Assignment on Deng Xiaoping

Deng Xiaoping belonged to small group of revolutionary people who brawled as guerillas for the communist case and also dominated it later in following decades and that turned into People’s Republic which was proclaimed on Oct. 1, 1949. Today, nearly half a century has passed since the installation of Deng in the powerful upper-reaches of China and that also lead him to making the world’s largest communist party in 1954. Deng became China’s paramount leader in 1978 and he reigned for a generation. Even after his retirement, he continued to be an all-powerful patriarch. He nourished the economic boom that drastically advanced the lives of Chinese. Although he faced many daunting challenges yet he continued to add to the siege of China’s straining foundations. He eased the struggle to survive in Chinese countryside by overcoming all the shortages there. Throughout those years, Deng signified the aspiration of Chinese to move past the ideological extremism that had marked the Mao era and retrieved for the Chinese a long-denied prosperity. But during all this and his struggles, he also came to represent a obstinate and inflexible confrontation to democratic stirrings. For Deng, China's economic reform could only occur under the dictatorial rule of the Communist Party. The security forces of China who had turned into being often harsh and brutal under Mao continued to be the same under Deng but China today still remain to be perennially criticized as a nation whose rulers seem to respect human rights only ungenerously and unwillingly (Tyler)

On account of China becoming a capitalist, what form of capitalism has emerged in China? Lack of political liberalization kept the China’s market transition persistent. Although the political system has stood still over the past many years but the party is no longer a communist except in name and it distanced itself from radical ideology. One of the major reasons in the empowerment of Chinese exercising political views is internet and even so, China lingered to be ruled by a single party. This continuity in the system hides a deep change in China’s political reality while the strongman politics claimed to be over after the death of Deng Xiaoping. This takes back to the end of 1976 which can also be called post Mao reform. Against conventional wisdom, China became a well known market economy by the end of 90s before it joined WTO in 2001. At the end of 1976, Hua Guofeng with the full support of Deng Xiaoping, launched an economic plan of modernization. It was a startled investment-driven program basically that focused on heavy industry and can also be called a good example of ‘big-push industrialization’ (Teiwes and Sun)

Deng Xiaoping was named as Chinese revolutionary and veteran of the Communist Party. In 1978, he was not only eager to adopt capitalist methods but also brought so many reforms to stimulate economic growth. It is believed to be an historic accord between him and U.S president Jimmy Carter that took place in 1979 ultimately reversing the China-US tensions going on from decades. He was of the notion to bring several revolutionary reforms in not just economic sectors but also private sectors so that they could start and run their own businesses. To attract foreign investments, Deng established four special economic zones along the coast of China. Due to these revolutionary reforms that Deng put in place, China has embraced deep roots into property rights, high profits and free market competition while it was one of the major countries to oppose capitalism. And till date, China continued to transform itself into a major hub of innovation and consumption from a low-tech manufacturing center after all the Deng’s historical reforms (Coase and Wang)

Works Cited of Deng Xiaoping

Coase , Ronald H. and Ning Wang. How China Became Capitalist. 2013. 18 April 2020 <https://www.cato.org/policy-report/januaryfebruary-2013/how-china-became-capitalist>.

Teiwes, Frederick C. and Warren Sun. Paradoxes of Post-Mao Rural Reform: Initial Steps toward a New Chinese Countryside, 1976-1981. illustrated Edition. Routledge, 2015.

Tyler, Patrick E. . Deng Xiaoping: A Political Wizard Who Put China on the Capitalist Road. 1997. 18 April 2020 <https://www.nytimes.com/1997/02/20/world/deng-xiaoping-a-political-wizard-who-put-china-on-the-capitalist-road.html>.