Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Society of the People's Republic of China

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was delete. The Bushranger _{One ping only} 00:06, 23 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Society of the People's Republic of China

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WP:NOTESSAY;WP:OR;WP:SYN. Most of this can be merged to other articles; It looks like a nice soup of different information that we have on other articles synthesized into its own article. Curb Chain (talk) 20:45, 15 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This debate has been included in the list of China-related deletion discussions. • Gene93k (talk) 01:41, 16 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Keep The article may have issues, but it is certainly notable. PS. Proof: the search for "chinese communist society" on Google Books yields OVER A 100,000 hits.--_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 21:39, 17 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

"chinese communist society" is not "Society of the People's Republic of China". The number of hits is also irrelevant.Curb Chain (talk) 06:03, 22 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Delete Doesn't seem to have a topic. Duplication of Chinese culture and Demographics of the People's Republic of China really. Chipmunkdavis (talk) 23:09, 17 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Keep and wikify. 119.237.156.46 (talk) 23:19, 17 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Keep (reluctantly) despite the low quality of the article. Delete (after all). It's too long, it's unreferenced, and it has lots of irrelevant content. This topic deserves its own wiki, but not in its current form. The page is copied straight from one of the Library of Congress Country Studies (see my "Comment" below). ~~but these country studies are in the public domain. may be a mix of content from other pages, but that can be solved with paraphrasing and rewording as long as we don't create a content fork.~~ If we keep this page, we will have to rewrite it from scratch anyway. If someone recreates this page, they could consult excellent pages on Society of the Han Dynasty (a good article) and Society of the Song Dynasty (a featured article), as well as Society of the United States, which is far from perfect but could also help. ~~The problem with keeping this wiki is that nobody will feel like tackling the huge task of rewriting it. But this issue belongs on the talk page.~~ Cheers, Madalibi (talk) 00:31, 18 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Speedy delete for blatant copyright violation. Comment. The lead is copied verbatim from this blurb from "Country studies" of the Library of Congress ("Society" section). The section on "Ethnic boundaries" comes from a section of that name from the same website.[1] And we have the same problem for "Han diversity and unity,"[2] "Traditional society and culture,"[3] "Social change,"[4]] and presumably all the other sections. ~~I still think this topic deserves its own page, but~~ Right now this wiki is an exact copy of the Library of Congress "Country study" on China. ~~As such, it deserves speedy deletion.~~ That apparently doesn't warrant deletion, because Library of Congress Country Studies are in the public domain, but the content is just not good enough to be kept as it is. If we move the content to Wikisource (as Curb Chain suggests), someone can rephrase some of this information into something more manageable and we can work from there. ~~I'm not sure what can be done in this can of case...~~ Madalibi (talk) 00:52, 18 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

We can move it to Wikisource.Curb Chain (talk) 05:38, 18 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

This sounds like a good option, actually. That way we could keep the text somewhere where it can be easily consulted, but in a way that would not mislead our readers. The bibliography should be moved as well, since it presumably comes from the same source as the text. Still, I would prefer to move the content rather than delete the entire page. For one thing, this topic is still notable, and the current page has a salvageable bibliography that could help to rewrite this page. Madalibi (talk) 06:30, 18 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Delete or at the very least follow Madalibi's example and blank whole sections. Otherwise, we are misleading readers. The giveaway is the repeated phrase "By the mid 1980s." It's better to honestly present the fact that the article is in the beginning stages. If we can't delete on grounds of low quality, what can we delete? ch (talk) 03:36, 18 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Comment. I just blanked a few more sections that were about China before the founing of the PRC in 1949, but the article is still more than 60,000-bytes long and still suffers from all the problems mentioned above. Incidentally, the whole text of the article was pasted in a single edit in November 2007[5] and hasn't changed significantly since. The page creator immediately tagged it as outdated (template: {{update}}), but this tag was later removed. So the entire article is still a verbatim copy of a single outdated source. Very misleading indeed, and I'm wavering in my "Keep" vote... Madalibi (talk) 04:21, 18 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Delete because the material is duplicative of other article topics. The source of this article may be useful as a source on Chinese culture, but we don't need this as an article. -- Whpq (talk) 18:11, 18 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]
- That some people don't understand what is the difference between culture, demographics and society is sad, but no reason for the article's deletion. Content needs to and will eventually be properly divided between those articles. Certainly, society of country articles are notable, and of high importance to sociology (and the given countries). --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 21:10, 19 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Chinese culture existed for thousands of years. The People's Republic of China on the other hand has existed probably less than 100 years. If you think that Chinese society has changed massively due to the communist takeover which is largely political, I think you are sorely wrong.Curb Chain (talk) 07:20, 20 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Have you heard of such a tiny event as a Cultural Revolution? And your comment proves that you have not read the article, as for example the section "Social change" deals with those changes. How can one consider such a very informative para, rather representative of the article, unencyclopedic, is beyond me. In case you'll complain that the article is poorly referenced: " Enormous changes took place in Chinese society after the Communist rise to power in 1949". And this is hardly a one-of-a-kind source. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 01:54, 22 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The Cultural Revolution was quickly undone years after

==Social change== does not have a single reference

"Enormous changes took place in Chinese society after the Communist rise to power in 1949." is only one sentence, in one book, at the beginning of a paragraph.Curb Chain (talk) 05:58, 22 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I think any quick search on Google Books will show that this topic is worthy of its own wiki (see this, for example). This topic is clearly notable, and there's a lot to say about it. But the problem is not notability, it's content. Right now, the entire page is a direct copy of a single outdated source. I have therefore changed my vote to "Delete" above. I was saying keep the bibliography, but it's also outdated, and the references are too incomplete to be very helpful. I do hope, however, that someone will recreate this page and write something better on this very important topic! Madalibi (talk) 07:35, 22 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Chinese society currently redirects to this page. I am skeptical that the subject matter of that search is not a rewording of "culture". Are the only articles on these "society" articles the 3 you mentioned?; I find it hard to believe that this is not a conflation of "society" and "culture".Curb Chain (talk) 08:06, 22 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I'm sorry, which three articles do you mean? Madalibi (talk) 08:11, 22 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Oh, I see, thanks. Yes, I did mention those three above. I didn't mean they were the main reason why we should have a page on PRC society. They're just examples of what can be done with the theme "Society of..." The main question we need to ask when we're trying to decide if a topic deserves its own page is: is this topic covered in a sufficient number of independent reliable sources? In this case, the answer is definitely yes. A large number of sociologists, anthropologists, political scientists, and historians have studied post-1949 Chinese society. I can think of issues like the One-child policy, Ethnic groups in China, Migrant workers, Demographics of the People's Republic of China, People's communes, Floating population, Urbanization in China, Work units, as well as a number of topics that don't have their own wiki: agrarian reforms, the division of society into "classes," marriage and gender issues, wealth inequality, the nouveau riche, etc. In other words, there are tons of material to write a page on "Society of the People's Republic of China" even if only a few decades have elapsed since 1949. But I agree with your assessment of the current page, and this is why I voted delete. Cheers, Madalibi (talk) 08:29, 22 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Sure I find these instruments have affected the Chinese population, but I don't think it has affected the Chinese people as a society. These are political instruments, and the Chinese have a deep attachment to their culture that society or sociological aspects do not penetrate.Curb Chain (talk) 08:43, 22 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I would say urbanization, floating population, work units, registration into "ethnic nationalities," imbalances between boys and girls, and current forms of labor are all new characteristics of Chinese society regardless of how they started. This is not a referendum on whether the essence of Chinese society has changed since 1949. You may be right about society as a whole, but as long as reliable sources discuss modern Chinese society, then modern Chinese society deserves its own wiki. This is all I'm trying to say! Cheers, Madalibi (talk) 09:03, 22 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

But China is a polity. When we refer to Chinese, we refer to the han chinese. Otherwise, I see no compartmentalization of society and culture. Ethnic minorities within in China's territory would not call themselves Chinese.Curb Chain (talk) 09:07, 22 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I think "Society of the People's Republic of China" should refer to all social phenomena in the PRC that have been discussed by reliable sources, not restrictively to Han Chinese. And I'm not sure I get your point about the conflation of society and culture. Forms of labor, "class struggle," the one-child policy, population migrations, etc. are forms of social organization and interaction. Sure, they're infused with cultural meaning, but everything everywhere is. In any case I think we're getting a little far from the AfD! I propose we move this to some talk page, perhaps mine? Madalibi (talk) 09:30, 22 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Considering China is a one party system, I don't think these policies imposed on the people inhabiting the Chinese territory accept these changes to their "society" as chosen. This is a political imposition is all I'm saying. To take your example of class, this could be a custom not a sociological aspect. Take the Indian Caste system. This is cultural, not sociological. That's what I mean the conflation of society and culture.Curb Chain (talk) 09:38, 22 October 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Delete or redirect somewhere. WP:OR that makes lots of POV assumptions (i.e. society vs societies; People's Republic of China vs Chinese people).

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.