A senior reporter for a Western media outlet stationed in Beijing for many years captured the essence of the concept in talking about how China has evolved. A few years ago, he says, the most hotly debated topic in China was at what point it could become part of the G-8. Then two years ago, American scholars reduced the ranks of the world's powerful countries to the G-2 ¡ª United States and China.
¡°This year, all that's left is the G-1 ¡ª China,¡± said the reporter in fluent Mandarin, sensing China's steadily expanding resolve.
Based on objective indicators, China certainly has the right to say to the world: ¡°When China is not happy, the world will not be happy.¡±
The country is the world's leading producer of more than 200 kinds of products and the world's biggest market for items such as cars, mobile phones and personal computers normally associated with advanced consumer markets. China not only can build airplanes, high-speed rail lines and aircraft carriers, it exports its technology abroad. While governments in the West have debt ratios of over 80 percent of GDP, China's stands at a mere 17 percent.
At a time when most countries around the world face serious shortfalls of funds, China's pockets are flush with cash that are poured into American and European bonds and may even be drawn on to rescue Italy.
Speed No Longer the Only Standard
In the recent past, China has been like a Formula 1 racetrack, with the central government leading the way in flooring the accelerator and local governments pushing forward at breakneck speed. If they crashed, no big deal. The central government not only replaced the car but also the driver to get local administrations back into the race.
But China has recently decided to change the track's operating model. Speed will no longer be the competition's only standard of success.
2008 marked a turning point in the country's mind-set. In an exclusive interview with CommonWealth Magazine, former Shanghai Mayor and Chinese Academy of Engineering President Xu Kuangdi said that after internal discussion and a self-evaluation in 2008, the Communist Party came to the realization that China was the world's leader in output but not in quality, lacking any prominent global brands. It produced 1.7 billion tons of steel annually but could not produce the best quality steel and still had to rely on imports. Its natural resources suffered from constraints, and acid rain was evident over a majority of its land.
¡°China is big but not strong. If the industrial structure isn't changed, we're finished,¡± Xu says.
Initiating a Comprehensive Overhaul
With a pivotal 2012 on the horizon, the issue of transition and transformation has grown more urgent.
Wu Xiaobo, a prominent management scholar and blogger on financial and economic issues, explains that 2012 will be a year of both economic and political transition - transitions that will force change in China.
China's core of political power, from the countries leaders and Politburo committee members to delegates of the National People's Congress and National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference will face the possibility of being replaced next year.
Economically, growth in recent years has been driven by a 22-trillion-renminbi (US$3.44 trillion) investment in major infrastructure projects, including a rail network, roads and airports. But with roughly a dozen high-speed rail lines and subway systems set to begin service next year, the age of big infrastructure projects has run its course, so what will China rely on next to stimulate growth?
The core concept of China's new five-year development plan, based on a consensus for change at all levels of the Communist Party, is transformation.