Since The Founding Of The Party's Regional Development Strategic Thinking Research

To a country as vast and diversified as China, regional division has multiple, e.g. economic and political, importance for the development of the whole society. Accordingly, promoting the harmonious development among different regions has always been a major issue in the modernization of China. The regional developmental strategy of the Communist Party of China (CPC) is a significant component of the Chinese socialist developmental theory. Since 1949, CPC, in view of the regional circumstances and developmental needs in different historical periods, has been adjusting its regional developmental strategies and promoting to transform the development pattern of different regions. These endeavors have immensely impacted on China's regional development and deeply changed the regional structure. Under the current situation of implementing the scientific development view and accelerating the transformation of the economic development pattern, studying the regional developmental strategy of CPC is of paramount significance both practically and theoretically. On the one hand, the increasing regional gap and challenged regional harmony call for such studies; on the other hand, properly solving regional problems will shed light on the building of developmental theory. The present study, incorporating the research methods of the history of CPC, economy and geography, summarizes the regional developmental strategy of the CPC since 1949 systematically. It takes the modernization of China as a clue, examines the exploration of China's socialist road by the party in power and holds that the laws of governing, of socialism and of human society coincide with each other. The present study divides the evolution of CPC's regional developmental strategy since 1949 into three stages:Balanced Development (1949-1978), Imbalanced Development of "Two Overall Concerns" (1978-2002) and Harmonious Development (2002-2011). Based on the division, it further analyzes the theoretical foundation and the internal and external factors of the regional developmental strategy in various historical periods. Apart from summarizing the gist of the strategy, the study also evaluates the effects of the strategy, looks into the relationships within the three stages and draws the characteristics of the evolution of the strategy and the lessons which could be learned. By doing so, the present study puts forward the following opinions. Firstly, the author proposes two concepts of "regionalization of national questions" and "nationalization of regional questions", and emphasizes that the strategy of "regionalization of national questions" is of more value under current situation; that is, incorporating national questions in regional development and harmonious questions in economic development, and gradually, bridging the national gap by weakening national questions and strengthening the role of economic development. Secondly, the author divides the regional developmental strategy from a new approach which differs from the conventional division that took the succession of the four generations of CPC leadership or splitting up the "two overall concerns" as natural chronological divisions in the evolution of the strategy. It argues that the strategy of leveling regional gap represented by the Western Development was a response to Deng Xiaoping's proposal of "two overall concerns" and it was transitional in nature while the harmonious regional developmental strategy is capable of representing a distinct stage. Thirdly, he summarizes the gist of the regional developmental strategy which is composed of major parts such as the strategies of the regional overall development, main-functional zones development, economic zones development etc. Fourthly, he evaluates the regional developmental strategies of different historical periods from political, economic and social aspects and tries to be historically impartial. Lastly, the author analyzes the intrinsic logic of the evolution of the CPC's regional developmental strategy and the lessons of regional development.