Top-Level Design and “Crossing the River by Feeling for Stones”

There are no precedents for China’s reform and opening up. It is therefore necessary to take a correct approach and advance through trial and practice.

The relationship between top-level design and “crossing the river by feeling for stones” (feeling the way proceeding by careful and limited experimentation – “feeling the way” so to speak) is one of the major relationships that must be handled well in the course of comprehensively expanding the in-depth reform that Xi Jinping has called for.

“Feeling the way” is a method of reform that is distinctively Chinese and appropriate to China’s conditions. The effort is aimed at seeking objective laws from practice. There is a dialectical unity between top-level design and feeling the way. Top-level design and regional and short-term implementation should be mutually reinforcing processes. Macro planning and top-level design are needed to advance reform in a systematic, integrated and coordinated way. Meanwhile, bold experiments and breakthroughs are encouraged to bring reform to a deeper level. 

頂層設計和摸著石頭過河的關系

改革開放是前無古人的嶄新事業，必須堅持正確的方法論，在不斷實踐探索中推進。頂層設計和摸著石頭過河的關系，是習近平提出的全面深化改革需要把握的重大關系之一。摸著石頭過河，是富有中國特色、符合中國國情的改革方法。摸著石頭過河就是摸規律，從實踐中獲得真知。摸著石頭過河和加強頂層設計是辨證統一的，推進局部的階段性改革開放要在加強頂層設計的前提下進行，加強頂層設計要在推進局部的階段性改革開放的基礎上來謀劃。必須加強宏觀思考和頂層設計，更加注重改革的系統性、整體性、協同性，同時也要繼續鼓勵大膽試驗、大膽突破，不斷把改革開放引向深入。