Alvin Y. So - The Global Rise of China

China Today series

1. Greg Austin, Cyber Policy in China
2. Steven M. Goldstein, China and Taiwan
3. David S. G. Goodman, Class in Contemporary China
4. Stuart Harris, China's Foreign Policy
5. Elaine Jeffreys with Haiqing Yu, Sex in China
6. You Ji, China's Military Transformation
7. Michael Keane, Creative Industries in China
8. Joe C. B. Leung and Yuebin Xu, China's Social Welfare
9. Orna Naftali, Children in China
10. Pitman B. Potter, China's Legal System
11. Xuefei Ren, Urban China
12. Judith Shapiro, China's Environmental Challenges 2nd Edition
13. Alvin Y. So and Yin-wah Chu, The Global Rise of China
14. Teresa Wright, Party and State in Post-Mao China
15. LiAnne Yu, Consumption in China
16. Xiaowei Zang, Ethnicity in China

Copyright Alvin Y. So and Yin-wah Chu 2016

The right of Alvin Y. So and Yin-wah Chu to be identified as Authors of this Work has been asserted in accordance with the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

First published in 2016 by Polity Press

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All rights reserved. Except for the quotation of short passages for the purpose of criticism and review, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher.

ISBN-13: 978-0-7456-6473-6

ISBN-13: 978-0-7456-6474-3 (pb)

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

So, Alvin Y., 1953

The global rise of China / Alvin Y. So, Yin-wah Chu.

pages cm

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-0-7456-6473-6 (hardback : alk. paper) ISBN 978-0-7456-6474-3 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. ChinaEconomic policy2000- 2. ChinaForeign economic relations. 3. ChinaForeign relations1976- I. Chu, Yin-wah. II. Title.

HC435.3.S587 2015

337.51dc23

2015011705

Typeset in 11.5 on 15 pt Adobe Jenson Pro

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Printed and bound in the UK by Clays Ltd, St Ives PLC

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This book is dedicated to our teachers, colleagues, friends, and students in Hong Kong

We still remember vividly our first trips to China. Alvin visited in the early 1970s when the country first opened its door to foreign visitors at the tail end of the Cultural Revolution. China was at that time a typical poor third world nation: the border city of Shenzhen had no building taller than four floors; restaurants closed at 8 p.m. The street light in the city was very dim and the stores closed very early, so there was not much city life after dark. Even when the stores were open, however, there was nothing for customers to buy except for some very simple necessities. A black-and-white TV, a refrigerator, or an electric fan was considered to be a luxury that few Chinese citizens could afford. No one owned a car, and everyone rode a bicycle or walked to work. Yin-wah's first visit was to her parents remote native village situated at the northern part of Guangdong province in the early 1980s. Everywhere there were lush paddy fields and, blessed with a hydropower dam located at the upper reach of the village's river, villagers got a free electricity supply, allowing them to turn on their lights after dark, which was a rare sight in the region. People were optimistic; an entrepreneurial teenage boy took the initiative to contract out pieces of grassland to herd geese.