The highly anticipated Third Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee was held in Beijing from July 15 to 18, 2024. The session reviewed and approved the ‘Resolution of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Further Deepening Reform Comprehensively to Advance Chinese Modernization’ (hereinafter referred to as the ‘Resolution’). The ‘Resolution’ consists of 15 sections and 60 articles, divided into three major parts, including more than 300 significant reform measures covering various aspects of the economy and society. So, how will these reform measures impact our lives? To analyze and interpret these issues, the China Talk program of china.com.cn invited Professor Yu Miaojie, President of Liaoning University and Fellow of the International Economic Association, for an analysis.
China Talk: Not long ago, the full text of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China’s Decision on Further Comprehensively Deepening Reform and Promoting Chinese Modernization was released. We have noticed that the ‘Decision’ consists of 15 parts and 60 articles, including more than 300 important reform measures. So, what are your feelings after reading the ‘Decision’? What do you think of the overall goal and timetable for further deepening the reform?
Yu Miaojie: I benefited a lot from the communiqué and the Decision of the Third Plenary Session after reading them. The theme of the Third Plenary Session is to further comprehensively deepen reform and promote Chinese modernization. There are two key words: one is ‘reform’ and the other is ‘Chinese modernization’. If we study those documents carefully, we can see that those documents have greatly enriched our understanding of what Chinese modernization means. When we study the Report to the 20th CPC National Congress, we know that Chinese modernization includes five aspects: it is a modernization featuring a huge population, common prosperity for all, harmony between material civilization and spiritual civilization, harmonious coexistence between man and nature and peaceful development. The communiqué of the Third Plenary Session of the CPC Central Committee and the Decision emphasized the ‘five modernizations’ again and deepened its meaning. At the same time, in addition to those five aspects, the meaning of Chinese modernization has further expanded to 15 aspects.
I carefully studied the ‘Decision’, believing that it has pointed out the direction for China’s further reform and opening-up in the future. As it is very specific in every aspect, enabling us to find the direction for reform and opening-up and economic development in the future.
In my opinion, the most central point is reform. And how to deepen the reform is very specifically reflected in all aspects of the ‘’Decision. Moreover, we can see that one of the main principles is to promote reform through opening-up and promote development through reform, which is very clear. The ‘Decision’ also gives us a timetable, including the year 2029 and 2035. Therefore, the timetable and road map are very clear so I have gained a lot after studying it.
China Talk: We have noticed that compared with the Third Plenary Session of the 18th CPC Central Committee, the ‘Decision’ mentioned security and development. What do you think of the central government’s consideration by emphasizing these aspects?
Yu Miaojie: I want to share my understanding about development and security. First of all, only high-level security can lead to high-quality development, or high-level security is the premise of high-quality development. Conversely, high-quality development is the guarantee of high-level security. Both are indispensable and cannot be neglected. In my opinion, in our work, we should view that in two aspects.
First, the focus on safety. As we are now in a great change that unseen in a century and faced with an extremely complicated international environment and arduous and complicated domestic development tasks, we have a deeper understanding of security. Security is generally reflected in five aspects. The first is the security of national defense, which is the most basic. The second is industrial security, including whether the industrial chains will be broken, which is very important. The third is energy security, including whether our core energies can be self-sufficient, which is also very important. The fourth is ecological security concerning biodiversity. The fifth is food security. Therefore, these ‘five securities’ are particularly important.
So, what is the difference between high-level security and non-high-level security? For frontline workers, we often equate safety with stability, or we say stability is equivalent to conservatism. Of course, it is right for us to strive for progress in stability, but safety does not mean conservatism. Therefore, how can we achieve high-level security? The Central Economic Work Conference held at the end of last year made it particularly clear that ‘striving for progress while maintaining stability’ was the first sentence and the second sentence was ‘promoting stability by seeking progress’. Promoting stability through progress is high-quality development, which is the key in the new era. Only high-quality development can ensure high-level safety.
So, what is high-quality development? We should fully apply the new development concept so that innovation is the first driving force, coordination is the endogenous feature and green is the universal form. Openness is the way we must follow, and sharing is the fundamental purpose. Only high-quality development, such as maintaining an annual economic growth rate of 5% and keeping our contribution to world economic growth at around 30% every year, can ensure high-level security. This is my understanding of promoting stability through progress.
Second, how to ensure high-quality development? The most important thing is to cultivate new quality productive forces. Why? Because one of the keys of high-quality development, from the enterprise perspective, is to improve the Total Factor Productivity. Total factor productivity is regarded as one of the most critical indicators for enterprises to measure technological progress. What should we do if we want to achieve a revolutionary breakthrough in technology and improve the total factor productivity steadily? That is to cultivate new quality productive forces. Therefore, we can see that the cultivation of new quality productive forces ensures the innovation and development of science and technology. The development of science and technology in turn ensures the high-quality development of the economy and the high-quality development of the economy guarantees a high level of security. This is the logic.
China Talk: So, the security and development are intertwined with each other.
Yu Miaojie: Yes.