Governance of water resourcesis typical in governance of the commons. The book Assessing Water Rights in China brings China’s national conditions into an analysis of water-control governance and the water-rights structure. It advances the theory of the hierarchical structure in water-resource governance in China and systematically examines the historical evolution of the water-rights structure in China. The book not only contributes to study of governance of commons in China but it also provides empirical evidence. In theory，the book constructs “a choice model for the structure of water governance” and a “conceptual model for a water-rights hierarchy，” and it also discusses a dynamic mechanism for introducing the market into a water- rights hierarchical structure with Chinese characteristics. For the empirical study，the book examines the water-rights structure in the Yellow River Basin as its object of analysis，analyzes changes in the law on the water-rights structure in ancient China and since the founding of New China，and also analyzes six typical cases in the Chinese water-rights market.