Deng Xiaoping

"Fourth, there is a stimulatory momentum of capital markets. Every single wealth story of venture capitalism, private equity or IPOs is an archetype of Deng Xiaoping’s most famous aphorism: “Let a small group of people attain wealth first.” It sets everyone drooling."

"Engineers have quite literally ruled modern China. As a corrective to the mayhem of the Mao years, Deng Xiaoping promoted engineers to the top ranks of China’s government throughout the 1980s and 1990s. By 2002, *all* nine members of the Politburo’s standing committee—the apex of the Communist Party—had trained as engineers. General Secretary Hu Jintao studied hydraulic engineering and spent a decade building dams. His eight other colleagues could have run a Soviet heavy-industry conglomerate: with majors in electron-tube engineering and thermal engineering, from schools like the Beijing Steel and Iron Institute and the Harbin Institute of Technology, and work experience at the First Machine-Building Ministry and the Shanghai Artificial Board Machinery Factory."

"In 1980, when Deng Xiaoping christened Shenzhen a “special economic zone,” the city had little to recommend it other than its location directly abutting British-ruled Hong Kong. Deng wagered that success in Shenzhen could tear down the socialist strictures on China’s economy that the rest of the leadership had been hesitating to dismantle. He lavished the city with supportive policies and penned editorials to beckon the ambitious to move there."

"Mao Zedong was not an engineer. He was a librarian at Peking University who then helped found the Communist Party, after which he became a warlord. After he established the People’s Republic in 1949, Mao’s stature became nearly godlike. He spent much of his time reading literature and philosophy, leaving the details of running the state to technocratic deputies like Zhou Enlai, Deng Xiaoping, and Chen Yun. Mao’s gifts in military leadership as well as poetry collided in a folksy slogan he was fond of repeating: *Ren duo, li liang da*. With people come power."

"Among the victims were the preponderance of basic government functions. The Cultural Revolution had made a mockery of anything that could be as organized as a national census. Deng Xiaoping, Chen Yun (the most senior official on economic policymaking), and other top leaders knew that China’s population was large, but they were in the dark about actual numbers. The leadership guessed that the population might have surpassed nine hundred million. When statistical authorities estimated that the population numbered nearly one billion people at the end of 1978, the leadership reacted with shock. No longer was a big population a cause of celebration. So many hungry mouths threatened to overrun Deng’s modernizations."

"The point, however, isn’t to condemn Cook or Apple. It’s to convey the predicament they’re in. At the turn of the millennium, Washington made a bet on China—a bet that free trade would liberalize the country and perhaps catalyze the creation of the world’s biggest democracy. Instead, trade enriched China and empowered its rulers. Cook shouldn’t be blamed by politicians for enmeshing Apple’s operations in China two decades ago, but he has erred by doubling down over the past decade despite mounting evidence that Xi has been ramping up repression at home and taking a more combative stance in international affairs. “You can say that we read them wrong, that we misunderstood China. But Jack Ma read China wrong, too. Every entrepreneur read China wrong,” says a supply chain expert who has lived in the country. “You look at what Deng Xiaoping and Hu Jintao were promoting—the [business class] didn’t see this coming. Xi changed the game completely. He’s another Putin in the making.” This person adds, “Look, I’m not a Cook fan. But you have to be sympathetic. He didn’t know what he was dealing with. Nobody did.”"

"In 1980, Shenzhen was a fishing village of fewer than 70,000 people. But as a special economic zone just across the harbor from Hong Kong, Shenzhen and the area around it underwent a metamorphosis. “By the late 1980s, the entire 104-mile route from Hong Kong to Guangzhou was lined on both sides with factories,” according to the late Ezra Vogel, a Harvard scholar and the biographer of Deng Xiaoping. By 1990 the city of Shenzhen had a population of 1.7 million; in the early 2000s, it had grown to around 7 million. In just twenty-five years, Shenzhen’s population grew a hundredfold."

"Deng Xiaoping then sent tens of thousands of Chinese, officials and members of the Communist Party, to Singapore so they could make the most of Singapore’s achievements. China openly used the city-state as a cadre school to train numerous Chinese leaders, for example, by sending Jiang Zemin as early as 1980, who was the Vice President of the Commission for Foreign Investments and later the Mayor of Shanghai, to eventually become the head of state in 1993 and Deng Xiaoping’s successor. From 1985 to the 1990s, the Chinese government did not hesitate to recruit Dr. Goh Keng Swee, one of Lee Kuan Yew’s lieutenants and often considered the architect of Singapore’s economic development, as an economic advisor."

"Deng Xiaoping did not want to follow this path, which he considered too dangerous for the country’s stability. This is why he decided to suppress the Tiananmen Square protests in June 1989. However, China had to find an effective alternative. Only one leader proposed another proven path. This uniqueness was clearly perceived at the time, for example by Samuel Huntington when he wrote in 1997: “Apart from the special case of oil-rich Gulf States, all the wealthiest countries, except for Singapore, are democratic.”"

"Lee Kuan Yew recalls the instructions given by Deng Xiaoping during this trip: “Open up, learn from the rest of the world and, most importantly, learn from Singapore, for their good governance and discipline.”"

"The following year, in 1979, Deng Xiaoping recounted his trip to Singapore and what he had learned for China: “I went to Singapore to learn how they use foreign capital. Singapore allows foreigners to set up factories on its territory and benefits from this in at least three ways: firstly, foreign companies pay the state 35% of their net profits in taxes; secondly, labor incomes go to the workers; finally, this approach has energized their service industries and local incomes.” And he concluded: “My opinion is that from now on, when we study economic and financial problems, our starting point must be how to make the best use of foreign capital, and how to excel in this area{{id_9}}.”"

"Deng Xiaoping declared: “Singapore enjoys good social order, the city is well managed […]. We should take advantage of their experience and why not do better than them.”"