Bad Elements | IAN BURUMA | News | Current Events | eBooks
Bad Elements
by IAN BURUMA
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Windows Vista / XP / 2000, Mac OS X Tiger Features
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Windows 98+, Tablet PC, Pocket PC 2003 Features
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Windows PC, Palm, Pocket PC, Windows Mobile, SymbianOS, Blackberry, iLiad, eBookMan, and more. Features
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All Palm & Pocket PC handheld devices plus all Windows and Macintosh computers. Features
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Bad Elements Summary:
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As China's leaders attempt to refute the Tiananmen Papers, condemn Falun Gong protests, and press Taiwan to embrace the one-China principle, a burning question emerges: Who are these opponents -- struggling not only in the People's Republic but overseas, in the U.S., Singapore, Hong Kong, and Taiwan -- who dare to stand up to the Communist party's powerful rulers, and what drives them? Buruma reports dramatically on exiles in California and religious dissidents in Beijing. He explores the tensions between cultural traditions and contemporary politics, illuminating Taiwan's transition from dictatorship to democracy and the handover of Hong Kong in 1997. Part travelogue, part analysis, Bad Elements illuminates the story of the Chinese opposition for Western readers who want to understand where China is headed. "Ian Buruma -- at his best! Witty, insightful, revealing. The author adds a new, broader dimension to the China subject showing that the struggle for this country transcends far beyond its borders. Very refreshing and fascinating." "Bad Elements is a marvelous guided tour of the many worlds of Chinese free-thinking. We visit frustrated refugees in New Jersey, rebels turned evangelist in California, gadflies in the authoritarian duchy of Singapore, long-suffering campaigners for Taiwan independence, punctilious Hong Kong democrats, stubborn Tibetans, and many more. We meet mayors and cooks, professors and streetwalkers. We go from city to town to tiny village to cyberspace. Two common threads hold the resplendent variety together. One is the reliable presence of the tour guide, Mr. Buruma, whose sharp eye, arch irony, and underlying moral seriousness provide a consistent vantage point; the other is the character of the bad elemen |
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"Strange things happen when Chinese dynasties near their end. Dams break, earthquakes hit, clouds appear in the shape of weird beasts, rain falls in odd colors, and insects infest the countryside. These are the ill omens of moral turpitude and political collapse. While greed and cynicism poison the society from within, barbarians stir restlessly at the gates. Corrupt officials, whose authority can no longer rely on the assumption of superior virtue, exercise their power with anxious and arbitrary brutality. When people, even those who live far from the centers of power, begin to sense that the Mandate of Heaven is slipping away from their corrupted rulers, rebellious spirits press their claims as the saviors of China, with promises of moral restoration and national unity. Millenarian cults and secret societies proliferate and sometimes explode in massive violence." What does it mean to be Chinese? Few questions in history have been as fateful. Bad Elements is the result of Ian Buruma's five years of travels throughout the Chinese-speaking world observing the varying groups competing for a right to define its answer. From the diaspora of exiles in the West, to Singapore, Taiwan, and Hong Kong, to factions within the People's Republic itself, Buruma comes to terms with the range of dissident communities competing to shape China's future in their own image. A brave and illuminating reckoning with the groups fighting for the Mandate of Heaven, Bad Elements is also a profound meditation on the universal themes of national identity and political struggle. From the Hardcover edition. |
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