Table of Contents

1. Historical evolution of public security organizations; 2. From the social affairs department to the ministry of public security; 3. Leading central security agency: Central Guard Bureau; 4. Elite security corps: Central Guard Regiment; 5. Armed police and its historical role in the CCP politics; 6. People's armed police in the reform era; 7. Garrison commands; 8. CCP intelligence agencies and services in the revolutionary era; 9. The intelligence apparatus and services under PRC; 10. The PLA, security services, and the elite politics.

Promotional Information

Describes the creation and evolution of Chinese security and intelligence agencies as well as their role in influencing Chinese Communist Party politics throughout the party's history.

About the Author

Xuezhi Guo is currently a full professor and director of intercultural studies at Guilford College, North Carolina. He graduated from South China University of Technology in 1982, and after research in Japan and Germany, entered the University of North Florida in 1991. He completed his master's degree in public administration in 1993 and earned his PhD in foreign affairs from the University of Virginia in 1999. He spent a year as a research fellow in the Miller Center before becoming an associate professor at Guilford College. He is the author of The Ideal Chinese Political Leader: A Historical and Cultural Perspective (2001).

Reviews

'Among the paradoxes of China's miraculous economic growth is that, despite rising per capita incomes and living standards, popular protest has increased. Since 2010, the People's Republic has thus spent more on its domestic security apparatus than on military security. Yet there has been very little serious scholarship on this development. Xuezhi Guo's book is the first comprehensive analysis of China's security state since the Cultural Revolution. Based on thorough archival research as well as wide reading in contemporary memorial and documentary literature, this is an outstanding monograph.' Lowell Dittmer, University of California, Berkeley

'This fascinating study examines the formation and early development of the Chinese security state. It begins to fill a gaping hole in understanding the intimate relationship between power, authority, coercion, and access to information that is at the heart of political rule under the Communist regime. The strengths of the book are the extensive use of Chinese-language materials and detailed historical descriptions of important but previously little known internal security and intelligence organizations … from the public security services to the praetorian central guards unit. This book offers a useful historical perspective to better comprehend the growing power and reach of the contemporary Chinese security state.' Tai Ming Cheung, University of California, San Diego

'[This book is] particularly helpful to the understanding of the CCP's mechanisms for controlling both Party members and the general population.' Zheng Yongnian, Pacific Affairs

'The book is a must-read for scholars studying the CCP's coercive apparatuses, particularly for scholars focused on 1927–1978. These readers will find a wealth of information gathered from a large number of Chinese-only primary sources, and they will be able to check Guo's specific arguments against a larger body of literature.' William Welsh, Journal of Chinese Political Science