The Chinese Mercantilists
Tiffany Tong
November 15th, 2007
China has been growing in GDP at rates that the world has never seen before. It took China less than 10 years to double its GDP, while it took Britain 58 years, the USA 47 years, and Japan 34 years (Hou & Hou, 2002). Countries that started market reforms at the same time as China have all seen less growth (Remmer, 1998). There are many speculated reasons for this apparent disparity: in this essay, I will argue that a mercantilist approach to the political economy is necessary for a smooth transition into a capitalistic system with free markets. Drawing from the Chinese case study, I will attempt to identify the characteristics of the reform policies and explain why it has been so successful in terms of economic growth. In the process, I will try to answer questions such as “is creating devolution beneficial to rapid growth?” or “is a strongly autonomous government required to push reforms forward?”