China Headlines: How is the Chinese Dream changing the world? (2)

CHINA'S CONTRIBUTIONS TO SHARED COMMUNITY OF DESTINY

Over the past decade, 475 Confucius Institutes have brought Chinese culture to 126 countries and regions.

China has become a responsible player in international affairs.

In war-torn Yemen, the Chinese Navy this year helped evacuate Chinese nationals as well as nearly 300 foreign citizens out of the country.

Chinese rescuers were among the first international relief teams to reach earthquake-devastated Nepal. China has also dispatched medical teams to Africa since the Ebola outbreak struck the continent.

Moreover, China has proposed building the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st Century Maritime Silk Road trade infrastructures to connect dozens of countries in Asia, Europe and Africa. Their economic development will become intertwined.

China also proposed establishing the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) with a planned authorized capital of 100 billion U.S. dollars. To date, 57 prospective founding members, including the United Kingdom, Germany and other Western countries, have agreed on the AIIB's charter.

NEW MODEL OF PEACEFUL RISE

Both China and the world have undergone sweeping changes over the past four decades. This historical period, to Zheng Bijian, former executive vice president of the Party School of the CPC Central Committee, is marked by unprecedented progress.

For China, this period began when it embarked on reform and opening up in 1978, and for the world, the period kicked off since the end of the Vietnam War, Zheng said.

A distinct feature of the new global landscape is the peaceful rise of a number of developing countries, China included, and the further growth of developed nations.

While some people still have a Cold-War mentality and conflicts continue to ravage some countries, peaceful development has become the theme of today's world.

Some may ask, will a rising China brawl with other countries or even aspire to rule the world?

In May, Xi reiterated to visiting U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, "The broad Pacific Ocean is vast enough to embrace both China and the United States."

China is proposing a new type of major-country relationship in which nations can cooperate in virtually all sectors spanning trade, investment, culture and military, and countries can address major global or regional issues through close consultation.

Tsinghua University professor Liu Jiangyong believes China's ideas can provide a new way of thinking for the world in addressing religious, ethnic and geo-political conflicts.

CHINA'S OWN PATH

Prof. Zhang Weiwei at Fudan University said the realization of the Chinese Dream is based on China's own path. It proceeds from reality rather than worshiping books, constantly summarizing and learning experience and lessons from itself and others, and advancing bold but cautious reforms.

The success of China's approach depends on whether China, through peaceful development, can build a modern socialist country with a population of 1.3 billion that is prosperous, strong, democratic, culturally advanced and harmonious, according to Zheng Bijian.

Such a path has never been proposed by emerging powers in modern times, Zheng added.

The problems that China has been addressing in recent years are also the problems of the world. In a little over three decades, China has lifted 600 million people out of poverty, and now keeps a relatively high growth rate in a global economic downturn.

The country is seeking to overcome the middle-income trap. It is also trying to achieve common prosperity after some of its people get rich, and is addressing environmental issues in development.

CPC'S INFLUENCE EXPANDS

To know China, one must understand the CPC, Robert Lawrence Kuhn, author of "The Man Who Changed China: The Life and Legacy of Jiang Zemin", said in an article for the South China Morning Post.

"The only way to grasp [China's] current conditions and anticipate its future prospects is to understand what the Party is and how it works," he wrote.

The CPC, with 86 million Party members, leads the world's biggest developing country. Having ruled for 66 years, the 94-year-old CPC has never stopped renewing itself.

Concerned with self-discipline, the CPC launched the "Eight-point" regulations at the end of 2012, banning extravagance and formalism among CPC officials and cadres.

Its anti-corruption campaign has seen many senior officials investigated, including Zhou Yongkang, once a member of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee.

The momentum continues. The Party launched a campaign to improve the conduct of officials, focusing on the "three stricts and three honests". The slogan refers to "being strict in morals, power and self-discipline", along with "being honest in decisions, business and behavior".

In terms of governing the nation, the CPC is leading China to adjust to the "new normal".

The CPC's latest rhetorical slogans, the "Four Comprehensives", outline principles for realizing the Chinese Dream through "comprehensively building a moderately prosperous society" as a strategic objective, and "deepening reform", "advancing the rule of law" and "strictly governing the Party" as building blocs.

DREAM FOR FUTURE

What is China's future? This question intrigues people around the world.

To China observers, the Chinese Dream is awakening people's imagination about the future, and demonstrating humanity's aspiration for a better world, particularly in the period after the global financial crisis, because the Chinese Dream has created new hope and faith for development.

The future remains to be tested in practice, but China is creating history, of its own and for the world at large. Enditem

(Xinhua writers Meng Na, Li Zhihui, Ren Ke and Tian Ying contributed to the sto