[Jonathan Alami]

• As China has transformed into an industrial and service based economy and its GDP has increased rapidly in the 40 years from 1980 to 2020, it has encountered challenges that are common to country’s that undergo these changes. As people have migrated to cities and employment and educational opportunities have increased, they have started to have less children. This is a common phenomenon in history as societies industrialize. However, the decrease in the amount of children people have means that there will be less people to care for the elderly in the future. China’s median age is already on the rise, and will only increase over time. As China’s population ages, it will come with challenges as the burden to care for the elderly will fall on an ever shrinking number of young people. This could result in economic stagnation. 
• Environmental challenges pose another challenge to China as a result of its economic rise. China has surpassed the United States for the largest output of carbon dioxide emissions. The use of fossil fuels to power its economic growth have resulted in air pollution and contributed to climate change. Another challenge China faces is the availability and cleanliness of water. With the urgency for nations to act on climate change increasing every year, it will be interesting to see what steps China can take to reduce its impact on the environment, while still maintaining economic growth. It was nice to see there are some positive developments with sustainability in China. Solar and wind power are increasing as a share of the total amount of power produced, and electric car production is also increasing.

 

[Jonathan Alami]

• The social and cultural transformation China has gone through since 1978 has been revolutionary in and of itself. Although still a Communist country today, China has implemented reform policies that have allowed for economic change. These policies in turn have resulted in a large and growing middle class with disposable income and opportunities for entrepreneurship that allow for economic and social mobility. The growth of the Chinese economy since 1978 has prompted a huge migration of people from the countryside to the cities, particularly Guangdong, Shanghai and Beijing. China’s economic transformation from a rural and agrarian economy, albeit state-controlled, to an urban and industrial economy has had massive social and cultural ramifications. 

 

• The growth of manufacturing in China coupled with the rapid increase in exports has driven a mass migration of people from the countryside to coastal cities. Cities such as Shanghai have transformed rapidly to accommodate the influx of workers from the countryside, but also as the middle class has grown and incomes have increased. It surprised me that as a result of this interregional migration, as many as 60 million children have been left behind as their parents have moved to the cities in search of work. It also surprised me that me that as cities have grown and developed since 1978, many properties have been torn down in favor of new developments. The owners of these properties were oftentimes not compensated well enough to continue living in the same area, so I wondered whether homelessness is or has become a challenge in China as a result of its economic and social changes. 

 

• The growth of the Chinese economy along with reform policies has also allowed for the development of a consumer culture. This consumer culture has brought shopping malls, restaurants, theatres, and internet cafes to China. Previously forbidden elements of cultural expression such dance, rock and roll, and western clothing styles have come along with this new consumer culture. The rise of the internet in the 21st century has furthered this development. There are limitations to this social transformation, however. The internet is monitored and censored by the government and inequality between the rich and the poor and the urban and the rural has grown. As economic growth starts to slow down, I am wondering what effect this will have on “openness” in China. 

 

[Jonathan Alami]

1. In 1978, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) changed its economic policies as a result of its change in leadership. When Deng Xiaoping became chairman of the CCP, new economic reforms were introduced to gradually steer China away from a centrally planned, command economy towards a more open, free market system. Economic reforms introduced an element of privatization into the Chinese economy--for example, farmers were leased plots of land by the commune and were allowed to keep or to sell anything they produced above their quota. New factories from international firms were also allowed to set up shop in China, creating a flood of new better paying jobs. People grew richer over time as a result of these new economic changes. 
2. Many industries in China are state owned, including banking and telecommunications. These industries take up a large share of GDP and are large sources of employment. Despite the presence of privatized firms in China, large parts of the economy remain centralized and state owned. 
3. A Chinese company that is influential outside of China is the tech firm ByteDance. It has gained more recognition in the United States in recent years due to its connection to the popular social media platform TikTok. Students may possibly have heard of this firm due to the popularity of TikTok. However, due to the lack of Chinese global brands, the number of Chinese companies students have heard of are few to none. 
4. As millions of people have migrated to coastal cities, the gap between urban and rural wealth has grown. Rural poverty continues to be a challenge in China, despite progress in recent years. Inequality between the eastern and western portions of the country has increased as almost all of the manufacturing and exporting industries that have driven China’s economic boom are located on its eastern seaboard. 
5. Consumption has changed in China as its population grows wealthier and services take up a larger share of the GDP. More people are entering the middle class in China and have greater disposable incomes. This has driven consumer spending and led to the proliferation of services (such as McDonald’s delivery service). 

 

[Jonathan Alami]

• I was surprised by the images of pollution pouring into the Bohai Sea from the Yellow River and the NASA images of re-engineered land. I think these would be excellent tools to help students visualize how people have an impact on their environment. 

 

• A key point I would incorporate into my lesson is the Belt and Road Initiative of Xi Jinping. We cover the Silk Road when studying China in the middle ages and the role it played in facilitating the spread of new ideas and inventions. A case study we examine of cross cultural interaction via the Silk Road is the visit of Marco Polo to the court of Kublai Khan. 

 

• It would be a great tool for discussion to examine China’s efforts to revitalize the Silk Road and to predict what some possible effects of this effort would be. I would want students to understand that historical themes such as the exchange of ideas through trade are playing out in our world as much as they did in the distant past. 

 

[Jonathan Alami]

Hello Everyone, 

My name is Jonthan Alami and I am the History Department Chair and 7th grade World History teacher at a charter school in Pacoima, CA. While the focus of my course is world history in the middle ages, I am excited to learn more about contemporary China and apply it to my classroom.  Preparing our students to be global citizens is heavily emphasized at our school!

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