Looking back on China’s relations with Australia
Author: Bob Hawke, former Australian Prime Minister
Next week will see the 60th anniversary of the establishment of the ‘new China’, the People’s Republic of China. No country other than China has a greater reason to look back with gratification and satisfaction over those 60 years of the remarkable development of China, than Australia. We have been an extraordinary beneficiary of China’s economic growth.
If we look in detail over the 60 year history of the People’s Republic, it is inevitable we will zero in on 1978. That year saw the single most important decision taken by any national leader in the twentieth century. That was of course, the decision of Deng Xiaoping in late 1978, to open up China to the outside world and move China towards a market economy.