This book examines key issues in each of the major sectors of the Chinese economy. It brings together pathbreaking research undertaken in Britain by both Chinese and non-Chinese scholars. It uses a wide range of primary research materials and subjects them to rigorous analysis. It illuminates the way in which China's 'step-by-step' reform affected different parts of the economy and identifies many difficulties resulting from this approach.

However, it also enables readers to understand why this broad strategy of reforming a communist planned economy was so successful in the Chinese case. China's 'East Asian' path of economic reform stands in marked contrast to the approach adopted in most of the former USSR and Eastern Europe. This book makes a large contribution towards understanding the causes and consequences of this difference in approach, which is one of the central economic issues of our time.