China's next emperor(s)

One of my regrets is that I practically know nothing about China.  About its history and, even more so about its politics.  Within my limited abilities, it is difficult enough to keep up with the country where I was born and raised, and the country where I, too, claim that this is my land.

China is no small country either and, therefore, it continues to be a mystery to me.  Some day, I shall travel to China and get a ground-level feel for that country. 

Unlike me, Ramesh, has spent a few years in China, and once before guest-blogged here about the Communist Party.  The real McKoy, as opposed to the Democratic Party that Faux Noose thinks of :) 

Ramesh has been following with interest the political developments in China, and writes this guest-post:

The official website of the Beijing Marathon, to be held on October 14th, had a clock counting out the days to the start. Pretty innocuous, you would think.  But last week, that clock turned blank and still remains blank.

No malfunction this is.  Instead, it signals to the world and, more importantly, to the Chinese people, when the expected truly momentous event would take place—the second instance of a peaceful handover of power in China.

America might be forgiven for the fixation on Obama vs Romney. But in many ways, an equally, if not more, important ”election” is taking place in China, though it is not an election where the citizens vote.  Everything is done in complete secrecy, behind locked doors, with much skulduggery, arm twisting, factional lobbying, loads of money spent, careers and alliances made and broken and every low political machination possible resorted to. Come to think of it, it seems remarkably similar to the goings on in the US election!

The outcome of all that should culminate on an autumn day sometime in October—hence, the reading of tea leaves from the disappearance of the Beijing marathon clock, the inference being that the marathon would be postponed since the date is clashing.

In the Great Hall of the People at Tiananmen Square, in the 18^th Party Congress, nine (or seven) men will walk onto the dais. Chances are practically nil that any of these will be women, so we can safely say men. Who these are, and the order in which they walk in and sit, will determine who the world, and the Chinese people have to deal with for the next ten years. This is the Standing Committee of the Politburo of the Chinese Communist Party, the top decision making body in the country.

As much as the Party would like to pride itself on a façade of unity and a smooth change of guard, it has been anything but that, this year. One of the top contenders, Bo Xilai was purged in a virtual coup, that could serve as the plot for a thriller.  (Perhaps a script is being written in Hollywood even now!)  Rumours and counter rumours have swirled around all year.  

For the last few days, the expected new president, Xi Jinping, hasn’t been seen in public leading to a further wave of rumours. Even the date on which the party Congress will be held has not been announced yet.

Nobody knows what would happen.

But here is a completely wild guess from this blogger. Out on a mid-October day in Beijing will walk the following seven men, with the Standing Committee reduced from nine to seven members:

• Xi Jinping: President
• Li Keqiang: Prime Minister
• Yu Zhengsheng
• Zhang Dejiang
• Wang Qishan
• Li Yuanchao
• Wang Yang

These will be the seven wise men who will govern China for the next decade. But Hu Jintao will continue to chair the Central Military Commission and, therefore, the real power for at least two more years. There will be much factional fighting and China will stumble along without strong leadership for some time to come.

The only certainty is that I will definitely be wrong. The game really is, how wrong ?

China's various shades of red

I have often expressed in this blog my disapproval of the "communist" party rule in China.  When I evaluate the different systems all around the world, I often think about whether I would want to live there.  The bottom-line regarding China is an easy one for me: a definite no. 

However, it is up the citizens of China to develop whatever social contract they want, as long as they don't force me to live under their norms.  To some extent, this is also what many other countries tell the US, right--that we should stop forcing everybody on the planet to use the US Constitution?

In my graduate school days, every once in a while I engaged my fellow-students from China on their social contract.  They were all not unhappy about it.  Some of them recognized the flaws, and yet seemed to prefer that over the structure here in the US, for instance, or what India has.  In a postmodernist world in which I intellectually understand that paradigms do not easily lend themselves to comparisons, I simply had to think in my mind that I couldn't live there, even if hundreds of millions are ok with that system.

Ramesh, who is no stranger to this blog, lived in China for three-plus years.  An ardent fan of capitalism, as even the title of his blog suggests, he writes, with perhaps a few more to come, that China and its politics are way more complex than the simplistic ways in which most of the rest of the world thinks about them: 

Mention the words Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the popular impression is that of an evil organisation, suppressing its people with an iron hand and bent on tyranny. The Party, like every other organisation in the world, has the good, the bad and the ugly. The bad and the ugly gets a lot of coverage and is well known. There is lot that is awful, even bordering on evil—like when it comes to Tibet and Xinjiang— and these have been well documented by the media all around the world . But, there is also the good that is seldom known.

The CCP is for large parts, a meritocracy resembling a corporate culture, more than a political party. It recruits the best talent, does careful career planning, imparts a lot of training—including at foreign universities—promotes the best talent, rotates them across different responsibilities and lets the best rise. It probably has the largest HR department in the world. Sure there is dirty politics of lobbying and incompetence, as with any corporate outfit. There are clear goals, objectives, targets and their performance appraisal system would shame even a well run company. By and large merit works. How many political parties can say that (ask Sonia Gandhi!)

In the CCP in its current format, another dictator like Mao is unlikely to arise. Senior leaders have a retirement age (India, US, are you listening?) There is no hereditary politics—Mao’s children and Deng’s children are political nobodies. In fact there is a generational change in leadership coming this autumn. Peaceful handover of power, which was hitherto the preserve of mature democracies, is now a fact in China.

The Party actually listens to the people. It may not be well known, but there are about 500 protests that happen in China every day. Not every protestor is jailed and beaten (although some are.) While there is brutal censorship of news, public opinion triggers action. The milk scandal, discontent over rising prices, house prices bubble, etc., have all seen responses that would actually make a democracy proud. As in most other countries, there is cover up (easier because there is no free press), but when the issue comes out, action is usually swift. The way the CCP listens to people and reacts is very different from democracies, but there is no denying that strong public opinion elicits a response.

There are no inter‐state disputes (again, are you listening, India?) Polarisation, which we increasingly see in democracies, is not a factor in China.

The ultimate test of any political party is this: can it win public support in an election. In this, the CCP comes out with flying colours. If there was a completely free and fair election in China today, the CCP will probably win a 90% majority. Almost nobody who knows China will dispute that.

As with all things in life, things are not black and white. There are only shades of grey—well, shades of red, in China!