1974-76: MA, Chinese language and literature, Stanford University
1970-74: BA magna cum laude, Chinese language and literature, University of Minnesota Twin Cities
AWARDS:
2017: Foreign Educator of the Year, presented by the State Administration of Foreign Expert Affairs; Chinese Government Friendship Award
CAREER:
2017-present: President and CEO, US-China Strong Foundation
2013-present: Nonresident senior associate, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
2010-present: Senior adviser, Vermilion Partners
2014-17: Associate dean, Peking University's Yenching Academy
2014-17: Professor of management practice, Peking University's Guanghua School of Management
2008-13: Managing director and senior adviser, Hill+Knowlton Strategies, Beijing
2005-08: Chairman of China operations, Shaklee Corp
1998-2005: President, National Committee on US-China Relations
1986-1998: Various senior management positions with Cargill
How search for knowledge helped lift China's reform
Under the new policy, farmers were able to exercise formal control of their land as long as they sold a contracted portion of their crops to the government, which resulted in an increase in production.
Holden returned to Beijing at the end of 1980, and the following year he spent six months traveling across the country as an interpreter.
He visited many places up and down the Yellow River, and was in the Tibet autonomous region for five weeks. During this trip, he saw a lot of China and got a sense of what was happening in the countryside.
"So many farmers' lives were improved dramatically by reform and opening-up," he said. "I realized that if they had the incentive to produce their own food and sell it, and they had a market to sell it in, lots of things became possible."
He said reform and opening-up removed the barriers that prevented the Chinese from being successful.
In addition to material benefits, the opening of Chinese people's minds has made a deep impression on Holden, a veteran China expert who served as president of the National Committee on US-China Relations from 1998 to 2005 and later became an associate dean at Peking University.
"That's actually the biggest change in China - the acquisition of knowledge, which was not available before," he said. "The idea that the average person could have a passport and travel overseas was an incomprehensible and impossible idea even in 1985,'86 or'88."
In 1980, when Holden was living in Washington, China established an encyclopedia publishing house. "They realized there were just big gaps of knowledge. They started the conversation with the Encyclopaedia Britannica in Chicago," he said.
In the summer of that year, China Encyclopedia Publishing House announced it would translate the Encyclopaedia Britannica into Chinese. Holden served as interpreter at a news conference in Washington to announce the partnership.
To Holden, it was a major signal that China was ready to learn about the outside world and wanted as much knowledge as possible.
"That was a major step to opening-up. That was the beginning to show a clear purpose from the Chinese people to be open to new ideas. Over the past 40 years, China has accomplished a great deal, and the Chinese people have been enabled to fully utilize their work habits and entrepreneurial spirit to create a better future for themselves."
