Writing the “history of the PRC” in Xi Jinping's China

Abstract

This contribution concerns the discipline of “People's Republic of China (PRC) History”, a term that refers to the study of the long revolutionary period, roughly from 1921 to the present. It is a relatively new discipline, a post-Cold War development that emerged toward the end of the 20th century when historians began to claim the Mao era, which until then had been primarily the preserve of political scientists. Even for such a young field, the situation has changed progressively and markedly in recent years. The paper focuses on two different but related issues: first, the accessibility of historical archives within the PRC, and second, the proliferation of so-called “garbage sources.”