The Hopkins-Nanjing Center notes with regret the passing of Wan
Li (万里 ), former chairman of the National People's Congress, pioneering
reformer in China’s top leadership, and a friend and supporter of the Hopkins-Nanjing Center from its
earliest days. Wan Li passed away on
July 15 at the age of 98 in Beijing.
Wan Li is well known for the agricultural reform policies he
implemented in the 1970s, when he was party chief for the eastern province of
Anhui. These reforms helped to launch the household-responsibility system that
would gradually replace the commune system.
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| Wan Li in 1981 |
Less well known is the role Wan Li played in the establishment
of Hopkins-Nanjing Center. In 1979, on a visit to the United States, Wan had met
with Johns Hopkins University Professor Professor Chih-Yung Chien (钱致榕).
Professor Chien was at that time working closely with then-Hopkins President
Steven Muller to help realize their vision of creating a joint Sino-American
educational enterprise that would help ground US-China relations in mutual
understanding. "Steve and I wanted Americans to learn about the real China
and the Chinese to learn about the real United States," Chien says. Chien shared this vision with an enthusiastic Wan
Li in 1979, shortly before Wan Li was promoted to the central leadership in
Beijing. Meanwhile, President Muller had begun discussions with then-Nanjing
University President Kuang Yaming, and the outline of the Hopkins-Nanjing
Center for Chinese and American Studies began to take shape. On a visit to
China in September 1981, President Muller was invited to Nanjing to work on the
details of a formal agreement. He was also invited by Wan Li to the Great Hall
of the People in Beijing, where the historic agreement to establish the
Hopkins-Nanjing Center was signed.
After five years of preparation, The Hopkins-Nanjing Center was
ready to open in 1986. Wan Li’s contributions to its founding were not
forgotten. In October, 1994, Johns
Hopkins University held a special ceremony at the Hopkins-Nanjing Center to award
an honorary degree to Wan Li, who had recently retired as Chairman of the
Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress. William Richardson, who
had succeeded Steven Muller as President of Johns Hopkins University, presented
the commendation to Wan and praised his important contributions to education,
to US-China relations, and to the Hopkins-Nanjing Center.
Written by Jill Huang, SAIS Student
