Social Sciences in China (Chinese Edition)

No. 12, 2023

How National Poverty Alleviation Action Responds to Differentiated Needs—Targeted Poverty Alleviation and Its Contribution to Knowledge

(Abstract)

Lü Fang and Huang Chengwei

From the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, the Party established a system of targeted poverty alleviation that inscribed a great miracle in the history of human development. We can learn from China’s experience that in order to take targeted measures to combat poverty, developing countries cannot simply follow the decentralized poverty reduction method advocated by Western development theory. Rather, it is necessary to simultaneously address the three key aspects of “high-quality information production,” “effective mechanisms for linking policy supply and demand,” and “integrated policymaking and policy coordination,” to build an “integrated multilayered governance structure.” China’s tough battle against poverty has fulfilled its solemn commitment to “a moderately prosperous society in all respects, leaving no one behind,” which demonstrates the outstanding institutional advantages of the poverty alleviation with Chinese characteristics. In a broader sense, targeted thinking constitutes an important intellectual and methodological dimension for understanding and promoting the Chinese path to modernization.