New Books In East Asian Studies

Exploring the boundaries, fringes, and inner workings of civil society, Taru Salmenkari investigates local forms of political agency in China in light of the globalization of political values, practices, and institutions in Global Ideas, Local Adaptations: Chinese Activism and the Will to Make Civil Society (Edward Elgar, 2025). She provides a theoretical framework for globalization, examining new forms of governance emerging with non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and how these have reconfigured social power in China.This topical book outlines how civil society has been promoted globally since the 1980s, as NGOs advance development cooperation, democratization, and neoliberal third-sector service production. Salmenkari studies the outcomes of these processes in China, where civil society promotion met strong localizing forces rising from NGO activists'' own values, governmental regulation, and local society. Evaluating various forms of Chinese self-organizing, she discusses the social omissions of Chines