China 2030 Building a Modern, Harmonious, and Creative Society

China’s economic performance over the past 30 years has been remarkable. It is a unique development success story, providing valuable lessons for other countries seeking to emulate this success—lessons about the importance of adapting to local initiative and interregional competition; integrating with the world; adjusting to new technologies; building world-class infrastructure; and investing heavily in its people.

In the next 15 to 20 years, China is well positioned to join the ranks of the world’s high-income countries. China’s policy makers are already focused on how to change the country’s growth strategy to respond to the new challenges that will come, and avoid the “middle-income trap.” That is clearly reflected in both the 11th and 12th Five Year Plans, with their focus on quality of growth, structural reforms to harness innovation and economic efficiency, and social inclusion to overcome the rural-urban divide and the income equality gap.

The idea behind this study was developed in 2010, at the celebrations for the 30th anniversary of the China–World Bank partnership. To commemorate that milestone, former World Bank Group President Robert Zoellick proposed to Chinese leaders to work jointly on identifying and analyzing China’s medium-term development challenges looking forward to 2030.