, and sociology.

The latest edition of this classic text has been updated to reflect current trends and implications for future demographic developments. The areas of Africa, international migration and population and environment have been strengthened and statistical information has been updated throughout. A new edition of this classic history of demography text, which has been updated to strengthen the major subject areas of Africa, international migration and population and the environment Includes the latest statistical information, including the 2015 UN population projections revision and developments in China's population policy Information is presented in a clear and simple form, with academic material presented accessibly for the undergraduate audience whilst still maintaining the interest of higher level students and scholars The text covers issues that are crucial to the future of every species by encouraging humanity's search for ways to prevent future demographic catastrophes brought about by environmental or human agency Analyses the changing patterns of world population growth, including the effects of migration, war, disease, technology and culture

In this comprehensive analysis of thirty-five years of population change in the People's Republic of China, the author highlights China's shifting population policies and pieces together the available data, assessing and adjusting them as necessary in order to discover the actual population changes.

When the British occupied the tiny island of Hong Kong during the First Opium War, the Chinese empire was well into its decline, while Great Britain was already in the second decade of its legendary "Imperial Century." From this collision of empires arose a city that continues to intrigue observers. Melding Chinese and Western influences, Hong Kong has long defied easy categorization. John M. Carroll's engrossing and accessible narrative explores the remarkable history of Hong Kong from the early 1800s through the post-1997 handover, when this former colony became a Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China. The book explores Hong Kong as a place with a unique identity, yet also a crossroads where Chinese history, British colonial history, and world history intersect. Carroll concludes by exploring the legacies of colonial rule, the consequences of Hong Kong's reintegration with China, and significant developments and challenges since 1997.

This is a rich and comprehensive study of beggars’ culture and the institution of mendicancy in China from late imperial times to the mid-twentieth century, with a glance at the resurgence of beggars in China today. Generously illustrated, the book brings to life the concepts and practices of mendicancy including organized begging, state and society relations as reflected in the issues of poverty, public opinions of beggars and various factors that contribute to almsgiving, the role of gender in begging, and street people and Communist politics. Panoramically, the reader will see that the culture and institution of Chinese mendicancy, which had its origins in earlier centuries, remained remarkably consistent through time and space and that there were perennial and lively interactions between the world of beggars and mainstream society.

A comprehensive, yet entertaining look at China's history through a modern lens. For millennia, China was the largest and richest nation on earth. Two centuries ago, however, its economy sank into a depression from which it had not fully recovered--until now. China's modern resurgence as the world's largest nation in terms of population and its second-largest economy--where 800 million people have been lifted out of poverty in the space of a few decades--is the greatest untold story of the 21st century. A Brief History of China tells of the development of a rich and complex civilization where the use of paper, writing, money and gunpowder were widespread in ancient times and where silk, ceramics, tea, metal implements and other products were produced and exported around the globe. It examines the special conditions that allowed a single culture to unify an entire continent spanning 10 billion square kilometers under the rule of a single man--and the unbelievably rich artistic, literary and architectural heritage that Chinese culture has bequeathed to the world. Equally fascinating is the story of China's decline in the 19th and early 20th century--as Europeans and Americans took center stage--and its modern resurgence as an economic powerhouse in recent years. In his retelling of a Chinese history stretching back 5,000 years, author and China-expert Jonathan Clements focuses on the human stories which led to the powerful transformations in Chinese society--from the unification of China under its first emperor, Qinshi Huangdi, and the writings of the great Chinese philosophers Confucius and Laozi, to the Mongol invasion under Genghis Khan and the consolidation of Communist rule under Mao Zedong. Clements even brings readers through to the present day, outlining China's economic renaissance under Deng Xiaoping and Xi Jinping. What really separates this book from its counterparts is the focus on women, and modern themes such as diversity and climate change. Chinese history is typically told through the stories of its most famous men, but Clements' telling gives women equal time and research--which introduces readers of this book to equally important, but less commonly-known facts and historical figures. Often seen in the West in black or white terms--as either a savage dystopia or a fantastical paradise--China is revealed in the book as an exceptional yet troubled nation that nevertheless warrants its self-description as the Middle Kingdom.

A satisfactory comprehensive history of the social and economic development of pre-modern China, the largest country in the world in terms of population, and with a documentary record covering three millennia, is still far from possible. The present work is only an attempt to disengage the major themes that seem to be of relevance to our understanding of China today. In particular, this volume studies three questions. Why did the Chinese Empire stay together when the Roman Empire, and every other empire of antiquity of the middle ages, ultimately collapsed? What were the causes of the medieval revolution which made the Chinese economy after about 1100 the most advanced in the world? And why did China after about 1350 fail to maintain her earlier pace of technological advance while still, in many respects, advancing economically? The three sections of the book deal with these problems in turn but the division of a subject matter is to some extent only one of convenience. These topics are so interrelated that, in the last analysis, none of them can be considered in isolation from the others.

This book offers a sociological analysis as well as a theological discussion of China’s internal migration since the marketization reform in 1978. It documents the social and political processes that encompass the experiences of internal migrants from the countryside to the city during China’s integration into the global economy. Informed by sociological analysis and narratives of the urban poor, this volume reconstructs the political, economic, social and spiritual dimensions of this urban underclass in China who made up the economic backbone of the Asian superpower.

Three thousand years of Chinese history in an accessible and authoritative single volume.