Property Rights, Institutional Evolution And National Growth

Property and property rights are symbols of a civilized society. To promote and secure property rights is the most effective approach to wealth of people and mightiness of country.For a long time, there has been an antinomy between two perceptions on property. One thinks that private ownership is the root of all evil and property rights need to be abrogated to eliminate evil; the other advocates respecting and protecting property rights. Since the Human Being is selfish,the property rights is designed. Consequently two institutions of property rights were established: western capitalist countries established the institution of private property rights with inviolability of private property as the principle, and traditional socialist countries established the institution of property rights that "eliminating private property and implementing state ownership of property" .The property rights system ofsocialist countries is divided into two stages,traditional socialist countries property rightsand reform socialist countries property rights.The first stage began from 1918 to 1991,until Soviet Union collapsed,the other socialist countries regarded Soviet Union as a model,eliminated private property and implemented state ownership of property. The reform and opening China is the typicality which allowed and encouraged recovery and development of private economy on the pure basis of public ownership,sinc then, private property rights have recovered,grown and developed.The theory of Utopian socialism on property rights equated private ownership with private property rights. The theory of Marxist classical writers on property rights always insists on distinguishing the ownership system that belongs to the category of production relations from property rights that belong to the category of superstructure. The elimination of private ownership system advocated by Marx is only about eliminating the right of using private property to exploit others, rather than eliminating private property itself. The "reconstruction of personal ownership system" presented by Marx is in order to let individuals to realize private possession of means of production under a free and non-dissimilated condition. In former Soviet Union, socialists represented by Stalin dogmatically comprehend the Marxist theories and formed the "Stalin Mode" , which were taken as the highest standards by other socialist countries; they advocated implementing unitary socialist public ownership, pushed socialization and relativization of property rights to the extremity and resulted in prevalent poverty. In 1991, Soviet Union collapsed, which indicated the failure of Soviet mode and the beginning of complete privatization.The evolution of private property rights in contemporary China can be divided into two stages, eliminating private property rights and evolution private rights.Before the reform and opening since 1978, China copied the property institution of the former Soviet Union, and forcibly implemented unitary public ownership and deprived property rights with the following modes: the mode of forcible deprivation of properties of landlords and rich peasants through land reform in rural areas; forcible deprivation mode in rural collectivization movement; and peaceful redeem mode under powerful authority on capitalists and private owners in cities and towns.After 1978, the Communist Party of China abandoned the Soviet Union type of communism, step on the road to socialism with Chinese characteristics, and on the basis of unitary public ownership allowed and encouraged recovery and development of private economy, and since then private property rights have recovered, grown and developed. The Third Plenary Session of the Eleventh Central Committee started a new era of reform for China. The reform abandoned the Soviet Union type of communism, decided to walk on its own a path to build the socialism with Chinese characteristics. The growth of property rights in China presented three modes of evolution:The first is rural property rights growth mode. Through the Party' s recognition and encouragement on rural household contracted responsibility system, the peasants acquired personal freedom and the right of contracted operation of land; their properties received acceptance and achieved growth, the creativity of peasants found its expression in fixing farm output quotas on a household basis, developing township and village enterprises, setting up small cities and towns, and taking up temporary or permanent jobs in cities, etc. The system of fixed farm output quotas on a household basis unlocks the beginning of the peasants land property rights;The township and village enterprises abolishes the situation which the agriculture can only be holded in the countryside,and the industry can only be holded in the cities,opening a rural industrializepath Chinese characteristics;The small coties and towns,which builded on the township and village enterprises,abolishes the situation which the man in the countryside only be a farmer and the men in the cities only be citizen,opening a rural town path with Chinese characteristics;Taking up temporary or permanent jobs in cities is also the great creativity of the Chinese peasants,which can increase the peasants income greatly.The creations of the peasants set China free from the shackle of Soviet Union mode and opened a new era of reform and opening.The second is the mode of urban property rights. The Party applied the achievements made in rural reform to urban reform, and through the contractual management responsibility system of state-owned enterprises and the policy of allowing small urban businesses of industry and commerce, it developed the concept and practice of property rights in urban areas. The growth of property rights in urban areas found its expression in the development of nonpublic economy. The growth of nonpublic economy found its expression in idealistic liberation,adjusting its policies,amendingthe Constitution and laws and offering support in practice ,etc. providing idealistic soil for the growth of property rights through idealistic liberation; secondly, the Party adjusted its policies, encouraging and guide the growth of property rights, offering people policy support to build up family fortunes, and providing support in practice for the growth of property rights; thirdly, through amending the Constitution and laws, the State put property rights under the protection of the Constitution and laws.and the finally,the nonpublic economy can develop rapidly under these supports.From the fetishism of public ownership, to allowing and encouraging the development of nonpublic economy, China' s reform cause kept opening new pages and property rights were able to rapidly developed.The third is the mode of property rights in special economic zones. The Party and the State Government established special economic zones in Shenzhen and etc, and implement preferential policies, promoting the growth of private property rights through opening and inviting foreign investment. The credit of the growth of property rights in special economic zones goes to the creativity of politicians and reformers. With great theoretic courage and political wisdom, they established special zones for market economic experiment in China that had implemented planned economy for a long time, opened an important levee breach for the market-oriented reform, and laid the foundation for China for later justifiably establishing the reform objective of socialist market economy.Looking back on the history of evolution of property rights since 1949, we find out that the Party has played the leading role in China' s evolution of property rights, and formed China' s basic route of developing on the pure basis of public ownership and promoting growth of property rights, i.e.The understanding of the Communist Party of China about the private property rights gradually becomes profundity according to the understanding about the essence of the socialist countries.The protection about the private property rights also enclose these two principles,which socialist public ownership is the principal part and joint wealth.The growth and protection of the private property rights is the representative of the socialism with Chinese characteristics.That is to say,the road to socialism with Chinese characteristicsis the road on its own leading under the Communist Party of China,neither dogmatically comprehending Marxist theories,nor copying the other countries former.This study thinks the growth and protection of the private property rights has greatly contributed to China economic development and the social transfer,but it also causes great changs on the construction of the income assign and the property,the social conflict starts gradually. wealth is testing the Party' s governing capability. To promote the State' s ability of create and control wealth has become an important aspect of the State' s capability. The testing of wealth on national capability finds its expression in three aspects: promotion of wealth creating; promotion of capability of protecting property; promotion of capability of allocating wealth. Looking back,considering and summarizing the relation among property rights,institutional evolution and national growth from the theory and the practice has become a great task of the socialist.