Zed Asian Arguments – China and the New Maoists

A slight diversion. I’m sure some readers of this blog think me permanently trapped in the past. This is true, largely, though I do attempt to monitor the state of things currently too. Mostly I do this through editing and commissioning a series of books for Zed Books in London on contemporary Asian issues – Asian Arguments. If I do say so myself Asian Arguments has built up over the last six or seven years or so into a nice list of a couple of titles a year covering the region fairly well and with a mix of authors including journalists, academics, NGO workers and activists. There’s been a blend of veteran writers as well as first timers and there’s more to come soon on Burma, Xinjiang, Thailand and elsewhere in Asia.

But this month we have the latest in the series – China and the New Maoists (here on Amazon.co.uk and , from Kerry Brown and Simone van Nieuwenhuizen….

Forty years after his death, Mao remains a totemic, if divisive, figure in contemporary China. Though many continue to revere him and he retains an immense symbolic importance within China’s national mythology, the rise of a capitalist economy has seen the ruling class become increasingly ambivalent towards him. And while he continues to be a highly visible and contentious presence in Chinese public life, Mao’s enduring influence has been little understood in the West. In China and the New Maoists, Kerry Brown and Simone van Nieuwenhuizen looks at the increasingly vocal elements who claim to be the true ideological heirs to Mao, ranging from academics to cyberactivists, as well as at the state’s efforts to draw on Mao’s image as a source of legitimacy. A fascinating portrait of a country undergoing dramatic upheavals while still struggling to come to terms with its past.