Examining the interaction between the Communist Party of China (CCP) and specific social categories (including peasants, workers, the middle classes, and the dominant class), with a focus on class and class discourse, this volume analyses the CCP-s impact on social change in China between 1921 and 1978.
By exploring the CCP-s evolving discourse of class, this book demonstrates that, while class has retained its centrality, its meaning has been re-articulated from an ideological-political tool to a less meaningful signifier, though always used instrumentality. By examining the impact of the CCP-s policies and discourse surrounding class, it also reveals how its own policies since 1921 have shaped the CCP-s current (2021) perspectives on class and stratification. This volume, through an analysis of economic, political, and cultural inequalities in Chinese society even after 1949, also reveals the emergence of a diverse and often overlooked middle class in Chinese society during
