Popular science publishing in contemporary China

Abstract

Since the 1950s China's popular science publishing has been the business of the government, and subject to its will. China adopted a system of planned economies, as the Soviet Union did, until the 1980s when a policy of reform and opening-up was adopted. During the period of the planned economies, popular science publishing was not a commercial but a governmental enterprise. More than 100 million copies of the most representative publication of this period, One Hundred Thousand Whys, have been distributed. The Unmoved Mover Series of the 1990s was a milestone in the new era. What is significant about this series is that it broke through the prevailing mode of science-popularization as serving for industrial and agricultural production, serving for ideology'. China's popular science publishing has its defects, genetically and culturally. In an age of marketization, popular science books are frequently applauded by the experts, but not enjoyed by general readers.