China became a member of the World Trade Organization (WTO) on 11 December 2001, after the agreement of the Ministerial Conference. The admission of China to the WTO was preceded by a lengthy process of negotiations and required significant changes to the Chinese economy. China's membership in the WTO has been contentious, with substantial economic and political effects on other countries (some times referred to as the China shock), and controversies over the mismatch between the WTO framework and China's economic model. Background Until the 1970s, China’s economy was managed by the communist government and was kept closed from other economies. Together with political reforms, China in the early 1980s began to open its economy and signed a number of regional trade agreements. China gained observer status with GATT and from 1986, began to work towards joining that organisation. China aimed to be included as a WTO founding member (which would validate it as a world economic power) but this attempt was thwarted because the United States, European countries, and Japan requested that China first reform various tariff policies, including tariff reductions, open markets and industrial policies. Preparations After the 1997 Asian financial crisis, China sold off or merged many unprofitable state-owned enterprises. In 1998, China reformed the State Council to greatly reduce the mandate of the State Planning Commission and increase the mandate of the State Economic and Trade Commission. This shift also corresponded to the change in premiership from Li Peng to Zhu Rongji, the latter of whom strongly believed that China needed deeper economic restructuring. This restructuring, which had been happening since the 1980s, included crackdowns on corruption and the establishment of chambers of commerce. The World Trade Organization Ministerial Conference of 1999 and related 1999 Seattle WTO protests were the penultimate step before Chinese accession. United States' role Formal diplomatic relations between the United States and the People's Republic of China were not established until 1979, and even afterwards, trade relations were hampered by the high tariff rates of the Smoot–Hawley Tariff Act of 1930. After the two governments settled asset claims dating from the Korean War in 1950, Congress temporarily granted China most favored nation status in 1980. However, Chinese-American trade was still hindered by the Jackson–Vanik amendment of 1974, which made trade with the United States contingent on certain human rights metrics. The Jackson–Vanik restrictions could not apply, however, to WTO members, because of