Heavy Industry: Heavy Industrialization and Its Evaluation

Abstract

This chapter inspects the heavy industrialization during the Mao era and examines its legacy to the Deng era. Heavy industrialization in the Mao era laid the foundations of heavy industry, providing favorable conditions for economic development in the reform and opening-up era. The presence of heavy industry was maintained during the Deng era. Moreover, during the Mao era, the embryonic forms of some of the reform and opening-up policies could be found in the policies related to heavy industrialization, such as the utilization of foreign plants, technology, and funds, and the exploration for a better SOE management system. On the other hand, heavy-industry-oriented development strategy during the Mao era aimed at strengthening national defense, and as a result, investment efficiency was not improved. However, the challenge of improving investment efficiency was also a difficult issue during the Deng era.