1.1 China’s Gradualist Reforms – An Introduction

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From the course by The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology

China’s Economic Transformation Part 1: Economic Reform and Growth in China

24 оценки

The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology

China’s Economic Transformation Part 1: Economic Reform and Growth in China

24 оценки

In 1978, after nearly 30 years of socialist planning under Mao Zedong, China was one of the world’s poorest countries, saddled with an inefficient, inward-looking economy. Today, China is an upper-middle income country and the world’s largest trading nation, contributing more to global economic growth than any other nation. How could such a remarkable transformation take place? This course will examine in detail the reforms that have contributed to China’s economic development and the current challenges facing the Chinese economy. After completing this course, you will be able to: - describe the origin and consequences of China’s key economic reforms since 1978; - explain how features of China’s fiscal and financial systems have impacted development outcomes; - assess the extent to which China has integrated itself into the global economy and the consequences of such integration for China and other countries; - explain the importance of different sources of economic growth during different periods since 1978; and - critically assess the economic and policy challenges facing China going forward. This course does not offer certificate at the moment. Course Overview video: https://youtu.be/YBkhpvWUoIw

From the lesson

Orientation and Module 1: China’s Gradualist Reforms

In this module, we will introduce you to China's gradualist reforms. But before you start with the lectures, please watch the Course Overview, review the Assignment and Grading page, and introduce yourself to other learners who will be studying this course with you.

1.1 China’s Gradualist Reforms – An Introduction4:18

1.2 Institutional Change – A Framework8:18

1.3 Reform Overview9:23

1.4 Decollectivization of Agriculture9:35

1.5 The Rise and Fall of Township and Village Enterprises (TVEs)9:30

1.6 The Problem of State-owned Enterprises13:36

1.7 China’s Gradualist Reforms – Module Summary4:40

Meet the Instructors

Albert Park
Director of the Institute for Emerging Market Studies, Chair Professor of Social Science and Professor of Economics

[MUSIC]

Hello and welcome to this module on China's Gradualist Reform.

In this introduction, I want to provide some motivations for

why we should be interested in studying China's economic transformation.

And second, introduce you to the topics that we'll be covering in this module.

If we look at the growth in China's Gross Domestic Product,

since the establishment of the Socialist Republic in 1949,

you can see that there has been a dramatic change.

In particular, since the period of economic reform began in 1978,

there has been exponential growth in China's economic output.

This really shows the power of compounded high rates of annual economic growth.

By the end of this period, China's output

is a thousand times greater than in 1952.

The question,

of course, is how did China accomplish such a remarkable economic transformation?

That's what we're going to try to address in this course and in this module.

China has also become increasingly important to the global economy.

You can see here that compared in the 1980s,

when China's growth was relatively unimportant to global economic output and

the leading countries were the USA and Japan.

By the 2000s, China has become the most important country

in contributing to total economic growth in the world.

And much faster than even the United States and

other emerging market countries.

So if we return to the question,

why should we bother studying Chinese economic reforms?

We can think of several different perspectives.

The first, of course, is China's global importance.

In the future, no matter where you live in the world,

what happens in China will matter because it will affect

what's happening in all of the other countries in the world.

Second, if we're trying to understand the general process of economic development,

how do poor countries become rich countries?

China's historic accomplishment becomes an incredibly important case study for

studying this general process.

And finally, if we want to understand the current challenges facing the Chinese

economy and the likely paths or outcomes that are going to occur in the future.

We really need to understand what has happened in the past,

what has happened during the past 30 years of economic reform.

In this module, we will cover five main topics.

The first is institutional change as a framework for

thinking about economic reform.

So we will use these concepts to try to understand analytically why reform

has unfolded in the way it has and what it has meant for economic performance.

We will then provide a overview of China's graduous reform experience,

contrasting it with the big bang,

big shock therapies applied in Russia and Eastern Europe.

Then we will turn to reforms and specific sectors of the economy.

And in this module, we will look both at agriculture and the industry.

On the agricultural side, we will examine the decollectivization reforms that

returned farming to households at the beginning of the reform period.

On the industrial side, we will analyze the rise and

fall of China's township and village enterprises.

And also discuss the continuing problem of state-owned enterprise reform in China.

And as we examine each of these topics,

we will continue to use this framework of institutional change as a lens for

understanding what is happening in China's economic reforms.

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