Xu Xiuli and Li Xiaoyun: Chinese Modernization Provides Experience and Enlightenment for the Development of the Global South
Chinese-path modernization is a significant force driving the third academic transition in China. It implies that researchers in the New Era must transcend the dependent state characterized by the "center-periphery" dynamic in the traditional global knowledge map. They must attend to the vivid practice of China's development with a fresh subjective consciousness and problem-awareness, while actively participating in setting the international academic agenda and engaging in dialogues over new types of academic theories. Specifically, in the field of development studies, Chinese-path modernization provides beneficial insights for resolving three classic dilemmas in global development theory. These three dilemmas are: first, how to seek a balance between a nation’s independent development and its integration into the international community; second, how to handle the relationship between government, market, and society within a country to form a collective synergy while maintaining mutual tension; and third, how to resolve the dilemma of "going out" to participate in development cooperation while transcending colonial and hegemonic paradigms to establish a more equal and mutually beneficial development community.
The three classic dilemmas mentioned above are common scenarios encountered by late-developing countries as they seek their own development and provide global public goods in the face of an international order characterized by structural inequality and uneven distribution of interests. As the world's largest developing country, the solutions and paths explored by China have "expanded the channels for developing countries to achieve modernization and provided a brand-new choice for those countries and nations who wish to accelerate their development while preserving their independence." This contributes to the continuous broadening of the intellectual boundaries and conceptual maps used by global development scholars to understand, advance, and measure development. It innovates existing systems of development knowledge and promotes practical innovation and theoretical exploration of the Global Development Initiative.
Integrating into the International Order while Maintaining Independent Development
For the vast number of developing countries, the international order formed after World War II manifests in the economic sphere as imbalances in technology, talent, and markets, and in the political sphere as imbalances in military, organizational, and discursive power. This unbalanced international order often makes it easy for developing countries to fall into "structural blockades," forming a path dependency in a peripheral position. Consequently, they either pursue isolationism or integrate into the international system at the cost of sacrificing sovereignty; this constitutes a classic binary dilemma in development studies. Dependency theory and structuralism, originating in Latin America, were theoretical responses to this dilemma, while the "import substitution" policies widely implemented in developing countries in the 1960s were attempts at the practical level. Since the end of the 20th century, discourses regarding aid traps and Global Value Chains (GVC) have further reflected the deep introspection of developing countries regarding this dilemma. Guided by such thinking, many poor countries maintain a skeptical attitude toward the international order and system, upholding conservative concepts of international cooperation. They even maintain a cautious psychology toward investment, trade, and aid from emerging countries, including China, which easily leads to missed development opportunities.
The process of Chinese-path modernization demonstrates that the antithesis between integrating into the international system and losing developmental sovereignty can be transcended. As long as they firmly promote continuous and in-depth reform and opening up, emphasize the design and utilization of effective institutional and policy tools, and uphold the concept of "selective learning," [1] developing countries can actively integrate into the international community while simultaneously incorporating factors compatible with their own national conditions. Through bidirectional socialization in international practice, they can continuously accumulate their own development resources and momentum, transforming from fragile dependency to independent development.
Reviewing the historical course of China's modernization, enhancing the capacity to effectively transform international experience has always been a core tenet of reform and opening up. The core elements of this capacity include pragmatic incremental learning and maintaining leadership over one's own development process. The former is the method of integrating into the international system, while the latter is the value upheld during the integration process.
In the 1980s, when meeting with the President of the World Bank, Comrade Deng Xiaoping stated, "China is determined to achieve modernization and develop its economy. With help from the international community, China will achieve these goals faster and more efficiently; without it, we will do it all the same." In actual cooperation, our country took full advantage of the strategic opportunities brought by economic globalization, continuously expanding opening up from rural areas to cities, from the east to the central and western regions, and from technology to management. At the same time, China always insisted on basing development domestically, maintaining the initiative in the development process. Through mechanisms such as incorporating international cooperation priorities into national five-year development plans, closely integrating cooperation priorities with national development strategic deployments, and incorporating the incentives of executing entities into the government administrative system, China autonomously guided the localization and transformation of international resources to ensure they "serve our purposes" (wei wo suo yong). [2]
After entering the new stage of development, China has focused on constructing a new development landscape (dual circulation), promoting the construction of a unified national market, and building a new system for a higher-level open economy. It promotes better connectivity between domestic and international markets and makes full use of both domestic and international markets and resources. Simultaneously, China actively participates in global economic governance, enhancing its capacity to allocate resources worldwide and its ability to benefit within value chains. It strives for strategic initiative in open development, thereby avoiding the dilemma of falling into aid dependence or dependency on Foreign Direct Investment (FDI).
Many developing countries often fall into a choice dilemma between effectively integrating into the international order and maintaining independent development. Taking African countries as an example, throughout nearly 70 years of development since independence, the choice and practice of their development strategies have always been constrained by various internal and external factors. From the 1960s to the 1970s, more than 30 countries on the African continent were in the early exploratory stages of seeking independent development, attempting to directly replicate Western mainstream development economic theories and industrialization strategies to achieve national building goals. However, these strategies relied too heavily on the "trickle-down effect" and often ignored fundamental issues such as improving the welfare of the poor and the integrated development of industries like manufacturing and agriculture. From the 1970s to the 1980s, the deterioration of the international economic environment caused African countries to fall further into serious economic crises and inflation. To escape the crisis, the Organization of African Unity launched the Lagos Plan of Action in 1980, emphasizing self-reliance, autonomous development, and economic cooperation. It pointed out that reducing external dependence was key for African countries to exit their economic predicament. Although the plan focused on human resource development, agricultural self-sufficiency, scientific and technological self-reliance, and indigenous industrial development—reflecting the collective wisdom and common vision of African economic development strategies—it was difficult to implement effectively due to immense financial pressure. Consequently, to obtain external financial aid and loan support, African countries had to accept the Structural Adjustment Programs (SAPs) proposed by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), conducting economic construction according to international rules, standards, and plans dominated by developed countries. This led most African countries to implement reforms involving the privatization of State-Owned Enterprises (SOEs), marketization of the economy, and trade liberalization. They loosened government regulations, opposed various forms of government intervention, and carried out structural adjustments in finance, banking, agriculture, industry, and foreign trade.
However, the actual effects of implementing structural adjustment programs were not ideal. Africa's economy did not fundamentally improve; instead, it encountered the most widespread and serious economic crisis since independence. This was manifested in several ways: first, after being swept into the wave of capitalist globalization and constrained by the international economic environment, Africa's traditional agriculture and national industries lost their comparative advantages and competitiveness. For instance, Nigeria's economic growth has been highly dependent on the world oil market since the 1960s, leading to a development strategy of de-industrialization and de-agriculturalization. As the oil industry entered a slump in the 1980s and 1990s, the country's economic growth began to slow or even turn negative, highlighting the typical "Dutch disease" phenomenon. Second, after the implementation of structural adjustments, the debt of African countries increased rather than decreased. According to statistics from the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, the continent's debt surged from $126.92 billion in 1980 to $271.9 billion in 1990. Third, as structural adjustments progressed, the fiscal budgets of African countries became increasingly dependent on international aid. Relevant statistics show that in the 1960s, Africa received an average of $3 billion in external aid annually; by the early 1990s, this figure had climbed to $18 billion. While Africa's population accounted for only 13% of the world total, it accounted for 45% of the aid provided by international financial institutions and the UN in 1993, and 64% of the aid provided by the European Union. Finally, structural adjustments triggered many social instability factors. The government's anti-poverty functions were weakened, even triggering socio-political crises such as "urban riots." According to statistics, due to the implementation of privatization reforms, unemployment rates in African countries rose by 15%, further exacerbating social unrest and poverty.
Under the influence of "decoupling" strategies, some developing countries choose a path of isolationist development, making it easy to fall into the predicament of "anti-globalization." Unlike Western modernization theory, dependency theory was primarily proposed based on the development experience of the Third World, especially Latin America. This theory holds that the root of economic backwardness in the Third World lies in the unequal global political and economic structure and external environment. It advocates for breaking away from the "center-periphery" binary structure and champions "decoupling" to escape the hegemonic control of developed countries in the existing world system, resisting the unjust international order to achieve national independence, self-reliance, and innovative development. At the practical level, many developing countries gradually explored the implementation of "import substitution" policies, aiming to achieve economic autonomy by replacing imported finished goods with domestic industrial products.
In the early stages of development, this strategic model allowed some developing countries to reduce external dependency and achieve preliminary industrialization through means such as restricting imports and raising tariffs. However, with the extreme implementation of "decoupling" policies, some developing countries came to believe that they could only achieve autonomous economic development by cutting ties and completely escaping the world market dominated by developed countries. This view runs contrary to the historical trend of economic globalization and ignores the drawbacks of the "import substitution" model, such as low efficiency, a lack of international competitiveness, and the tendency to trigger geopolitical crises; its sustainability has thus been questioned. For example, from the 1950s to the 1980s, Mexico adopted a policy of import-substitution industrialization, achieving a transformation from an agrarian country to an emerging industrial country with a relatively complete industrial system—a feat known as the "Mexican Miracle." However, as import substitution industrialization deepened, its drawbacks gradually emerged: Mexico's foreign trade and balance of payments saw massive deficits, and rising interest rates in the United States triggered a Mexican debt crisis. This led to currency devaluation and capital flight; in 1987, the inflation rate soared to 131.8%, making it difficult to completely escape high dependency on the U.S. economy. In contrast, Venezuela's conflict with the United States was even more intense. To achieve oil nationalization and escape U.S. economic control, former Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez took radical measures such as severing diplomatic ties with the U.S., promoting the nationalization of enterprises, and cracking down on foreign investment and international trade. However, in the face of U.S. economic sanctions and international oil crises, Chávez's populist economic concepts led Venezuela into a predicament of long-term hyperinflation, massive economic fluctuations, and social unrest.
In summary, the vast number of developing countries should take the maintenance of independent development as their core objective. They should neither totally reject the existing international order in a radical manner, nor fail to actively seek to integrate into the world system through self-reliant, flexible, and pragmatic means. Regarding the direction of development, they should firmly integrate into the existing international system. Isolationism can hardly enhance national strength, especially now as the Fourth Industrial Revolution gathers momentum; nationalism and populism easily lead to self-seclusion (gù bù zì fēng), [3] thereby causing one to miss strategic opportunities for national development. Regarding strategic choice, they should maintain independence and autonomy while formulating development strategies and plans that suit their national conditions based on their own development stages and advantages. They should clarify specific demands for the local transformation of international resources, actively align their needs with donors or investors, maintain the initiative in development, and carry out Prepared International Development Cooperation. [4] Regarding the practical path, they should proceed step-by-step and allow for trial and error. They should clarify the focus and priority order of international cooperation with different countries at different stages of development, accumulate experience in pilot zones, and then promote it on a large scale when conditions are ripe. This strengthens bottom-line management and explores new models of open cooperation that are both wise and flexible.
Synergistic Development of Government, Market, and Society
Chinese-path modernization provides exploratory experience for establishing a new model of synergistic development among the government, market, and society. In classical development studies, the roles of different forces such as the government, market, and society in promoting development are often fragmented, forming different theoretical paradigms such as neoliberalism, the developmental state theory, and structuralism. These paradigms reflect more the opposition between different forces. Since...
Since the Industrial Revolution in the 18th century, Western Europe and the United States underwent early stages of industrial policy and trade protectionism, gradually forming an economic system centered on the free market, a political system centered on democratic politics, and a social system supported by civil society. These three elements, independent and checking one another, became the typical model of Western modernization. As globalization spread to non-Western regions, they formed global development norms. However, over the past 70 years, the possibility for non-Western countries and regions to achieve development by relying on mechanisms where the government, market, and society are separated—or even in opposition—has been extremely limited.
Chinese-path modernization provides new ideas for a development model that integrates the triple forces of government, market, and society. As a latecomer, China faces the dual challenge of limited resources and diverse development needs: on the one hand, resources such as financial capital, human capital, and social capital are relatively scarce; on the other hand, the state faces numerous tasks in infrastructure construction, market cultivation, educational investment, and health and environmental protection. In this context, an integrated leadership force is needed to anchor the overall direction of development and determine the priorities for development in a given period to coordinate limited resources. Latecomer countries must also gradually solve developmental problems by continuously improving market mechanisms and promoting multilateral collaboration and innovation among micro-entities. Consequently, the process of Chinese-path modernization is full of experimental demonstrations and organized grassroots innovations, forming a pattern of top-down integration and checks, and side-to-side competition and collaboration. This has resulted in a development model where government, market, and society exert force in synergy, evolve symbiotically, and achieve interactive unity.
A typical representative of this model is China’s poverty alleviation process. Since the founding of the People’s Republic, the Party Central Committee has always attached great importance to poverty alleviation and reduction. From early institutional poverty alleviation [5] to relief-based and development-oriented poverty alleviation after the Reform and Opening-up, and finally to targeted poverty alleviation in the 21st century, China’s poverty governance has undergone a gradual refinement from targeting regions to targeting counties, villages, and households. This has fully leveraged the multi-party forces of government, market, and society. Particularly in targeted poverty alleviation, governance methods such as "five levels of secretaries leading poverty alleviation" [6] ensured that resources reached the most grassroots levels, effectively solving the "last mile" problem of poverty reduction. The mutual embedding rather than separation of the government, market, and society is often an alternative mechanism for dealing with constraints such as capital shortages and technical deficiencies. As the level of development continues to rise, the interaction model among the three will undergo organic adjustments.
In some developing countries, the relationship between government, market, and society is not one of effective synergy and cooperation, but rather a state of opposition and tension. As the primary means of resource allocation, the market can promote efficient resource utilization and rapid economic development. However, the market is not a naturally formed modern institution; it requires active guidance and cultivation by the government. Especially in the construction of "hardware" infrastructure like roads and transportation, and "software" infrastructure like information exchange, laws and regulations, and management systems, government intervention and support are crucial. The prerequisite for an effective market is governance by a promising government [7]. If "large market, small government" is overemphasized while the government's regulatory and coordinating roles are ignored, the profit-seeking nature of the market will run rampant, leading to unequal resource distribution, a widening gap between rich and poor, and potentially even social unrest. For example, Argentina, relying on its unique natural resources, vigorously developed its agricultural and pastoral industries and was known as the "granary of the world." Its economic growth rate was higher than 6% for 43 consecutive years, and in the early 20th century, it once became the seventh richest country in the world. Today, however, Argentina has lost its former glory, with a domestic poverty rate exceeding 40% and an inflation rate as high as 142%, deeply mired in the middle-income trap. The root cause of Argentina’s decline lies in the fact that free-market development could not be effectively guaranteed by the political system. The country lacked a strong government and experienced frequent military coups and crises of regime change. It explored almost all possible political options for developing countries: from initial liberal democracy under oligarchic rule to Peronist populism, anti-democratic bureaucratic authoritarianism, and then to liberalism and even anarchism. Political disorder led to a lack of continuity and stability in economic policies; development swung back and forth between Peronism and liberalism, trapping the nation in a "pendulum-style" development cycle that continuously exacerbated crises such as the wealth gap, class polarization, fiscal deficits, and inflation.
In addition to the maladjustment between politics and economy or government and market, some developing countries also suffer from insufficient synergy between government and social forces. In these countries, traditional forces and social organizations are active and exert important influence on policy formulation and execution. However, due to a lack of institutionalization and systematicity, these social forces find it difficult to shoulder the heavy responsibility of maintaining national order on their own. Many African countries are merely fragmented collections of hundreds or thousands of different ethnic groups or tribes, where most power institutions have failed to thoroughly penetrate the management level of grassroots villages and communities. The power of tribal chiefs, armed guerrillas, separatist forces, and a large number of non-governmental organizations is very strong, resulting in the African people failing to form a true overall identity with the state. Some African countries also suffer from insufficient state functions. Under the influence of decentralization theories in the 1980s, central-local relations became increasingly fractured, and governments lacked authority and executive efficiency, making it difficult to guarantee basic security and order or provide robust tax systems and social welfare. Meanwhile, a large number of social organizations are active; for instance, there are 3,776 influential indigenous African social organizations across 45 countries, such as the African Centre for the Constructive Resolution of Disputes (ACCORD) in South Africa, the Africa Initiative Programme in Kenya, and the Organization of Rural Associations for Progress (ORAP) in Zimbabwe. These organizations play a role in protecting local rights and promoting democratization. However, in African countries that have not yet completed nation-state building, if these organizations follow an oppositional "state-versus-society" logic rather than a complementary "state-and-society" logic, they can easily hinder the national development process. Objectively, if social organizations act as a confrontational force in the early stages of a country's development, they will, to a certain extent, weaken the people's identification with government authority or a central order. This is detrimental to the formation of a developmental state and the implementation of specific public policies, and may even lead to problems such as unbalanced economic development and a widening gap between rich and poor.
Therefore, achieving synergy and cooperation between the government, market, and society is the key for developing countries to move toward stability and sustainable development. This requires the state to strengthen its capacity for coordination and actively leverage the synergistic forces of all three, seeking common development and co-evolution within a dynamic balance. Specific lessons include: breaking through traditional development concepts; reconstructing the integrated relationship between state, market, and society; establishing a developmental government or developmental society suited to one's own conditions; setting development goals that unite all parties; and finding the "greatest common denominator" [8] to unite various forces. In the practice of modernization, the focus should be on "priorities" at specific development stages to promote collaboration among various forces, forming an overall pattern of a promising government, an effective market, and a strong society. In advancing modernization, particular attention should be paid to the introduction and assimilation of new ideas, new technologies, and new management experiences, valuing expert wisdom and scientific power, and emphasizing the cultivation of new-type modernization talents and professional teams to build a sustainable capacity system consistent with the country's stage of development.
Building a New Global Development Governance Mechanism Based on Extensive Consultation, Joint Contribution, and Shared Benefits
Unlike traditional colonial and hegemonic paradigms of development cooperation, Chinese-path modernization provides a new demonstration for building a new global development governance mechanism based on extensive consultation, joint contribution, and shared benefits. Since the 1990s, a binary distinction between "Big Development" and "Little Development" has gradually formed in classical development studies. "Big Development" refers primarily to the use of development aid by developed countries as a means of intervention to guide developing countries to modernize according to the standards and models of the developed world. "Little Development" refers generally to the long-term process of internal political, economic, and socio-cultural change within a country or society, especially a developing one. This classification highlights the emergence of the "self" and the "other" as distinct concepts among development subjects, reflecting a critique and transcendence of Western-centrism. However, the definition of the intrinsic attributes of both still takes Euro-American modernity as its premise. The norms of contemporary global development governance also still take Western liberal democratic systems and free-market economies as their core logic. Conducting transnational cooperation and entering the world of "the other" under this logic means the overseas expansion of the liberal order. Guided by traditional modernization theory, the diverse cultures and systems of different regions and countries in the world system are expected to continuously converge toward uniformity.
A salient feature of Chinese-path modernization is its emphasis on "harmony without uniformity" [9], peaceful development, and a new global governance outlook of consultation, contribution, and shared benefits, striving to transcend the development paradigms of colonialism and the "logic that a strong power must seek hegemony" found in Western history. China continuously advocates peace, development, cooperation, and mutual benefit in the international community, adheres to an open strategy of win-win cooperation, focuses on sharing opportunities and seeking common development with other countries, and advocates for a more just and beautiful world order that recognizes difference and plurality and resolves problems through peaceful means.
As China moves toward the center of the international stage, the progress of the new South-South cooperation paradigm continues to advance. Currently, China has become a major trading partner for more than 140 countries and regions and has promoted the establishment of multiple "1+N" regional cooperation platforms, such as those with Africa, Latin America, the Arab world, ASEAN, Central and Eastern Europe, and Central Asia. In addition, China has established new development institutions such as the China International Development Cooperation Agency (CIDCA), the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), and the New Development Bank (NDB). It further promotes international cooperation through new platforms and financial tools like the Global Development Promotion Center, the Global Development and South-South Cooperation Fund, the Silk Road Fund, and the China-Africa Development Fund, as well as platforms for mutual benefit such as the China International Import Expo (CIIE) and the China International Fair for Trade in Services (CIFTIS). In recent years, on the basis of the Belt and Road Initiative, China has successively proposed the Global Development Initiative (GDI), the Global Security Initiative (GSI), and the Global Civilization Initiative (GCI). These initiatives focus on cooperation and dialogue in areas such as poverty reduction, food security, climate change, green development, peace, and civilization. They respond to the needs of the international community, help resolve global development, security, and trust dilemmas, and contribute Chinese wisdom to solving the development, governance, trust, and peace deficits from the perspective of global governance top-level design. They provide new ideas and elements for the world's development knowledge base, promote interaction and coordination among developing countries, international multilateral organizations, and other international actors, and drive the establishment of a shared global development knowledge system.
Based on principles of equality, mutual benefit, mutual respect, and non-interference in internal affairs, China advocates for extensive consultation, joint contribution, and shared benefits with partner countries. It follows a gradualist development methodology of "learning by doing" and "improving in practice," and a dual-track modernization theory of "parallel experience sharing," continuously promoting a pragmatic learning process of co-evolution. This is specifically manifested as: first, the experiences shared are pragmatic, accessible, and consistent with the local stage of development, rather than being ahead of that stage, highly abstractly constructed, or value-driven; second, the modes of sharing are generated through interactive consultation and joint construction between both parties, involving a process of mutual learning and inspiration rather than one side providing a fixed model or template; third, the sharing parties form a partnership of equality, mutual benefit, and mutual success, rather than a one-way relationship of giving and receiving, respecting the autonomy and "ownership" of the partner and focusing on innovation and win-win results.
The status and role of Global South countries in the global governance system are gradually rising. Emerging countries are both recipients and donors in the international system. This dual identity gives them unique experience in providing development resources abroad, as they deeply understand the challenges and considerations recipient countries face when accepting external resources. This allows them to better maintain independence and equality, achieve economic win-win results, and enhance sensitivity to shared identities in the cultural sphere. However, hindered by many restrictions within the international system, some developing countries still lack sufficient motivation to "go global" and actively participate in global governance. For instance, when dealing with global challenges such as climate change, environmental crises, financial crises, and global health, some developing countries find it difficult to formulate and implement effective global public policies due to a lack of necessary technology, capital, and human resources, thus failing to actively steer situations in their favor. Although South-South cooperation is as old as North-South cooperation, it has long lacked a unified consultation and dialogue platform—such as the OECD—resulting in relatively limited influence, volatility, and fragility.
It can be seen from this that the exploratory experience of China’s practice of new-type international development cooperation provides important insights for other countries in the Global South. First, there must be a recognition of the symbiosis of multiple values and norms within global governance; in particular, emphasis should be placed on utilizing the development opportunities brought about by concepts advocated by South-South cooperation, such as "attaching no political conditions," "mutual benefit and win-win results," and "harmony in diversity." [10] At the levels of aligning concepts with strategies, dialoguing on policy and public management, and cooperating on specific economic and technical projects, countries should establish more targeted cooperation plans and organizational systems, thereby enhancing the effectiveness of new-type development cooperation. Second, emphasis should be placed on parallel experience sharing and alignment. Focus should be directed toward the dimensions inherent in South-South cooperation, such as the concession of development space, the companionship [11] during the development process, and the mutual benefit of development outcomes. Countries should continuously improve their own domestic and international organizational management, coordination, and mobilization capacities for participating in "extensive consultation, joint contribution, and shared benefits." [12] At the same time, they should focus on referencing and filtering development experiences suitable for their own stage of development and strengthen localized application. Third, as an important force in the international community, Global South countries should inherit and carry forward the historical tradition of "seeking strength through unity" [13] and shoulder their contemporary mission. While exploring independent development paths, they should use their own development experience and the power of international cooperation to resolve intensifying geopolitical conflicts, becoming a powerful force for promoting world peace and development. In recent years, many countries—including China, India, Brazil, Türkiye, Thailand, and Colombia—have established international development cooperation agencies and strengthened the theoretical construction and policy practice innovation of South-South cooperation. This fully demonstrates that Global South countries are actively shaping an external environment conducive to their own development and to global and regional stability through international development cooperation.
(The authors are respectively: Dean of the College of International Development and Global Agriculture, China Agricultural University; Senior Chair Professor of Humanities and Social Sciences, China Agricultural University) Source: People's Tribune · Academic Frontiers, Issue 13, 2025 Web Editor: Ma Jingren