London

AS China prepares for a leadership transition next month, problems are mounting: slowing economic growth, the political fallout from the Bo Xilai affair and destabilizing social problems. Chinese leaders find it hard to know what ordinary people really think.

For four years, I tried to answer this question, as I traveled to and from the foggy, industrial megacity of Chongqing as a visiting professor. I spent months teaching and studying in communities without foreigners around, where state-run factories had closed and where landless ex-farmers now live in barren blocks of apartments.

I wanted to find out what was on the minds of ordinary people. What did they talk to one another about? So in 2007, with permission of the authorities, I put up billboards featuring images of trees, like the “wish trees” in Daoist, Buddhist and Confucian temples, where people tie notes about their private desires to the branches, hoping that the wind will blow their prayers to heaven. Chongqing residents stuck hundreds of their leaf-shaped notes onto the branches of my “trees.”

Their wishes and worries were candid, heartfelt and startling: people had lost their optimism and were yearning for security and freedom from anxiety. Income is a primary worry for those who have lost their jobs or land. Pensions and social welfare payments are almost nonexistent. People struggle to pay for education. They can’t afford medical treatment; clinics and hospitals require patients to pay cash in advance. A serious illness can spell financial ruin for an entire family.