(FORTUNE Magazine) – At the end of September, FORTUNE hosted the most successful global CEO conference in our history. Past meetings in Singapore, Barcelona, Bangkok, and Budapest have drawn good crowds. But this year's choice, Shanghai, proved an extraordinary magnet for the global business elite.

Jack Welch of GE came to China, as did Jacques Nasser of Ford and Hank Greenberg of AIG. Doug Ivester of Coke and Roger Enrico of PepsiCo made it; so did AOL's Steve Case and Yahoo's Jerry Yang. Time Warner's Gerald Levin (my ultimate boss) was there; so was Sumner Redstone of Viacom. Jorma Ollila of Nokia, George Fisher of Kodak, Martin Sorrell of WPP, Robert Kuok of Kerry Holdings--the list goes on and on. Some household names stood out in the crowd: Michael Dell, Ted Turner, Henry Kissinger, Robert Rubin.

The theme of the forum, "China: The Next 50 Years," was purposely pegged to the 50th anniversary of the People's Republic of China, which sent a few critics on both the left and the right into paroxysms of outrage at FORTUNE. But we were not there to serve their or anyone else's agenda, including that of the Chinese government. We had our own agenda going in: to explore the seemingly huge potential that China holds for the capitalist world, without being naive about the many social, structural, and political realities that make doing business there so difficult. (For a more complete report on the substance of the conference, see "The View From China.")

President Jiang Zemin kicked off the Global Forum with a provocative keynote address. He pledged good terms to create "a better environment for foreign enterprises investing here," then hastened to add, "We oppose any efforts by any country to impose its own social system and ideology on another country," an unveiled reference to China's U.S. critics. He pointedly declined to renounce the use of force against Taiwan.

As those of you know who saw the Oct. 11 issue of FORTUNE that led up to the forum, we didn't flinch in our journalistic treatment of these and other controversies. Meanwhile, our sister publication Time, which was leading a fact-finding tour of journalists and executives throughout China, had its issue on the 50th anniversary banned from newsstands.

The day after Jiang's speech, former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, who first visited China for President Nixon in 1971--when it was truly the dark side of the moon--spoke to our group and pleaded for perspective, using what has become a standard line for him: "China has been here 5,000 years, the U.S. 200. Their feeling is that they got by the first 4,800 years without our advice, and they can continue to do so."

Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew of Singapore--traditionally global business' best friend in Asia--spoke the next day, praising China's leadership for its progress in opening up its economy over the past 20 years; he bases his hopes for the country on China's younger generation, noting that over 100,000 Chinese students are now in America, Western Europe, and Japan.

Former Treasury Secretary Rubin stressed his commitment to advancing the cause of human rights and democracy around the world, but went on to say that he believes all such U.S. interests--including protecting national security--"are best served by engagement with China, by a constructive relationship with a strong and stable China."

It was a remarkable gathering, and it was far from uniformly upbeat. Our sessions were filled with blunt talk about corruption, environmental woes, financial reform, the rule of law (including human rights issues). What's important to remember is that, unlike the Soviet Union, China has chosen to join the rest of the world by growing its economy first, with political and social change to follow. Further growth will be tough without deeper structural reform, but the mere fact that FORTUNE could hold such a conference in China today signifies an enormous step toward openness from just a few years ago. Still, it isn't just the economy that's at stake here. If economic progress in China falters, political and social reform are certain to be the first casualties.