OLLI0152 - China’s Modernization – Part B

Course Description

The goal of this instructor is to have course participants achieve a judgment-free understanding of the modernization of China. For most of China’s 5,000 years of recorded history, China had the most advanced civilization in the world. Starting in 1839, the year that the first Opium War began, China suffered a century of humiliation at the hands of foreign imperialistic powers. That century of humiliation and early attempts at modernization were covered in Part A. In Part B, we will continue the story and commence with the aftermath of the devastation of the Great Leap Forward. We will discuss the impact of the Cultural Revolution and the programs of Deng Xiaoping which led to the opening of China and the incredible growth of China’s economy. At least 500,000 people were taken from poverty into the middle class in about thirty years. The course will conclude with a discussion of Xi Jinping and what his program might mean for the future of China. This course will be recorded.