ABSTRACT
From the beginning of China's contact with the West, the overwhelming need for economic development has been recognized by virtually all Chinese leaders and intellectuals. The Communist party and the Guomindang struggled to the death but shared remarkably similar visions of the state accelerating and guiding the economic development process. This consensus was not unique to China, of course, and images of the heroic struggle for economic construction echo through the domestic propaganda of Korea, the Soviet Union, and many other developing countries. But for better or worse, it was the Communist party in China that actually laid the framework of institutional change and accelerated industrialization, and accomplished the first stage of a fundamental and inevitable historical transformation. How does one evaluate the achievements and shortcomings of that effort? Was the Chinese development strategy under Mao a success or a failure? What was the legacy left to post-Mao China?
