FACULTY SPOTLIGHT
by Jacquelyn Lazo
From the Chinese Cultural Revolution to the Darden Classroom:
DENNIS YANG’S
Career as a Global Economist
D
ennis Yang did not become a well-respected global economist by accident. His interest in economics began at a young age. By the time Yang graduated from high school, he had written a thesis on Chinese tax reforms — one that would ultimately serve as the precursor to his dissertation in economics. But perhaps Yang’s dogged pursuit of an economics career began in his tumultuous childhood, not through his schooling. Yang grew up in the shadow of the Chinese Cultural Revolution, which broke out under Chairman Mao Zedong in 1966. Thousands of highly educated individuals were targeted for “reeducation” programs, and Yang’s family was forcibly displaced to a camp in the Chinese countryside in 1969, when Yang was only 3 years old. Yang was struck by the impoverished rural Jiangxi province to which his family had been relocated. “When a car passed by the village, dozens of children, all naked, would run after it amid a thick cloud of dust because they had never seen one before,” he recalled. “There, I got a sense of what poverty was about, and that left an impression on me.” His early observations on the rural-urban disparities are later reflected in his research on the role of structural transformations in the process of economic development. During the second half of the Cultural Revolution, Yang’s family was able to return to Beijing. After Mao’s death in 1976, China transitioned from a central planning system to a market-based economy. Yang witnessed this transformation and began to “realize that economic reforms are refreshing and powerful, and that they result in profound changes to society.” In high school, Yang was one of only two Chinese students chosen to study at the new branch of the United World College in Trieste, Italy.
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THE DARDEN REPORT SPRING/SUMMER 2013