China's Rise and Strategic Competition

China's modern economic transformation began with the "reform and opening up" policies launched by Deng Xiaoping starting in 1978, which introduced market mechanisms and opened the country to foreign trade and investment while preserving Communist Party political control. Sustained high growth rates over subsequent decades, accession to the World Trade Organization in December 2001, and integration into global manufacturing supply chains allowed China to overtake Japan in 2010 as the world's second-largest economy by nominal GDP. Since Xi Jinping became General Secretary of the Communist Party in 2012 and President in 2013, Chinese foreign policy has generally been described by analysts, and at times by Chinese officials themselves, as more assertive than under his predecessors, framed domestically around concepts such as the "China Dream" and "national rejuvenation."