Jia Gao is Professor of Chinese Studies at the Asia Institute, the University of Melbourne.

Explanation of social change in the People’s Republic of China is most usually heavily determined by the political leadership’s policy statements. Prof Gao’s highly original analysis instead focusses on ordinary people’s everyday responses to and interactions with the policy process, and advances an overall theory of their social psychology in terms of competitive social repositioning. — David S. G. Goodman, China Studies Centre, University of SydneyOne of the most successful attempts that analyses current China’s social transformations through the daily life and experiences of contemporary Chinese people. — Shenshen Cai, Chinese Studies, Monash University.

• List of Abbreviations; List of Figures; List of Tables; Preface and Acknowledgements; The Absence of Everyday Chinese in the Dichotomous Paradigm; Rebranding the Communist Heir Narrative and the Cultural Revolution; Tearing the Utopian Veil Down by Sent-Down Youth; Crying Out for Changes in the Second Half of the 1970s; Battling for the Advantages Under the Dengist Political Alliances; Climbing Different Social Ladders from the Mid-1980s; Filling in the Post-1989 Vacuum Left by Educated Liberals; Seizing Chances to be Entrepreneurial in Post-1992 China; Towards a Theory of Competitive Social Repositioning; References; Index

Jia Gao is Professor of Chinese Studies at the Asia Institute, the University of Melbourne.

Explanation of social change in the People’s Republic of China is most usually heavily determined by the political leadership’s policy statements. Prof Gao’s highly original analysis instead focusses on ordinary people’s everyday responses to and interactions with the policy process, and advances an overall theory of their social psychology in terms of competitive social repositioning. — David S. G. Goodman, China Studies Centre, University of SydneyOne of the most successful attempts that analyses current China’s social transformations through the daily life and experiences of contemporary Chinese people. — Shenshen Cai, Chinese Studies, Monash University.

• List of Abbreviations; List of Figures; List of Tables; Preface and Acknowledgements; The Absence of Everyday Chinese in the Dichotomous Paradigm; Rebranding the Communist Heir Narrative and the Cultural Revolution; Tearing the Utopian Veil Down by Sent-Down Youth; Crying Out for Changes in the Second Half of the 1970s; Battling for the Advantages Under the Dengist Political Alliances; Climbing Different Social Ladders from the Mid-1980s; Filling in the Post-1989 Vacuum Left by Educated Liberals; Seizing Chances to be Entrepreneurial in Post-1992 China; Towards a Theory of Competitive Social Repositioning; References; Index