How the farmers changed China

In this original and provocative book, Kate Zhou argues that Chinese farmers rather than the communist leadership have been the driving force behind their country's phenomenal economic growth and social change. Guided by their own interests rather than by directives from Beijing, farmers in effect have been privatizing land, creating new markets, establishing rural industries, migrating to cities, shaping their own family-size policy, and redefining the role of women.

Drawing on rich primary sources and her own years of experience in the countryside, the author focuses on local initiatives and the stories of ordinary people, arguing that the farmers were effective precisely because their movement was spontaneous, leaderless, non-ideological, and apolitical. Yet, their "reform from below" may well lead to the most long-lasting and fundamental changes contemporary China has witnessed.