In 2009, on the outskirts of the southern metropolis of Guangzhou, Xian villagers secretly prepared for the Dragon Boat Festival. For them, the commemoration of the 221 BC poet Qu Yuan, who threw himself into a river to protest official corruption, held particular resonance. Guangzhou’s drive to become a ‘National Model City’ ahead of the 2010 Asia Games accelerated a voracious demand for land, turning the ground beneath the villagers’ feet into a commodity as valuable as diamonds, a treasure too rich for local officials to ignore. Dragons in Diamond Village is about the courage of individuals: Huang Minpeng, a semi-literate farmer turned self-taught rights defender; He Jieling, a suburban housewife who just wanted to open a hair salon; Xian villagers like Lu Zhaohui who refuse to give up the land their families have cultivated for generations. Theirs is a community bound by shared history and a belief in the necessity of change, a band of unlikely activists fighting for their place in China’s new cities.

Dragons in Diamond Village: And Other Tales from the Back Alleys of Urbanising China

History

Bandurski, David

Asia

Penguin Books China

“David Bandurski is a modern-day Marco Polo taking us into the heart of new China.” —Kevin Sites, author of In the Hot Zone China’s explosive modernization has led to a unique phenomenon: voraciously-growing cities absorbing formerly distant villages that become tenement communities. Dragons in Diamond Village is about the plight—and the courage—of the village-dwellers caught in this tide of urbanization: Huang Minpeng, a semi-literate farmer turned self-taught rights defender; He Jieling, a suburban housewife who just wanted to open a hair salon; and villagers like Lu Zhaohui who refuse to give up the land their families have cultivated for generations. It is, in short, a stirring tale -- a community of unlikely activists, they are fighting for identity, justice, and their rightful place in China’s new cities. Behind them stand millions of others who exist in the strange limbo of the urban village. Because their villages stand on invaluable tracts of land—vulnerable to the machinations of corrupt local officials—their homes have become a battleground in the war over China's urban future.

Dragons in Diamond Village: Tales of Resistance from Urbanizing China

Politics & Social Sciences

Social Sciences

Melville House

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Bandurski, David. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Bandurski, David