On Apr.15, 2015, Professor Liu Baocheng, Director of CIBE, gave a lecture on Ethical Integrity in a Transformative China to a Swiss EMBA students’ delegation at UIBE. During Liu’s lecture, he spoke about his opinions between the successes and some concerns for China’s five generations of business leaders. Following is a brief summary of his lecture.
The first generation experienced huge price caps between regions under Deng Xiaoping Era. Due to the fact the capitalism combined with socialism, the second generation saw corruptions in the form of rent seeking leading to huge profit and buying out socialist factions.
The third generation introduced basic management to China, thus making them one of the most important contributors to the growth of China. This generation experienced a wide variety of growth and setbacks during the peak of this time period. Some important points that lead to growth within China was New Zealand being the first western country to recognize China’s ability. This fact has then lead Switzerland to sign a trade agreement with China. The agreement allows China to experience 15 years of transformation to a semi-market economy with the hopes of becoming a market economy by next year. Through domestic competition, China is trying to shift to a more eco-friendly market.
However, one of the most notable setbacks that occurred during this generation is the problem of pollution. China becoming a more global market has raised too many environmental concerns. Within the recent years, China’s reliance on coal for power supply is the worst in the world. While the world relies on about 25% of coal, China relies on 55%. However, currently the Chinese government is taking the necessary steps to lower pollution levels. The environment is not the only group who is being exploited. The rural areas generates 230 million migrant workers moving to big cities. The reason for their exploitation is due to these workers not having the proper documentation, a Hukou. The exploitation of migrant workers and the environment gives big companies more power resulting in an unproductive process.
Next is the fourth generation, who has been dubbed the money hungry generation. The people in this generation were given the opportunity to study overseas. The successful students who know their way around Wall Street and the likes have since returned home putting what they learned into practice in China. However, this results in the fourth generation off-smarting the third generation. But, the fourth generation has found new and innovative ways to do business and create new technology.
For the fifth generation, Professor Liu calls for them to sustain growth and development of the Chinese society. He has created a new program to help guide this generation on the right path and put an end to the money hungry people.
Some other concerns that were discussed during this lecture were doing business in China. It seems some Chinese companies think too rashly when agreeing on contracts with other companies. They do not take into accountability the business process or culture awareness. More concerns about the pollution and how China generates a lot of recourse that does not directly benefit them. Global resources that are produced in China are screened and soon after exported for the rest of the world’s use. Lastly, one way that the Chinese government is reducing exploitation of migrant workers is by creating a minimum wage and labor laws.
Finally, the lecture was closed in the heat discussion on related questions raised by the EMBA students. 
