Reform and opening up has profoundly transformed China, while exerting a significant impact on the world. Clarifying its global significance and distilling its international experience is therefore an essential requirement for deepening research on the history of China’s reform and opening up in the new era.

Reshaping China’s relationship with world

The convergence of globalization and reform efforts in socialist countries formed the broader historical context for China’s reform and opening up. The decision to embark on this path was never driven solely by domestic imperatives; rather, it emerged through dynamic interaction with global currents on multiple dimensions. China’s reform and opening up both benefited from the opportunities created by globalization and technological revolution and served as a representative example of how socialist countries could break free from the constraints of outdated institutional frameworks.

Reform and opening up embodies a dynamic interaction between China and the world—a process of cumulative advance that integrates agency and structure. As articulated in the Recommendations of the CPC Central Committee for Formulating the 15th Five-Year Plan for National Economic and Social Development, the essence of reform and opening up lies in “drawing momentum from opening up to propel reform and development, and sharing opportunities with the world to promote common development.” From this perspective, reform and opening up should be understood as a systematic project driven jointly by internal and external forces. An international perspective on the study of reform and opening up seeks to restore this historical reality by recognizing both China’s active decision to integrate into the global system and the objective influence of the international environment on its reform trajectory. External perceptions of and responses to China’s reform and opening up have, in turn, shaped its course of development.

The post-WWII international order, dominated by Western developed nations, was constructed around an institutional logic that primarily served the interests of advanced economies, leaving developing countries with limited voice. During the 1970s, however, the international landscape underwent significant changes, marked by the gradual emergence of multipolarity and the continued expansion of international political participation. China’s restoration of its lawful seat in the United Nations in 1971 laid an institutional foundation for its participation in global governance and further catalyzed shifts in the global balance of power.

As reform and opening up deepened, China’s rapid economic growth intensified its need to engage with the international economic system. In 1980, China resumed its lawful seats in the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund—a natural step in its pursuit of modernization. This move signaled China’s deeper integration into the international economic order and its emergence as an increasingly consequential actor within a multipolar global system.

In the early 1980s, two World Bank economic missions to China not only reflected the country’s openness to international economic ideas and its willingness to learn from global development experience, but also facilitated the influx of development aid, advanced concepts, technologies, and talent. These exchanges played a pivotal role in China’s exploration of economic theory and cultivation of professional expertise, while reshaping international perceptions of China’s reform and opening up.

China’s accession to the World Trade Organization in December 2001 further redefined its relationship with the global economic system and substantively elevated its international standing.

Offering Chinese experience on modernization

China’s reform and opening up represents an unprecedented undertaking in the history of modernization—a development path explored through practice by the Chinese people under the leadership of the CPC in the absence of precedents or established theoretical models. Over time, this process has undergone a historical transition from learning from others to contributing China’s own experience.

From the outset, reform and opening up adhered to the principle of grounding development in national conditions and exploring paths suited to China’s specific realities. In its early stages, China’s economic construction faced a dual constraint: limited theoretical preparedness and a lack of practical experience. In response, the CPC repeatedly emphasized the importance of actively assimilating and learning from outstanding achievements of human civilization, including advanced international experience in economic development.

Through initiatives such as inviting foreign experts to conduct research and lectures in China, as well as dispatching delegations abroad for systematic observation and study, China accumulated extensive insights and recommendations related to economic reform and development. By upholding openness and inclusiveness while insisting on selective adaptation, China creatively integrated these lessons into its own reform agenda, ensuring that reform advanced in an orderly manner while remaining firmly rooted in national conditions. Compared with other countries pursuing reform, China’s consistent commitment to independence and self-reliance constitutes a central pillar of its success.

The history of reform and opening up is, in essence, a shared narrative of development written jointly by China and the world. Only by fully acknowledging the relevance and influence of international factors can related research construct a comprehensive knowledge system and deepen the understanding of both the necessity and inevitability behind the formulation and development of China’s reform and opening up policies.

Bi Yana is a research fellow from the Institute for Reform and Opening Up Studies at Shenzhen University.