China's economic rise to power and relevancy in manufacturing for the rest of the world begins after the death of Mao, and then the defeat of the Gang of Four and Hua Guofeng by Deng Xiaoping. Deng, as the new chairman, envisioned a more moderate China that could open up to the rest of the world, which coincided nicely with the Nixon administrations plans of trying to divide communist powers against one another. Under Mao, China's economy had stagnated, forcing the country to fall behind the rest of the world. In 1960, China's GDP was ~60 billion, and it took a huge dive until it picked back up around 1965. For comparison, the US's was ~550B.

The death of Mao and opening of China to the West (Detente) had two great impacts on the psyche of the Chinese population. The first is that they were weary from the destruction of the Cultural Revolution. The second is that they saw how far behind they lagged compared to other nations. Both of these led to a far reaching condemnation of communism and more importantly, the CCP. Deng Xiaoping, upon taking over leadership, began a campaign to rethink Maoism. From Deng's point of view, he felt that such a campaign would allow more moderate elements in China vent their frustrations with the disastrous Cultural Revolution, helping the CCP to maintain legitimacy, as Deng had no plans on ending authoritarian rule in China, but did want to restructure the definition of Maoism (which will become known as Socialism with Chinese Characteristics). The result, to Deng's chagrin, was a flood of anti-CCP literature across universities in China and the beginning of various pro-Western and pro-Democracy movements within China, the largest of which was Democracy Wall, which formed in 1978. Within the year, Deng ended the campaign and banned any literature on the subject. It was essential for the CCP to revive the economy in order to please its population and retain power.

Entering the 1970-80s, China had two important developments socio-economically. First, the rise of liberalism and pro-Democracy within the CCP, which will climax in 1989 at Tiananmen Square. The second was the formation of Special Economic Zones (SEZ) across the nation, with the tiny fishing village of Shenzhen leading the way. Deng's plans were ambitious and he had to balance between the continuously dissident pro-democracy movements and the hard conservative Maoists that survived the post-Cultural Revolution. By 1980 China's GDP did see steady growth, and reached ~191B. But this was still low compared to the US's 2T+ GDP, and the unruly liberal elements of the CCP were pushing Deng hard into the zone of capitalism. For example, they were pleased to see the massive construction projects in SEZ, but they also demanded more ambitious projects, such as a stock market inside China. But things suddenly halted after 1989, as the CCP found itself in a struggle for survival. Indeed, despite the successful crackdown on protesters in Beijing the slow death of the USSR quickly began to de-legitimize communism internationally.

It should also be noted briefly that in addition to the democracy movement, which falls apart rather quickly after Tiananmen Square, the CCP began feeling enormous pressure within its ranks from nationalists. Beginning in the mid-eighties when companies began moving to China in earnest, China became a large target for Western nationalists why attacked what they saw as politicians selling out their own working populations to turn a quick profit. Even some well known international scholars, such as Samuel Huntingdon, began publishing works that were critical of the developing world, in particular China. These perceived insults to China had the double effect of not just helping legitimize the CCP in the aftermath of the Tiananmen Incident, but also increasing demand for China's ascendancy to greatness in the modern world. Now, in the face of what was viewed as renewed imperialism, only the CCP could protect China from the threat of America, who had already subjugated nearby Japan and South Korea, and was actively working with the treacherous KMT to keep Taiwan from reunifying!

1992 marks the turning point of China's economic luck. In a bid to save his legacy and perhaps to save China from revolution, Deng Xiaoping embarked on his ambitious Southern Tour. This is truly the beginning of when the term Socialism with Chinese Characteristics begins to emerge. Despite being retired, Deng still held considerable influence over public opinion, and the tour did a lot to force then-head of state Jiang Zemin into action. From 1992 onward, China's economy flies through the roof. And arguably because of this, the CCP went from a low point in public popularity, to new highs as millions of Chinese were uplifted from poverty. In 1992 China's GDP was 427B. In 2000 it was 1.2T. China survived the crash in 2008 by using their state power to bailout businesses from going under, and keeping a large pace of growth thus allowing it to avoid entering recession. By 2010, China's GDP was 6T. Today, it is at 13T. The Shanghai stock exchange, formed in 1990, played a large role in bringing in massive wealth to China. China entered the WTO in 2001.

Why was China chosen over India despite similar population and the ability of both to outsource massive amounts of labor? Well, mainly because of ambitious CCP leadership, but also because of those SEZs during Deng's early reign. China didn't just have the population, but it also had the infrastructure to maintain such a high demand for production from the West. But the rapid rise of China has also seen the displacement of many populations by the government in order to continue fueling growth, as well as wage disparity among classes. The Chinese population, perhaps pragmatically, has attempted to personally solve this by resorting to marketing their own goods; i.e., pirated or fabricated goods sold at extremely cheap costs but at a lower quality than the official product, which has fallen under criticism from various world governments.

Conclusion

Since the death of Mao, it has been necessary for the CCP to maintain its legitimacy in the eyes of its population. The opening of China to the rest of the world convinced many Chinese that communism simply wasn't the answer, and possibly a scourge against their own personal success. So did the CCP do this because of the international respect it brought, or any sort of desire for trade? Well, not exactly, though that's always a plus. In a sense, the CCP's quest to thrust China into the forefront of the global economy has two sides to it: one is to appease their population (which could be said really about any government, but it is especially so for China because of the fallout of the Cultural Revolution), and another side is nationalistic. China's quest to lead the world politically and economically had to begin with the latter. Then, by uplifting massive amounts of people from poverty, could China take its steps to become a world superpower, and appease both liberal moderates and nationalists within the CCP.