Two Types of Economic Growth in Asia : Chinese Development along the East Asian Path and Indian Development with a Stratified Social Structure

摘要

Following other countries in East Asia that have achieved the u22East Asian Miracleu22, China has been successfully developing its economy after the agrarian and economic reforms starting in 1978. A little later, in the 1980s, another giant Asian country, India, also started along the road of high-rate economic growth. While the two Asian giants share many common features, they also differ in some important aspects in their developmental processes. In this paper, we have compared Indian and Chinese economies in connection with the structure of rural society. Discussing initial conditions for economic development, we have pointed to the fact that the polarized socio-economic structure of Indian society basically remained unchanged. In the period between 1950 and the 1970s, the Chinese economy witnessed a labour-intensive type of agricultural development, whereas in India, village society remained stratified and agricultural development was led by the rich peasant groups. In China, the rapid expansion of rural markets provided the grounds on which rural small-scale industries and enterprises grew rapidly, creating a base on which export-connected industries could later develop. In India also, the weakening of hierarchical control in polarized village society, together with an increase in agrarian production and rural surpluses, led to the considerable expansion of consumption by rural households of various classes, including the lower. This created a remarkable growth in demand for consumer durables and formed one of the vital elements resulting in the economic growth of the 1980s. At the same time, these could not radically change the basic structure of Indian rural society, and therefore about one-fifth of the rural population remained below the poverty line. They would not be able to participate in the opportunities created by economic growth. The chance to earn non-agricultural income is not equally provided to all sections of the population in India. The labour market in Ind