China Emerging_ 1978-2008 - Xiao-bo , Wu [48]
From 1990 onward, China started piloting elections for the lowest level of administrative officials, Chair of the Village Committee. This photograph shows the public calling out votes as they are counted in Leikou Township of Anyang County, Henan Province, October 1998.
From 1998 onward, China’s reform entered a stage in which the distribution of benefits was more complex and the conflicts were more violent. From policymaking authorities to entrepreneurs and intellectuals, everyone now felt that reform had been pushed into unknown territory. People began to have mixed feelings of excitement and anxiety about what the reform would bring about to their own lives and the whole nation. In the years following 1998, people came to understand far more clearly what Zhu Rong-ji had referred to when he mentioned “landmines” and “swamps.”
The issuing of lottery tickets around 1998 ignited the hopes and desires of many lower- and middleclass people. The lucky draw events were often attended by hundreds of thousands of people in many cities.
Market Manipulators and the Problematic Stock Market
A
century of great confusion and conflicts finally came to an end in 1999. To mark the transition to a new century, one that many Chinese refer to as “China’s Century,” Fortunemagazine announced that it would hold its annual meeting in Shanghai. It scheduled the meeting
at the end of September, prior to the country’s national holiday. This was the first time that a famous media organization had selected China as the site for its global annual meeting. The topic was in line with everyone’s thinking: “Let the world understand China and let China understand the world.”
This was a comforting approach to China’s increasingly close ties with the rest of the world. China’s macroeconomic performance was also bringing comfort to many quarters. The country was like a “lone ranger” in leading economic development. Southeast Asia had not recovered from its financial debacle, and further crises had erupted in Russia and Brazil. China, in contrast, was seeing its consumer market revived and the booming housing market in a cycle of rapid growth, drawing all sectors along with it.
Meanwhile, the capital markets were taking their own course. In most of the world, capital markets have always been a barometer of the economy; however, in China, this “barometer” frequently played jokes on people, like some funny distorting mirror at a carnival.
The authority over Macao was transferred from Portugal to China on December 20, 1999, which brought an end to over one hundred years of colonialism in this territory.
Environmental degradation increasingly impacts cities in China. From 1988 onward, sandstorms became an environmental hazard in Beijing.
May 19, 1999, started as a normal day, a day unworthy of any major news. The stock markets had been listless for more than seven hundred days in a row, but on this day, they suddenly woke up. A succession of thirty-two days of positive news had allowed a ray of sunshine to finally break through. The central bank had lowered the interest rates, but more importantly, a new Securities Law had been passed. The normally cautious People’s Daily now published a special editorial on May 19, asking everyone to “have firm confidence, respect the new regulations, and enjoy the positive situation in the stock markets.” Within two months, the Shanghai Stock Exchange shot up by 1,700 points, an increase in market capitalization of more than 50%. Shareholders reveled in the long-awaited sunshine.
Another group of people, however, now came out of their lairs, shouting with joy. This was the clever, risk-taking class of market manipulators who are referred to as zhuang-jia in China. The term zhuang-jia dates back to the old gambling days of China when these people served as bankers in the game and held all the chips in their hands.
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