China’s economic growth: towards sustainable economic development and social justice

Abstract

During the pre-colonial period, the regions of South Asia, South-East Asia and East Asia were highly integrated. However, during the colonial period, Europeans took control of trade and siphoned off the profits to Europe. After the end of the colonial period, East Asia and South Asia began to re-engage with each other. China is not the first country to grow at a rapid rate. Japan experienced similar growth from the mid-1950s until 1973; during that period, Japan’s real gross domestic product (GDP) expanded fourfold over a period of 15 years (Ito and Weinstein 1996, p. 206). The commonly held view is that China is a fast-growing economy with a large amount of foreign direct investment. China’s economy is thought to be largely based on exports consisting of labour-intensive products. However, this view is a generalization derived from statistical calculations and empirical findings. Extrapolations of trends into the future are often a futile exercise as there are too many intervening scenarios which may prevent past trends from continuing into the future. However, China’s economic growth experience since the reform period is similar to that of Japan and Korea when they were in similar phases of economic development.