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Opinion: A brief history of China

Harold Byler
Opinion contributor

China and its government are main topics of the news media today, but most people I know don’t seem to have much understanding of its government, its problems, or its predicted future. 

I have put together this abbreviated version of China’s recent history as an attempt to provide a better understanding of what is happening there. 

After the defeat of Chiang Kai-shek in 1949, the name of the Chinese government was changed from ‘The Republic of China’ to ‘The Peoples Republic of China’, ruled by the Chairman of the Communist Party, Mao Zedong, a ruthless leader.    

The chaos of the Cultural Revolution ended in 1976 with the death of Mao.  Hua Guofeng took over, but had no real powerbase.

In 1978, Deng Xiaoping ousted Hua Guofeng and, for the almost the first time in Chinese history, allowed his predecessor a relatively peaceful retirement.

In 1980, Deng introduced capitalism and began policies of reform, opened up its economy, and to a much lesser degree, its political life.

In 1989, the violent suppression of Tiananmen Square protests dimmed hopes for further political reform and tarnished China’s international image, but had little long-term effect on their capitalist economic progress.

In the 1990s, Deng opened the currency printing presses to expand the economy.  The resulting irresponsible and wasteful spending has taken China into massive debt that has made their currency worthless on the international market. 

After Deng died in 1997, Jiang Zemin became effectively the leader, probably because of his firm ideological stance and successful handling of student protests in Shanghai.  Hong Kong, which had been a British 99-year-lease colony since the First Opium War in 1842, was returned to China. As a special administrative region, Hong Kong maintained separate governing and economic systems from that of mainland China. 

In 2001, China was admitted to the World Trade Organization and bid successfully for the 2008 Olympics. 

In 2002, Jiang Zemin handed the premiership over to Hu Jintao. 

In 2003, the SARS outbreak, one of a periodic series of deadly epidemics that began in 1957 and continued to the present time, was the first major crisis of Hu Jintao’s premiership.  After initially attempting to cover up the problem, China’s response was robust.

From 2003 to the present, globalization has continued to grow China’s cheap-labor economy at around 10% a year and some economists expected it to overtake the USA by 2020.  Government efforts to cut corruption had some effect, although some allege those efforts were used to settle political feuds.  Human rights remained a major concern for foreign non-governmental organizations, but foreign governments and business increasingly overlooked such issues in the charge to make money in China. Only 17% of China’s land is arable, not enough to feed their population in spite of their efforts to limit the expansion of that population; they rely on the produce of the U.S. Mid-west.

In 2013, Xi Jinping became President, cracked down on corruption and began advancing the quality of their industrial system to enhance the battle against poverty.

In 2019, a coronavirus epidemic was initially covered up, but was followed by a robust response.  China’s debt bubble began to crash into economic and civil disorder in Hong Kong, causing the Red leaders to go with governance by paddy wagons, show trials, brutal suppression of public dissent, and a return to Chairman Mao’s gun barrel as the ultimate source of power. 

Mao’s Marxist form of rule did not work.  But what is now becoming evident is that former President Deng’s printing press form-of-rule is not working either, and now President Xi has a severe financial problem. 

Harold Byler Jr. of Brady is the author of “Reflections of a Realist” available at bookstores, online at and other retailers, and at the McCulloch County Library in Brady.​​​​​​​