The Politics of Crisis Management in China: The Sichuan Earthquake

(Hardback)

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This book analyzes the ways in which the Chinese government and military responded to the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake in Sichuan province. It adopts a comparative and historical perspective in studying the responses of the Chinese government in the first critical 72 hours, the mobilization of the Peoples Liberation Army and its difficulties, the assertive and important role of the non-governmental groups which established a partnership with the state in the rescue operations, and the process and politics of reconstruction. The book is rich in materials, including comparative case studies of the Tangshan earthquake in 1976, the outbreak of the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome in 2003, the earthquakes in Haiti, Chile and Myanmar, and the contrasts with the Japanese earthquake tsunami in 2011. Researchers, government officials, policy analysts, seismic specialists, journalists and students will find this book extremely useful, conceptually insightful and practically policy-relevant.

Reviews

This book offers a systematic and well-textured case study with keen analytical insights in a comparative framework of the key dimensions of Chinas regime responses and crisis management efforts in the aftermath of the devastating 2008 Sichuan earthquake. Its focus on the rescue-relief-rehabilitation processes should render this book a much welcomed contribution to the Chinese governance, comparative politics, and Asian public administration fields as well as being a highly relevant and directly useful reference work on natural disasters relief and humanitarian aid for international bodies, national regimes and NGOs around the globe. Readers in the academic world and in the public sector will enjoy the rich details and refreshing findings of this illuminating volume that highlights the realpolitik implications with domestic consequences and external impacts of a rising China as a global soft power player with a huge crisis management capacity. The books detailed coverage of the PLAs leading role in post-quake rescue-relief operations have yielded valuable appreciation of the Chinese militarys other vital domestic functions. This has direct bearings on the elevation of natural disaster crisis management capacity into becoming a high priority concern on the Chinas national security and societal harmony agenda as well as 21st century developmental strategies. -- Ming K. Chan, Stanford University
The unprecedented response by the Chinese public to the tragedy of the Sichuan earthquake has long called for scholarly treatment and analysis. The field is indebted to Professor Lo for this path-breaking initial study which comprehensively explores both the governmental and popular response to the crisis, usefully framing it as a comparative study of crisis management in China, insightfully juxtaposing it to the management of recent other crises as well as the events surrounding the Tangshan earthquake of 1976. -- Victor C. Falkenheim, University of Toronto

Author Bio

Sonny Shiu-Hing Lo is professor and head of the Department of Social Sciences at the Hong Kong Institute of Education.