MODERNIZATION AND ITS DISCONTENTS REVISITED - THE POLITICAL-ECONOMY OF URBAN UNREST IN THE PEOPLES-REPUBLIC-OF-CHINA

The euphoria over economic liberalization in China was shattered by th e Tiananmen Square incident of 1989. This article uses rational choice theory to explain why these demonstrations should occur during a peri od of rapid economic growth, why college students (arguably, the privi leged elite of China's youth) should serve as the instigators of these demonstrations, and why workers and other groups that had not partici pated in previous waves of demonstrations joined those of 1989. Despit e remarkable growth in the Chinese economy, the costs and the benefits of reform increasingly have been allocated not by impersonal market f orces nor the authority of the party but by corruption and favoritism. This became the issue that linked the interests of workers and studen ts and allowed the mobilization of workers by students. Theory suggest s that discriminatory allocation of the costs and benefits of reform e ncouraged coalitions that made it rational for individuals to particip ate in demonstrations.