Open Access in the Economic sphere: Understanding China's Development

Abstract

This article is the last piece in a series of articles written from the perspective of contemporary non-Western countries, arguing that it is open access in the economic sphere and the interconnected institutions in the areas of property right protection and contract enforcement, financial market, rule of law, and the accumulation of human resources that determine economic and human development. The case of China shows again that the theory of North and his colleagues overemphasizes the role of open access to political organizations or competitive democracy in economic development. While Singapore restricts the role of opposition parties, China strictly prohibits opposition parties. Both countries have developed relatively well. I have also analyzed the cases of India, Japan, and Brazil elsewhere to show that open access to political organizations does not play significant roles in economic development or even human development. These cases, however, are much less obvious in explaining my argument than the cases of Singapore and China. If my argument is correct, there are new ways of defining the roles of government in economic development. This article has also made some preliminary efforts in discussing the roles of government in economic development. The article, however, does not deal with questions about political regimes with the rule of one party or a dominant party. The case of China also has implications to the theory of the end of history. Future research can benefit from further attention to these issues.