Teoría Culturalista de Aprendizaje de Vigotsky

Jiang Zemin’s most important economic legacy was to ensure the reform and opening up after Deng Xiaoping’s southern tour in 1992. Jiang was consistently dedicated to reforming the central planning system and creating a competitive market within China. At the 14th CCP National Congress in October 1992, Jiang delivered a report entitled “Accelerating the pace of reform and opening up and the modernization construction to win the great victory of

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socialism with Chinese characteristics”.15 _{It was the first time that the Chinese leadership}

declared that the target of China’s economic reform was to establish a socialist market economy. At the third Plenary Session of the 14th CCP Central Committee in November 1993 the Party passed the “Decision of the CCP Central Committee on some issues concerning the improvement of the socialist market economy”, which allowed the market to play a

fundamental role in resource allocation under the macroeconomic management.16 The mid-

1990s witnessed a series of economic reforms, including reforms of enterprise system, tax sharing system, financial system, foreign trade system and foreign exchange management system. In particular, Jiang Zemin and Zhu Rongji pushed forward a large-scale privatization to reorganize the state-owned enterprises in 1997 and 1998. China experienced a dramatic transition from central planning to market economy and the nature of China’s economy changed accordingly in the 1990s. As Coase and Wang noted,

“The role of the Chinese state in the economy has become progressively less significant, no matter what measurement is used. Before the economic reforms, the Chinese people had little economic freedom and the state controlled every aspect of the economy, from production, to retail, and even consumption. Today [2012], private entrepreneurship is the primary driving force of the Chinese economy. The size of the state sector in the economy has fallen significantly relative to the non-state sector.”17

15 _{“Historic junction: establishing the socialist market economy [历史节点：建立社会主义市场经济体制]”,}

People’s Daily, 11 October 2007, retrieved from http://cpc.people.com.cn/GB/104019/104740/8150356.html (accessed 14/09/2016).

16 _{“30 most influential events in the 30 years of China’s reform and opening up [中国改革开放30年最具影响} 力的30件大事]”, retrieved from http://theory.people.com.cn/GB/41038/6757582.html (accessed

14/09/2016).

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Jiang’s report at the 15th CCP National Congress in September 1997 responded to the changing nature of China’s economy. Jiang declared that China’s basic economic system for the primary stage of socialism was to maintain public ownership as the main

form and to allow the development of multiple forms of ownership.18 Furthermore, the

second Plenary Session of NPC passed the PRC Constitutional Amendment in March 1999, which explicitly stated that the non-public sector was an important component

of China’s socialist market economy.19 Last but not least, Jiang’s commitment to reform

and opening up finally helped China to join the WTO in 2001. Premier Zhu Rongji was also the key supporter for China’s access to the WTO.

The infrastructure conditions the superstructure. Jiang’s most important

political legacy was probably the “Three Represents” [三个代表] Theory, which was

closely related to the changing nature of China’s economy. Jiang put forward “Three Represents” when he visited Guangdong province in early 2000. More specifically, the “Three Represents” requires the CCP to “always represent the development trend of China’s advanced productive forces, the orientation of China’s advanced culture, and the fundamental interests of the overwhelming majority of the Chinese people”.20

Jiang’s “Three Represents” Theory was widely interpreted, both at home and abroad, as an official justification to expand party membership to include elites of all social circles, which marked the CCP’s transition from a proletarian revolutionary Party

18 _{“Jiang Zemin’s Report at the 15th CCP National Congress [江泽民在中国共产党第十五次全国代表大会上} 的报告]”, Xinhua News Agency, retrieved from http://news.xinhuanet.com/zhengfu/2004-

04/29/content_1447509.htm (accessed 14/09/2016).

19 _{“National People’s Congress of the People’s Republic of China, PRC Constitutional Amendment (1999) [中华} 人民共和国宪法修正案（1999年）]”, retrieved from http://www.npc.gov.cn/wxzl/wxzl/2000-

12/10/content_7075.htm (accessed 14/09/2016).

20 _{“Jiang Zemin put forward the “Three Represents” Theory in 2000 [2000年江泽民提出“三个代表”重要思} 想]”, Xinhua News Agency, 7 April 2000, retrieved from http://www.hq.xinhuanet.com/focus/2008-

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towards an elite governing Party. According to Brown, Jiang’s “Three Represent” was “one such theoretical contribution, leading to the admission that entrepreneurs were also productive elements in society” and also “a partial admission that the social

makeup of China was becoming more complex”.21 Miller also remarked that “Jiang

Zemin’s ‘three represents’ thus reflected the Party leadership’s decision to pursue a strategy of political co-option with regard to the entrepreneurial, managerial, technical, and professional elites who were emerging in Chinese society as a consequence of the

economic reforms.”22 In a nutshell, Jiang’s “Three Represents” forms the theoretical

basis of China’s elite-coalition governance in the twenty-first century.

In addition to the changing nature of China’s economy, China’s entry into the WTO also brought about important political implications. WTO is certainly one of the key institutions to promote the Western norms of neoliberal global trade. Although there is a heated debate over the relationship between the world liberal order and the

rise of China in the twenty-first century23_{, two implications of China’s entry into WTO}

after the 15-year-long negotiations should be clear. First, the Chinese leadership recognized the key principles and values of WTO agreements. As Brown notes, “politically, the final acceptance into the WTO fold marked a moment in which China signalled a full commitment to accepting international norms, working within them, and

21 _{Kerry Brown (2009) Friends and Enemies: The Past, Present and Future of the Communist Party of China,}

Anthem Press, p.107.

22 _{Allice Miller (2011) “Dilemmas of globalization and governance”, in Roderick MacFarquhar (ed.) The Politics} of China: Sixty Years of the People’s Republic of China, Cambridge University Press, p.570.

23 _{See, for example, John Ikenberry (2008) “The rise of China and the future of the West: can the liberal system}

survive?”, Foreign Affairs, Vol.87, No.1, pp.23-37; Shaun Breslin (2010) “China’s emerging global role: dissatisfied responsible great power”, Politics, Vol.30, No.1, pp.52-62; Hung Ho-fung (2012) “Is China saving global capitalism from the global crisis?”, Protosociology: An International Journal of Interdisciplinary, Vol.29, pp.159-179; Shaun Breslin (2013) “China and the global order: signalling threat or friendship?”, International Affairs, Vol.89, No.3, pp.615-634.

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attempting to regularize at least some of its economy with the rules established largely

in the West, in North American and Europe.”24 _{Second, the increasing scale of China’s}

engagement with the world economy in the twenty-first century meant that international interests were much more entangled in China’s domestic politics. Special attention should be paid to the more international-domestic interactions in China’s economic policy making.