Burton challenges standard interpretations of contemporary China in this major new investigation. The post-Mao agenda, in which the notion of class struggle as the "key link" was explicitly repudiated, formed the foundation for China's post-1978 modernization program. Burton describes this program as "post-socialist," arguing that socialism as a definitive category has become irrelevant. He contends that demands for the reform of China's system of economic organization were the direct result of the failure of the Party's post-revolutionary political agenda and that subsequent economic improvements led to calls for modernization of the nation's structure of political authority.