Beijing’s pride in having hosted the 2008 Olympics and China’s protean economic growth contain a dark underside—unemployment, crime, corruption, and prison camps. Prison camps, or laogai, are the subject of Phillip F. Williams and Yenna Wu’s monograph which interweaves memoirs, fiction, and strands of social science and literary theory to uncover aspects of the contemporary Chinese prison camp. This text is not only important and innovative, it is glittering with details on a rarely revealed aspect of Chinese society.
Read the full review (PDF): China Information-2007-Cathcart-173-5
Image: Gulag remnants near Qinghai Lake, PRC.
Adam Cathcart 