JAN, George P. <br/><br/>
The military and democratization in China in the post cold war era 

 - New York :  Marcel Dekker,  1999 
<br/><br/> The purpose of this paper is to use China as a case study of the relationship between the military and politics in a developing communist country. Specifically, it attempts to examine the role of the military in the democratization process in China. The term “military” used in this paper refers to the People's Liberation Army (PLA), the standing military force of China. It does not cover all the elements of what Harold Lasswell called “specialists in violence”,(') such as the armed police and the militia. Furthermore, this study does not deal with the broader concept of military involvement in society as a whole. It is limited to the PLA's involvement in Chinese politics. In terms of time frame, this paper focuses on the economic reform period since 1978 with special emphasis on the years after the Tiananmen Incident of 1989. This study primarily deals with the PLA's role in politics at the national level.