Aminda M. Smith faithfully and in many ways imaginatively addresses a lacuna in our understanding of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) attitudes toward the social underclass, first during the revolution that brought the party to power, and later after the party assumed control in the 1950s. This monograph sheds new light on the origins of the CCP’s extrajudicial ways of dealing with a wide range of social types it deemed not fully supportive of the revolution, and with alleged offenders against the old and new social orders. . . . Smith’s scholarship is rich in details and statistics. . . . This book’s strength is in depicting changes in how the Chinese revolutionaries saw the 'dangerous classes' and the social forces that motivated them, and sometimes how those 'classes' viewed their own reformation.
American Historical Review
This is a highly original book on an important topic. Using material that was top-secret until recently, Aminda Smith presents a series of fascinating case histories of individuals subjected to thought reform and demonstrates how thought reform was central to the drive by the Communists to remake the social structure in their own image and to extend their authority into society. She provides a new and imaginative reading of the consolidation of Communist power and what the revolution meant for those on the margins of society.
Steve Smith, All Souls College, University of Oxford Aminda Smith is at the forefront of a new generation of scholars writing the history of the People’s Republic of China. Her book explores how the Chinese Communist Party’s ideal vision for society clashed with the complicated lives of people on the margins during the 1950s. Rich with compelling human voices, Smith’s work combines impressive archival discoveries with sophisticated analysis. It not only tells us new things about the 1950s, it also helps to explain why the Communist Party has continued to use reeducation-through-labor in recent years.
Jeremy Brown, Simon Fraser University