Contributing a new dimension to the existing literature on China’s economic development which focuses on the how questions – i.e., questions about the process and conditions – this dissertation research addresses a fundamental why question. Specifically, it asks: why, after more than two millennia of subsistence-oriented economy, did Chinese leaders and/or common people become interested in and reorient toward sustained economic growth? It examines and compares three episodes of China’s economic modernization in the course of the past century, testing the hypothesis that this reorientation has been motivated by nationalism, specifically the desire to improve the international standing (power and prestige) of China, using as the chief means to this end the country’s enormous economic resources. The three chosen episodes for historical comparison are: the Nanjing Decade (1928-1937) under the rule of the Nationalist government, the years of early economic reform led by Deng Xiaoping (1978-1997), and the recent years, broadly identified as Chinese globalization, under Xi Jinping (2013- present).
Drawing upon historical archives, biographies, contemporary official documents, media reports, economic statistics, and survey data, this dissertation empirically examines the major changes of China’s political economy in each of the three periods. In particular, it looks into the development and competition of different nationalist aspirations (i.e., nationalism prioritizing the economy versus other spheres such as ideology, culture, or the military) and analyzes the mechanisms through which the type of nationalism that came to be adopted by Chinese leaders and eventually the people made the economy its priority. On the basis of the comparative-historical analysis of the three core periods in Chinese political economy, the dissertation overall argues the following:
First, the identification of the economic sphere as the basis of national greatness in China (in imitation of leading Western nations and, in particular, Japan) made economic success a way to social status and approbation. This led to nationalism, specifically nationalism prioritizing the economy, among those with economic opportunities, as people came to connect their success and increased dignity with China’s international standing, seeing themselves as directly contributing to it and becoming personally invested in and committed to the nation’s prosperity.
Second, the sectors of the population to whom economic opportunities were open during the three periods of Chinese modernization differed. Thus, nationalism prioritizing the economy was only shared by a small number of individuals within the intellectual and business elite in Republican China, spreading to a much wider circle in the elite and those who got rich first under Deng’s “Reform and Opening-up” policy, and, in the recent decades eventually percolating to the population at large.
Third, competition for international prestige is endless – when it is pursued through the economy, it creates commitment to sustained growth. China’s rising international status based on its rapid economic growth since 1978, signaled by its astonishing display at the Beijing Olympics in 2008 and its resilience during the 2008/09 international financial crisis, converted many more Chinese into nationalists, which, in turn, reinforced their economic motivation, creating a snowball effect.
Fourth, similarly to the earlier leaders in the economic competition (e.g., Britain, the US, and Japan), China’s growing economic power changed its attitude to free trade and globalization. Its economic policies have steadily turned away from protectionism that so many experts believe to be inseparable from the political ideology of the authoritarian Chinese state. China’s recent championship of globalization shows that economic globalization is ideologically-independent – i.e., it is simply in the interest of the economically most powerful nations, and thus, today, in China’s national interest.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bu.edu/oai:open.bu.edu:2144/47027 |
| Date | 27 September 2023 |
| Creators | Wu, Zeying |
| Contributors | Greenfeld, Liah |
| Source Sets | Boston University |
| Language | en_US |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis/Dissertation |
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