Charles Burton, China’s Big Shift: Politics & Society Before & After the 1978 3rd Plenary Session of the 11th Central Committee, October 15, 2014. poster, PowerPoint, summary.
Thirty six years ago a revolution began that transformed China’s political and economic landscape. At the 3rd plenary Deng Xiaoping effectively became the paramount leader of China and launched the “four modernizations” that reoriented China away from Mao’s social and economic policies.
Professor Burton was studying in Shanghai at Fudan University through this period, and has subsequently lived and worked in China, and studied China. Drawing on his archive of photos and anecdotes Professor Burton’s presentation reflected on the exciting transition from the Mao-era and how that transition continues to be reflected in the Chinese Communist Party’s policies and Chinese society today.
Charles Burton obtained a Ph.D. from the University of Toronto in 1987 after studies at Cambridge University in England, and three years at Fudan University in Shanghai in the late-’70s. He speaks, reads and writes Chinese with native fluency.
He has worked for the Communications Security Establishment Canada (CSEC), and was seconded from his 25 year career at Brock University to the Canadian Embassy in Beijing as a Counsellor for Political Affairs from ’91-’93 and ’98 until 2000.
He is author and editor of books and articles about China and North Korea and frequently comments in the Canadian and Chinese press, radio and TV on Chinese and North Korean affairs
