Although China's Special Economic Zones (SEZs) have already been widely known, they are under-studied, and the existing literature is missing certain topics such as the study of official discourses on these SEZs. What this study attempts to address are these questions: Does the Chinese political discourse on SEZ development change in both the domestic and international contexts? How does the Chinese discourse adapt to the domestic and international audiences and adjust to their conjuncture? The authors search and analyze official five-year plans for discrepancies between discourses and interpretations from ministry to ministry, and between the Chinese and English versions of the official discourse. The aim is to introduce discourse analysis to this topic, contributing to the discussion a broader description and analysis of SEZ dynamics, as well as an overview of their adjustments in accordance with the ever-evolving Chinese political and economic projects.
TopIntroduction
Since the 1990s, the number of special economic zones (SEZs) worldwide has continued to increase significantly. As of 2019, there were approximately 5,400 SEZs in the world, and “at least 500 more zones (approximately 10 per cent of the current total) have been announced and are expected to open in the coming years” (UNCTAD, 2019, p. 128). The concept of SEZs can be broadly understood as a framework, of which there are different types, various names, specific roles that they play, and corresponding modes of operation. SEZs have five main positive effects: (1) they stimulate exports to promote the economic development of a region or an entire country; (2) they attract foreign investment through special fiscal or non-fiscal policy incentives; (3) they expand the labour market and provide more employment opportunities; (4) their spillover effect can drive the development of relatively backward areas; (5) they reduce the development cost of enterprises through agglomeration, which also facilitates the development of these enterprises and improvement of their performance (World Bank, 2017, pp. 15–27).
In 1978, the third Plenary Session of the 11th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) marked the beginning of the “reform and opening up” policy. Meanwhile, the decision to shift the CPC’s focus to economic construction was made. Soon after, China took the lead to establish SEZs in Shenzhen, Zhuhai, Shantou, and Xiamen as windows for China to “open up.” As a result, China’s economy has developed rapidly since 1980, with its real GDP growth staying positive throughout and always besting the world average (Figure 1). In a speech that marked the 40th anniversary of the establishment of the Shenzhen SEZ, President Xi Jinping (2020) said that Shenzhen and other SEZs have accumulated valuable experience in the 40 years on reform and opening up, thus not only must SEZs continue to develop, they must also do better and perform at a higher level. Table 1 shows this process, divided into four phases, and lists different types of SEZs and major development strategies that China has proposed in recent years. In fact, after the establishment of the first group of SEZs, China has constantly experimented with and expanded opening up. No matter from the coastal cities, along the Yangtze River, towards the inland, or from the border and cross-border cities to overseas economic and trade cooperation zones, China has set up various types of SEZs at different times, in conjunction with national development strategies to promote economic development and reform.
Table 1. Different Types of Special Economic Zones in China
| Timeline | SEZ Types |
| 1978 | Phase I — Reform and opening up — The germination period of “Bringing in” and “Going out” |
| 1979 | CSEZ — Comprehensive Special Economic Zones |
| 1984 | OCC — Open Coastal Cities |
| 1984 | CN-ETDZ — China National Economic and Technological Development Zones |
| 1988 | CN-HTIDZ — China National High-Tech Industrial Development Zones |
| 1990s | SCSZ — Special Customs Supervision Zones |
| 1992 | CBECZ — China Border Economic Cooperation Zones |
| 1992 | SNA — State-level New Areas |
| Post 2000 | Phase II — Steps towards internationalization |
| 2001 | Chinese accession to the WTO |
| 2003 | CCBECZ — China Cross-Border Economic Cooperation Zones |
| 2006 | COCZ — China Overseas Economic and Trade Cooperation Zones |
| Post 2013 | Phase III — The Belt and Road Initiative (China going out, going global) |
| 2013 | CPFTZ — China Pilot Free Trade Zones |
| 2015 | CCBECPZ — China Cross-Border E-Commerce Comprehensive Pilot Zones |
| Phase IV — Regional domestic and functional integration |
| 2015 | Coordinated Development for the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Region |
| 2016 | China in the IMF SDR |
| 2019 | The Framework Plan for New Land and Marine Routes for Western Regions |
| 2019 | Outline of the Yangtze River Delta Regional Integrated Development Plan |
| 2019 | The Development Plan for Guangdong–Hong Kong–Macau (Greater Bay Area) |
| 2020 | Hainan Free Trade Port |
Source: Adapted from Leandro & Li, 2020, pp. 5 & 10.