China’s Leader Urges Opening Communist Party to Capitalists

China’s President, Jiang Zemin, declared that private business owners should be allowed to join the Communist Party of China. “China's leaders have recognized the importance of private businesses in absorbing the state sector's excess workers and in improving the economy's global competitiveness as the country prepares to enter the World Trade Organization.” The incorporation of business people into the party could signal a major improvement in the social and political status of once-suspect ‘capitalist-roaders’. – YaleGlobal