South China Morning Post
| During the period of reform, Beijing also accomplished the goal of securing the return of Hong Kong's sovereignty to the motherland in 1997 and Macau's in 1999, though relations with the breakaway island of Taiwan have been rocky. [...]
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On November 24, 1978, under the dim light of an oil lamp, 21 farmers in Xiaogang village in the eastern province of Anhui marked their fingerprints on a contract that divided community-owned farmland into plots for individual households.
The contract stipulated that if their arrangement was discovered and any signatory thrown in prison, the others would raise their children until they turned 18.
The controversial move, initially attacked as a return to capitalism, triggered a wave of revolutionary changes leading to the system of 30-year leases on land plots, and marked the beginning of the mainland's historic process of opening and reform.
Last month, in what was called a ‘landmark policy document’, the ruling Communist Party's Central Committee agreed to allow small farmers to sell their right to till the land.
At the time the Anhui villagers were turning their backs on collective farming, entrepreneurs in the Pearl River Delta began setting up small factories to provide original equipment manufacturer (OEM) services to businesses in Hong Kong. Dajin Textiles in Shunde, Guangdong, is believed to be the first OEM factory established in the area, at a time when foreign trade was strictly regulated.
Through political wisdom or sheer good fortune, the two groups' bravery in challenging political taboos was endorsed by the Communist Party under reformist leader Deng Xiaoping.
The Xiaogang model was soon copied by thousands of villages across the province, and the Shunde experiment was said to have eventually prompted the top leadership to designate four ‘special economic zones’ in 1980. They were Shenzhen, Zhuhai, Shantou and Xiamen. In 1985, a further 14 port cities were opened to overseas investment. These were the first to receive foreign capital and technology, and have since been leading China's export boom.
It is tempting to say that changes might have taken place even earlier, when the disgraced Deng made a political comeback after the death of chairman Mao Zedong and the downfall of the Gang of Four, Mao's political allies, in 1976. Back then, the pressing need for change, no matter how painful, was obvious. The mainland was just emerging from the shadow of the devastating Cultural Revolution, and decades of economic and social mismanagement had impoverished the country.
Before a crucial party plenum to set the country's new course, Deng's men launched an ideological debate on the so-called ‘criterion of truth’ to prepare for change.
The tide began to turn for good at that meeting - the Third Plenum of the 11th Chinese Communist Party Central Committee - in December 1978. Deng, then vice-premier, wrested power from the conservative faction headed by Hua Guofeng, the party chairman who remained staunchly faithful to Mao.
With the victory of the Deng credo - ‘practise is the only test of truth’ - the meeting marked the turning point in the party's central policy theme away from the idealism of socialist revolution towards economic development, thus ushering in the era of opening and reform.
‘Thirty years of reform and opening up have brought about historic changes in China's development and created the fastest major growing economy,’ said Chi Fulin, executive president of the China Institute for Reform and Development.
Deng's reform suggested a loosening of central controls on economic life, undertaken in a spirit of pragmatism and gradualism as an antidote to Mao's ideology of class struggle. Similarly, it heralded China's integration into the global economy.
Since then, market-oriented reform has been the common thread running through transfers of political power from Deng to former leader Jiang Zemin and President Hu Jintao, although internal power struggles have occasionally slowed the pace.
There was debate on the pace of reform between the reformist camp, headed by Deng, and some conservatives headed by Chen Yun throughout the 1980s and early 1990s. Deng prevailed, however, and set the course of reform in stone with his famous 1992 south China trip.
Mismanagement of the economy and internal power struggles helped trigger nationwide pro-democracy protests, and the consequent bloody military crackdown on student demonstrators in Tiananmen Square on June 4, 1989, was a major setback for China's reform and diplomacy.
Power struggles also led to the sacking of two top reformist party officials and Deng's hand-picked political successors, Hu Yaobang and Zhao Ziyang, for being sympathetic to political liberalisation.
Despite facing continuous challenges at home and abroad to one-party rule, China's Communist Party remained politically secure, avoiding the widespread collapse of socialism in the 1990s. The mainland's economic boom began in the countryside in 1978, lasted through the 1980s, and was followed by today's urban, industry-led growth.
The mainland has seen booms in almost all sectors of the economy and society, including foreign investment, trade, financial markets, consumption, travel, overseas study, military modernisation and foreign relations. There is also a booming interest in western culture and a new, modern lifestyle that incorporates foreign movies, fashion and design, and even religion - from home-grown Confucian philosophy to Buddhism and Christianity.
From 1978 to last year, the mainland's gross domestic product grew by 9.6 per cent annually from $216US.5 billion to $3US.6 trillion. Fiscal revenue grew 45-fold from 113.2 billion yuan ($128HK.5 billion) to 5.1 trillion yuan, greatly increasing national strength.
Material life for the general population has never been better, with a staggering 300 million people lifted out of poverty during this time. The World Bank hails that as the biggest poverty-reduction effort in history and the country's greatest contribution to world development. Today China is the world's fourth-largest economy, holding $1US.9 trillion in its coffers - the wealthiest by that measure. It is the third-largest trading nation and a favoured recipient of foreign direct investment.
China's economic and political clout is growing so rapidly in some regions, such as Africa, that critics have labelled Beijing a ‘neo-colonialist’. This record of development has become an inspiration to many around the world as developing economies turn to China in search of solutions to their own developmental difficulties.
With its recent hosting of the spectacular 2008 Beijing Olympic Games and a Chinese astronaut's historic spacewalk, the nation appears to have created an image for itself of a global power second only to the United States. Beijing has played an increasingly significant leading role in many important international organisations and global affairs. Its support during the current global financial turmoil, for instance, is strongly sought by western nations.
During the period of reform, Beijing also accomplished the goal of securing the return of Hong Kong's sovereignty to the motherland in 1997 and Macau's in 1999, though relations with the breakaway island of Taiwan have been rocky.
Of course, the cost of the economic miracle should not be discounted. The environmental damage has been staggering, the gap between rich and poor is growing - most citizens lack sufficient health and retirement programmes - and corruption has never been reined in. More worrying, the economic boom has not brought systemic political reform and rule of law to an increasingly sophisticated economy and society, as many had hoped.
‘Compared with the forceful and well-paced economic reform, political reform has not yet started - which obviously results in an income gap and strains society,’ veteran dissident Dai Qing said.
Despite its economic success, she said, the mainland still faced risks and formidable challenges, and its future success rested on the fundamental reform of its political system and introduction of the rule of law.
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