The Chinese Economy after Mao

Chairman Mao died in September 1976, and with his death an era in Chinese and world history came to an end. Nearly a quarter of mankind was directly affected by Mao’s politics, and in this sense he undoubtedly was the greatest revolutionary leader of this or any other century. He was also the architect of a distinctive strategy of socialist economic development. Yet within two or three years of his death China embarked upon a major series of economic reforms which, if implemented in full, will profoundly alter the way the Chinese economy functions. Indeed the reforms currently under discussion, when combined with those that have already been introduced, are far more radical than anything previously even considered, let. alone implemented, in any other communist country. These reforms are the subject of this chapter.