Can't help posting some excerpts of this interesting article for those of you interested in the directions that China could or could not take based or not based on the past... Enjoy!

It is certainly not taught in textbooks, but Mao’s record was nothing short of a disaster: The Great Famine of 1958-61 — the result of a course of industrialization known as the Great Leap Forward — caused starvation not seen on a scale since Stalin’s collectivization. Meticulous research by the journalist Yang Jisheng and the historian Frank Dikötter has estimated the death toll at anywhere from 36 million to 45 million. Meanwhile, Mao lived in luxury. […] Politically weakened by the economic disaster, Mao in 1966 launched the Cultural Revolution, plunging the country into a decade of turmoil, tearing families apart and eliminating what decency remained in society.

The “reform and opening” that Deng began in the late 1970s, after Mao’s death, led to unprecedented economic growth, but also yawning imbalances in the distribution of wealth and soaring inequality. Coupled with a lack of respect for land rights, many peasants and workers have felt powerless in the midst of head-spinning economic change, internal migration and choking pollution. […]Therefore, many Chinese became nostalgic for the leftism of the Mao era. […] The cult of Mao is the greatest obstacle to social transformation in China. Looking backward will lead China away from what it needs today: real political reform. China must embrace the rule of law, not the lawlessness that could lead to a modern-day Cultural Revolution.
"China Must Purge Mao's Ghost" on the New York Times of Dec 25 2013

Crikey, what a good post! As a result I have ordered Mao's Great Famine by Frank Dikotter. Thanks ,mate.

I will say this though. In general China has some freedoms which many of us do not have in the west. Like the freedom to go down-town without much risk of being beaten to a pulp by drunks, as in The UK. It is generally safer for women and children to wander unescorted in China than it would be in the West. Let's hope they don't copy us too closely in the future.