Enough room to fix structural dysfunctions

China's transitioning economy still suffers from a number of structural dysfunctions, which are exactly what the comprehensive reform embarked upon in 2013 and the supply-side reform launched last year aim to fix.

But China's economic slowdown since 2010 is a periodic phenomenon and has a lot to do with external factors. Countries at the same level of development, including Brazil, India and Russia, have endured even sharper decline in growth rates over the same period. The same applies to developed economies like the Republic of Korea and Singapore.

The extensive economic turbulence that haunts them essentially shows that their exports, investment and consumption, the three driving forces of an economy's growth on the demand side, are all in trouble.