Historical Background
Part 3 of 4

Deng's economic reforms soon shifted from agriculture to industry.  One part of his program was the creation of Special Economic Zones in which businesses could operate with minimum regulation and state control. Seizing the opportunity, a host of Chinese merchants and entrepreneurs made fortunes in these zones into which billions of dollars of foreign investment began to pour.^[1] Factories sprang up overnight. As peasants swarmed to the cities to fill the labor demand. China's cities experienced tremendous growth in population and wealth. 

Consider the city of Chicago by way of analogy. As Americans flooded westward in the 19th century, this city became a symbol of rapid industrial growth and vigorous expansion. It was the fastest growing city in the world at that time. Chongqing, a Chinese city situated at the intersection of the Yangtze and Jialing rivers, is a city few Americans have heard of. But it is growing at a rate eight times that of Chicago in its heyday.^[2] And this city is not alone. Shenzen, a modest fishing town 25 years ago, has since grown 100 fold and rivals New York city in population.^[3] Since Mao proclaimed the People's Republic of China in 1949, the number of cities in China with over 1 million people has grown from 5 to over 40. And currently, the sum of construction nation-wide in China is equivalent to building a New York City every three months.  

To be sure, other civilizations have experienced rapid economic growth, urbanization, and industrialization in the past. But what makes China's growth different from that of the United States in the late 19th century or Japan after World War II, is the sheer scale and speed of this transformation.^[4]  

Just as rapid has been China's exposure to western consumer goods and global trends. It is difficult for most Americans to realize the significance of this shift. For most of its history China has been isolated from or uninterested in foreign culture. This is partly due to its historic roots. In Western civilization we inherited our notions of law from Rome, our alphabet from the Phoenicians, our numerals from India, and our philosophy from the Greeks. For the Chinese, all these things had their origin at home, making it difficult for them to see the value in things originating outside of their own civilization. China's geography helped to reinforce this notion. China is isolated by natural barriers on all sides except it's northwest border, a deficiency they attempted to amend with the famous Great Wall. Later on, the Ming Dynasty made isolation official state policy.  

But China's meteoric rise to global economic status has made this cultural quarantine impossible. By 1997 ninety percent of Chinese had televisions. There are 180 million more cell phone accounts in China than there are people living in the United States. Urban Chinese are becoming computer savvy and internet cafés abound in major cities. Despite the persistence of censorship in the media (although less than most Americans assume), doing business with the world has necessitated a greater degree of transparency and familiarity between China and the world. 

Notes:
[1] Examples of these rags to riches stories are given in James Kynge, China Shakes the World: A Titan's Rise and the Troubled Future--and the Challenge for America (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2006, ch. 1.
[2] "China's Chicago: Urbanization in China," The Economist, July 28-August 3, 2007; Kynge, China Shakes the World, p. 27
[3] James Fallows, "China Makes, the World Takes," The Atlantic, July/August 2007, p. 52.
[4] This insight comes from Kynge, China Shakes the World, p. 27.