In this new era, the Chinese nation is experiencing a tremendous transformation: it has stood up, grown rich, and is now becoming strong. In recent times, the Chinese nation has become independent and more prosperous. The key to this is the CPC and the Chinese people's correct understanding of the characteristics of the times, as well as the guidance of the theory of socialism with Chinese characteristics and the opportunities availed during 40 years of reform and opening up.

Peace and development remain the call of our time. China is still in the primary stage of socialism and this basic national condition has not changed. China's international status as the world's largest developing country also remains unchanged. This determines that China must adhere to and develop socialism with Chinese characteristics and strengthen its confidence in the path, theory, system, and culture that it offers.

Embracing the world 

At the opening ceremony of the Boao Forum, Xi described economic globalization as an irreversible historical trend. China's door to the world will not be closed, he said, but will instead open wider still.

Only by opening its door wider will China have the opportunity to communicate with the international community, integrate into world development, offer wisdom to the progress of human civilization, realize the common advancement of more countries and regions, and contribute to the global economy.

In this way China can also show its philosophy to the world, contribute to building a community with a shared future for mankind, and safeguard world peace.

Opening wider is incumbent on China in its role as a responsible major country. Through the Belt and Road Initiative, it can promote peaceful cooperation, openness, inclusiveness, and consultation based on mutual respect and benefit.

Opening is the prerequisite for integration, and integration is the purpose and result of openness. On January 28, 2013, Xi said that China should have a global vision, better integrate domestic development with opening up to the outside world, and combine the interests of the Chinese people with those of all people.

China's reform and opening up represents a voluntary embrace of economic globalization and active integration into the prosperous future of human society.

Economic globalization is a trend which facilitates trade, investment, personnel flow and technological development.

If China wants to develop, it must not shut its door. The country must continue to integrate into the world and contribute to the building of an open and reasonable international order. China must seize global strategic opportunities, cope with challenges properly, handle international and domestic situations coordinately, promote more equitable and reasonable global governance, and create favorable conditions for its development and world peace.

"An integrated world is there. Whoever refuses the world will be refused by it," Xi said at a meeting commemorating the 200th anniversary of Karl Marx's birth.

Reform and innovation 

Unlike the 1950s and 1960s, when China gave priority to developing heavy industry, at the beginning of reform and opening up the government encouraged and developed relatively small labor-intensive industries, making good use of the country's comparative advantage in cheap and abundant labor. Such industries seized a share of the domestic and international market, greatly promoting China's economic and social development.

With the continuous expansion of the global market and profound changes in the world order, China is moving closer to the center of the international stage. China's development model has faced many problems in areas such as human resources, exchange rates and natural resources. Moreover, it should not be satisfied with its role as a world factory. The key to changing this is the development of core technology and the ownership of proprietary intellectual property rights.

Innovation is the primary driving force for development and the bedrock for building a modern economic system. Only through continuous reform and innovation can China continue to generate sustained economic growth.

However, it must be acknowledged that a lack of innovation is still an issue inhibiting China's development. Without mastery of core technologies, technical barriers will appear sooner or later.

Yet through reform and opening up, China continues to develop and create. It is no longer simply an imitator or follower, but steadily becoming an innovator and trailblazer.

Common well-being 

Economic globalization is both a trend and a means. Its fundamental goal is to let the people of every country share the fruit of social development. China promotes globalization and global governance following the principle of achieving shared growth through discussion and collaboration, so as to make new and greater contributions to humankind, establish and improve the multilateral trading system and promote more open, inclusive, balanced and mutually beneficial global economic growth.

In the modern world, countries are more interdependent, which inevitably brings greater uncertainty and instability. As a representative of emerging economies and developing countries, China is increasingly involved in improving global governance, taking on more important international responsibilities, effectively increasing its overall impact on the development of the world economy, and providing the international community with timely, effective and diversified public goods.

In August 2014, during a visit to Mongolia, President Xi said that all countries are welcome to board the train of China's development. The idea that "to go fast, go alone, but to go far, go together" reflects China's willingness to promote the common progress and well-being of humankind. At the core of China's development is the desire to share opportunities and interests, achieve mutually beneficial results, and to make these outcomes bigger and more evenly distributed.

A harmonious world is an ideal envisioned in traditional Chinese culture. The concept of a community with a shared future for mankind is a response to historic changes. The shared aspect of these visions is that they focus on human liberation, happiness and development.

In this interconnected world, people should seize the opportunity presented by globalization to set up a community with a shared future. People should trust each other, jointly cope with the crises and challenges facing humanity, and achieve shared growth through discussion and collaboration.

The process of reform and opening up that started 40 years ago is the key to determining the destiny of contemporary China. It is indispensable for the liberation and development of social productivity, and is the only way to adapt to the new scientific and technological revolution of our times.

The successful experience of socialism with Chinese characteristics has injected new vitality into the international socialist movement, accelerated the multipolarization of the world, and provided a new choice for nations that hope to fast-track their development and maintain their independence.

China's reform and opening up is the result of the Chinese people's conscious exploration of scientific socialism in China and their efforts in sinicizing and popularizing Marxist doctrine. It is a path that the Chinese people have chosen to make the country strong. It could be said that reform and opening up is the inevitable result of the combination of scientific theories of socialism with China's own development practices. It is in this sense that President Xi emphasizes that socialism with Chinese characteristics is essentially the application of the scientific socialism founded by Marx and Engels to China's contemporary reality.

China has entered a new era. The best way to commemorate reform and opening up is to continue on the path toward development that it has created, by devoting greater effort to innovation, linking China's national interests with the well-being of all human beings, and pursuing the freedom, liberation and happiness of humankind.

The author is a research fellow with the Center for the Study of Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences

Copyedited by Laurence Coulton 

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