Overview
Informed by a geographer's perspective, this text portrays a vast country where distance still acts as a major constraint on social interaction, where the population is so huge that demand for resources almost always outstrips supply, and where regional variations have produced a rich mosaic of human and physical characteristics.Since the death of Mao Zedong in 1976, critical changes have swept all levels of Chinese society. This text, which views contemporary China from a geographer's perspective, assesses the questions inherent insuch rapid evolution. how do the Chinese manage to provide enough food for more than a billion people? In what ways are they restructuring and modernizing their economy? How have they been able to provide mass access to such services as health care, education, and housing? The author also delves into the relatively unexplored realm of everyday life in the new China. Why do so many want to leave the countryside and move to the cities? how has life changed for women after centures of Confucian oppression in China? And what does the future hold for China's many ethnic minority groups? By providing answers to questions such as these, the book illustrates the centrality of geography to the study of China--a country where distance still acts as a major constraint on social and spatial interaction; where the population is so huge that demand for resources almost always outstrips supply; and where regional variations have produced a rich mosaic of human and physical characteristics.
Christopher J. Smith is associate professor of Geography and Planning at the State University of New York at Albany.