An interesting little article in The Times outlining criticism of China’s economic reforms as instigated by Deng Xiaoping as the country’s economic boom sees it poised at a cruical juncture in its recent history.
From The Times:
The most prominent dissident still living in China has attacked the Communist party’s economic reforms and compared Deng Xiaoping, its late leader, to Louis XIV.
His essays are the second public challenge to the leadership after the appearance of Charter 08, a manifesto for political change that has been signed by more than 7,000 prominent citizens.
The essayist is Bao Tong, 76, who was the highest-ranking official imprisoned after the 1989 crackdown on China’s democracy movement. He served a seven-year sentence and now lives under house arrest in Beijing.
The essays contain devastating language. They will agitate China’s leaders because of Bao’s status as a veteran comrade speaking out while thousands of workers lose their jobs as a result of the world recession. The essays appeared as the party was celebrating 30 years of the “reform and opening-up” policy instituted by Deng, who died in 1997.
Bao says true economic reform died in 1989 when Deng turned against political liberalism and backed rule by a strong state. He argues that the party has merely transferred economic privilege to a corrupt bureaucratic elite. “The price we have paid for it today has been too steep: a cheap labour force, added to massive plunder of natural resources, poisoned air and polluted water,” Bao writes. Read more »
