A Reflection on China’s Economic Reform from the Perspective of Catholic Social Teaching

It has been nearly four decades since China initiated its economic reform in 1978. In spite of the fact that it brought the unprecedented economic growth to China, the reform is viewed by many (including myself) as problematic, and has recently seemed to be caught in the dilemma between recession and inequity. This article intends to explore the structural flaws of China’s economic reforms in the light of modern Catholic social teaching, especially the basic theological principles it builds in explicating activities in political-economic spheres. On the basis of the Catholic understanding of economic liberty, market, government, and equity, this article tries to provide a public theological agenda for China’s economic reforms, in order to help solve the problems they are facing. Meanwhile, based on the same theological standpoint, it also gives a critical assessment of the New Left’s negation of liberal economy.


INTRODUCTION
Started at the end of 1978 and initiated by the former top leader of Chinese Communist Party, Deng Xiaoping, China's economic reform, with the objective of establishing and improving the market economy system, has effected great economic and social changes in China during the last dozens of years. While, admittedly, some of these changes can be viewed as remarkable achievements, the others cannot. One This essay uses non-sexist language, but the sexist expressions in the direct quotations from papal encyclicals will be kept unchanged.
Last but not the least, imago Dei indicates that man has a destiny that transcends the merely material or physical aspects of human life. Human being, as an existence made from dust but also with spirit from God, never completely fulfill himself / herself within the dimension of created goods. Rather, continuously extending and renewing one's spiritual life should be viewed as a crucial part of the integral development of the human person: 'he is a spiritual being, open to transcendence and to the discovery of more penetrating truths, thanks to his intellect, by which he shares in the light of the divine mind.' 13 Through learning and exploring previous human culture, one can push the boundaries of human knowledge; through acting in relation to others responsibly and learning to be virtuous, one can develop human morality; by making use of creativity and initiative in trying to satisfy human needs through work, one can improve and develop greater skills; and, by appreciating and creating artworks, one can promote aesthetic sense and enrich his or her humanity.
Although human flourishing cannot be equated to the material and physical wellbeing, this does not mean that matter should be seen as evil or unimportant. The social tradition asserts that 'the human person cannot do without the material goods that correspond to his primary needs and constitute the basic condition for his existence; these goods are absolutely indispensible if he is to feed himself, grow, communicate, associate with others, and attain the highest purposes to which he is called'. 14 Furthermore, these two kinds of existence interrelate with each other and indeed are in mutual perichoresis, that is, co-inherent. Therefore, any effort that tries to separate them or emphasize solely the spiritual existence will be in vain, and ignores the fact that the material existence of human is the stage on which the drama of redemption is being putted.
These three implications of imago Dei-the human person as the subject, the social nature of human being, and human constitution as matter and spirit-build together the foundation for the Catholic church to understand the integral development of the human person. One must view human flourishing in these three aspects as a whole and not separated. More than that, they are in practice conditions for each other. Both initiative and collaboration are necessary for economic prosperity. Economic prosperity, in turn, could provide a more solid basis on which human persons express their agency, establishing complicated social networks and nurturing virtues. For these reasons, the economic life could be seen as an axis around which all the different dimensions of human development interact, both positively and negatively.
In Laborem exercens, John Paul even claims that by subduing and dominating the earth, human work stands as a sharing in the activity of the Creator, namely, cocreation. 15 It is not surprising, therefore, that the economic life has always been a key topic, if not the most important one, in the Catholic social tradition.
What must be added here is another reality of human existence, which, even though not as an implication of imago Dei, is equally crucial for the social tradition elaborating the integral development of the human person. That is the Fall and the consequent entrance of sin into the world. Although sin was not an original part of human nature, now it is truly an indelible mark in that nature. The social tradition has deeply realized this fact and for that reason adopts a realistic way, both embodied in the ends it sets for human development and the means to fulfill them, in discussing the social issues. This could be no more explicitly expressed than in Centesimus annus, where John Paul puts it: Man tends towards good, but he is also capable of evil. He can transcend his immediate interest and still remain bound to it. The social order will be all the more stable, the more it takes this fact into account and does not place in opposition personal interest and the interests of society as a whole, but rather seeks ways to bring them into fruitful harmony. 16 Based on the anthropological insights stated above, the Catholic church confirms three permanent principles at the very heart of her social teaching. These principles are the common good, subsidiarity, and solidarity. All of them could be seen as the Church's approved ways to promote human flourishing and to fulfill the integral development of the human person.
The common good, defined as 'the sum total of social conditions which allow people, either as groups or as individuals, to reach their fulfillment more fully and 7 more easily", 17 stands as the decisive one among and the centre of the three principles. The phrase, 'the sum total of social conditions', contains two implications.
First, it indicates that the task of Catholic social teaching is not creating the allinclusive end for people living in different corners of the world. Rather, the best possible society, which is in practice the immediate objective of the social teaching, would be a society with 'all conditions that assist, as distinct from directly cause, people to achieve self-mastery'. 18 Second, it makes 'the common good encompasses all spheres of social life, not just the economic. ' 19 Closely related to the common good are the other two principles which could also be viewed as the appropriate means to achieve the former. The principle of subsidiarity, which was formulated clearly for the first time by Pope Pius XI in his encyclical, Quadragesimo anno, and articulated more fully by John Paul II in Centesimus annus, means that [A] community of a higher order should not interfere in the internal life of a community of a lower order, depriving the latter of its functions, but rather should support it in case of need and help to coordinate its activity with the activities of the rest of society, always with a view to the common good. 20 This principle stems directly from the personalism of Christian anthropology which views the individuals as agents and is at the same time rooted in the instrumental nature of the common good. 21 Most of the time, therefore, the social entity whose activities constrained by the principle of subsidiarity is the state and the governments at all levels. One of the merits of viewing subsidiarity as an appropriate means to promote the common good lies in the fact if the former is provided by the latter, then not only can the state not decide the ends of the human development, it can also not prevent individuals or associations from creating themselves the conditions for their own flourishing, unless its action stands as the last resort. That is why both John XXIII and John Paul II warned against the excessive development of the welfare state and the dependency it creates. 22 By solidarity is meant the idea that all persons are interrelated and interdependent with each other, and therefore that they are obligated to serve each other and to be responsible for each other in all kinds of group. 23 It serves the common good as its end: 'it is out of love for one's own good and for that of others that people come together in stable groups with the purpose of attaining a common good.' 24 Thus, solidarity stands at the same time a means to reach the common good and an end of development because the relational and social dimension of human nature could also be fulfilled in it. Unlike subsidiarity which exists as a negative principle aiming to constrain the actions of the state, solidarity, on the contrary, stands as a positive principle which encourages individuals, associations and the state all actively committing to the common good.

CATHOLIC SOCIAL THOUGHT AND THE MARKET ECONOMY
How did the Catholic social tradition, then, evaluate the market economy, in terms of the Christian perceptions of human development and the permanent principles of the Church's social doctrine? The answer is rather complicated, partly due to the changing historical circumstances in which the social encyclicals were published, and partly due to the lack of precise and consistent terminology used by the popes. The latter, however, does not indicate that discussion of the market economy holds an unimportant place in the social encyclicals, but that more efforts must be made if we wish to grasp the real evaluation of the market economy as such behind diverse usages of the popes of political-economic terms such as 'capitalism' and 'liberalism', both of which are sometimes viewed by us as synonyms of 'market economy'. 25 In order to find a preliminary answer to the question above so that we could acquire the criteria to reflect China's economic reality, and at the same time prevent readers from falling into terminological confusion, the following discussion will, on the one hand, view the modern social tradition of the Church as a whole and try to give a concise of its thought of the market economy, and on the other avoid using the terms with ideological color such as 'capitalism' or 'liberalism', unless necessary.
In spite of the fact that no one pope has ever sacralized the market economy and that even some of them severely criticized the existing capitalism in their days, the Catholic social tradition, generally speaking, endorses the market economy as an effective economic institution and at the same time in accord with human nature. This endorsement, in practice, consists of two different but inseparable approvals. One is the approval of private property, and the other is of the free market as the basic mechanism for the allocation of resources.
Concerning private property, almost all the popes since Leo XIII treat it as a necessary condition for the practice of the human person's economic freedom. Leo argues that the right to private property stems from natural law, 26 and this argument has been inherited by some of his successors who likewise emphasize the importance of private property, especially Pius XI and John Paul II. For the latter, the right to own property 'is fundamental for the autonomy and development of the person'. 27 At the same time, all the popes mention above also emphasize in varying degrees that the possession of property is not an absolute right and must be subordinated to the universal destination of goods. 28 Consistent with this approval of private property is the Church's attitude towards the free market. Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church affirms explicitly that 'the free market is an institution of social importance because of its capacity to guarantee effective results in the production of goods and services', and that 'in many circumstances, the free market is the most efficient instrument for utilizing resources and effectively responding to needs". 29 From these two affirmations comes the Church's endorsement of the market Pius XI uses it in a lightly negative sense in his Quadragesimo anno and John Paul II makes a careful differentiation of two different kinds of usages of the term. 26  where he was trying to answer the question about whether capitalism could be the path to true economic and civil progress: The answer is obviously complex. If by 'capitalism' is meant an economic system which recognizes the fundamental and positive role of business, the market, private property and the resulting responsibility for the means of production, as well as free human creativity in the economic sector, then the answer is certainly in the affirmative, even though it would perhaps be more appropriate to speak of a 'business economy', 'market economy' or simply 'free economy'. The market, in this aspect, is exactly the place where people have every opportunity to make choices, to be creative and initiative, and to solve problems themselves. This is the reason why John Paul reminds us repeatedly that 'a business cannot be considered only as a "society of capital goods"; it is also a "society of persons"', 33 and the advantage of the mechanisms of the market is above all that 'they give central place to the person's desires and preferences '. 34 In parallel with this endorsement of the market economy, the social tradition, from 30  its very beginning, denounces socialism (the central planned economy plus public ownership), and has never viewed it as a feasible economic option. Pope Leo XIII recognizes in socialism its nature as the suppression of private property, and therefore, even against the background of the extreme unjust distribution of wealth and the poverty of the workers of his time, refuses clearly community of goods which he sees as the main tenet of socialism. 35 Following the footsteps of his predecessor, Pius XI opposes even more strongly and describes it as 'extreme harm' to the working class. 36 John XXIII's attitude towards socialism is equally clear-cut by stating that 'no Catholic could subscribe even to moderate Socialism'. 37 However, it is again John Paul II who in Centesimus annus shed light on the theological foundation of the Church's opposition to socialism: [T]he fundamental error of socialism is anthropological in nature. Socialism considers the individual person simply as an element, a molecule within the social organism, so that the good of the individual is completely subordinated to the functioning of the socio-economic mechanism …. Man is thus reduced to a series of social relationships, and the concept of the person as the autonomous subject of moral decision disappears, the very subject whose decisions build the social order. 38 What is more, due to its suppression of the human person's initiative, socialism does not only bring harm to human dignity, but also leads to economic ruin. Taking the events of 1989 as vivid examples, John Paul asserts that the inefficiency of the economic systems in the socialist countries of the Eastern and the Central Europe should not be 'considered simply as a technical problem, but rather a consequence of the violation of the human rights to private initiative, to ownership of property and to freedom in the economic sector'. 39 Compared to the realistic insight of human nature in the anthropological basis on which the market economy build itself, socialism also ignores the fact that self-interest, as one of the conditions with which people exercise their freedom, cannot be violently suppressed. Wherever this happens, 'it is replaced 35  The approval that the Catholic church gives to the market economy, however, pertains only to its potentiality and validity in promoting human flourishing, but not to its absoluteness and sufficiency in doing that. Regarding the principle of the common good, a good economic system should benefit as many people in the world as possible, whether by providing them opportunities to exert their initiative and creativity, or by satisfying their own and others' material and spiritual needs through that exertion. In the case of the market economy, it alone does not automatically bring about the common good, and certain conditions are necessary for its normal functioning. Moreover, even an ideal market economy is still not enough for the integral development of human persons. With a profound insight in this, the Catholic social tradition also elaborates two other important dimensions which are both indispensible for a society running the market economy.
The first dimension, which every social encyclical devoted many pages to discuss, stands as the role of the state. The first pope who defined the role of the civil power as responsible for realizing the common good is Leo XIII. 41 At the same time, however, the means by which the state could realize it was not clarified by him. Along with the development of the social tradition, especially the formulation of the principle of subsidiarity, the appropriate action of the state to the economy is now defined by the Church as creating 'situations favourable to the free exercise of economic activity', and establishing 'limits for the autonomy of the parties in order to defend those who are weaker '. 42 While the social tradition since Rerum novarum has never embraced laissez-faire liberalism, it has always equally been against excess government intervention which could diminish freedom and initiative of the human person. What is, then, the appropriate role the state should play concerning economic affairs? First, 'the fundamental task of the State in economic matters is that of determining an appropriate juridical framework for regulating economic affairs', because 'economic activity, above all in a free market context, cannot be conducted in an institutional, juridical or political vacuum '. 43 Second, the state is obligated to 'sustain business activities by creating conditions which will ensure job opportunities, by stimulating those activities where they are lacking or by supporting them in moments of crisis', and to 'intervene when particular monopolies create delays or obstacle to development'. 44 By doing both, the state does not commit to attain most or even all common goods by itself, just as what the welfare state has tried to do. It serves rather to create and keep the impartial market competitive environment and make people as many as possible be able to participate initiatively in the economic life.
However, as what stated above, a relatively ideal market is still not sufficient for attaining the common good, even the economic one. A main part of this insufficiency comes from the so-called 'market inadequacy'. 45 This refers to the situation where market outcomes cause serious economic and social disadvantage, usually due to the incapability of people in participating effectively in the market. The task of the state in this aspect should be direct material or financial assistance, through redistribution programmes, to those whose needs are not met by the market.
To accomplish the three tasks above, a democratic political institution is required.  According to the economic discourse contained in Catholic social doctrine, therefore, this economic system stood as orthodox 'socialism'. No later than the year of 1993, the direction of reform toward the establishment of a market-oriented economic system had been explicit, and private business also obtained its status of legitimacy.
Since then, the development of Chinese economy has moved to its second phase, which, notwithstanding its 'Chinese characteristics', has generally been accepted as 'market economy'.
In spite of the fact that this institutional reform is simultaneously a socio-economic conversion and an ideological one, its core and foundation are still the establishment of a new economic institution, which mainly includes the reforms in the following areas: (1) The reform of ownership that allows the development of private business as complementary with state-owned business; (2) The reform of the price mechanism that allows commodity prices decided by the market rather than by the government; (3) The establishment of different markets of production, including the commodity market, the technical market, the financial market, the land market, and so on; (4) The establishment of a juridical framework for regulating the market economy; (5) The establishment of a social security system.
While it has greatly extended the economic freedom of both the individuals and the associations, the market economy coming from this reform nevertheless leaves vast room for state intervention. This can be seen, firstly, in the existence of a large number of state-owned enterprises possessing the monopoly in industries such as finance, energy, transportation, metallurgy, and telecom. In the meantime, the state involves itself deeply in the allocation of economic resources in almost all industrial sectors by holding the executive authority of the examination and approval of commercial enterprises. Besides, the state intervenes the market frequently by using different kinds of macroeconomic regulatory measures including taxation, credit, laws, and even executive orders and direct investment.
Comparing this description of the market economy in China with the elaboration of the free economy in the Catholic social tradition, it is rather clear that the former can be defined at most as a 'hybrid economy' which combines both the factors of the market economy and that of the statist economy. However, before carefully analyzing this economic system in the light of the criteria we have found in the social tradition, it is necessary for us to take a look at its outcomes. These outcomes, as both positive and negative, will in the next section become one part of the basis on which our conclusion emerges.
Can we say that China's economic reform is by far successful? In many senses, the answer would be definitely yes. Nevertheless, 'social injustice' is still a superficial description of the socially undesirable outcome produced by China's market economy. In a deeper sense, the problem of the contemporary Chinese society could be appropriately defined as 'the fracture of social structure', a phrase used by a professor of sociology at Tsinghua University, Sun Liping, to describe the social structure of contemporary China. By using this term, Sun claims that a part of the Chinese population has been thrown outside the social structure, as he puts it: 'these people, rather than living at the bottom of the social structure, has been located outside that structure.' 57 Moreover, this fracture is 'embodied in many levels of the cultural and social life'. 58 In recent research, Sun goes further on this subject and believes that the fractured structure is becoming solidified, which means that the social mobility in China has decreased and that each social stratum has begun the process of reproducing itself. At the same time, he notes, the antagonism between the two sides of the fracture is also becoming increasingly obvious. He describes this phenomenon as 'the oligarchic development of the upper class versus the populist development of the underclass'. 59 China's economic reform, thus, is a double-edged sword. As mentioned above, what has accompanied dramatic economic growth is startling social inequality and rapid differentiation of the social structure. Both of the latter outcomes may lead to social instability some day in the future and would do harms to the sustainability of China's economic development. With regard to this, conducting a cause analysis of both the gains and losses of China's economic reform is needed. This analysis could, of course, be an economic one, but, as the Catholic social tradition has shown us in other examples, it could also be a theo-economic one.

CHINA'S ECONOMIC REFORM AND ITS THEOLOGICAL DIAGNOSIS
Chinese economic performance during the last thirty years has attracted intense global attention. Since the start of the last decade, an increasing number of Western intellectuals concerned about economic development has turned to the Chinese model of the economic development for inspiration. Some of them even consider that China's market economy has provided a ready-made alternative to liberal capitalism which has been dominated in most Western countries for a century and was expected to achieve global dominance inevitably. 60 As a witness of such a mushroom growth, I think that this attention is fair and reasonable. After all, any mode of economic development which can last rapid growth for more than thirty years deserves serious consideration. However, it is precisely because of its enormous appeal that this mode must be treated much more carefully and comprehensively. ownership and central planning at that time mean that almost all productive activities were controlled by the state. Under such a circumstance, both economic initiative and creativity were wildly suppressed, and the Chinese economy had been suffering from the inefficiency and the lack of incentives.
On the contrary, the market economy reform tries to give much more respect to economic freedom of the human person by endorsing both the private business and the free market. The result, therefore, is the great liberation of potential economic initiative and creativity which had always been owned by Chinese people. In this way, after having adhered to the socialist economy for more than thirty years, Chinese Communist Party (CCP) finally achieved a limited but important consensus with the Catholic social tradition on the human person, which recognizes both the human agency and self-interest, and their indispensability for modern economic life. As John Paul II puts it: Whereas at one time the decisive factor of production was the land, and later capital-understood as a total complex of the instrument of production-today the decisive factor is increasingly man himself, that is, his knowledge, especially his scientific knowledge, his capacity for interrelated and compact organization, as well as his ability to perceive the needs of others and to satisfy them. 61 From the perspective of the social tradition, therefore, the most important dynamic behind China's economic take-off is rather clear, that is, the economically liberated human person. As we know, China had and still have the largest population in the world, a fact indicating that once they were given economic freedom, even if only a part of them or a part of that freedom, it follows the unleashing of the great economic vitality. However, it is equally undeniable that during the whole process of China's economic reform, the state has always been playing an indispensable role which ensured the smooth implementation of it.
On the one hand, in the early stage of marketization of privatization, where the great economic structural transformation was happening, the Chinese government enacted a range of laws and regulations in due course and also utilized a series of economic measures to both provide guidance to the transformation and to prevent economic activities from falling into chaos. On the other hand, whenever the global economic environment deteriorated, the state acted as the stabilizer of economic life through using all kinds of economic tools with great skills and flexibility. Both of these are indeed good practices of the requirements made by the social tradition to the state, that is, the positive involvement in economic matters without substituting them.
Unfortunately, however, where China's market economy succeeded hides also the origins of injustice. Specifically, in giving people economic freedom and allowing the state to intervene the market, China's economic reform has largely ignored both solidarity and subsidiarity, and this, in turn, led to the loss of the common good.  64 In the situation of China's market economy, contrarily, by disallowing or obstructing private business to enter the economic sectors such as finance, energy, transportation, metallurgy and telecom, the state has largely suppressed economic freedom in these industries. Instead of assisting the economic activities of its citizens, the state has taken over them. In the long term, this will definitely do harm to vitality of Chinese economy and create dependency of individuals to the state. What state monopoly has also created is distributive injustice, which is brought about essentially by unfair competition and reflects in the relatively more comfortable income and welfare of employees in these enterprises.
Second, even after the economic reform, the allocation of economic resources in China has still been controlled considerably by the state, although not entirely decided by it. This is mainly embodied in two facts: (1) The executive authority of the examination and approval of commercial enterprises has been held by the state; (2) So far China's economic development has depended heavily on massive governmental investment in infrastructure. These forms of intervention themselves are obviously contradictory to the principle of subsidiarity, because the market allocates resources by agreement, yet the state allocates resources by coercion. Moreover, in view of China's authoritarian regime where the separation of powers has not been observed, and the practice of the executive power has been lack of supervision and restraint, it is hardly a surprise that authorities have frequently manipulated the allocation of economic resources and give advantages and privileges to particular market subjects, which includes relatives and friends of officials at various levels and all kinds of elites who would like to ally with the political power. The root of the problem, in terms of Pius XI, lies in that the state 'cannot curb and rule itself', 65 and this stands as one important reason that the social tradition emphasizes subsidiarity and at the same time democracy as an indispensable means to guarantee subsidiarity.
Another vested interest group that has come into being in China's authoritarian market economy is consist of those corrupted rent-seekers among officials at various levels. 'Rent-seeking' is an idea originated by Gordon Tullock and elaborated more fully by the American economist, Anne Krueger. It refers to the non-productive profit-seeking activities which attempt to gain coercive monopoly so that the rentseeker can make an excess profit, or 'rent'. 66 In her article, 'The Political Economy of the Rent-Seeking Society', Krueger maintains that it is government restrictions upon economic activity that give rise to rent-seeking. 67 Moreover, she also differentiates legal rent-seeking and the illegal one. Despite that both result in reduced economic efficiency and reduced actual wealth creation, the former refers to those public, legal instances of rent-seeking, while the latter 'takes other forms, such as bribery, corruption, smuggling, and black markets.' 68 Concerning China's authoritarian market economy, massive illegal rent-seeking activities have generated from the abovementioned executive examination and approval of commercial enterprises. During this process, a number of bureaucrats as well has become the rent-seeker. Through exercising legitimately or illegitimately the executive power, they solicit and extract 'bribe' or 'rent' from those market subjects who intend to take advantages and privileges in the market. During the last thirty years, rent-seeking has become the primary form of corruption in China.
Other than violating the principle of the universal destination of goods, 69 using monopolistic political power in rent-seeking activities has also greatly cumbered further economic reform in China. Firstly, the existence of rent-seeking opportunities has disinclined the political power to grant more economic freedom to individuals and associations, that is, to follow the principle of subsidiarity. Second, in spite of the fact that rent-seeking activities of bureaucrats could also be regarded as a business, it is rather one that is destructive and should be placed outside of the market. Within it, there is no real initiative, creativity and those virtues that fair market competition requires and cultivates. 70 Third, even though those economic elites have gained excess profits through illegal rent-seeking, harassed the free market, and reduced economic efficiency, they have still driven China's economy by constantly putting profits into reproduction. In comparison, bribes accepted by corrupted officials can hardly become capital and be utilized by any economic activity due to its unlawfulness.
Instead of participating in the co-creation with God, what they have been involved is only a zero-sum game.
In fact, the destructive impact of this cronyism has also extended beyond the market economy. As we have elaborated above, economic life is an area that relates to all dimensions of human existence. What John Paul II affirms, therefore, concerning the relationship between the market economy and human morality could be analogized to that relationship in the Chinese situation. While for John Paul an ideal market cultivating virtues, what has happened in contemporary China is that a distorted market encourages vices. Dishonesty, falsehood, abuse, favouritism and corruption have existed universally in almost every corner of the society. Although these also partly resulted from the cultural deviation brought about by the Cultural Revolution as well as from utilitarianism and hypocrisy prevailing in the educational system, it is hard to deny that the cronyist nature of the market economy has contributed much to the barbarism of contemporary China. 71

CONCLUSION
After thirty years of mind-bending economic growth, China's economic reform has come to a crossroad. Based on the Catholic social tradition, a paradox could be clearly discerned as existing in China's market economy. Compared to the era of planned economy, on the one hand, the partially liberated economic freedom in China's market economy has indeed created far more wealth for this country and its citizens.
On the other hand, however, excess intervention in the market from the authoritarian state has still suppressed a significant part of economic initiative and creativity, and While providing a diagnosis of China's economic reform, within the social tradition could also be found the antidote to the problem. According to the principles of subsidiarity and solidarity, the state should return to its appropriate role in relation to the market economy, that is, the establisher of juridical framework, the stabilizer of the economic activities, the defender of market fairness and the provider of basic welfare, rather than the monopolistic profit-seeker. This decrease of direct interference would, in turn, increase the vitality of the market economy, and at the same time reduce rent-seeking activities of both bureaucrats and entrepreneurs. Only then, might the existing injustice in China be alleviated and the common good be promoted. However, prior to any concrete social policy, the state must foremost realize that 'The human person is the foundation and purpose of political life.' 72 On this point, the Catholic social tradition would necessitate a complete rethinking of the political ethic and anthropology of the Chinese Communist Party.