December 18 marked the 40th anniversary of China's “reform and opening” policy, which was inaugurated at the Third Plenum of the 11th Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), held December 18 to 22, 1978. The entire year has seen a number of events and exhibitions celebrating the anniversary, which effectively gave birth to “socialism with Chinese characteristics.” All the previous festivities were leading up to the anniversary proper, where President and CCP General Secretary Xi Jinping was expected to give a speech outlining not only the past but the future of China's economic reforms.
Ahead of December 18, there was a wave of guarded optimism overseas about Xi's speech. The thaw in the U.S.-China trade war is holding, and China made good on promises to lower tariffs on U.S. automobiles and agricultural products. Yet those are temporary fixes that don't address U.S. concerns about the very structure of the Chinese economy, in which the CCP and its state apparatus play a huge role. Accordingly, some China experts thought that Xi might take the opportunity of the anniversary celebration to embrace a more ambitious reform agenda – without appearing to bow to U.S. pressure.
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