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Falun Gong: The End of Days. By Maria Hsia Chang. (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2004. 208 pp.) Since April 25, 1999, when Falun Gong followers protested outside the Communist headquarters in Beijing, news reports about this religious (or semi-religious) group has abounded in the mass media, especially in the English-speaking world. The Western journalistic portrayals of Falun Gong are often focused on how the Falun Gong faithful suffered from persecution and how the Chinese government was in the wrong. Finally, we have a book by Professor Maria Hsia Chang, Falun Gong: The End of Days, which offers a balanced view of both this group and the Chinese government. Academic studies of Falun Gong are only at the beginning stage. A Chinese by birth and a political scientist by training, Dr. Chang is well equipped to investigate this new religious movement in a critical and yet sympathetic way. She does not embrace Falun Gongs view of the end of days, but she is sympathetic toward the suffering of its followers. Her view of the Chinese government is critical, and yet rational. By including a chapter on the history of millenarianism in China, she places the persecution of Falun Gong in a proper historical context. There are ve chapters in the book. In chapter 1, A Religious Sect Dees the State, Dr. Chang details the emergence, development, and persecution of Falun Gong, whose followers have deed the government. To untrained eyes, persecution of Falun Gong is simply an ideological combat. Dr. Chang has correctly pointed out that the groups effective organization and deep permeation into various sectors of the Chinese society have aroused fear in the government, which is very much aware of the countless uprisings in Chinese history that were instigated by religious messages. In chapter 2, Dr. Chang elaborates on the relationship between Chinese religions and millenarian movements. In this chapter, Chang discusses the folk religions of antiquity, Confucianism, Daoism and Buddhism, and so on. She particularly singles out for treatment those religious movements such as the White Lotus Society, the Eight Trigrams, the Taiping Rebellion, and the Boxers. She suggests that the syncretic nature of Falun Gong very much resembles these movements, with which I agree. Chapter 3 explores central questions such as, What do the Falun Gong followers believe in? and How do they practice their beliefs? Here, Dr. Chang discusses the cosmology, gods, moral life, karma, and reincarnation as well as cultivational practice as taught by Falun Gong. Obviously, Falun Gong draws on Buddhism, Daoism, and modern science and synthesizes them into what its followers believed to be an integrated holistic system of belief and practice. Dr. Chang

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does not make a value judgment on these teachings, as she just presents them as they are believed and practiced by the followers. In chapter 4, Dr. Chang moves back again to the tension between the government and the Falun Gong movement. The government labeled Falun Gong as a cult, a label that the Falun Gong followers resisted. Along with the label is the governments strategy to criminalize the activities of Falun Gong. Here, Dr. Chang disapproves the use of this label. She quotes Leo Pfeffer, If you believe in it, it is a religion or perhaps the religion, and if you do not care one way or another about it, it is a sect; but if you fear and hate it, it is a cult (p. 98). As an observer of Chinese politics, Dr. Chang also questions the governments claim that cracking down on Falun Gong represents the will of the people. In the last chapter, Dr. Chang discusses various religious movements in contemporary China. She attributes the emergence of these movements to the social ills caused by Chinas new economic policies. She concludes that, by continuing the traditional Chinese states intolerance of heterodox faiths, the Communist Party may well come to reap the same fate. It may discover that, by politicizing and driving underground unapproved religions and other groups, it is hastening the time when such groups, like the roiling ood waters of the Yellow River, eventually break through the dikes to directly challenge the state (p. 158). The whole book is highly readable. It is scholarly and yet popular. In terms of the general absence of a serious study of Falung Gong, Dr. Changs book will have its rightful place for years to come. There are a few critical points that I would like to raise regarding this book, however. First, the book relies heavily on secondary literature. Has the author done any eldwork or actually met and talked with Falun Gong followers? Second, there is some confusing usage of the terms that appear throughout the book, such as religion, faith, cult, and secret society. One would legitimately demand that the author dene these terms, as such denitions do affect our perceptions of the group. Last, one would expect Dr. Chang, as a political scientist, to offer her views regarding possible solutions to the conict between the Chinese government and Falun Gong. One logical conclusion that Dr. Chang could have drawn from her analysis is that in order to stamp out millenarianism in contemporary China, the government should allow the ve ofcially sanctioned faithsCatholicism, Protestantism, Buddhism, Islam, and Daoism more social and cultural space, as these faith traditions do much to offer solace and comfort to those people who suffer while the country is experiencing a great transition, socially, economically, and culturally.

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In spite of some shortcomings, Dr. Changs book is commendable for its insights and richness of information. I would strongly recommend it to students in courses such as Chinese Religions and Contemporary Chinese Politics. I would also recommend it to general readers who are interested in Chinese politics and religions. Zhonghu Yan Hope College, Holland, Michigan