Based on a treasure trove of information collected through fieldwork interviews and painstaking documentary research through the Chinese and Western language presses, this book analyzes one of the most important reforms implemented in China over the past decade - the rural tax and fee reform.

Christian Göbel is a researcher of Political Science at the Institute of East Asian Studies, University of Duisburg-Essen, where he also teaches Comparative Politics.

1. 'Peasant Burden' and the Dynamics of Rural Reform and Development 2. Bureaucratic Sprawl, Government Debt and 'Peasant Burden': How Serious? 3. The Institutional Sources of Peasant Burden 4. The Limited Agendas: Peasant Burden and Rural Fiscal Reforms 5. From Innovation Networks to Competition under Hierarchy 6. Reform Implementation and Ad-Hoc Policy Innovation 7. Impacts and Outcomes: The Case of Anhui Province 8. Why the 'Third Rural Revolution' Failed