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We must pursue people-centered development and fulfill their desire for a better life. Forty years of reform and opening-up have taught us that it is the Chinese Communists' original aspiration and founding mission to seek happiness for the Chinese people and rejuvenate the Chinese nation. It is also why we started reform and opening-up.

Our Party comes from the people, has its roots among the people and works for the benefit of the people. Serving the people wholeheartedly is the fundamental purpose of the Party. Therefore, meeting the fundamental interests of all our people is the starting point and ultimate goal of all our work. Our policy-making should be based on what the people support, approve of and are content with. We should comply with the people's aspirations, respect the people's opinions, be attentive to public sentiment, and be dedicated to improving the people's wellbeing. We need to formulate and implement the right theories, guidelines, principles and policies to lead the people forward, and at the same time draw impetus from the people's creativity and demands for development. We must ensure the people share the benefits of reform and opening-up, and be motivated to engage in further reform and opening-up and socialist modernization.

On the path ahead, we must always have as our goal the people's desire for a better life. We must fulfill the Party's fundamental purpose of serving the people wholeheartedly, put into practice the mass line, and ensure the people's principal status. We must respect the expectations the people have expressed, the experience they have created, the rights and interests they enjoy, and the role they have played, so as to fully release their immense creativity. We need to improve our democratic systems, expand democratic channels, diversify forms of democracy, and enhance legal guarantees for democracy, so as to ensure the people enjoy democratic rights that are extensive and full, real and concrete, and effective and applicable in accordance with the law. We should address the people's needs, concerns and expectations, ensure that they share the achievements of economic, political, social and eco-environmental development, give them a stronger sense of having direct and substantial benefits, happiness and security, and continue to promote well-rounded human development and common prosperity for everyone.

(Source: Extract from Xi Jinping's speech at a grand gathering to celebrate the 40th anniversary of China's reform and opening-up at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China, December 18, 2018.)

This episode is presented by Michael Wang.