If the 20th century ended in 1989, the 21st began in 1978

Eleven years before the epochal events in Germany, a seismic change was taking place in China

Martin Jacques in Beijing
Thursday May 25, 2006
The Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/china/story/0,,1782531,00.html

It is, of course, common sense that 1989 was the defining moment of the last quarter of the 20th century. Who could possibly disagree? It closed a chapter of history that had been ushered in by the October revolution in 1917. It brought to an end the systemic challenge that communism had posed to capitalism, the belief that there was, indeed, an alternative. It allowed the United States to emerge as the undisputed superpower of a new century. It gave globalisation access to the former Soviet bloc from which it had been excluded: henceforth, globalisation could live up to its name.

That is an imposing list by any standards: an epochal event of enormous implication. But the most important event of the late 20th century? Let me present another candidate: 1978. What, you might ask. Why 1978? It was the year that Deng Xiaoping introduced his open-door reforms in China , which inaugurated a quarter-century of annual double-digit growth rates, resulting in the economic transformation of China. Compared with 1989, 1978 was admittedly a rather dull affair, however far-reaching its implications might have been. But 1989, on the other hand -notwithstanding the fact that it was bloodless and atypically good-natured - had more than a touch of the grand European political theatre. It was recognisably in the European revolutionary tradition. No contest there then.

Nor did 1978 have the elevated political meaning that attaches to 1989. The latter did not just exude political theatre: it had substance too. It closed an era of not just communist but also socialist history. From that moment on, the world acquiesced in capitalism: like it or lump it, there was no other alternative in town. The country that had carried the hopes of a systemic alternative had collapsed amid its own contradictions.

That is history on the grandest scale - 1978 cannot possibly compare. A communist country chose to turn its back on an era of egalitarianism and embrace the market. It took the first tentative steps towards capitalism. In that sense, interestingly, 1978 mirrored 1989, or even anticipated it. Unlike the Soviet Communist party, the Chinese Communist party chose to introduce capitalism. So in political terms, in the language of grand alternatives Europeans are so partial to, 1978 cannot hold a candle to 1989.

No, the case for 1978 must be established on quite different grounds. It involved the making of a very different kind of history. Ever since