Firstly，we should always base ourselves on the nat...
Which road to take is a fundamental issue that determines the longterm development direction of a nation.The road taken so far by the Chinese，resulting from generations of explorations by forward-looking Chinese for modernization，has its own logic of history.Its general feature of deviating from the western capital model of development rests on the rationale accumulated over history.After the Opium War，many farsighted Chinese did propose to learn from western capitalism，wishing to “use foreign techniques to curb foreigners”.Unfortunately，China as a“student” turned out to be a constant victim，invariably punished by the west，its “teacher”，so that the “teacher ’s road” became highly distasteful.
The October Revolution in Russia offered the Chinese an alternative to the capitalist road.Thus，the Chinese Communist Party led the people in their protracted struggles which ended with the founding of the People ’s Republic of China.Terminating the semi-colonial and semi-feudal history，the Chinese put an end to the war-torn turmoil of the country and stoop up to change their fate.The top priority before them was to accelerate industrialization so as to reduce the poverty and improve the productivity of a faming nation.In face of the hard-pressed international environment and the daunting domestic situation，the Chinese leadership naturally turned to the Soviets for introducing the planned economic system，which stressed forced accumulation at the cost of consumption，and an orientation towards heavy industry development by means of almost reckless investment.Through thick and thin，China built up a relatively complete industrial system in a matter of 30 years，thereby laying a basic foundation for the take-off industrialization experienced since reform and opening-up.
However，the planned economic system of traditional socialism could not in the three decades solve such problems as the structural imbalance of the economy and the low efficiency in resource allocation，so much so that China ’s gap with the developed world widened rather than closed.It was right against this background that China initiated reform and opening-up in 1978，gradually discarding the traditional socialist economic system，giving an increasing role to the market in factor distribution，and finally aiming at the establishment of a market system.Embarking on the new road of socialism with Chinese characteristics，the Chinese leadership liberated tremendously the productive forces of the society and incentivized the whole people to bring their creative power into full play，ultimately setting up another record of continued hyper growth of the national economy following other Asian wonders.
The reform and opening-up program is by no means a result of copying the institutional arrangements of other countries，or following the transitional patterns of other former socialist countries，even less being inspired by the Washington Consensus on privatization and westernization.Over the whole course of reform and opening-up，the Chinese stood firmly on their own national conditions to unleash the productive potentials and improve the welfare of the people.The road of socialism with Chinese characteristics gradually emerged，which refuted the notion that socialism and the market economic system were mutually exclusive.The Chinese people，abandoning a lot of previously held dogmatic assumptions，experimented with various methods of economic operations，like the family contractual responsibility system in the villages，the separation of the ownership and management in enterprises，the contractual system in the state-owned enterprises，the managementbuyout，the mixed shareholding ownership，etc.None of these practices was imposed upon us.All of them came up through our courageous explorations in line with the domestic national conditions.