Dali L. Yang argues a thesis many would like to find true. In China, he argues, markets have created pressure for limited, effective, and transparent government. Crises in the 1990s and since led Chinese leaders to implement reforms with these goals. They have achieved considerable if not complete success, and this leaves China better prepared for democracy. This thesis is most clearly stated in the conclusion. The first chapter offers an introduction and historical overview. Each of the intervening seven chapters documents and assesses a particular type of reform.

Yang must be commended for encyclopedic research based on extensive reading in Chinese newspapers, among other sources. Copious information makes this book a useful resource for anyone working on political reform in China from 1997 to 2003. Successive chapters look at downsizing government and separating business from government; reforms to the tax system to restore central revenues and create more rational incentives for localities; the divesture of military-owned enterprises and related efforts to level the economic playing field; administrative rationalization to increase transparency and the provision of services; reforms to procurement and the management of public works; the struggle against corruption; and strengthening legislative and accounting institutions to promote horizontal accountability.

This sophisticated argument uses crises to link markets' abstract needs with leaders' policy choices. Revenue shortfalls led to many reforms, including, for example, the decision to divest enterprises owned by the military when such enterprises engaged in such rampant smuggling that tariff revenues drastically declined. The Asian Financial Crisis prompted reforms to reduce cronyism. The SARS crisis stimulated reforms to promote transparency.

Dali Yang is one of many who find wisdom in the choice of Chinese leaders to maintain authoritarian rule while implementing economic reforms, especially in contrast to Russian leaders who allegedly allowed too much democracy too soon. In Yang's view, the Russian route led to an increasingly parasitic state that Putin could only control by imposing less democratic government. In contrast, he argues, Chinese reforms “have taken the essence of Margaret Thatcher's reforms to heart: ‘We are strong to do those things which government must do and only government can do’” (p. 108). He sees similarities with the American Progressive Movement and endorses Samuel Huntington's argument that strong government is “the foundation of political liberty.” The conclusion is that China may be on a more expeditious route to democracy than Russia.

How to assess this argument? Yang has accurately identified the intentions of some Chinese leaders. His evidence includes their statements of intent. These reforms are a logical response to the crises China has faced. Many reforms are clearly designed to create incentives to lead agents to govern effectively, rather than the traditional reliance on commands and moral exhortation.

The sticking lies in how successfully this program is being implemented. The author consistently reaches guardedly optimistic conclusions on the basis of carefully qualified assessments of a great deal of evidence. He often employs words like “appears to,” and “emerging.” He commendably presents contrary evidence, as in his chapter on corruption when he notes that most of his informants “remain viscerally skeptical about the Chinese leadership's commitment to anticorruption” (p. 249), but goes on to express guarded optimism that corruption will be controlled.

Some of Yang's evidence can be construed to reach other conclusions. For example, he cites the Yueyang City People's Congress's refusal to confirm the Communist Party's nominee for mayor as evidence of the increasing authority of legislative organs. Careful readers will find his footnote stating that two days later the mayor was confirmed. Other accounts attributed this to the party's forceful arm twisting. Are Peoples Congresses gaining power? Or does this show that when they step out of line, the party reins them in? Similarly, Yang argues that the problem of illegal land seizures has been addressed by new systems for procuring land, but it remains that many still see land seizures as the leading source of contentious politics. Propaganda departments, for example, find the issue so sensitive that they have banned further reporting of land disputes.

This raises the question of whether a government that practices extensive censorship and arrests outspoken critics can be said to be limited. Yang repeatedly states that he is aware of and regrets political constraints. He notes that there are differences between China's reforms and the Progressive Movement because of the democratic environment in which it occurred. But his explanation of these differences is limited and, as noted, he argues that it is to China's advantage that there has not been more democracy sooner.

How limited China's government may seem depends on what sphere we look in and the standard by which we judge. By most accounts, the sphere the author investigates, business, is the area in which the Chinese government allows the most space for private initiative. And yet, most of the literature that considers trade associations and other business organizations finds corporatism, not pluralism. Entrepreneurs evidently believe that the government has so much arbitrary authority that it is best to collaborate. By the standard of Maoist totalitarianism, corporatism is a move toward limited government, but this is not the definition of “limited” that Margaret Thatcher uses. There are other spheres where government is less limited. Yang does not say much about China's large and growing inequalities, or the contentious farmers and unemployed workers who try to claim equality before the law.

I count myself among those who hope that the thesis of Remaking the Chinese Leviathan is borne out. If the governance reforms that this book describes succeed in sustaining China's rapid economic growth, humanity's fate will be happier. If they also lead to limited government, which in turn leads to democracy, so much the better. But it could be that compared to Poland or Hungary, Russia's troubles stem from too little democracy, not too much, and that China will eventually suffer similar problems. Dali Yang is to be commended for making a serious case that we all must consider. But the jury is still out.