ABSTRACT
China’s highly successful economic transition during the last three decades, with an officially reported GDP growth rate of 9.5 percent per year since 1980, has been accompanied by huge and complex social change.2 I refer, in particular, to changes in the incidence of poverty, the security and distribution of income, employment opportunities and the provision of human services such as education and health care. The development in these areas raises the issue of China’s future policy options to improve social conditions; indeed, this is the basic topic of the paper. First, however, it is important to be clear about the nature of the economic transition.
