Lecture by James Kynge is now available to listen to online

There can be no more striking a consequence of the last three decades of Chinese economic reform than the emergence of a middle class that may now number more than 150 million people. Diligent and upwardly-mobile, this swelling demographic is re-shaping the Chinese economy and conditioning the business strategies of the international companies that seek to do business in the world’s fastest growing market. But who are the people that make up this vast cohort? What do they think, and how do they view the world around them? In the 18th century, the American middle class – rallying behind slogans such as “No taxation without representation!” – fought a long struggle for a say in their country’s political destiny. Are China’s emerging consumers hard wired to repeat America’s experience, transferring the influence they wield at the cash registers to the ballot boxes of the future? Or has China, as its government professes, found an alternative model for development?