Chinese Modernization Offers Experiences and Inspirations to Developing Countries
Aug 23-2024
The report of the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC) specified the goal of advancing the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation on all fronts through a Chinese path to modernization. In his recent speech at the 2024 annual conference of Chinese Economists Society, Prof. Justin Yifu Lin tried to provide answers to three questions: What is Chinese modernization? How to realize it? And what significance does it hold for the world? Prof. Lin is Honorary Dean of the National School of Development and Dean of the Institute of New Structural Economics, both at Peking University.
Since the end of the Second World War, many newly independent countries have regarded the path taken by Western countries as the only one to achieving industrialization and modernization. It turned out that by 2008, only 13 economies had joined the ranks of high-income ones, while the majority of developing countries were stuck in the “middle income trap”, or even “poverty trap”, said Prof. Lin.
He pointed out that the Chinese path of modernization, as envisioned by the CPC, shares some common features of modernization, such as promoting economic development, increasing income levels, and improving people’s wellbeing; meanwhile, it takes on certain Chinese characteristics rooted in China’s national conditions. The Chinese modernization, he stressed, is the modernization of a huge population, of common prosperity for all, of material and cultural-ethical advancement, of harmony between humanity and nature, and of peaceful development.
Based on the new structural economic theories that he has championed for years, Prof. Lin believed that to realize Chinese modernization, China’s different regions should adhere to the principle of “seeking truth from facts”, leverage their own factor endowments and comparative advantages, and turn their comparative advantages into competitive advantages by harnessing the combined roles of efficient market and effective government. At the same time, they can build inter-regional coordinated cooperation under the guidance of the central government, so as to ensure development for all areas. He also emphasized that development based on comparative advantages must aim to fully utilize both domestic and international markets.
Prof. Lin believed that the Chinese path to modernization will have profound impacts on the world by inspiring the developing countries not to neglect their own national conditions and blindly follow Western models. Making good use of their own factor endowments and comparative advantages, coupled with the joint forces of efficient market and effective government, paves their path to industrialization and modernization.
