What They Say

Editor's note: Launch of the new book raises a further discussion by experts and scholars from different countries in various fields revolving around the development of the Communist Party of China and the promotion of world progress by mutual help and assistance of shared ideals between China and the rest of the world. The following are excerpts of their speeches made at a forum related to the book launch.

Robert Lawrence Kuhn

Founder and chairman of Kuhn Foundation, an expert on China and winner of the government's Friendship Award, who has been associated with China for more than 30 years and has traveled across 100 cities.

For the world to understand China, the world must understand the Party's way of thinking.

President Xi Jinping states that the CPC should be governed by standardized rules and procedures that are open to public oversight. Only by adapting continuously, focusing on real-world issues, can the Party construct a truly prosperous society that is sustainable.

The Party-led system involves effective feedback mechanisms, such as polling, to discern what people think, for example, about proposed new policies. So, even though there are no elections in the Western sense, there is a good deal of feedback from different constituencies. Another example is when officials are nominated to new positions, there is often a period of time for feedback from colleagues, subordinates and superiors.

Moreover, the work reports of Party leadership at Party congresses every five years, and the work reports of the government at the National People's Congress each year, reflect a great deal of input and suggestions from all relevant officials, experts and constituencies. These work reports are not just what top leadership puts together for form and ceremony. No－they are drafted by many teams, and feedback and opinions are solicited from numerous officials and experts; the documents circulate iteratively many times during the six to eight months or more of the drafting period.

For those foreigners who marvel at how China contained COVID-19, with so few cases and deaths compared to other countries, I point out that the common root of China's success in containing the contagious coronavirus, and China winning the war to eradicate extreme poverty, is the CPC's leadership and organizational capacity.

All political parties, all political systems, have trade-offs, and while achieving national objectives is indeed an advantage of China's Party-led system, it is not the only criterion for evaluating systems. This is why continuing reform, opening up and system improvement are needed.

"It's fair to say that we have achieved successes," President Xi said. "Nevertheless we should have a cautious appraisal of our accomplishments. We should never overestimate our accomplishments or indulge ourselves in our achievements."

Danilo Turk

Slovenian diplomat, professor of international law, human rights expert, and political figure who served as president of Slovenia from 2007 to 2012.

This year the Communist Party of China celebrates its centennial. I congratulate the CPC for the historic achievements and for the gigantic contribution that China－under the leadership of President Xi Jinping－is making to the progress of the world.

In the past seven decades, China was transformed from a predominantly agricultural society into an industrial and post-industrial giant. The past four decades, the period known as the time of reform and opening-up has been particularly impressive.

Extreme poverty was eliminated and standards of living have been improving. The development process of China has put people first, continuously improving people's livelihood and opening new avenues of progress. Today it has a leading role in the world.

About 20 years ago, I worked as assistant secretary-general of the United Nations and I have followed the development of China closely. The leaders of China told the United Nations that China will make a major contribution to the implementation of the global development goals, the United Nations Millennium Development goals.

And indeed China made a decisive contribution.

In every meeting we, the officials of the United Nations, had with the leaders of China, we admired their commitment to results and to global progress.

Progress of China has transformed the world.

William Brown

William Brown was a young airman in the United States Air Force when he became interested in China. Driven by curiosity, he moved with his family to Xiamen in 1988, where for three decades he has witnessed the changes since reform and opening-up began. He won the Touching China's 2019 Person of the Year award.

The Chinese dream embodies the shared ideals－and all people share that same dream－of a peaceful and moderately prosperous life for their families and children. This is why people around the world admire China for its consistency in fighting poverty for 70 years, and not just at home, but abroad as well.

In 1994, our family drove 40,000 kilometers around China in three months to see how reforms had affected life, even in remote areas of Inner Mongolia, Gansu, and Tibet. Some places were so poor that UNESCO said they were hopeless. But UNESCO was wrong. Thirty years ago, China's strategy was "roads first, then riches".

This was simple and pragmatic, but as I found 25 years later, it was very effective.

In 2019, with the help of Xiamen University's School of Management and New Channel International Education Group, I drove around China again, but thanks to new roads it was only 20,000 km and 32 days. And even the people in supposedly hopeless areas like Ningxia were prospering, with new homes and concrete roads right to their doorsteps.

And in remote Tibetan valleys, the nomads prospered with e-commerce, thanks to the world's most extensive internet system.

And, as in the 1950s and 1960s, China continues to help other poor nations with the Belt and Road Initiative－which is basically exporting China's successful "roads first then riches" strategy.

My son Matthew and his wife, who do volunteer medical and social work in Africa, said that even the most remote areas have Chinese working hand in hand with Africans to build the roads, highways, dams and ports that will help them lift themselves from poverty.

No wonder my African friends are so grateful to China, and the UN secretary-general said in 2017 that the world's only hope for ending poverty was China's precise poverty alleviation.

Thank you, China, for allowing me to witness the Chinese dream fulfilled, and I look forward to it becoming the world's Dream as well－peace and moderate prosperity shared by all peoples.