BUSINESS WITH THE PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF CHINA

Abstract

This article reviews the international trade and business aspects of the new long-term objectives of the People’s Republic of China’s (PRC). It reviews these objectives, known as the “four modernizations”, which include agriculture, military, industrial and scientific modernization, in light of the PRC’s generally constant goals of national independence, security, modernization, socialist transformation, effective leadership and party control. It examines the impact of these goals on mainland China’s foreign trade, examining in particular the administration of foreign trade, export and import transactions, the new Joint Venture law, banking, financing, taxation, dispute settlement regime and the general body of commercial law. It concludes that Japan’s special capacity for trading with China and plans for a Pacific Economy Community could see the political and economic centre of gravity shift to the Far East.