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Advances in Politics and Economic 
ISSN 2576-1382 (Print) ISSN 2576-1390 (Online) 

Vol. 1, No. 2, 2018 
www.scholink.org/ojs/index.php/ape 

91 
 

Original Paper 

Singapore Model and Mainland China Model in Terms of GDP 

Development 

Hui-Chin Lai1* 
1 Graduate Institute of Political Economy, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan, Taiwan (Republic 

of China) 
* Hui-Chin Lai, Graduate Institute of Political Economy, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan, 

Taiwan (Republic of China) 

 

Received: July 22, 2018       Accepted: August 8, 2018       Online Published: August 10, 2018 

doi:10.22158/ape.v1n2p91              URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.22158/ape.v1n2p91 

  

Abstract 

The research investigates the Singapore model and mainland China model in terms of its’ GDP 

development. It covers ideologies, methods and reasons for government interventions, the roles of 

state-owned businesses and the issues of labor in accordance to the different stages of GDP 

development. The interventions from the governments that caused the market to rebound and resilience 

are found in two countries. The article also redefines the developmental state as unlimited methods and 

ideologies under a government-led economic development economy.  

Keywords 

Country’s GDP Development, Singapore Model, Mainland China Model, Developmental State, 

Government Interventions, Market Resilience, Labor Issues 

 

1. Introduction 

Singapore was originally a place with limited resources and a small island with poor soil. In 1965 

during its independence, Singapore’s relationship with its neighbor Malaysia was not friendly at the 

time, and the country must survive on its own ever since. In the process of becoming independent, 

Singapore’s government played an important role in the economy. Since 1980, the country went 

through the stage from struggling to survive to economically on top within Southeast Asia and known 

as one of the “four dragons of Asia”. Today, Singapore has been listed as one of the developed 

countries, with a GDP per person of over USD$50,000. 

Compared to successful economic results, Singapore politics have often been criticized as being highly 

inflexible as a result of having a single political leader and a dominant political party. Opposition power 



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is very limited and also the freedom of speech of its people. The situation is rather similar to mainland 

China where an inflexible political state has led to a great hike in its economic development.  

People’s livelihood in mainland China is starting to recover from 70s after going through the nightmare 

of the Cultural Revolution. Following up continuous economic reforms, people are getting well fed and 

experience a long-term economic growth. Most people no longer suffer from poverty and are becoming 

prosperous. Although in the process, several stages of economic reform took place, being a dominant 

political party, leaders are being followed without questioned, and controlled government information 

seems to have never changed.  

As a result that mainland China urgently wants to become internationally recognized, and more and 

more scholars are highly interested in its non-transparent politics, the transparency of the country 

seems to have been improved progressively. In recent years, it started with Western journalists making 

reports only by asking around, to Universities beginning to publish academic writings, more 

non-transparent areas in politics have been revealed. Literature regarding the dominant Chinese 

communist party and its secret ways of operations, policy, practice and changes greatly increased. The 

model of mainland China’s politics and economics seems to present a clearer view now and it seems 

possible to study it with the given background.  

Currently, the major studies on mainland China’s and Singapore’s development model are criticism. 

Stephan Ortmann and Mark R. Thompson in “Journal of Democracy (2016)” mention that both 

countries are against the western idea of democracy by limiting freedom of speech, preventing 

opposing voices with penalties that violate human rights. Some Singaporean scholars oppose the point 

of view with literature, that Singapore is not a country dictated by a dominant political party as written 

in “The Real Singapore Model (2015)” of Min Xin Pei. In 2016, the City University of Hong Kong 

conducted a research conference known as “The Singapore Model and Its Influence to discover the 

effects of Singapore’s political model on mainland China”. 

Who learns from whom and which model is better seems to raise a valuable discussion. However, the 

purpose of this article is to discover similarities in the economic development among Asian countries. 

Furthermore, we find out what are the necessary factors in the process of economic development 

compared to the ideology of free economy. This article shall discuss the matter from the questions 

stated as follow: 1) Singapore and PRC have its own political ideology to evolve and achieve GDP 

growth target in different stages. What are their similarities? 2) What are the similarities in the business 

model of Singapore and mainland China’s state owned enterprises? Are there similarities in their 

contribution to GDP growth? 3) What efforts did both governments make in order to receive these 

skills that achieve economic growth? 4) A dominant political party and powerful leader in the 

long-term have what kind of effect on the economy? What are the similarities between both countries 

on this? Discover what economic impact, especially on GDP, that both countries have through 

government intervention. 

 



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2. Communism Ideology and GDP of the Founding Nations 

During the founding period of both nations, Singapore and mainland China were deeply affected by the 

ideology of communism. 

2.1 Singapore 

After the Second World War, the ideology of communism has spread to Singapore. The island was 

colonized by the English and the Japanese, and therefore, it should have adapted to the ideology of its 

governors. It was difficult to clarify its own ideology and development strategy under the 

circumstances. Until the post-war period in the 50s, the Singapore communists established labor unions 

and Chinese schools, which resulted in turmoil causing multiple riots. Under such circumstances, the 

people of Singapore electeda left wing leader David Marshall. The leader was not recognized by the 

English (Note 1). Until the leader Lim Yew Hock was elected and since then Singapore’s self-governed 

status had been recognized by UK. Not long after, Lee Kuan-yew of “the People’s Action Party” was 

elected as the president, Lee Kuan-yew believed that Singapore could not survive on its own, and 

therefore he proposed to join Malaysia as one of its states. Although communists in PAP opposed to 

this proposition, Singapore still joined Malaysia as a federal state. However, Singapore failed to build 

up a good relationship after joining Malaysia due to political differences, which lead to multiple 

blood-shed incidents. In 1965, Singapore was expelled by the Malaysian Federation and soon latter 

announced its independence (Note 2). 

After the Second World War, a massive amount of unemployed population emerged, causing a jump in 

unemployment rate to 12-14% in Singapore (Note 3). The environment played an important role in the 

support of communism. In the 50s, the China communist party had become the dominant party in 

mainland, and the original governing party Chinese nationalist party retreated to Taiwan (Note 4). 

Moreover, the Marxism ideology exists in the colonizing country UK. All these internal and external 

factors, as a result, boosted the development of communists (space) in Singapore. It was unknown 

whether or not Lee Kuan-yew’s strong proposition to join Malaysia is the result of that he did not want 

to see the communism grow. After Singapore was expelled from the Federation of Malaysia, Lee took a 

great effort to urge Singapore join the liberal alliance such as United Nations and the Commonwealth 

of Nations. Internally, no matter before and after Singapore’s independence in 1965, Lee took a great 

interest in reducing the member of communists in PAP. Economically, he focused on reducing the 

unemployment.  

 

Table 1. Singapore GDP Growth Rate 

1961 1962 1963 1964 1965 1966 1967 1968 1969 1970 

8.1% 7.1% 10.0% -3.7% 7.6% 10.9% 12.3% 13.6% 13.7% 13.9% 

1971 1972 1973 1974 1975 1976 1977 1978 1979 1980 

12.1% 13.5% 11.1% 6.5% 4.6% 7.4% 7.5% 8.7% 9.4% 10.0% 



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1981 1982 1983 1984 1985 1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 

10.7% 7.2% 8.5% 8.8% -0.7% 1.3% 10.8% 11.1% 10.2% 10.0% 

1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 

6.7% 7.1% 11.5% 10.9% 7.0% 7.5% 8.3% -2.2% 6.1% 8.9% 

2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 

-1.0% 4.2% 4.4% 9.5% 7.5% 8.9% 9.1% 1.8% -0.6% 15.2% 

2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016     

6.2% 3.9% 5.0% 3.6% 1.9% 2.0%     

Source: World Bank. 

 

Table 2. Singapore GDP Figure (USD) 

1960 1961 1962 1963 1964 1965 1966 

427.88 448.96 471.88 510.99 485.30 516.29 566.54 

1967 1968 1969 1970 1971 1972 1973 

625.72 708.27 812.27 925.29 1070.82 1263.66 1684.34 

1974 1975 1976 1977 1978 1979 1980 

2339.57 2489.78 2758.66 2845.88 3193.33 3899.57 4926.96 

1981 1982 1983 1984 1985 1986 1987 

5595.24 6075.60 6629.94 7223.40 6995.10 6793.54 7531.25 

1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 

8902.41 10380.28 11864.28 14505.02 16144.01 18302.43 21578.46 

1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 

24936.83 26263.02 26386.46 21824.04 21795.70 23792.61 21577.08 

2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 

22016.83 23573.63 27405.27 29869.85 33579.86 39223.58 39721.05 

2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 

38577.56 46569.68 53166.68 54431.16 56029.19 56336.07 53629.74 

2016       

52960.71       

Source: World Bank. 

 

Between 1960 to 1965, the ideology of Singapore governing power had been changed from 

communism to economic development. Five years before independence, Singapore’s GDP was US$ 

427-516, with an average economic growth of 5.8%. In this period, the GDP compared to Hong Kong 

was about the same, higher than Taiwan and Korea of US$200 but lower than Japan of US$900. The 

economic growth was between -3.7-10% (Note 5). Due to the high economic growth, employment was 



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greatly boosted. The unemployment rate was still high, however, the government see the hardship of 

poor people; it launched home ownership scheme and built great amount of public housing (Note 6) 

(Kuang, 2015, pp. 9-14). The successful improvement in the economy and society made the removal of 

communists in PAP easier without causing any political turmoil or riot in society. Under the system of 

direct election, PAP was still the dominant party, but its ideology had changed from the communism led 

nation founding model to the economic development-led model and greatly accepted by the voters.  

2.2 PRC 

Although during the founding period of Singapore and mainland China were both affected by 

communism, but from the point of view of their ideology both countries had advanced in different 

directions. After the Second World War, Chinese communists supported by the Soviet Union had 

successfully replaced the governing Chinese nationalist party in mainland. In 1949, the People’s 

Republic of China has been founded. Chinese nationalists Kuomintang party was a party with the party 

spirit of freedom. When the Chinese nationalist party was in power, there was a great disparity between 

rich and poor, and also the gap between the elites and civilian was gradually expanding; people were 

generally poor. This made the Communist Party who advocated the elimination of the class, which was 

welcomed by the people and had a hotbed of rise. The Kuomintang’s administrative approach is also 

more liberal. Therefore, after the founding of the Republic of China from 1911 to the end of World War 

II, apart from the time of the Japanese invasion, Kuomintang has always been with unclear chains of 

command. Leaders such as Sun-Yat-Sen, Yuan Shi-Kai, Song Jiao-Ren, Chiang Kai-Shek, none of them 

were powerful enough to lead the whole party. There are also left-wing groups and right-wing groups 

within the party, and as a result sometimes KMT accepted the communists, other times it cleared the 

communists. Externally, major foreign powers such as United States, Japan and Soviet Union were 

highly influential on the party (Note 7). Unlike Singapore, the nationalist party was unable to provide 

economic growth to China; it failed to reduce unemployment and poverty, which caused the ordinary 

people to be in favor of communism. With the successive years of war against Japan, people’s livelihood 

was languishing. In this environment, communism that is with the unilateral ideology, the single 

influence of foreign forces, and the provision of a dream of averaging wealth for the poor masses were 

welcomed by the mainland people. The Communist Party had gradually replaced the Kuomintang in 

mainland China. 

After 1949, the movement of the founding campaign of the People’s Republic of China continued until 

the death of Mao Zedong in 1976. In this founding period of the nation, mainland China experienced 

multiple radical movements such as the Three-anti and the Five-anti Campaigns (Note 8) (Fairbank & 

Goldman, 2002, p. 349), Great Leap Forward, People’s commune. Millions of people died of starvation 

(Note 9) (Smil, 1999). The whole society was generally stagnated in poverty. In the regard of history, 

we know that giving such background the country more likely results in the rise of communism. But in 

mainland, which was already dominated by the communists, people seem to see these movements as 

part of the nation’s founding campaign. The movements rather did not cause any political turmoil or 



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dramatic change in politics. The fact that the system of the People’s Republic of China, one-party 

dominated as governing party had not changed. Compared to Singapore that was transformed from the 

ideology of communism to economic development, the mainland Chinese has entered into the path of 

the communism consciousness. 

 

Table 3. Mainland China GDP Growth Rate 

1961 1962 1963 1964 1965 1966 1967 1968 1969 1970 

-27.3% -5.6% 10.3% 18.2% 17.0% 10.6% -5.8% -4.1% 16.9% 19.3% 

1971 1972 1973 1974 1975 1976 1977 1978 1979 1980 

7.1% 3.8% 7.8% 2.3% 8.7% -1.6% 7.6% 11.7% 7.6% 7.8% 

1981 1982 1983 1984 1985 1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 

5.2% 8.9% 10.8% 15.1% 13.4% 8.9% 11.7% 11.2% 4.2% 3.9% 

1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 

9.3% 14.2% 13.9% 13.1% 10.9% 9.9% 9.2% 7.8% 7.7% 8.5% 

2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 

8.3% 9.1% 10.0% 10.1% 11.4% 12.7% 14.2% 9.7% 9.4% 10.6% 

2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016     

9.5% 7.9% 7.8% 7.3% 6.9% 6.7%     

Source: World Bank. 

 

Table 4. Mainland China GDP Figure (USD) 

1960 1961 1962 1963 1964 1965 1966 

89.52 75.81 70.91 74.31 85.50 98.49 104.32 

1967 1968 1969 1970 1971 1972 1973 

96.59 91.47 100.13 113.16 118.65 131.88 157.09 

1974 1975 1976 1977 1978 1979 1980 

160.14 178.34 165.41 185.42 156.40 183.99 194.81 

1981 1982 1983 1984 1985 1986 1987 

197.07 203.34 225.43 250.71 294.46 281.93 251.81 

1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 

283.54 310.88 317.89 333.14 366.46 377.39 473.49 

1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 

609.66 709.41 781.74 828.58 873.29 959.37 1053.11 

2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 

1148.51 1288.64 1508.67 1753.42 2099.23 2695.37 3471.25 

2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 



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3838.43 4560.51 5633.80 6337.88 7077.77 7683.50 8069.21 

2016       

8123.18       

Source: World Bank. 

 

Mainland China from 1960 to 1976 (Note 10), in the 17 years of nation-founding ongoing period, its 

GDP rose from US$90 to US$165, at an economic growth rate of 4.8% per annum (Note 11), growth 

range from -27.3% to 19.3 %. The average economic growth seems agreeable, and the rate had no 

significant difference compared to Singapore during its founding period. However, behind these 

numbers, many people died due to starvation because of poor governance. The fact should not be 

hidden, but rather should be left a negative comment on the economic growth of PRC for its founding 

period. 

 

3. Two Types of Developmental State Models 

The developmental state was a term defined by renowned author Chalmers Johnson. His research on 

Japan defined that the developmental state is a nation that is being governed by technocrates in the 

administration withinbureaucracy, a well-planned economic structure can be organized by government 

interventions to adjust the market with an acting department as the lead (Note 12) (Adrian, 1994). From 

the above definition, it is obvious that developmental state suggests that it is a government-led economic 

development, while the action and methods taken by the government is unlimited. In this research, 

although (space) even Singapore and the People’s Republic of China have various ideologies in the 

development of the country, it is obvious that the two nation’s governments both take the lead in the 

process of economic development, and this fact has been recognised by the leaders of both countries. 

Therefore, it is reasonable to define that both Singapore and mainland China adopted the methodology of 

the developmental state. 

Although Singapore and mainland adopted the method of developmental state after their own nation’s 

founding period, they still have a great difference in ideologies in regard to their economic 

development. 

3.1 Singapore 

The ideology of Singapore’s development is actually based on state capitalism (Note 13) that operates 

in contrast to Neo-liberalism (Chua, 2016, p. 499). Why is it in contrast to Neoliberalism? 

Neoliberalism prefers small governments, light taxes and minimum government interventions. The 

state capitalism in Singapore suggests that the economic development is led by State-Own Enterprises 

(SOEs); even though there is the development of private companies, the private companies are largely 

related to SOEs. And because the governing party is PAP, the PAP takes control of SOEs. Thus, the 

ruling party PAP can use its desired approach to manage the policy and economy of Singapore.  

In normal countries, enterprises and workers can easily become opposition forces. This could trigger 



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phenomena such as labor movements and therefore causes economic stagnation. The government often 

faces a dilemma between enterprises and workers. In some countries, there are political parties that are 

in favor of enterprises while the others political parties favor workers. These parties take turns to be 

governing parties in order to apply different labor policies that achieve the purpose of checks and 

balances. Such problem never exists in Singapore. In Singapore’s economy, most of the enterprises are 

SOEs that belongs to the government. Government shares the profit with its shareholders, and the 

shareholders are also voters as well. In this case, they share the same benefits together along with 

expectations and target. 

A great part of Singapore voters works in foreign firms (Note 14); these foreign firms rarely cause any 

labor movement. Generally, a foreign firm established in another country usually has their purposes. 

They either want to extend their access to the market or seek more opportunities for enterprise 

development. Therefore, these firms usually tend to choose countries with less-developed labor 

movements. Even when there is a labor dispute involved, the firm can easily transfer its operations to 

other locations. And countries like Singapore with higher average income workers, foreign firms 

usually seek for talents and the remuneration offered by foreign firms usually is not disappointed. As a 

result, the chance of having a labor dispute is reduced. 

Other than foreign firms, SOEs and SOEs related enterprises, companies that really have no connection 

to government capitals are small retail businesses. These are often family businesses mainly run by 

family members, and they rarely cause any labor movements. 

Singapore is like a gigantic enterprise. To workers in SOE and SOEs related enterprises, they are also 

voters and their benefits are shared. Foreign firms and small retailer employees have none or very 

limited influence on politics. When the economy is in an expansion state, foreign and small retailers 

can share the benefit as well. Under the given structure, Singapore never had any large scale of labor 

movement that occurred, and its economic prosperity had already been listed as a developed country. 

Voters evaluate the capability of PAP is likely the same as evaluating the profitability of SOEs. PAP as 

the dominant political party, has been favored by voters from independence ever since. 

The Economic Development Board (EDB) has been established in Singapore since 1961. During the 

post-war period, many Asian countries maintained rapid economic growth and they all have a strategic 

planning department responsible for the nation’s economy. For example, Korea has Economic 

Development Committee, Japan has MITI, and Taiwan has Economic Stability Committee (which later 

transformed into CIECD, Council for International Economic Cooperation and Development). It was 

the EDB that was responsible for the matter in Singapore. In 1961 when EDB was first established, the 

total budget was 100 (space) million Singapore dollars, and by that time US$1 equaled to 3.0612 

Singapore dollars. The main mission of EDB was to attract foreign capitals, and at that time they 

invited a few heavy industries such as Shell Group. EDB also established a few SOEs, such as National 

Iron & Steel Mills Limited (NISM) (Note 15). Military industries left by the English became a major 

source of SOEs. These military industries include military port, military shipyard, electric company, etc. 



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Before 1970, EDB’s mainly focus on helping firms investing in Singapore. EDB was also being called 

the “generator of state enterprises (Note 16)” (Chua, 2016, p. 503). 

Between 1965 to 1970, it was a period of survival for Singapore. GDP increased from US$516 in 1965 

to US$925 in 1970. In these five years, the average economic growth rate was 12.88%. This value is 

more than double to the average economic growth rate during the nation’s founding period. Singapore’s 

export was generally close to balance (Note 17). Since the colonization to the nation’s founding period, 

Singapore has always been an important transshipment port because of its geographical location at the 

upper tip in the Strait of Malacca. However, Singapore obviously was not satisfied with being only a 

transshipment port. The establishment of EDB has shown the determination of Singapore’s willingness 

to transform by introducing multiple companies into the country; Singapore transformed from a 

country relies on transshipment port trading economy to an industrialized economy.  

The nation of Singapore founded in 1965. Among the “four Asian dragons”, Singapore was the latest 

country to begin industrialization. Other countries such as Taiwan (Note 18) (Chu, 2017) and Korea 

(Note 19) (Cui & Park, 2010) had begun since 1950. By manufacturing products locally, these 

countries replaced the need for imports to sustain economic growth. And by the 1960, these countries 

have already greatly grown. Singapore was the latest nation in this economic race, but it also gave 

Singapore a different advantage, which was also known as the leapfrogging argument. 

Leapfrogging argument (Hobby, 1995, p. 137) (Note 20) mainly suggests that a late start-up allows the 

nation to gain access to the newest technologies and bypass the ones that become obsolete. With this 

policy, the government focuses on increasing industrial and technological upgrade. Singapore’s 

government other than providing tax benefits to attract foreign firms, EDB have been establishing 

offices in Europe, United States, Asia and many other places since the 70s. Its purpose was to invite 

technologically advanced companies to establish their presence in Singapore. Texas Instruments in 

Singapore was established at that time. EDB (space) sent out talents to overseas foreign firms for 

training, such as Philips of Netherlands, Tata Group of India, etc. Other than sending talents overseas 

for training, Singapore also established training facilities to train up new talents. For example, in order 

to nurture talented with an advanced technological background, Singapore cooperated with Japan, 

Germany, and France to establish institutes of technology (Note 21).  

From 1970 to 1980, Singapore’s GDP increased from US$925 to US$4926, with an average growth of 

9.1% per annum. It has continued the golden years since 1965. With a low unemployment rate in 

Singapore and continuous projects with massive investment, Singapore experienced labor shortage and 

resulted in an overheated economy and an inflation rate of 10% (Note 22). Singapore government 

believes technology advancement is important, and they came up with another strategy to increase its 

technological level. The government increased individual wages through authority power (space) and 

hope this can eliminate low-wage industries. They believed that high-income industries also mean that 

they have high technology (Note 23). Through increasing wages of workers, the original 38% of GDP 

that came from labor income was being increased to 48% of GDP (Note 24). However, the market was 



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unable to adjust the sudden increase in wages and the poor decision resulted in economic turmoil. 

In the 80s, how the Singapore government managed to resolve its economic turmoil. In the early 80s, 

Singapore greatly increased the salary of workers, which resulted in a spike of the unemployment rate 

from below 3% to 6%. Economic growth decreased to -0.7% in 1985. The inflation caused by an 

overheated economy suddenly dropped from 10% to almost zero (Note 25). Singapore urgently revised 

its labor regulation, so that salaries may be adjusted freely. After a period of adjustment, the salary 

income falls back from 48% to 42% of the GDP, and the rate stabilized between 42%-44% until 1997. 

Economic growth in 1987 resumed to 10.8%. The method of increasing salaries to resolve inflation and 

an overheated economy in order to increase overall technological level was a risky strategy. But from 

the above example, we can see that salaries will eventually fall back to the supposed level of the market, 

and government intervention may not always influence the market.  

SOEs expansion became an alternate contributor to Singapore’s economic growth. After 1988, EDB 

helped the SOEs to expand their businesses to foreign countries (Note 26). Other than beneficial 

policies such as the exemption on profit taxes, deficit reduction, providing solutions to capital and 

business conditions to increase competitiveness, EDB also had government power at its disposal. In 

cases of foreign firm acquisitions, EDB assisted in the negotiation on behalf of Singapore. Although a 

few acquisitions failed (Note 27) (Dent, 2008, p. 108) because it had been frustrated by the foreign 

country’s politics, Singapore SOE overseas investment was generally successful. From 1980 to 1990, 

Singapore’s GDP jumped from US$4926 to US$11864. The average economic growth was 7.8% during 

the decade. Average GDP growth from 1980 until the financial crisis in 1997 was 8% per annum.  

During the financial crisis in 1997, the influence on the finance sector in Singapore was not significant. 

Singapore has been attracting foreign firms to invest since 1970. In order to increase the export of 

foreign firms, it is essential that capital could be transferred easily. Singapore wanted to develop into 

another regional financial center after Manila (Note 28) (Cook, 2008, p. 122), which was not successful; 

and for that reason, the (space) Singaporean government (space) made the internal and external 

financial sectors clearly separated. Regulators information were kept concealed, and any domestic bank 

may not be owned by foreign firms for more than 20% of its shares. Foreign banks were required to 

maintain a high percentage of reserved capital (Note 29) (ibid;123-125). And as a result, during the 

financial crisis in 1997, real estate and price of shares fell, but the banks were unaffected. Local banks 

outperformed foreign banks. However, Singapore firms were still affected by the international financial 

crisis, and so in 1998 economic growth was reduced to -2.2%, but soon it resumed to 8.9% in 1999. 

Singapore’s industrial structure made itself volatile to changes in the international economic crises. The 

major manufacturers in Singapore are related to crude oil and electronics. At the end of the 20th century, 

80% of the gross national income came from service industries, and 20% among it belonged to industry 

(Note 30) (Chua, 2016, p. 502). Foreign firms accounts for 80% of the export in 2008 (Dent, 2008, p. 

87) (Note 31). Singapore also actively established free trade agreements with other countries all over 

the world. The nation has no agricultural or sunset industries, and therefore, it would be easier for 



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Singapore to establish agreements with other countries. Whenever Singapore conducted to establish an 

agreement, any conditions related to the United States would offer them the greatest advantage. This is 

also known as “American Exceptionalism” (Note 32) (Cook, 2008, p. 131), where the United States 

was always being offered with the best conditions. Therefore, Singapore had always maintained a great 

relationship with the United States and its allies. Moreover, Singapore is being considered as an Asian 

country, and so it rather faces fewer obstacles on trade agreements, compared to Japan and other 

countries. For these reasons, Singapore’s leading position as a transshipment port has never been 

shaken, and it is becoming a nation of export products for the whole Malay Peninsula and to the world.  

Therefore, whenever international trades are being affected by the economic crisis, Singapore will 

always be influenced by the aftershock. In 1998 after the 1997 financial crisis, the economic growth of 

Singapore was reduced to -2.2%. The “.com crisis” of 2000 caused the economic growth in 2001 to be 

reduced to -1%. The subprime mortgage crisis in 2008 caused the economic growth in 2009 to be 

reduced to -0.6%. And because of the two major international economic crises from 2000 to 2010, 

Singapore’s average economic growth was reduced to 5.9% in this decade, which is much lower than in 

the previous decades.  

The operations of enterprises focused on profitability and efficiency, and the government may have a 

different interest in the matter, thus this may create the roles of conflicts from the aspect of being a 

company manager and a governor. In 1981, Singapore established a foundation known as Government 

of Singapore Investment Corporation (GIC). Its capital source mostly comes from worker’s pension 

and the fiscal dividend of the central bank, which is also the Monetary Authority of Singapore. GIC is 

Singapore’s largest international investment organization. In order to avoid speculator attacks, it 

conceals most of its information and keeps a low transparency. However, the public thinks otherwise. 

They believe that the government is taking profit from the citizens, and even the way how pensions are 

being paid sometimes causes dispute (Note 33) (Chua, 2016, pp. 509-510). It is not surprising to hear 

that the expansion of SOEs would compete for profit with private enterprise. Singapore intended to 

create an institution with standardized state capitalism, such as the sovereign fund and SOEs. The 

government regulates the profits of sovereign fund and SOEs; 50% of the profit will be invested and 

the other 50% will be contributed to the government budget. It is a source for the government spending 

on public services, subsidize low-income families and wages. SOEs and the sovereign fund between 

2009-2013 contributed to 12-15% of the nation’s budget (Note 34) (ibid; 515), but the extreme 

disparity between the poor and the rich did not change. The GINI coefficient was maintained at around 

0.42 since the year of 2000 in Singapore (Note 35). 

Singapore government obtained a positive fiscal surplus in 2017 (Note 36), but the government still 

owed a great amount of debt. Singapore government has a debt to GDP ratio of 110.6% in 2017 (note 

37), this value is the highest among the “four Asian dragons”. Singapore is unlike Hong Kong which 

constantly has a massive amount of capital investment from mainland (Note 38) (Dayo, 1987, p. 89). 

The Singapore economy is led by the government, and therefore the government often needs to provide 



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assistance to the enterprise that faces a crisis. For example, the government helps SOEs to increase 

their competitiveness, provide beneficial policies such as tax exemption and deficit reduction. In case 

of an economic and financial crisis, the government reduces the taxes paid by enterprises, rent, real 

estate tax or provide a wage subsidy to assist enterprises. Including the expenditure of social welfare, 

Singapore government owes the highest debt among all countries in Southeast Asia, only second to 

Japan. 

3.2 Mainland China (PRC) 

In the ideology of early economic development of the PRC, it is close to Neoliberalism that the 

government favored minimal intervention, light tax or even zero tax. In 1976 following the death of 

Mao Zedong, political leaders of mainland China who favor free economy returned to power. 1976 was 

a year that became a critical time of change in the economic development of the PRC (Note 39). Before 

1976, mainland was under the influence of country founding campaign, where the egalitarianism 

implemented such as everyone eating from the same pot, and the society was generally poor. After 

experiencing poverty and starvation, intellectuals with insight believed an open economy could be the 

only solution to poverty. Under the leadership of Deng Xiaoping, a political leader with an open mind 

towards economy, the PRC government allowed individuals or small private businesses to start trading 

goods or services freely. The civilians may run their business at specific location and trade. Very soon, 

non-agricultural industries grew rapidly in the 1980s. The size of city was rather on a small scale, and 

most places were still villages. Village household income increased with the support of small private 

businesses. 

Following the economic liberalisation in local areas (Note 40) (Huang, 2008, p. 52); private sectors 

grew rapidly. A few private business owners who know how to manage business believed that in order 

to expand their size, a financial loan friendly environment supported by the government will be 

necessary. Under the permission of the PRC government, the banking sector agreed to offer loans with 

loose conditions. If the small enterprise was unable to get loans from the banks, they could reach 

unregulated loans such as loans purchased in small groups. In regard of agricultural loans, the funding 

could be provided by the Rural Credit Cooperative. Starting from 1980, a high ratio of loans was 

borrowed for entrepreneurs to start their businesses, and agricultural loans were increasing rapidly 

(Note 41) (ibid, pp. 140-147). These standard or non-standard financial enterprises had not been closely 

regulated or conducted strategic planning in loans by the financial authority. The environment of the 

whole society was acting laissez-faire and supportive towards individuals and households who wanted 

to start a business. 

The economic development started from the bottom level heading back to the top generated zero labor 

movement or resistance at all. Most people who wanted to run their own businesses were unwilling to go 

back at the period living in poverty of continuous revolutions and agrarian labor (space) movement. The 

ordinary people who wanted to generate wealth for their families, regardless of entrepreneurs or 

employees, do not favor the days of the revolutionary movements anymore. Furthermore, because the 



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private business scale was generally small, the low number of employees in these medium-to-small 

enterprises would hardly organize any labor unions. New enterprises were very young and industry 

clusters still yet to be found. In the given environment, industrial labor organization could hardly be 

formed.  

From 1976 to 1990, the GDP in mainland China went from US$165.41 to US$317.89, and an average 

GDP growth of 8.5% per annum. In the rapid development of local economy, people started to see higher 

expectation on the political freedom. PRC leader Zhao Ziyang suggested the separation of political party 

and the government (Note 42) (Guo, 2016, p. 164) (Liu, 2001). His opinion was greatly supported by 

students at that time. Unfortunately, the Tian An Men incidents broke out. It caused a massive crackdown 

on the students in 1989. The demand of a democratic political system in PRC faced a defeat, and the route 

towards political freedom became an empty talk by the time. 

After the student movement in 1989, the government regarded the country and communist party as a 

whole; the government started to actively control the economy, and the Neoliberalism environment had 

come to an end. Instead, an economic development model of state capitalism alike has been implemented. 

In order to further command the economy efficiently, more tax reform policies were implemented after 

1990. Most of the tax revenue was being collected by the central government. The insufficient budget 

reduced in local tax was then subsidized by the central government and therefore, the authority of local 

government was greatly reduced (Note 43) (Huang, 2008, pp. 163-168) which resulted in building a 

stronger governing power to the central government. Private enterprises in villages was no longer 

allowed to trade fertilizers, and the government started to form nation-owned enterprises that lead trade 

in these sectors (ibid, p. 162) (Note 44). Since fertilizers trading has great importance in agricultural 

production, containing fertilizers meaning the government could have taken the grip of village economy. 

The government implemented strategic economic policy in the 1990s. Policies were in favored of the 

cities and attracting foreign investments. Deng Xiaoping gave a crucial speech during his visit to the 

south in 1992. He wanted a small portion of people in the country to “become wealthy” first. The 

government policy would favor the cities, which later caused a large portion of population moved to the 

cities for work. Many laborers work in cities away from home for years, and they only return home once 

per year during major holidays such as the Chinese New Year. And as a result, all transportation systems 

were overloaded during major holidays due to the high demand, causing a massive number of people 

seeking for ways of transportation. 

In order to create a beneficial export environment for businesses, the Chinese Yuan went through a long 

depreciation against the US dollar. Since 1980, CNY depreciated from CNY$1.4883: US$1 to the level 

of CNY$3.7: US$1 in 1987 (Note 45). The currency has been depreciated a total of 149%. In addition to 

the overheated economics, the economy suffered a half state-generated inflation in the mainland.  

In 1987-88, the inflation rate hiked up to 27% (Note 46). When the depreciation of the mainland Chinese 

currency has stopped, the inflation followed to slow down shortly. But after the Tian An Men incident, 

CNY further depreciated from CNY$5.8: US$1 to CNY$8.7566: US$1 in 1994. Once again, the half 



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state-generated inflation occurred in the mid-90s and the inflation rate hiked to 27% until it slowed down 

again in 1998. 

Strategic depreciation of currency helped mainland China in attracting foreign capital during the period 

of international economic sanction. The 1989 Tian An Men incident caused a global economic sanction 

against PRC. The economic growth of mainland China in 1989 and 1990 dropped to 4.2% and 3.9% 

respectively. Foreign firms held their investments, and a negative yearly trade balance sometimes was 

recorded (Note 47). In order to attract more foreign firms to invest and bring in new technologies, 

mainland China depreciated its currency from 1980 to 1995 for a total of 488% in these 15 years. A 

depreciation in currency favors export, and the great depreciation had attracted neighboring factory 

enterprises in Hong Kong and Taiwan to invest in mainland. The low cost of labor and land attracted 

exporters to establish new factories inmainland China. During the 1990s, the Japanese currency 

appreciated and caused its asset bubble burst and an economic depression followed. This opportunity 

offered other Asian countries to compete for the export market. The mainland China is not the exception. 

CYN which was called for a halt in depreciation because of the high inflation was being resumed for 

depreciation and again caused inflation. Obviously, the economic strategy of the mainland Chinese 

government regarded export and FDI as the first priority. The Japanese depression has provided a great 

opportunity formainland China to increase export. 

Nevertheless, foreign investors really entered mainland China after 1992. PRC actively developed 

Special Economic Zones (SEZs) in the 80s. Starting with the first four special regions Shenzhen, Zhuhai, 

Shantou, and Xiamen. In 1984. PRC also opened 14 more cities and 14 ports. In 1985, the three deltas of 

Changjiang, Zhujiang, and Minnan Xia zhang chuan were opened. In 1986, the “Law of the People’s 

Republic of China on Foreign-Capital Enterprises” passed, allowing foreign investors to 100% own 

firms in mainland (Note 48) (Wei, 2008, pp. 21-23); However, foreign investments in mainland were not 

improved because of the law. Direct investment capital until 1991 only reached a maximum of US$4.366 

billion dollars. Furthermore, the investment loans were far greater than direct investments, and in 1991 

investment loan was $US6.888 billion (Wei, 2008) (Note 49). Foreign investors generally had a negative 

opinion on Chinese political policy against merchants in the past, and it was believed to be the main 

reason. After the Tian An Men incident, PRC politics favored the left wing again. Whether or not the 

economy would be affected was also a major factor that needed to be considered by foreign investors. 

Deng Xiaoping’s 1992 speech in the South was a concrete confirmation that economics favors the right 

wing. Direct investments in 1992 boosted in a sudden to US$11.008 billion dollars, and investment loans 

were US$7.911 billion dollars (Note 50). Since 1992, foreign direct investment became far greater than 

loan investment. Foreign investments from 1992 to 2004 was accounted for average 4% per annum of 

GDP (Note 51). 1992 onwards to 2000, FDI of mainland China maintained at a percentage of average 

13% of total investments in fixed assets (Note 52). 

After 1990, mainland China’s GDP growth maintained a high ratio in a stable pattern that even 

international environment has little influence on it. Most of the South-east Asia countries were critically 



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influenced during the financial or economic crisis such as in the 1997 financial crisis of Korea, Indonesia, 

and Thailand. Even countries that were not strongly affected still suffered due to a decrease in 

international trading volume and import/export. On the contrary, mainland’s GDP during the 1997 

financial crisis was only reflected in the economic growth of 1998 and 1999, which was reduced to 7.8% 

and 7.7% respectively. Other international crises occurred such as the .com crisis in 2000, the economic 

growth of 2000 and 2001 was 8.3% and 9.1%. During 2008 financial crisis, the annual economic growth 

of 2008 and 2009 was 9.7% and 9.4%. Since the 90s, it can been seen that mainland China’s economy has 

almost been unaffected by the international economy. 

The mainland’s economic development started from the bottom to the top, however, when it gets to the 

highest political and state-owned enterprises, the economic liberalistion and private economics retreat. 

Although mainland China achieved extraordinary economic development, political reforms and changes 

are still small. The model that a dominant political party leads the government is being applied. The 

Chinese Communist Party has the constitutional right to be the only political party that rules. And for this 

reason, the CCP one-party dictatorship apparently is legal in Mainland. The majority public in mainland 

China seems to have little or no opinion on politics after the Tian An Men incident. There has been rarely 

large scale revolt or movement caused by political issues. If there was any revolt or movement, most 

were related to livelihoods such as forced demolition or unreasonable decision that affects the people’s 

livelihood. The economic success of the whole country reflected in the high economic growth. From 

1991 to 2010, the average economic growth was 10.5%. This raises a question, what kind of economic 

contribution achieved from SOEs under the management of the CCP government? 

In the 1990s, the reduction in assets of SOEs went through a reform including privatising enterprises. 

SOEs were making an average of no profit at the very beginning. The government started to close down 

poor performing companies, reduce a large number of workers, and get the enterprises listed on the stock 

market. These actions created a positive balance of net income to the SOEs (Note 53). Instead of using 

the old strategy that the SOEs run multiple businesses in every sectors, now the SOEs mostly run in 

finance, energy, telecommunication, and manufacture sectors. It has become obvious that many SOEs 

has become private businesses. The assets of SOEs reduced from 70% of the nation total assets in 1997 to 

45% in 2012 (Note 54). However, the average profit of SOEs is still lower than the private enterprises. 

The profit of private enterprises continued to rise after the economic liberalisation, and has been 

increased to about 9% until it turns stagnant in 2008. SOEs profit climbed to 7% in 2007, but reduced to 

4% suddenly and keeps dropping (Note 55) (Gao, 2010). On the other hand, SOEs debts greatly hiked in 

a sudden. 

The reasons behind the profit decrease in state-owned enterprises are worthy to be studied. In 2007, the 

debt to equity leverage ratio suddenly hiked, which was even higher than the private sector. Since the 

turning in 2007, the debt to equity leverage ratio of SOEs increased to reach almost 150% until 2013. 

However, the ratio in private enterprise decreased to 75% in 2014 (Note 56). These data reflects directly 

on (space) profit of SOEs; their profits are shrinking, while private enterprises’ are growing. The 



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situation is similar to what happened in 2008 during the financial crisis. The mainland Chinese 

government announced that they need to stimulate (space) domestic demand. However, the method that 

they used was rather different from other countries. The increase in local demand looks like in fact 

partially funded by the debt of state-owned enterprises. On the other hand, while the international trading 

performance was rather poor, the SOEs that has basic industrial businesses, energy and other industries in 

control, tended to sacrifice their profit in order to subsidize private businesses to increase their 

competitiveness. Therefore, the increase in debt of SOEs was possibly caused by the sacrifice and the 

government call for demand strategy. 

From the 1990s state-owned enterprise reform to after 2010, mainland China’s GDP growth has not seen 

being influenced by the reform of SOEs. After 2007, the economic growth has not decreased because of 

the great debt of SOEs. It could be said that the greatest achievement of the reform in mainland’s SOEs 

was performing at the expectation of the market. The SOEs do not drag down the economy because of the 

monopoly, inefficiency, or placing priority in political agenda over profit. 

 

4. Discussion and Summary 

The SOEs in Singapore and mainland China are similar in some extent, but their operation focuses on 

different targets. Singapore and Chinese SOEs are both major players of investing overseas. Politically, 

the Chinese government uses SOEs as a tool to maintain political stability. SOEs in mainland China are 

largely made up by members of the Chinese Communist Party. The SOEs consists of 400,000 CCP 

organizations, and CCP members of 10 million. The Central Administration, known as the SASAC, is 

responsible for monitoring SOEs and all overseas investments made by the SOEs. 60% of the total 

overseas investments of mainland comes from SOEs (Note 57) (Wu, 2017). If we say an enterprise is 

regarded as capitalistic and mainland China equals to the communist party, SOEs owns half of the total 

assets (Note 58) (Nordqvist, 2014), it is reasonable to believe that PRC engages in the same form 

towards state capitalism as Singapore. However, SOEs in Singapore have been the generators of GDP. 

Singapore SOEs focus on profit and efficiency as their goals. Internal affairs such as stabilizing export 

or expanding demand are still being managed through the government budget. In mainland China, 

SOEs consider their political agenda as the first priority, while making a profit is their second concern. 

The SOEs of mainland China act as a supporter in the economic growth. 

Singapore and PRC both wanted to implement policies that over rules the market through government 

interventions, but the market strongly resisted. The Singapore government used its political power to 

increase wages in the 80s in order to upgrade its industry, but as a result it ended with a hike in 

unemployment. In 1985, economic growth reduced to a negative level, which was a sign of a 

depression. In mainland China, the government greatly depreciated the mainland Chinese currency in 

the 80s and 90s in order to attract foreign investments, which caused a great hike in inflation but not 

much influence on GDP growth. From the above, it is obvious that when a government considers only 

economic growth while ignoring any political turmoil and livelihood of the people, the currency 



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devaluation strategy of PRC seems to be possible after all. However, in countries of direct elections, 

such strategy may force the political party to step down. 

The ideology of Singapore and PRC adapted influenced the GDP growth of both countries. Their 

influences may be categorized into the “unstable economy” of the country founding period and the 

“economic development” period. It is particularly interesting that Singapore and mainland were both 

influenced by communism during their founding period. The economy greatly fluctuated during this 

period of time. In the worst year, mainland China lowest GDP was -27.3% of 1961 and Singapore was 

-3.7% of 1964. Communism perhaps was suitable when founding a nation, but it can cause great 

economic fluctuations comparing to the economic development stage. During the economic 

development stage, neoliberalism or state capitalism’s influences were not significant on GDP growth 

as exampled by Singapore and mainland China. However, the success of Singapore and mainland were 

only viewed from a historical perspective, their strategies may not work out the same results in other 

countries. 

Singapore, in 1968, already surpassed average GDP of the world, while PRC has become closer to this 

same average than ever. The mainland’s GDP gap away from this average was US$689.3 in 1970 (Note 

59), which was 18 years behind this average. In 2015, the average was only 8 years behind, and the gap 

seems to be closing quickly. Comparing with average GDP of each countries and world GDP average, 

it could see more similarities and differences of Singapore and mainland China’s models. More time is 

needed to observe the development of mainland China in order to continue with this research.  

 

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Notes 

Note 1. See the article “1955–Hock Lee Bus Riots”. Singapore Press Holdings. 

Note 2. See the article “Singapore–Road to Independence”. U.S. Library of Congress. 

Note 3. https://www.mti.gov.sg/MTIInsights/Pages/1965-%E2%80%93-1978.aspx. Ministry of Trade 

and Industry Singapore. Accessed June 8, 2018. 

Note 4. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Kuomintang 



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Note 5. See Table 1 Historical GDP Growth Rate of Singapore; source: World Bank; also Table 2 

Historical GDP Per capita source: World Bank. 

Note 6. See Kuang, Daoqiu’s book, pp. 9-14. 

Note 7. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Kuomintang 

Note 8. See the book of John Fairbank and Merle Goldman, China: A New History, Cambridge: The 

Belknap Pressof Harvard University Press, 2002, page 349 

Note 9. See Vaclav Smil’s 1999 article- “China’s great famine: 40 years later”. BMJ (Clinical research 

ed.), 319(7225), 1619-1621. 

Note 10. The historical record of Mainland China’s GDP starts from 1960 according to World Bank. 

Note 11. The average economic growth is calculated for 16 years from 1961 to 1976.  

Note 12. See Leftwich, Adrian, “The Developmental State”, Working Paper No. 6, University of York, 

1994; Leftwich, Adrian, “Bringing politics back in: Towards a model of the developmental state”. 

Journal of Development Studies, Volume 31, Issue 3 February 1995, pp. 400-427; Chalmers Johnson’s 

1982 book MITI and the Japanese Miracle.  

Note 13. Many Singapore scholars mention that Singapore’s economic development ideology is  

state-capitalism, scholars including Chua BengHuat of his 2016’s paper State-owned enterprises, state 

capitalism and social distribution in Singapore; Hui Ying SNG’s paper Sate-Capitalism Singapore, June, 

2011. 

Note 14. According to Economic Development Board, there are 7000 MNCs and more than 37400 

international companies in Singapore.  

Note 15. https://www.edb.gov.sg/en/news-and-resources/insights/headquarters/scaling-up-from-singapo 

re.html 

Note 16. https://www.edb.gov.sg/content/edb/zh/why-singapore/about-singapore/our-history/1960s.ht 

ml  

Note 17. See Chua BengHuat, 2016’s paper, state-owned enterprises, state capitalism and social 

distribution in Singapore, p. 503. 

Note 18. https://tradingeconomics.com/singapore/balance-of-trade; Source: tradingeconomics.com and  

Statistics Singapore 

Note 19. Chu Wan-Wen’s 2017 book-台灣戰後經濟發展緣起, chapter 5. 

Note 20. Cui Zhiying; Park ChangKeun’s book 當代韓國經濟. 上海: 同濟大學出版社. 2010, 11. 

Note 21. See Michael Hobday’s book, 1995, Innovation in East Asia: the challenge to Japan, page 137 

Note 22. https://www.edb.gov.sg/content/edb/zh/why-singapore/about-singapore/our-history/1970s.h 

tml 

Note 23. https://tradingeconomics.com/singapore/inflation-cpi; Source: tradingeconomics.com and 

Statistics Singapore.  

Note 24. https://www.edb.gov.sg/content/edb/zh/why-singapore/about-singapore/our-history/1980s. 

html 



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Note 25. See Roy Ngerng’s 2013 article-Singaporeans the Truth about Our Wages Revealed, chart 23, 

May 25.  

Note 26. https://tradingeconomics.com/singapore/inflation-cpi ; Source: tradingeconomics.com and 

Statistics Singapore. Accessed June 8, 2018.  

Note 27. See Chua BengHuat, 2016’s paper, state-owned enterprises, state capitalism and social 

distribution in Singapore; Malcolm Cook’s book, 2008 Banking reform in Southeast Asia Page 125; 

Carr Rodanm. 

Note 28. Kevin Hewison and Richard Robison (Eds.), 2006’s edited book, The Political Economy of 

Southeast Asia: Market, Power and Contestation, p. 272 

Note 29. Such as Shin Corporation Affair in Thai, Christopher M. Dent’s 2008 book-East Asia 

Regionalism, p. 108 

Note 30. See Malcolm Cook’s book, 2008 Banking reform I Southeast Asia, P. 122; The first regional 

finance centre is Manila. 

Note 31. Ibid, pp. 123-125. 

Note 32. See Chua BengHuat, 2016’s paper, state-owned enterprises, state capitalism and social 

distribution in Singapore, p. 502. 

Note 33. See Christopher M. Dent’s 1008 book East Asian Regionalism, page 87. 

Note 32. See Malcolm Cook’s book, 2008 Banking reform I Southeast Asia, p. 131. 

Note 33. See Chua Beng Huat, 2016’s paper, state-owned enterprises, state capitalism and social 

distribution in Singapore, subsection- Singapore’s Sovereign Wealth Funds, pp. 509-510.  

Note 34. Ibid, page515 

Ote 35. See the Ministry of Finance Occasional Paper-Income Growth, Inequality and Mobility Trends 

in Singapore, 2015; 

https://www.mof.gov.sg/Portals/0/Feature%20Articles/Income%20Growth,%20Distribution%20and%2

0Mobility%20Trends%20in%20Singapore.pdf. Accessed June 8, 2018. 

Note 36. https://tradingeconomics.com/singapore/government-budget; source: tradingeconomics.com 

and Monetary Authority of Singapore.  

Note 37. https://tradingeconomics.com/singapore/government-debt-to-gdp; source: 

tradingeconomic.com and Government of Singapore.  

Note 38. See the 1987 book edited by Federic C. Deyo-The Political Economy of the New Asian 

Industrialism, p. 89. 

Note 39. http://www.chinanews.com/m/sh/2018/05-11/8511095.shtml. From the article we can see the 

very beginning of neoliberalism “At the end of 1976, the Cultural Revolution came to an end. 

Everything was waiting to be rebuilt. Including Chen Shouzhu, a group of old Comrades gathered 

together and wished to contribute any way they could. At this time, many young people returned from 

the frontier to Wenzhou. At the same time, halted factories forced many unemployment workers, high 

school and university students to seek jobs elsewhere. Soon, many people started to run a “small 



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business” to make for a living. In February 1979, central government and the state council forwarded 

the first economic report of individual business development. “According to the demand of the market, 

permission is granted to registered residents who obtained agreement by related department officers to 

personally engage in repair, service and handcrafting”. Translated from the part of the article. Accessed 

June 8, 2018. 

Note 40. See Yasheng Huang’s book, 2008, Capitalism with Chinese Characteristics: Entrepreneurship 

and the State, p. 52. 

Note 41. Ibid, pp. 140-147. 

Note 42. See Guoguang’s 2015 book-China’s Party Congress, p. 164; Also Liu Xiaobo’s article, 2001, 

Feb 5. http://www.epochtimes.com/b5/1/2/5/n43835.htm 

Note 43. See Yasheng Huang’s book, 2008, Capitalism with Chinese Characteristics: Entrepreneurship 

and the State, pp. 163-168. 

Note 44. Ibid, p. 162. 

Note 45. http://fxtop.com/en/historical-exchange- 

rates.php?A=1&C1=USD&C2=CNY&MA=1&DD1=&MM1=&YYYY1=1953&B=1&P=&I=1&DD2

=15&MM2=06&YYYY2=2018&btnOK=Go%21; Source: Central Bank of China. 

Note 46. https://tradingeconomics.com/china/inflation-cpi; Source: tradingeconomics.com and National  

Bureau of China. Accessed June 8, 2018.  

Note 47. https://tradingeconomics.com/china/balance-of-trade; Source: tradingeconomics.com and 

General Administration of Customs. Accessed June 8, 2018. 

Note 48. Wei Yujun -  2008-中國大陸外商直接投資政策之變遷, 1980-2007, page 21-23 

Note 49. ibid page 34, table2-1 

Note 50. ibid page 34, table2-1 

Note 51. https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/BX.KLT.DINV.WD.GD.ZS?locations=CN. Accessed 

June 8, 2018 

Note 52. Wei Yujun-  2008- 中國大陸外商直接投資政策之變遷, 1980-2007. 

Note 53. See article-Fixing China Inc. from Economist. Accessed June 8, 2018. 

Note 54. See the graph sourced OECD from the article–Promise & Peril of SOE Reform in Mainland 

China, Feb 2016. Accessed June 8, 2018. 

Note 55. See the graph of GaoXu’s article-Sate-Owned enterprises in China: How profitable are they?. 

Accessed June 8, 2018. 

Note 56. See the graph of the article-A whimper, not a bang, Sep 17, 2015, the Economist; the graph 

sourced from CEIC; NBS; WIND; IMF. Accessed June 8, 2018. 

Note 57. See Wendy Wu’s article, How the communist party controls China’s state-owned industrial 

titans, June 17, 2017. Accessed June 8, 2018. 

Note 58. See the graph of Christian Nordqvist-Chinese Economic forecast trimmed down, April 7, 

2014, Market Business News. Accessed June 8, 2018. 



www.scholink.org/ojs/index.php/ape                 Advances in Politics and Economic                   Vol. 1, No. 2, 2018 

112 
Published by SCHOLINK INC. 

Note 59. See the Appendix -World GDP per capita source: World Bank. 

 

Appendix 

World GDP per Capita (USD) 

1960 1961 1962 1963 1964 1965 1966 

450.4 462.33 488.14 514.81 552.68 590.07 627.01 

1967 1968 1969 1970 1971 1972 1973 

653.73 691.22 745.52 802.46 868.09 981.04 1172.25 

1974 1975 1976 1977 1978 1979 1980 

1326.05 1449.42 1549.17 1722.07 1992.19 2274.33 2516.17 

1981 1982 1983 1984 1985 1986 1987 

2537.25 2470.33 2482.9 2533.29 2618.52 3046.21 3405.19 

1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 

3746.68 3865.47 4272.52 4450.76 4653.44 4662.4 4931.83 

1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 

5401.38 5441.28 5344.88 5256.61 5380.22 5482.63 5378.82 

2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 

5514.32 6114.83 6800.56 7271.06 7775.61 8651.15 9371.49 

2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 

8775.39 9509.37 10443.94 10539.39 10709.47 10864.3 10143.33 

2016       

10163.96       

 

 


