While expectations for policy changes are not high as Beijing marks the 30th
anniversary of the reform era, a clutch of forward-looking cadres and
intellectuals are taking advantage of the occasion to press for bolder
measures, particularly in political liberalization.
This is despite the fact that the leadership under President Hu Jintao and
Premier Wen Jiabao seems totally preoccupied with economic woes such as
slackening exports and fast-rising unemployment. Moreover, conservative
elements within the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) hierarchy have decried
perceived Western support for the Dalai Lama as signs of a larger
"conspiracy" against the Chinese socialist system.
Hu is scheduled to deliver a keynote address at the Great Hall of the People
later this month to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Third Plenary Session
of the 11th CCP Central Committee, when Deng Xiaoping kicked off the reform and
open-door era. Yet the mainstream thinking is that Hu would focus on upbeat and
"patriotic" elements such as China's economic and technological achievements,
which will be cited to justify the "ruling-party" for life status of the party.
The Hu-led Politburo's hard-line attitude toward political reform was evident
in the harsh treatment meted out to some of the approximately 300
intellectuals, including scholars, writers and journalists who signed Charter
08, a petition demanding that Beijing honor the 60th anniversary of the UN
Universal Declaration of Human Rights by introducing systems and principles
including elections, judicial independence and freedom of speech and religion.
Modeled after Charter 77 of Czechoslovakia, Charter 08 urged Beijing to make
radical changes to a political system that "continues to produce human rights
disasters and social crises, thereby constricting China's own development but
also limiting the progress of all human civilization". The authorities
responded by detaining the leaders of the campaign, including well-known writer
Liu Xiaobo and political scientist Zhang Zuhua. (See
China kills chickens to frighten monkeys, Asia Times Online, Dec 20)
As the country is buffeted by austere economic realities, the relatively
reformist mood of late 2007 and early 2008 seems to have been forgotten. About
a year ago, Peking University Politics Professor Yu Keping, deemed an advisor
to Hu, caused a stir by penning an essay called "Democracy is a good thing."
Moreover, a group of officials in southern China, including Party Secretary of
Guangdong Province Wang Yang, spoke enthusiastically about a "third wave of
thought liberation".
Since the summer, however, Wang has been concentrating only on solving export
problems in his province. Professor Yu seems to also have mothballed his more
radical ideas when he was recently interviewed by the official media about the
experience of three decades of reform. While talking to China News Service, Yu
dwelled on the least controversial of the "reforms", eradicating corruption and
allied economic crimes. "We should fight corruption at its roots," he told CNS.
"More effort should be put on the selection and promotion of officials, putting
limits on power, and [improving] the cadre responsibility system and policy
transparency."
However, much stronger - and increasingly impatient - calls for thorough-going
reform, particularly liberalization of the political structure, are being made
by retired officials and senior academics who are often referred to as "public
intellectuals" (gongzhong zhishi fenzi) in the Chinese media. Given that
many joined the CCP in the 1930s and 1940s, senior public intellectuals are
given more leeway by censors and state security agents to speak up. Among the
most vociferous is respected economist Wu Jinglian, a one-time confidante of
former premier Zhu Rongji.
Writing in a couple of official papers, the 67-year-old government adviser
noted that the authorities "must quicken the pace of political reform". Wu
complained that pledges made at the 15th and 16th CCP Congresses such as
"building a country with rule of law" had yet to materialize. "A modern market
economy needs to have the superstructure guarantees of constitutional
government, democracy and rule of law," he pointed out. "We can no longer
afford to tarry and wait." Wu noted that owing to the lack of checks and
balances, the phenomenon of "rent seeking", or corruption, had mushroomed. He
estimated that such improper and illegal activities accounted for up to 30% of
GDP.
Hu Fuming, a renowned political philosopher, also railed against further
procrastination about political reform. A retired professor, Hu was widely
credited for having fired the first salvo for "thought liberation". In
mid-1978, he published the article "Practice is the sole criterion of truth,"
which indirectly laid into the blind worship of "Mao Zedong Thought"
popularized by Chairman Mao's chosen successor Huo Guofeng. Reminiscing about
his audacious gesture, Hu told the official media that "I was psychologically
prepared to go to jail" for running afoul of the powers-that-be.
The 73-year-old thinker revealed that he had this year been making speeches
around the nation "to add fire" to reform. "Reform must be all-rounded," he
said. "In tandem with economic reform, we should push forward political changes
and implement democratic construction with more enthusiasm." Referring to
President Hu's oft-repeated goal of "constructing a harmonious society", Hu
pointed out that "developing democracy and rule of law are the prerequisites of
building a harmonious society".
Advocates of no-holds-barred liberalization also include the children of
earlier-generation reformers whose avant-garde views underpinned the
pro-democratic student movement of 1989. Foremost among them is the son of
revered party chief Hu Yaobang, Hu Deping, who is now a vice-director of the
CCP United Front Department. Hu Deping's views have attracted notice because
his father, who died weeks before the June 4, 1989 crackdown, was a one-time
mentor of President Hu.
In his article on the 30th anniversary of reform, which was published in the
Guangzhou-based Southern Weekend newspaper, Hu Deping focused on the liberal
pronouncements of Marshal Ye Jianying (1897-1986). Ye, also a former chairman
of the National People's Congress (NPC), played a pivotal role in smashing the
Gang of Four in 1976. Hu quoted Marshal Ye as scolding the CCP leftists: "It's
as though implementing democracy amounted to a restoration of capitalism … Some
of our comrades become very nervous once they hear the word 'democracy.' They
seem to be afraid that this would be equivalent of abandoning the dictatorship
of the proletariat." The younger Hu also cited Ye's somewhat bitter comments on
China's rubber stamp legislature: "It [the NPC] has the title but no substance;
it has got things to do but no power." Wrote Hu: "I think it's the only time in
the history of the NPC that such words were pronounced."
How effective is the fulmination of public intellectuals such as Wu Jinglian
and Hu Fuming? Analysts say that while these big names seem to have been
marginalized within the CCP, they have huge networks, including access to
"princelings", a reference to the offspring of party elders such as Vice
President Xi Jinping. The 55-year-old Politburo stalwart and heir-apparent to
President Hu has been charged with drafting the party document summarizing
three decades of reform policy.
While Xi is usually regarded as cautious and risk-averse, particularly in
ideological matters, he is known to respect the liberal views of his famous
father, the late Xi Zhongxun. A close friend of Hu Yaobang, the elder Xi was
instrumental in helping Deng formulate market-oriented policies when he was
party secretary of Guangdong from 1978 to 1981. At least in the near term,
however, Vice-President Xi is expected to toe the overall line of maintaining
political stability and upholding the CCP's mandate of heaven.
The play-safe, stability-uber alles approach that may characterize the last
four years of the Hu-Wen administration is evident in remarks made by experts
in major think tanks such as the Central Party School (CPS), which is headed by
Vice-President Xi. In their assessment of the past three decades of reform,
these elite scholars have put the emphasis on what a Xinhua News Agency article
calls "assiduous effects to shake off the 'boom-bust cycle' of political
regimes".
According to CPS researcher Dai Yanjun, "under new historical circumstances,
only the CCP can remain China's ruling party". However, Professor Dai warned
that the party must "bolster its legitimacy by improving its governance ability
so as to win the resolute support of the broad masses". Other academics
interviewed by Xinhua pointed out that after ruling for 60 years, it would be
easy for the CCP to "lose its liveliness and vitality" - and that the
leadership must do its best to eradicate corruption and augment intra-party
checks and balances.
It seems clear, however, that substantial steps in reform are unlikely at this
time of great economic uncertainty - and social instability. In fact, a number
of think-tank scholars have put the government imperative on preventing the
infiltration of "hostile, anti-China foreign forces", usually a code word for
the United States. Ji Zhengju, a senior researcher at the Central Compilation
and Translation Bureau, a major official think tank, indicated that the CCP
must draw the right lesson from the demise of the Soviet and East-European
Communist Parties in the early 1990s. These political parties, Ji said, "had
gone astray by changing the overall direction of their countries".
The researcher added that it was due to the "maneuvers of anti-Communist
forces, plus the infiltration and plots of Western countries" that Soviet and
East-European parties lost their inner cohesion and embraced Westernization.
Earlier this year, the CPS and other party units had shown educational videos
warning CCP members of how central Asian countries such as Georgia and
Kyrgyzstan had undergone "color revolutions" due to the alleged subversion by
Western powers.
Indeed, during their marathon provincial tours the past fortnight, top leaders
including President Hu, Premier Wen Jiabao and First Executive Vice-Premier Li
Keqiang were mainly concerned with finding ways and means to generate jobs and
pre-empt unrest - not spreading the gospel about the next stage of reform.
Particularly active were the two Politburo members in charge of law and order:
Zhou Yongkang and Meng Jianzhu.
While touring Zhejiang, a province where thousands of factories have been hit
by export doldrums, Zhou urged law enforcement officers to pay minute attention
to information about social stability. "We must make early discoveries about
[social] contradictions and disputes, and make early attempts at reconciliation
and resolution," he told local officials. "We should ensure that minor problems
are solved [on the spot] in villages, big problems are resolved within towns,
and that contradictions will not disturb [central authorities]."
And after the terrorist attacks in Mumbai earlier this month, Minister of
Public Security Meng noted in a high-level conference that police nationwide
must raise their guard against violent incidents. "We must boost our
consciousness about fighting terrorism," he said. "We must look out for weak
links, strengthen the construction of anti-terrorist squads, and raise our
ability to handle emergencies."
Given the bunker mentality that seems to be prevalent among the CCP leadership,
it seems improbable that the Hu-Wen team will in the near future duplicate the
bold, visionary - and risky - reforms unveiled by late patriarch Deng 30 years
ago.
Willy Wo-Lap Lam is a Senior Fellow at The Jamestown Foundation. He is
the author of five books on China, including the recently published Chinese
Politics in the Hu Jintao Era: New Leaders, New Challenges.
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