Soldiers, Weapons, and Chinese Development Strategy: The Mao Era Military in China's Economic and Institutional Debate

Abstract

This article surveys the historical origins of the relationship between China's military and its economic development strategy. In the mid-1950s, Chinese military scientists and their patrons in the PLA began to offer development alternatives for specific critical economic sectors. These emphasized high technology not simply for defense but within the economy at large, and took China's relative standing on the international stage as a reference point for purely domestic economic policy choices. The article reviews the origins and evolution of these ideas within the Mao era polity. It summarizes the development package that resulted: (1) a 'techno-national' development doctrine formulated by military leaders to rationalize expensive, often esoteric strategic weapons efforts; (2) an organizational style that coupled mobilizational top-down elements to remarkably flexible and innovative managerial institutions absent from most state-led socialist-style economic sectors. Finally, it surveys the effect of military -technical influence on three important aspects of China's technological and economic trajectory: the development of a scientific, technical, and precision industrial cadre; the construction of an advanced national technical infrastructure; and the development of the Chinese education system.