* A newly-released think tank report has shed insights into how Chinese modernization creates a new model for human advancement.
* The new model of human advancement, which is not an imitation or replication of others, offers a fresh option for developing countries in their pursuit of modernization.
* The splendid accomplishments of Chinese modernization demonstrate that modernization can be achieved through multiple pathways, and each country is well equipped to forge a path of its own.
BEIJING, Nov. 13 (Xinhua) -- A newly-released think tank report has shed insights into how Chinese modernization creates a new model for human advancement, presenting a new landscape distinct from Western models of modernization and offering a brand-new option for developing countries to pursue independent development.
Titled "A New Model for Human Advancement and Its Global Significance," the report was jointly produced by think tanks operated under the Institute of Party History and Literature of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and Xinhua News Agency. It was released during the Global South Media and Think Tank Forum held between Nov. 11 and 12 in Sao Paulo, Brazil.
The report analyzed the common challenges for human advancement and explicated how Chinese solutions regarding modernization serve as a valuable reference for countries worldwide, including those in the Global South, in advancing their modernization efforts.
According to the report, the Chinese path to modernization features coordinated progress in material, political, cultural-ethical, social and ecological terms. It embodies a developmental concept that prioritizes the people over capital, pursues common prosperity over polarization, emphasizes people's free and well-rounded development over materialism, and advocates the equality and common progress of all nations over hegemony.
Noting that Chinese modernization has pioneered a new model for human advancement, the report said the model is rooted in Chinese conditions while draws on the experience of other countries. It not only delivers happiness and wellbeing to the Chinese people, but also actively advances common prosperity of the world.
Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, held in late 2012, China has created an extraordinary economic growth miracle, with its GDP surpassing 126 trillion yuan (around 18 trillion U.S. dollars) in 2023. Between 2013 and 2020, nearly 100 million Chinese in rural areas were lifted out of extreme poverty.
Particularly in the past decade, the country has sustained an average annual economic growth rate of over six percent with an average annual energy consumption increase of only three percent, achieving a 26.8 percent reduction in energy consumption per unit of GDP.
As a key driver for global economic growth, China contributes approximately 30 percent to the annual expansion of the world economy, read the report, adding that the country is a primary trade partner for over 140 countries and regions.
China is also committed to creating new opportunities for the least developed and developing countries. At this year's China International Import Expo, held in Shanghai earlier this month, China provided over 120 free exhibition booths to participants from 37 of the world's least-developed countries and expanded the African products section.
Hou Yanshe, a professor at the School of Marxism of the Renmin University of China, said Chinese modernization is of "significant global importance" as it transcends differences in ideology, social systems and stages of development.
The new model of human advancement, which is not an imitation or replication of others, offers a fresh option for developing countries in their pursuit of modernization, Hou said.
As expounded in the think tank report, the unique perspectives, including views on civilization, democracy and ecology, embodied in the new model for human advancement make a significant and innovative contribution to modernization theory and practice worldwide.
Keith Bennett, a British analyst on international relations who has long followed China's development, has called Chinese modernization "a fundamentally different paradigm for modernization."
From Bennett's perspective, it is a kind of modernization that plays an effective role in helping more countries pursue and promote their own pathways toward modernization.
Donald Rushambwa, a research fellow at the Zimbabwe-based China-Africa Economic and Culture Exchange Research Center, noted that "in just over 40 years, China has realized economic take-off and completed comprehensive modernization in science and technology, infrastructure and other fields without exploiting any other countries. This is an example for developing countries to follow."
The splendid accomplishments of Chinese modernization demonstrate that modernization can be achieved through multiple pathways, and each country is well equipped to forge a path of its own, the report said, adding that "Chinese modernization, as a new model for human advancement, belongs to China, and the world as well." ■
