Podcast: What makes China a great economy?

For the past few decades, China's marvelous economic growth has dazzled the world.

People's Daily Online Business Podcast by Li Zhenyu
For the past few decades, China's marvelous economic growth, faster than any large economy in human history, has dazzled the world.

It is widely recognized that China's magnificent growth story was built on an export-led model. And some Western countries have always blamed China for its large trade imbalance.

But Doug Guthrie, tenured professor of International Business at The George Washington University (GWU) and a Western expert in China’s economic reform, thinks differently.

"China hasn't just become an economy because of exporting. China has become a great economy because of its very careful approach to infrastructural investment," Guthrie, who is also a professor of International Business at GWU, told me.

"If you like at, for example, how China made it through the economic crisis of 2008, 2009, it's because it had a very very kinda planned approach to infrastructural development."

"So, you see a lot of infrastructural development happened on the eastern seaboard, then they decided to shift to the western parts of the country. So there's a huge amount of planning that goes into I think is very important for an economy to be healthy," said Guthrie.

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