What Are We Talking about when We Talk about Contingency: What Is Exactly “Contingent” about China’s Transition from Socialism to Capitalism?

Yueran Zhang, University of Chicago

The recent "historical turn" in the studies of the Chinese Reform has sought to challenge the linear, teleological and triumphant narratives that permeate the conventional accounts of the Reform story, instead emphasizing the contingent, indeterminate and eventful elements in the multi-layered historical processes. This move beyond the “Whig history” is certainly to be commended, but the analysis of historical contingency has remained conceptually messy and under-specified. How exactly should we conceptualize the meaning of “contingency” in the historical context of China’s transition from socialism to capitalism? And what exactly is contingent about this historical transformation? Based on my ongoing book project, this presentation takes stock of how the existing literature approaches the issue of contingency in order to seek analytical clarity and provides an alternative framework that rigorously grounds the analysis of contingency in historical comparison.

No extended abstract or paper available

 Presented in Session 166. The Chinese Reform as Social Science History (II): Temporality and Contingency