ABSTRACT

Social security was thus treated as an important political and economic stabilizing factor in the perceived growing unstable economic environment, and it has moved to the top of the policy agenda to provide a safety net to meet further economic insecurity. In China, social security centres mainly on labor insurance. It has been clearly written in the Constitution of the Peoples’ Republic of China that “working people have the right to material assistance in old age, and in cases of illness and disability”. China’s economic reform strategy took on an evolutionary course instead of adopting the shock therapy of Poland and the Big Bang theory of ex-Soviet Russia. However, China borrowed experiences from the Poland model and focused on using price reform as the spearhead of change, followed by privatization of enterprises and property ownership transformation.