Sovereignty, Authority, and Power

Geographic Influences on Political Culture

• China has 1.3 billion people.

  • This ancient population was geographically protected and isolated.

• Deserts, mountains, and the ocean blocked the invasion. of China has 1.3 billion people. This ancient population was geographically protected and isolated.

• Mountain ranges, deserts, and the ocean blocked foreign influence.

• Today, most Chinese live in the east, especially near the coast, separated from the west by a massive plateau.

• The large navigable rivers that cross China allowed people and culture to mix.

• North and south have different climates and terrain, so a cultural divide persists. Westerners are often non-Han and isolated from Chinese society.

Components of Chinese Political Culture

• Confucian values: China’s dynastic roots were centered on Confucianism, which taught adherence to social hierarchy and a suppression of individual ambition in the name of achieving social harmony of the collective group.

  • Confucianism a system of philosophy or religion, based on the ideals of Confucius and prominent in Chinese culture, that emphasizes social harmony and self-improvement

• Ethnocentrism: Ancient dynasties spoke of China as “The Middle Kingdom,” or in essence, the center of human civilization.

  • “Middle Kingdom” a Chinese conception of the state of China and its people as central to the story of the world; evidence of Chinese ethnocentrism

  • The idea of Chinese cultural superiority is sometimes still expressed today in the context of China’s rise to superpower status as some kind of destiny for the Chinese people to achieve.

  • Tibetans an ethnic minority group in China, concentrated in the Tibet region; frequently a concern to China as a potential separatist movement

  • Uighurs an ethnic minority group in China, predominantly Muslim and concentrated in the Xinjiang region, that is frequently a concern to China as a potential separatist movement

• Isolationism: As European imperialism reshaped the world in the late nineteenth century, China fell under the influence of powers from Britain, France, Germany, and later Japan.

• Maoism: Mao Zedong, the leader of the Communist Revolution in the 1930s and 1940s, left an indelible impression on Chinese politics with his charisma and the ideals of his movement.

• Deng xiaoping theory: Deng Xiaoping succeeded Mao in leadership of the Chinese Communist Party after Mao’s death and rejected Mao’s ideological commitment to leftist values for a more pragmatic approach.

• Informal relationships/patron-clientelism: While official positions and formal authority matter in modern China, it is just as important to understand that much of Chinese political operation depends on informal relationships and friendships within the CCP.

  • Guanxi, or “connection,” is often used to describe a political actor’s ability to achieve a political goal, based on personal connections to those in power.

  • Guanxi Chinese word for “connection”; it is used to describe the importance of patron-client relationships in Chinese politics

Political and Economic Change

• China is one of the world’s oldest civilizations, and while many of China’s ancient practices dating back to dynastic rule are still visible today, China endured a series of major upheavals in the twentieth century that brought about the modern Chinese state.

Ancient Dynastic Rule

• Chinese politics operated under a system very similar to European feudalism during the dynastic age (approximately 2800 b.c.e.–1911).

• A powerful ruling family with a large army claimed the mandate of heaven, basically ancestors guiding the destiny of the Empire from above through their collective wisdom.

• Mandate of Heaven during the dynastic period, a description used in China for the choice by collective ancestral wisdom of who should hold political power

The Republic of China (1911–1949)

• The early republic was quickly divided into two rival political movements; the Kuomintang (KMT) founded by Chiang Kai-Shek, and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) led by Mao Zedong.

• Kuomintang (KMT) the ruling nationalist party of China from 1927 to 1948; it fought against the Communist Party during the Chinese Civil War

• Chinese Communist Party (CCP) the ruling party of China since 1949; it established the People’s Republic of China and a one-party system

• Chiang Kai-Shek became president of China in 1928, and could not maintain Sun’s good relationship with the CCP.

• Chiang outlawed the CCP, and then waged a military campaign with KMT forces to root the CCP out of the country.

The Revolution of 1949

• Long March a retreat by the communist forces (1934–1935) during which Mao and the communists recruited new forces and built support among peasants across the countryside

• Taiwan also called the Republic of China, an island to which KMT nationalists fled after losing the Chinese Civil War; ruled independently but still claimed by the People’s Republic of China

• “Two Chinas” a reference to the claims of both the communist government in mainland China and the nationalist government in Taiwan to be the legitimate rulers of China; the term is increasingly used to describe the major disparity in economic development between China’s cities and rural areas

• Mao's forces waged a propaganda war in peasant villages as they fled the KMT.

• The 1934–1936 Long March of retreat galvanized the peasantry, who would support Mao's future Chinese People's Republic.

• After Japan invaded Manchuria in 1937, Mao became a national hero after the Japanese surrender in 1945.

• Mao's forces defeated Chiang Kai-Shek and his supporters, forcing them to flee to Taiwan.

• In 1949, Mao declared the People's Republic of China, while Chiang and most of the world believed the KMT nationalists in Taiwan were still China's legitimate rulers.

  • Thus, "two Chinas" existed for most of the 20th century.

  • Taiwan remains part of China's future.

Building the People’s Republic of China (1949–1966)

• Maoism a system of thought and ideology, based on the ideals of Mao Zedong, that emphasizes collectivism, egalitarianism, and the necessity of individual participation in class struggle

• Democratic-centralism and mass line: Much like Lenin’s vision, the Maoist state would be run by an inner revolutionary elite who would professionalize the revolutionary organization.

  • Mass line described the connection the leadership must always maintain to the people, carefully listening to the wisdom of the masses.

  • Mass line a principle of Maoism emphasizing the need for political leaders and elites to stay close and connected to the peasantry

• Struggle and activism: Though leadership would be centralized, Mao insisted that development of the state could not come from the inner elites, but rather that change must come from the collective action and struggle of the revolutionary enthusiasm of the masses.

• Collectivism: Maoist thought values the good of the community above the good of the individual.

  • The expectation was that people should sacrifice their own interests for society’s well-being in the long run.

• Egalitarianism: Maoism rejected the old hierarchies of the dynastic age and sought to abolish all class distinctions, even those based on merit or scholarship.

• Hundred Flowers Campaign a policy under Mao Zedong from 1956 to 1957 that allowed open discussion and criticism of the policies of the Communist Party and their results; it ended in a crackdown against the dissidents

• In 1957 and 1958, Mao made a major break from the Soviet Union diplomatically, and launched a program known as the Great Leap Forward, a name that did not in any way match the results it produced.

• The Great Leap Forward attempted to force China’s transition from an agrarian society to a utopian socialist economy through rapid collectivization and industrialization.

  • Great Leap Forward an aggressive, forced collectivization and industrialization campaign starting in 1957 that resulted in disastrous famines and economic decline

• Great Chinese Famine a mass starvation event in China (1958–1962) that killed 20 to 45 million people and coincided with the policies of the Great Leap Forward

The Cultural Revolution (1966–1976)

• Cultural Revolution the term for the Chinese Communist Party’s policies from 1966 to 1976, which attempted to purify the ideology of the country of capitalist and democratic values and restore and enhance the Maoist ideology

• Personality cult the use of media, propaganda, spectacles, social controls, and other mechanisms by the state to promote an idealized and heroic image of the country’s leader

• Cadres work groups in communist systems that are led by ideologically committed Communist Party members rather than technical experts

• The Cultural Revolution also had relatively poor effects on the Chinese economy, and by Mao’s death in 1976, the CCP was divided into three factions:

  • Radicals: The radicals were the loyal Maoists who supported the ideological goals and methods of the Cultural Revolution.

  • Moderates: The moderates recognized many of the failures of the Cultural Revolution and sought to forge a more pragmatic policy program meant to modernize the Chinese economy for growth, even if growth led to some inequality in Chinese society.

  • Military: Military leaders played an influential role within the Party’s senior leadership because of the necessity of a large army to force compliance with the series of mass cultural campaigns.

Deng Xiaoping Theory and the “Four Modernizations” (1979–1997)

• The goals of Deng’s program were summarized as Four Modernizations: to make China a modern society in agriculture, industry, national defense, and science and technology.

• While Russia attempted to modernize rapidly through shock therapy, Deng led China on a course of gradual economic and political transformation in many ways:

  • Restoring agricultural markets: By creating town-village enterprises, or TVEs, Deng allowed peasants to decide for themselves if they would continue farming collectively or individually, and peasants were free to keep profits they earned from the sale of their produce (though they did not gain private ownership of the land they worked on).

  • Industry reform: Factories were to set prices and production based on supply and demand in the market, and Party leaders would no longer have control over their pricing and production decisions.

  • Opening of china: Deng gradually opened China to the global economy, inviting foreign investment by creating Special Economic Zones (SEZs) with no tariffs, and allowing multinational corporations to come in to do business in China, hiring Chinese workers and selling their products in the Chinese market.

  • Reemphasizing education: After Mao’s persecution of intellectuals, which ran contrary to China’s culture of social promotion based on merit, Deng reopened universities across the country and began recruiting college graduates with specific skills and expertise beyond ideological loyalty into Party leadership.

  • Small enterprises: While Deng did not immediately privatize Chinese land or heavy industry, he allowed entrepreneurs to start their own new small businesses, and they were also allowed to source their capital from foreign investors or corporations.

• Deng’s reforms led to rapid economic growth in China, and lifted millions of people out of poverty, in addition to setting China on a course toward status as a global economic power.

• Democracy Wall Movement a period of time in the late 1970s and 1980s during which Chinese citizens were posting reports and opinions freely on city walls without significant restrictions from the state

• Tiananmen Square Massacre a crackdown by the Chinese military against pro-democracy protesters in 1989 in which thousands of the protesters were killed

Stabilization of the Party (1997–present)

• The transfer of power from Jiang Zemin to Hu Jintao from 2003 to 2005 was one of the smoothest in any communist country’s history, and the transfer from Hu Jintao to Xi Jinping in 2013 was even more predictable and structured.

• With its politics stabilized at the highest level, and economic growth continuing, the Party has tremendous legitimacy among the Chinese people to continue their rule.

Citizens, Society, and the State

• Since Mao, Chinese society has transformed.

• While there was no independent civil society during the Maoist era, market reforms under Deng and beyond have led to affluence, inequality, and access to technology, which has made citizens' diverse interests and their ability to organize and express those differences a regular part of Chinese political life.

• The Party still controls certain ideas, but its ability to do so is eroding.

Significant Social Cleavages

Ethnicity

• 90% Han Chinese.

• Han Chinese the dominant majority ethnic group of China, comprising more than 90 percent of the Chinese population

• One-child policy a policy in China from 1979 through 2016 that attempted to control the growth of China’s population by limiting the number of children a family could have to one (with exceptions)

• Conquest and expansion expanded Chinese borders into other ethnicities.

• China recognizes 56 ethnicities.

• These ethnic minorities only make up 8% of China's population, but they live in large isolated western territories and are often given regional autonomy in matters like using a local language instead of

• Mandarin Chinese and exceptions to the one-child policy.

• Han CCP leaders isolate China's ethnic minorities from modern government and economy.

• The CCP actively promoted regional minority leadership.

• All five minority autonomous regions had minority governors in 2008.

• Party secretaries overseeing them have more power (and these Party secretaries remain Han).

• Chinese minorities are economically supported while repressed.

• Separatist movements among Tibetans and Uighurs in Xinjiang worry China.

• Most Chinese minorities do not want independence.

• Tibet was conquered by China in the 1950s, but the former government of Tibet, led by the Dalai Lama, a spiritual leader who also acted as the inherited head of state, refused to recognize the conquest.

• Dalai Lama the spiritual leader of Tibet; a target of the Chinese state because of his advocacy of Tibetan autonomy and independence

Urban vs Rural

• Economic reforms have lifted hundreds of millions of Chinese people out of poverty and created massive cities in the east and manufacturing centers in the center of the country.

• The 700 million-strong urban middle class shares concerns with developed nations.

• They want to ensure their children can afford good schools and top universities.

• They want nice apartments in safe neighborhoods and social advancement.

• They worry about retirement and health care.

• They fear the long-term health effects of city air pollution.

• Rural Chinese peasants lack electricity, plumbing, modern roads, the Internet, telecommunications, and more.

• The largest migration event in human history, many Chinese peasants migrate to cities for factory work to improve their lives.

• Urban residents fear the effects of this wave of poor laborers moving into their neighborhoods, similar to concerns in developed countries about immigration from poorer countries.

• The Chinese government regulates migration with strict rules about how long and under what conditions migrants can stay in the city.

• Real estate developers sometimes evict rural peasants, and Party corruption is often blamed.

Forms of Political Participation

Civil Society

• The Chinese Communist Party attempted to control all aspects of political and social life under Mao.

• Falun Gong (or Falun Dafa) was persecuted by the state in the early 2000s for organizing 70 million Chinese practitioners without state support.

  • Falun Gong a pseudo-spiritual movement persecuted by the Chinese state as an illegally formed civil society organization

• The government arrested Falun Gong leaders nationwide after 10,000 protesters gathered outside a government office to demand official recognition and an end to government harassment.

• Chinese detention is suspected of killing over 2,000 Falun Gong members.

Protests

• Protests are a common form of political participation in China, despite outside perceptions.

• Protests, which the government calls "mass group incidents," increased from 8,700 in 1993 to 87,000 in 2005 to over 180,000 in 2010.

• Most of these protests target local corruption, environmental damage, or other issues they hope the national leadership will address.

• To appease protesters, the Party may launch anti-corruption campaigns.

• Organizers may face censorship, imprisonment, and forced labor in "reeducation" camps if the Party sees a larger threat to their rule.

Political Institutions

Linkage Institutions

The Chinese Communist Party

• The central component of the Chinese political system remains the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), even after reforms have revolutionized everything else about the country.

• The Party claims the right to rule not on the basis of the free choice of the people, but rather on the Party’s history of governing in the best interests of the Chinese population at large. (This is consistent with Lenin’s and Mao’s idea of democratic-centralism.)

• While the CCP is the only party allowed to contend for and win national office, that does not mean everyone in China is part of the CCP.

Structure of the CCP

• The Chinese Communist Party is organized geographically, starting with the village or township, then the county, the region or province, and the central national party.

• Some cities are not organized into counties or provinces, so geographic rules vary.

• Party Congresses approve major Party decisions, including central leadership at each level.

• People's Congresses usually approve Party leaders' decisions.

• Each geographical Party Congress elects the central committee, which elects the political bureau (Politburo), which elects the Politburo Standing Committee.

• Party Congress a decision-making gathering of party officials held at each level of Chinese government to select officials for higher levels

• Central Committee a body of the Communist Party that is chosen by the larger Party Congress and is ostensibly empowered to choose the Politburo and senior leadership positions

• Politburo in communist parties, the senior leadership group that also acts as the executive branch in most cases

• Nomenklatura the process of elite recruitment in communist systems, whereby leaders at higher levels of the power hierarchy provide the names of those they would like to see promoted from the lower levels

• General Secretary the senior leadership position in the Communist Party and the de facto chief executive in the Soviet communist system

“Generational” Leadership

• CCP leadership transitions are often referred to as "generational" changes.

• The Politburo standing committee sees major turnover during these transitions.

• Recently, leaders in the standing committee will be in power alongside the general secretary/president for the two terms of five years allowed by the Constitution, then all step down at once, except for one younger member who becomes the new general secretary/president, bringing a new "generation" into the standing committee.

Elections

• China has held elections since the 1980s to legitimize the 1982 Constitution and Deng's reforms, but only at the local level.

  • This doesn't mean they support democracy or democratic values, though.

• The Chinese Communist Party reviews all candidates for municipal leadership or the village and township People's Congresses to remove objectionable candidates, and state media often emphasizes that a corrupt local official was "elected" into office, possibly to discredit elections.

• However, anyone over eighteen can vote for their local representatives in Local People's Congresses (LPCs), which in a system of indirect representation choose representatives for the County People's Congress, Provincial People's Congress, and National People's Congress (with the candidate list tightly managed by the ruling party).

Interest Groups

• Interest groups cannot freely influence the state in a pluralist system unless they submit to the CCP and get official recognition.

• Pluralism (pluralist) a system in which autonomous, independently formed groups freely attempt to influence the policymaking process of the government in competition with one another

• State corporatism a system to influence policymaking: the state establishes or selects groups to represent various interests rather than allow independently formed groups to participate

• The All-China Federation of Trade Unions, which represents factory workers, is one of the Party's associational groups that monopolize a group's interests.

• Only the All-China Federation of Trade Unions represents workers in business-worker negotiations.

  • This monopoly status gives Chinese workers a strong incentive to join the organization (compared to any independent organization) and incentivizes the organization to support the CCP or risk its position.

• The CCP usually requires associations with similar interests to merge or disband to avoid competition and make monitoring easier. Chinese interest groups are state corporatism.

• As civil society grows in China, corporatism and interest group monopolies may conflict with independent groups, requiring new pluralism or civil society restrictions.

The Media

• From the People's Republic's founding until 1980, all media—print, radio, and television—was state-owned and spread the Chinese Communist Party's message.

• Since Deng Xiaoping's economic reforms, many independent media outlets have competed with state media, but state media still dominates.

• Media coverage of sports, business, entertainment, and celebrities is competitive and vibrant.

  • These topics are unregulated.

  • The Chinese government censors topics like regime legitimacy and ethnic politics in Tibet and Xinjiang.

• In the 1990s, China stopped heavily subsidizing state media outlets, forcing them to rely on readership and advertising.

  • This changed coverage significantly.

• Investigative reporting and muckraking, especially against local Party officials, has skyrocketed.

• The news organizations and tabloids that expose corruption and scandal have attracted irresistible audiences, and it seems as though most media outlets are willing to risk Party retribution to get advertising revenue.

• National leaders with connections and political cover are rarely investigated and often portrayed as "saviors" who can fix local corruption.

• Despite growing media calls for civil liberties, rule of law, and other democratic reforms, national policy issues are rarely covered.

State Institutions

• Party state a system in which the internal workings of a single political party shape the governance of the state itself

• It's important to remember that China is a party-state, so the Chinese Communist Party's practices determine how government works, and government institutions' roles, powers, and responsibilities change as Party dynamics change.

• China's 1982 constitution defined state institutions and official selection.

• A party constitution was also written to determine leadership and membership.

• The party constitution determines who holds power under the state constitution in a parallel structure, so the two documents are inextricably linked.

• Party leaders often change the state constitution.

The National People’s Congress

• The National People's Congress (NPC) has nearly 3,000 provincial, county, and local assembly members, including village/township representatives.

• National People’s Congress China’s national legislature; its almost 3,000 members meet only once every five years, and it does not provide a significant check to executive power

• These delegates meet annually for a week, most recently at the 13th National People's Congress in 2018.

• They choose the president and other senior leaders and implement Politburo reforms.

• They ratify senior Party leadership's Party Congress decisions.

• Xi Jinping's 2013 Congress election was expected.

  • He was named CCP general secretary five months earlier at the Party Congress, and senior Party leaders in the standing committee had publicly discussed that decision for years.

  • 2018 delegates reelected Xi 99.8%.

• Opposing Party policies can cost ambitious NPC delegates their jobs.

• The NPC is too big and infrequent to be a legislature.

The President

• The National People's Congress elects the ceremonial head of state, but outgoing senior leaders of the CCP Politburo standing committee actually choose him.

• National People's Congress can renew the president's five-year term.

• 2018 abolished the two-term limit for the president.

• Modern Chinese presidents hold three positions, even though the National People's Congress must approve their constitutional powers.

• Leaders are publicly "groomed" for years to assume these three roles in orchestrated ceremonies.

• The National People's Congress elected Xi Jinping in 2013 and reelected him in 2018.

The Premier

• Presidents appoint the People's Republic's premier.

• The National People's Congress must approve his five-year term, which the president and NPC can renew.

  • While the president can theoretically appoint anyone over forty-five to the post, every premier has concurrently served in the elite seven-member Politburo standing committee, making only powerful senior Party leaders eligible.

• The State Council—35 ministers and governors who run China's bureaucracy—is under the premier's control.

  • Premier Li Keqiang.

The Bureaucracy

• The Chinese bureaucracy is hierarchical like the Communist Party.

• Most bureaucrats are Party members, but not all.

• Since Deng's reforms, China has prioritized hiring technocrats to manage bureaucratic agencies, such as engineers and water managers for the Ministry of Water and Conservancy, rather than Party officials.

• Bureaucrats may not be competent or well-intentioned (as is the case in any country).

• The Chinese saying "the mountains are high, and the Emperor is far away" describes the resistance of many local bureaucrats to new national government directives.

• Chinese bureaucrats often take bribes and make corrupt deals with local businesses, especially in rural areas.

• Transparency International's 2017 Corruption Perceptions Index placed China 77th out of 180 countries.

The People’s Liberation Army (PLA)

• People’s Liberation Army (PLA) China’s national military; it also wields considerable political influence as senior PLA members serve concurrently in the Politburo

• The CCP has long relied on the PLO.

• In 1927, Mao Zedong told a Party Congress that "political power grows out of the barrel of a gun" to justify armed struggle against the KMT.

• “Our principle is that the Party commands the gun, and the gun must never be allowed to command the Party,” Mao said.

• The Central Military Commission, chaired by the general secretary and president of China, Xi Jinping, includes top generals who also serve in the CCP Politburo.

The Judiciary

• China has four judicial levels.

• The Supreme People's Court in Beijing is China's final appeals court, except for Hong Kong and Macau.

• Supreme People’s Court China’s highest court of appeals; it lacks any power of judicial review of the government’s policies

• Local people's courts at the provincial, county, and village/township levels hear civil and criminal cases for the first time or serve as appellate courts.

• Special Jurisdiction Courts hear military and water transportation cases.

• Since they were British and Portuguese colonies before returning to China, Hong Kong and Macau have their own courts and legal systems.

Public Policy

• Policymaking in China is attempting to balance the ambitions of a large and increasingly powerful state to shape affairs in its favor on the world stage, and the needs of a massive population that is still largely poor and rural.

• The world is watching China’s choices closely, as its responses will have important consequences for the world going forward.

Economic Policy

• Iron rice bowl a Maoist-era Chinese term for the welfare state guarantees of housing and jobs to citizens

• Household responsibility system reforms by Deng Xiaoping that provided market incentives to China’s rural economy by requiring peasants to pay taxes to the state in return for the rights to grow crops and sell them at a profit

• Special Economic Zones (SEZs) geographic areas in China where manufacturers can make and export goods at lower tax rates than are permitted elsewhere in the country

• China has gradually moved toward full capitalism while retaining many of Mao's large state-owned companies since Deng Xiaoping's reforms introduced limited market economics.

• The Maoist welfare state, known as the iron rice bowl, guaranteed citizens work, housing, health care, and retirement in accordance with Mao's egalitarian vision.

• As the Great Leap Forward failed, this vision was never realized.

• Deng introduced household responsibility to collectivized farms in rural agrarian communities.

• After collectivization, the state owned the land, so families paid taxes and contract fees to work it and kept all of the profits from selling their crops.

Population

• China's one-child policy was created in the 1970s due to social, environmental, and economic issues.

• Only 36% of Chinese had a one-child policy, so this name is misleading.

• To control population growth, fines and tax incentives encouraged families to have smaller children.

• To comply, the government provided contraceptives, abortions, and sterilizations.

• The policy was more acceptable to urban families because a small family fit a middle-class lifestyle, while rural families needed children for agricultural labor.

• The policy has been relaxed to meet rural Chinese needs, and minorities in autonomous zones are exempt.

• “4-2-1 Problem” the danger of an aging population in which fewer and fewer young workers are born to pay for sustaining retirements and health care of elderly Chinese; this danger is a result of China’s longtime one-child policy

• “Missing girls” a phenomenon in China of a much larger male-to-female population ratio because of sex-selective abortions; a result of the one-child policy

The Environment

• After 1980, China prioritized economic growth over everything else. Unrestricted development is affecting China's environment today. 20–60% of Chinese farmland and groundwater are polluted.

• In 2006, China overtook the US as the largest greenhouse gas emitter, and the two countries now emit 50% of the global total.

• Air pollution may be the most pervasive environmental issue in China, affecting citizens daily.

• After over 50,000 reported environmental protests in 2012, environmental groups and air-polluted city residents pressured the government to act.

• At the 2014 People's Congress, President Xi declared "war on pollution" and pledged to cut air pollution by 25% by 2017.

• A new law allows government agencies to arrest, fine, and "name and shame" polluters who exceed new limits.

• Environmental groups can report issues without local officials retaliating.

• The main Chinese environmental protection law was last revised in 1989.