The 23rd Annual Meeting of the Research Association of China's Economic Laws and the 2nd National Marxism Economics Forum Held in Fujian
The "23rd Annual Meeting of the Society for the Study of Chinese Economic Laws and the 2nd National Marxist Economics Forum—Institutional Reform, Innovation-Driven Development, and Structural Adjustment," jointly sponsored by the Society for the Study of Chinese Economic Laws (中国经济规律研究会), the Academic Division of Marxist Studies of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS), and Fujian Normal University, was held at Fujian Normal University in Fuzhou from April 20 to 21, 2013. Renowned economists including CASS Academician and Research Fellow Liu Guoguang, Renmin University of China Honorary First-Class Professor Wei Xinghua, President of the Society for the Study of Chinese Economic Laws and Director of the CASS Academic Division of Marxist Studies Professor Cheng Enfu, former Party Committee Secretary of Xiamen University Professor Wu Xuangong, former President of Capital University of Economics and Business Professor Wen Kui, and former President of Fujian Normal University Professor Li Jianping, along with over 150 experts and scholars from across the country, attended the conference.
Participating experts and scholars engaged in extensive and in-depth discussions closely centered on the theme of "comprehensively deepening economic institutional reform, implementing innovation-driven strategies, and accelerating the transformation and upgrading of industrial structures." They provided thorough answers to the "hot" and difficult issues in contemporary Chinese economic development, achieving fruitful research results.
In his speech, Liu Guoguang pointed out that China has already established and initially perfected the socialist market economy system; the task hereafter is to further refine it. Running a market economy requires cultivating diversified entities for market competition and establishing a market environment of fair competition. However, one must resolutely oppose excessive marketization, oppose privatization carried out in the name of marketization, and oppose the realization of diversified competitive entities through the weakening, fragmentation, or dismemberment of the state-owned economy. One must also oppose the establishment of a capitalist-style free-competition market economy that ignores planning and lacks strong state regulation. The erroneous views holding that the socialist market economy currently practiced in China is a "half-command, half-market" mixed economy are the residual poison [1] of neoliberal ideological trends. If allowed to develop unchecked, and if the state-owned economy's control over important industries is broken and government intervention in the market is reduced in practice, then the great cause of reform will surely follow a path of no return toward "Westernization" [2], "fragmentation," and "capitalization."
In his speech, Cheng Enfu argued that, in accordance with the spirit of the 18th National Congress [3], and based on the initial establishment and general perfection of the socialist market economy system, our country should henceforth combine adherence to a socialist orientation with adherence to a modern market economy orientation. We must accelerate the adjustment and perfection of the socialist market economy system through "four keywords"—property rights, distribution, regulation, and openness—to construct a socialist "Four-Dominant Economic System" (四主型经济制度) as quickly as possible. This consists of: a multi-type property rights system with public ownership as the mainstay; a multi-factor distribution system with labor as the mainstay; a multi-structured market system with the state as the leader; and a multi-directional openness system with self-reliance as the leader. We absolutely cannot follow the suggestions of certain individual economists who claim that China currently has a dual system of "half-command, half-market," or that "state capitalism or crony capitalism" [4] has caused reform to stagnate or regress. These individuals argue that reform must take "privatization of state-owned enterprises, privatization of land, and financial liberalization" as its direction and goal, aiming to establish a market economy system based on the formula "social justice + market economy = socialism." The organic integration of socialism (or the primacy of public ownership) with the market economy can generate higher efficiency and greater fairness than the combination of capitalism (or the primacy of private ownership) with the market economy. To a significant extent, capitalism and monopoly private ownership deviate from market economy principles; the two possess deep-seated internal contradictions and conflicts.