"Openness Isn't Enough"

I was surprised that this article was NOT written by another socialist poli sci intellectual with the conceit of understanding ECON 101...
This article was actually written by a person that seems to understand that "'reform with openness' can produce economic change without political liberalization." Mary Gallagher of the University of Michigan argued that China's liberal economic reforms have spared her from the "shock therapy" of Russia. Reforming gradually, she says, has strengthened instead of weakened the CCP.

Could this be true? The implications of this article would be one of the following: Either China did not liberate enough (but this surely could not be because Gallagher then argues that it would have gone through 'shock therapy' as Russia) or should China have liberated at all? One thing we do know is that there are less Chinese below the poverty line today and there have been no Mao-like famines since the end of a socialist economy. Another thing we do know is that Chinese today, for the most part, are concerned more with making money than with what the government in Beijing looks like: is it Communist? Democratic? Black, Blue or Red is all the sam eto them as long as they can make money...That is for now..

So, as far as the Chinese one-party state goes, it is here to stay, at least on paper, for another 10-15 years.