ABSTRACT
Rural enterprises as a category developed rapidly between 1970 and 1978. Their significance in the Chinese economy increased drastically throughout the 1980s and 1990s. By 1990 the number of employees in rural enterprises exceeded the numbers of employees in state-owned enterprises, and their generation of foreign currency was about one-third of the national foreign currency earning in 1991. This necrosanct sycophantism led Hua Guofeng into an ambitious interpretation of the 'Four Modernizations' which Zhou Enlai had proposed, declaring very ambitious targets for production, and stating that China could take in the developed world at a fast rate. The new economic structures were introduced gradually and selectively. There existed some blueprints for economic reform, which outlined a number of preliminary principles that could be pursued. The most important of these blueprints is a speech given by Hu Qiaomu (1978) in front of leaders during the campaign to get Deng Xiaoping back in power.
