Behind the Silence

Reviews / Votes

Nie's important book...examine[s] the diverse and difficult experiences and views of different groups of Chinese people....In addressing the moral experience of abortion in China, it brings to light the multifaceted, complex and difficult dimensions of an issue that continues to be excluded from public debate by the political constraints of the Chinese state. -- Harriet Evans, University of Westminster * China Quarterly * Jing-Bao Nie's nuanced account of abortion in China has provided me with a new set of lenses through which to view abortion as it is theorized and practiced in the United States. Sensitive to issues of gender, race, and class; aware of hierarchies of power in the public, professional, and private realms; and attentive to debates about women's rights and responsibilities, he provides the means for previously repressed and suppressed voices to speak loudly about one of their most difficult choices: to say 'yes' or 'no' to new life. Nie has written a book for all seasons that I intend to use in my courses on Ethics and Public Policy, Health Care Ethics and Law, and Feminist Thought. -- Rosemarie Tong, Distinguished Professor in Health Care Ethics and director of the Center for Professional and Applied Ethics, University of Nort An important work about abortion in China....Nie's rich background is a perfect combination of medicine and sociology, with roots in Chinese culture, making his contribution to this area of research unique. This well-organized, readable book is useful for multiple disciplines in the social sciences. Highly recommended. -- R. Wang, Central Michigan University * CHOICE * [A] remarkable achievement. Nie's overarching project, the eclipsing of stereotypes held in the West about a monolithic and mono-cultural Chinese experience, can be said to be an unqualified triumph. Not only does the work represent a hitherto unexamined area of Chinese society, it contributes to a theory of ethics that must coexist with this contentious subject matter....Nie's book is about the morality and ethics of abortion as much as it is about the multifaceted grounds for a medical procedure, and its frequently devastating effects on the lives of Chinese women. * Canadian Review of Sociology and Anthropology * [A] unique and comprehensive study of abortion and its moral and ethical contexts in contemporary mainland China....Nie has made a tremendous contribution to scholarship in the area by giving a voice to so many silenced women and bringing to light some of the diverse personal meanings and experiences of aboration in contemporary China...This book with its clear and comprehensive exposition...can be recommended to a wide range of readers from specialists in Chinese ethics, sociology or women's studies, right through to undergraduate students taking general courses on Chinese society and culture. -- Rosemary Roberts, University of Queensland * New Zealand Journal of Asian Studies * from the Foreword:
One of the most important books written on morality and ethics in China. Nie's achievement is not just to tell us about what people have practiced and how they have reacted to abortion. Even more, this book opens a window on contemporary Chinese society that provides a better sense of how ordinary Chinese negotiate social dangers and endure and transform moral experience. -- Arthur Kleinman, Harvard University Using surveys and ethnographic information Nie Jing-Bao shows in this book how pluralistic, multisided, and contested the issue of abortion is in China. * International Journal Of Public Opinion Research * In this impressive book Nie Jing-Bao not only explores the voices of women whose reproductive choices are affected by the existing policies in China, but also elucidates the theoretical, philosophical, and social realities behind them. By speaking and listening to individuals and health professionals, Nie offers a unique and compelling account of the reality of reproductive life in modern China... [H]is non-judgmental, and intellectually sophisticated handling of the subject and those whose voices he documents, makes his book a landmark contribution. * The Lancet * This is a book full of real people struggling within constraints that touch them as individuals, but that also engage them in conceptions of the common good and of their place in the scheme of things. To grasp that overarching theme is to lift ethics from the narrow and procedural terms that are often dictated by individualistic conceptions of autonomy and rights and to remind us that our lives are articulated against a wider canvas than the one we often encounter. -- Grant Gillett, University of Otago * The American Journal Of Bioethics * [An] excellent and informative account of the impact of reproduction policies in China.... Nie's book is wonderfully nuanced and thoroughly researched. More than 700 Chinese people took part in the research he conducted, and Nie brings to their voices an understanding and compassion which speaks to his own personal and intellectual understandings of China, its history and its complexity. -- Sheila A. McLean, Glasgow University * Medical Law International * Affords rare insight into the personal experiences and viewpoints of some Chinese who have endured the world's harshest and most insistent state-directed birth control program. Of interest not only to students of Chinese society and culture, but also to specialists in ethics and public policy, medicine, and law. * Population and Development Review * An exceptionally thorough and well-documented examination of abortion in the PRC. This is a truly pioneering work in that the PRC government's antagonism to research that has anything to do with the one-child policy has, until now, made such a project impossible. Nie successfully overcame this barrier, however, producing this very important contribution to the academic study of China. * China Review International * This thoughtful study explores Cinese attitudes both past and present . . . contentious, thought-provoking and carefully nuanced. Nie's strong views on the nature of Chinese society and culture and the way he links his research to debates on whether ethical and moral values should be absolute or relative give his work relevenace far beyond its specifc subject matter. -- Delia Davin, University of Leeds * The China Journal * The most valuable information in the book comes from Nie's painstaking survey and in-depth interviews. . . .I recommend this book to Chinese readers for the particular attention it brings to what people in the West think about abortion in moral terms. I would also recommend it to Western readers because Nie has offered interpretation of much of the silence behind abortion in China. -- Yan Che, Shanghai Institute of Planned Parenthood Research * Studies in Family Planning * Nie's contribution is that he has been able to get some people in China to talk more openly about their attitudes toward abortion, fetal life, and morality...Nie also contributes richness to our understanding of what it means to live in a society where women may be forced to have abortions with the collusion of their work colleagues and friends as well as the coercion of the local state. -- Jean C. Robinson * East Asia * A timely work about the historical, cultural, social, and political aspects of induced abortion in China...[Nie's] work raises issues of gender, ethnicity, and religion in a meticulous, nuanced, and accessible manner, making the reader doubt whether people's experiences of induced abortion really conform to the stereotypes about which we so often hear. * Iias Newsletter, March 2008 * A well-written and insightful account of the impact of the family planning policy in China by an author with a keen understanding of both the moral and cultural issues involved. * Developing World Bioethics, March 2008 * Thought-provoking and thoughtful, Behind the Silence injects nuance and complexity into a fraught topic and should be standard reading for anyone seeking to understand
abortion in contemporary China. * Bulletin of the History of Medicine * A very ambitious book that aims to offer an account of Chinese voices on abortion....[Nie's] work contributes substantially to an understanding of abortion in China under the one-child policy in both descriptive and normative ways, giving rich texture to the title phrase 'behind the silence.'...An important and sensitive work. * International Journal of Feminist Approaches To Bioethics * Nie Jing-Bao's book Behind the Silence is an exceptionally thorough and well-documented examination of abortion in the PRC. This is a truly pioneering work....Nie creates a well-balanced account of both abortion and the one-child policy....Nie has some true gems in his study....He provides a striking range of voices. * China Review International, Spring 2007 *