Kenneth Lieberthal is a senior fellow in Foreign Policy and Global Economy and Development at Brookings. From 2009-2012, Lieberthal served as the director of the John L. Thornton China Center. Lieberthal was a professor at the University of Michigan for 1983-2009. He has authored 24 books and monographs and over 70 articles, mostly dealing with China. He also served as special assistant to the president for national security affairs and senior director for Asia on the National Security Council from August 1998 to October 2000. His government responsibilities encompassed U.S. policy toward Northeast, East and Southeast Asia. His latest book, Bending History: Barack Obama’s Foreign Policy (co-authored with Martin Indyk and Michael O’Hanlon), was published by the Brookings Press in March 2012.

Cheng Li is director of the John L. Thornton China Center and a senior fellow in the Foreign Policy program at Brookings. He is also a director of the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations.

Yu Keping is deputy director of the Compilation and Translation Bureau of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party and a professor of politics at Peking University.

China's path to political reform over the last three decades has been slow, but discourse among Chinese political scientists continues to be vigorous and forward thinking. China's Political Development offers a unique look into the country's evolving political process by combining chapters authored by twelve prominent Chinese political scientists with an extensive commentary on each chapter by an American scholar of the Chinese political system. Each chapter focuses on a major aspect of the development of the Chinese Party-state, encompassing the changing relations among its constituent parts as well as its evolving approaches toward economic gorwth, civil society, grassroots elections, and the intertwined problems of supervision and corruption.

Together, these analyses highlight the history, strategy, policies, and implementation of governance reforms since 1978 and the authors' recommendations for future changes. This extensive work provides the deep background necessary to understand the sociopolitical context and intellectual currents. behind the reform agenda announced at the landmark Third Plenum in 2013. Shedding light through contrasting perspectives, the book provides an overview of the efforts China has directed toward developing good governance, the challenges it faces, and its future direction.