Book review of Martin King Whyte, Myth of the Social Volcano: Perceptions of Inequality and Distributive Injustice in Contemporary China. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, (2010). $27.95 (paperback)

Levy, Richard

English

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The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare Volume 38 Issue 1 March Article 14 2011 Review of Myth of the Social Volcano: Perceptions of Inequality and Distributive Injustice in Contemporary China. Martin King Whyte. Reviewed by Richard Levy. Richard Levy Salem State University Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/jssw  Part of the Social Work Commons Recommended Citation Levy, Richard (2011) "Review of Myth of the Social Volcano: Perceptions of Inequality and Distributive Injustice in Contemporary China. Martin King Whyte. Reviewed by Richard Levy.," The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare: Vol. 38 : Iss. 1 , Article 14. Available at: https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/jssw/vol38/iss1/14 This Book Review is brought to you by the Western Michigan University School of Social Work. For more information, please contact wmu-scholarworks@wmich.edu. Journal of Sociology & Social WelfareMartin King Whyte, Myth of the Social Volcano: Perceptions ofInequality and Distributive Injustice in Contemporary China.Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, (2010). $27.95(paperback).Martin Whyte directly challenges the common perceptionthat inequality in China is so extreme and unjust that China issitting on a 'social volcano' of unrest. Whyte's data and conclu-sions are based on sophisticated survey research in 2004 (andmake no claims for the subsequent period). His conclusions arestartling. Whyte argues that most Chinese accept the presentinequalities as individually earned, rather than the result ofan unfair economic structure. Thus social justice is not a majorissue. Moreover, most Chinese are optimistic about their futureeconomic prospects. Farmers, who are not among the majorwinners in the reforms are, surprisingly, the most optimistic(although also the most supportive of an egalitarian distribu-tion system). Where there are critical views, they cannot bepredicted by economic or social status. Rather, they are linkedto individual experiences that occur across class, geographic,gender and Party membership lines. Since they are spreadso widely, the likelihood of a single dissatisfied group's mo-bilizing against the state is small. What most Chinese desireis a market economy with a welfare state supporting those inneed.In explaining why Chinese may hold these views, Whyteargues that: (1) Where the equality of the Mao period (largelywithin rather than across work units) was frequently unjust,now people see inequality as largely resulting from individu-al efforts and thus largely just; (2) Where farmers under Maowere virtually bound to the land through the household regis-tration system in a nearly feudal fashion, now they are free toleave the countryside and seek employment elsewhere; and (3)Chinese economic growth has been so massive that it is a non-zero sum game in which there was, at least initially, 'reformwithout losers,' and rural poverty has been reduced by some90%. This all contributes to the fact that Chinese are more ac-cepting of inequalities and more optimistic not only than thosein the post-socialist Eastern Europe countries but also, in nu-merous cases, than people in Western Europe and Japan.196There are, however, serious questions about Whyte's un-derlying framework. Whyte shows that the vast majority ofChinese (71.7%) think national income gaps are too big. Sincethis is lower than the 85-95% in Eastern European countriesundergoing shock therapy in the 1990's and is basically in linewith the 65-78% in the U.S. (1991), U.K. (1991), Japan (2006)and W. Germany (1991) (p. 71), and these countries have beenstable, Whyte implies that this undermines claims China issitting on a social volcano. In so doing, he leaves aside anyacknowledgement of the mechanisms that create and preservesuch inequality and resulting resentment in China and else-where-issues that are certainly relevant for social work.Whyte argues that for centuries in Pre-Liberation China,Chinese peasants were not bound to the land (as in feudalEurope), so there were few social obstacles to social and geo-graphical mobility for them, especially in a context in which "astrong government that will monitor and maintain the fairnessof economic competition" (pp. 14, 195) This oversimplifies andexaggerates both the degree of social mobility and the role ofgovernment in assuring fairness.Where he argues that many Chinese are dissatisfied withunfair institutional preferences in China, i.e., the absence of alevel playing field, the tendency for inequalities to continuebecause they benefit the rich etc., he implies that such inequal-ities are temporary weakness of China's market system. Butthese are not temporary weaknesses. In fact they become moreexaggerated when capital is concentrated, as evidenced in "ac-tually existing" capitalist societies.Whyte's framework leads him to claim that where angerand/or resentment exists, it is more frequently about proce-dural than distributive injustice. But if economic inequalitiesinfluence political power and process, e.g. the Party's supportof the newly wealthy for village leadership positions, then thisis not simply an issue of fair process. He does not acknowl-edge that the market can be and is manipulated by the power-ful. When powerful interests acquire a farmer's land "withoutproper consultant or compensation," he attributes resentmentto problems of process rather than the underlying inequality(p. 196).In short, White's book is extremely provocative, challeng-ing the "common sense" of most Western scholars and muchBook Reviews 197Journal of Sociology & Social Welfareof the Chinese leadership. While the data must be taken ex-tremely seriously, the conclusions the author draws from hisdata about the lack of social volatility are based in large part onoversimplifications and assumptions which merit more exten-sive consideration before the conclusions should be accepted.Richard Levy, Department of Political Science,Salem State UniversityPhilip McMichael (Ed.). Contesting Development: CriticalStruggles for Social Change, (2009). Routledge. 274 pages.$39.00 (paperback).As with all of Philip McMichael's work, this thoughtfullyedited collection forces a reconsideration of simplistic narra-tives of social change and development that identifies a longmarch to neo-liberal democratic hegemony. Building on a tra-dition of work including Wolfgang Sach's The DevelopmentDictionary, Arturo Escobar's Encountering Development and, re-cently, James Scott's Seeing Like a State, this work-through fo-cusing on those at the limits or boundaries of the developmentproject-suggests that development is anything but linear andcomprehensive in its scope.The collection contains case studies of organizations andgroups who have been excluded from the development projectand have contested their exclusion-and more broadly de-velopment itself. Ranging from studies of Abahlali baseMjon-dolo (those who live voluntarily in shack settlements [shantytowns]) in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, through to Braziliansoy bean farmers, to the established Brazilian Movimento dosTrabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra (MST, Landless Rural WorkersMovement), this collection provides a fascinating overviewof current struggles for social justice. Raj Patel's chapter onAbahlali baseMjondolo describes a movement of shack dwell-ers who, through contesting housing policies and deci-sion-making structures of the state, have sought to recreatean active and engaged form of citizenship that the AfricanNational Congress (ANC), since coming to power in 1994,has increasingly attempted to silence. The paradox of theANC-that the party of liberation now plays a role in silencing198

Review of \u3cem\u3eMyth of the Social Volcano: Perceptions of Inequality and Distributive Injustice in Contemporary China.\u3c/em\u3e Martin King Whyte. Reviewed by Richard Levy.

https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3594&amp;context=jssw

Review of \u3cem\u3eMyth of the Social Volcano: Perceptions of Inequality and Distributive Injustice in Contemporary China.\u3c/em\u3e Martin King Whyte. Reviewed by Richard Levy.

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