Highlighting the Guiding and Supporting Role of Technological Innovation

Question: China aims to basically achieve socialist modernization by 2035. Based on the study of the spirit of the Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee, what special significance does the “15th Five-Year” period hold?

The construction of China into a modern socialist country has been the consistent theme in formulating and implementing five-year plans. This is a historical process of progressive advancement and continuous development, requiring persistent effort and successive struggles. The Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee pointed out that the “15th Five-Year” period is a crucial time for laying a solid foundation and exerting comprehensive efforts to basically achieve socialist modernization, holding an important connecting role in the process of socialist modernization.

The so-called “continuing the past” means advancing the modernization cause following the “14th Five-Year” plan. The major achievements during the “14th Five-Year” period have laid a solid foundation for continued efforts. The so-called “opening the future” means creating favorable conditions for the final sprint during the “16th Five-Year” period. These three five-year plans represent the beginning, comprehensive effort, and final decisive battle respectively.

Question: What are the key tasks that need to be addressed during this crucial connecting five-year period?

The Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee identified more than ten major deployments. This is mainly reflected in continuously promoting the completion of a series of major strategic tasks.

For example, comprehensively and deeply implementing the new development philosophy, accelerating the construction of a new development pattern, promoting high-quality development, and continuously meeting people’s demands for high-quality living. While ensuring effective improvement in the quality of economic development, reasonable quantitative growth should be achieved. This is an important support for reaching the per capita GDP level of moderately developed countries in ten years.

Another example is accelerating high-level technological self-reliance and self-improvement, leading the development of new quality productive forces. Especially in areas such as original innovation and key core technologies, new breakthroughs should be made, driving industrial upgrading and talent cultivation. On this basis, further emphasis should be placed on building a strong domestic market, adhering to the close integration of benefiting people’s livelihoods and promoting consumption, investing in materials and investing in people; expanding high-level opening up, using opening up to promote reform and development, and sharing opportunities with countries around the world for common development.

Question: The Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee clarified that promoting high-quality development is the theme, with reform and innovation as the fundamental driving force. How should we understand the connotation and relationship between these two?

Promoting high-quality development is the theme of China’s economic and social development during the “15th Five-Year” period. The Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee clearly stated that we should focus on the real economy in developing the economy, adhere to the directions of intelligentization, greenization, and integration, accelerate the construction of a manufacturing powerhouse, quality powerhouse, aerospace powerhouse, transportation powerhouse, and cyber powerhouse, maintain a reasonable proportion of manufacturing, and build a modern industrial system with advanced manufacturing as the backbone.

At the same time, the Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee clearly required seizing the historical opportunity of the new round of technological revolution and industrial transformation, coordinating the construction of an education powerhouse, technology powerhouse, and talent powerhouse, enhancing the overall efficiency of the national innovation system, comprehensively strengthening independent innovation capabilities, seizing the commanding heights of technological development, and continuously generating new quality productive forces. This further clarifies the relationship between technological innovation, new quality productive forces, and high-quality development, highlighting the guiding and supporting role of technological innovation.

Mobilizing the Whole Society to Participate in Modernization Construction

Question: The Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee pointed out that China’s development is in a period where strategic opportunities and risk challenges coexist, with increasing uncertain and unpredictable factors. During the “15th Five-Year” period, how can we ensure decisive progress in basically achieving socialist modernization?

First, confidence must be enhanced. In the next five years, China’s development environment will face profound and complex changes, with heavy tasks in reform, development, and stability. Strategic determination must be maintained, especially recognizing that China’s economic foundation is stable, with many advantages, strong resilience, and great potential, and the supporting conditions and basic trend of long-term improvement remain unchanged;必胜信心 must be enhanced, especially seeing the comprehensive advantages of the socialist system with Chinese characteristics, the super-large market, complete industrial system, and rich talent resources. By concentrating on our own

Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee

The Fourth Plenary Session of the 20th Central Committee is a key upcoming meeting of the Communist Party of China (CPC). Historically, such plenums are major political gatherings where the Party’s central leadership discusses and decides on significant national policies and personnel matters. This session is expected to focus on critical issues of Party discipline and governance.

14th Five-Year

The “14th Five-Year” is not a physical place or cultural site, but rather a national strategic plan from China. Officially called the 14th Five-Year Plan for National Economic and Social Development, it outlined the country’s development goals for the period from 2021 to 2025. The plan focused on themes like technological self-reliance, high-quality growth, and green development, continuing a planning system that began in the 1950s.

15th Five-Year

The term “15th Five-Year” refers to China’s 15th Five-Year Plan, a national development blueprint that will guide the country’s economic and social policies from 2026 to 2030. As a future plan, it does not have a historical record yet, but it will continue China’s long-standing tradition of using these centralized plans to set strategic goals for national progress.

16th Five-Year

“16th Five-Year” is not a specific place or cultural site, but a reference to China’s 16th Five-Year Plan, which is a national economic and social development blueprint. These plans are policy documents that guide the country’s development strategy over five-year periods, with the 16th iteration likely covering the years 2026-2030. They are significant in modern Chinese political and economic history for directing national priorities and resource allocation.

manufacturing powerhouse

“Manufacturing powerhouse” is not a specific place but a term describing a region or nation that dominates industrial production. Historically, places like Manchester, England (during the Industrial Revolution), the Ruhr Valley in Germany, and more recently, the Pearl River Delta in China have earned this title. These areas became economic engines by concentrating factories, labor, and infrastructure to mass-produce goods for global markets.

aerospace powerhouse

An “aerospace powerhouse” refers to a nation or corporation that is a dominant global leader in the design, manufacturing, and launching of aircraft, spacecraft, and related systems. Historically, this term emerged during the 20th century, driven by the Cold War space race and rapid technological advancement, with entities like NASA and companies such as Boeing and Airbus establishing their legacy. These powerhouses are characterized by their massive investment in research, innovation, and complex engineering projects that push the boundaries of flight and space exploration.

transportation powerhouse

A transportation powerhouse is a facility that historically generated power for transportation systems, such as electric streetcars or early subways. These buildings, often built in the late 19th or early 20th century, housed massive steam engines or generators. Many have since been repurposed, but they remain important landmarks of industrial and urban history.

cyber powerhouse

“Cyber powerhouse” is not a specific historical place or cultural site, but a modern term describing an organization, city, or nation that is a dominant force in the digital and technological realm. For example, a country like Estonia is often called a cyber powerhouse due to its advanced digital society and pioneering e-governance initiatives. These entities are defined by their recent history of innovation in information technology, cybersecurity, and the digital economy.