Chapter 1Introduction
After striving for 15 years, China finally got the formal approval from the World Trade Organization's (WTO) 142 member countries, marking a new phase in China's transition to the market-based economy.
Against a global slowdown, China has made its first year of WTO membership a great success, with both better than expected economic growth and steadfast fulfillment of its WTO commitments. The Economist (02/15/2003, vol. 366) described "China's economy is already enormous. In dollar terms, its GDP is the sixth largest in the world, just smaller than France's.…
