1. Lieberthal Ch.7 Cao Simeng

2.  Introduction  The Top 25 to 35  Configuration of Political Power ◦ The Leadership Small Group ◦ 6 Most Important Xitong  Party Control of the Government ◦ Nomenklatura Appointments and Interlocking Directorates ◦ Party Core Group and Party Life  The Party’s Roles and Challenges

3.  The difference between Organization and Institutions: ◦ Organizations are coherent, internally interdependent administrative or functional structures. ◦ Institutions in contrast are practices relationship and organizations that have developed sufficient regularity and perceived importance to shape significantly the behaviors of their members.  Chinese political system is strewn with organizations that have not become institutions. In China, top power group at any time oversees virtually all sectors of work and politics, personally redefine the real rules of the game on an ongoing basis-highly personalized system.

4.  This chapter focuses on:  1: The way power is actually allocated behind the formal organizational facade among the top power elite as presented in Chapter 6.  2: How this small group deals with the country’s massive bureaucratic apparatus and the configurations of authority within the apparatus itself.  3: A consideration of the strategies used by the PRC’s political cadres.

5.  There are a key group of about 25 to 35 leaders to together determine the direction of policy in all important spheres.  Mao period: In this period leaders of CCP had different background, but Mao had the absolute power. (The core leader)  Deng period: Establish a new set of norms to govern relations among the top power elite(face dilemma); play a game of coalition politics; rejected the trappings of Mao’s power; built up the prestige of his protégés. ◦ But: Still retained some of Mao’s important powers and ultimate power stayed in Deng’s hands-in all aspects.

6.  The 3 rd generation has differed significantly from its predecessors: ◦ no background of revolutionary struggles; ◦ careers of working their way up various bureaucratic hierarchies; ◦ far better educated; ◦ far more knowledgeable about the international arena.  (e.g. Jiang Zemin; Li Peng)

7.  Though up to 2002, 16 th Party Congress, China is still led by a self-selected elite whose major constrains are imposed by the views and activities of other in the top group, rather than by formal institutional requirements, several important changes occurred:  The core leader has less power over his colleagues than was the case of Mao or Deng.  Formal requirements laid down in various rules and regulations are taken more seriously, even with the top group.  The top group is less cohesive.  The top group is less powerful than its processors in relation to the rest of the political system.  Retired revolutionary elders are no longer making the key decisions behind the scenes.

8.  Members of the top power elite differentiated in two ways: functional area of work & degree of specialization.  3 degrees: ◦ Key generalists: very top of the system including general secretary of CCP and premier of the government who become involved in many operational issues on a day-to-day basis and carry heavy work loads and responsibilities. ◦ Bridge leaders: responsible for helping to develop policy within a certain sphere, coordinating the activities of the bureaucracies relevant to executing that policy, and resolving the differences crop up with them. They are the so-called leadership small groups and most of them are members of Standing Committee of the Politburo.

9. ◦ Specialized leaders: have control over individual important bureaucracies including the heads of CCP’s institutions and some heads of provincial-levels. They run the most important bodies in the system. ◦ (an important extent of the structure: no rules limit the way the top leaders organized themselves or constrain what they are able to do.) ◦ Mishu(personal secretaries of top leaders, cf. Party Secretary 书记 shuji). The individuals and numbers of mishu are decided by leaders and they are influential even without officials identities. Personal guards.

10.  Sum-up of the political system since 1949: ◦ intensively personal; ◦ power concentrated in a small group; ◦ some aspects of system do not appear on organizational charts(e.g.mishu system).  With the features above, tensions between the system and bureaucratic organization is dynamic. Recent years have witnessed some attenuation of the features but Chinese system still has a long way to go.

11.  Key concepts of organization of power: ◦ Xitong ( 系统， systems) which led by leadership small group. ◦ the tensions of tiao( 条） /kuai （块） relationships.  Chinese organize the top executive members of the power elite into functional areas. The 4 broadest among them are : ◦ party affairs; ◦ government works; ◦ state security; ◦ foreign affairs.  Each of first three has a nationwide network of bureaucracies under it.

12.  A narrower set of functional portfolios is nestled beneath the 4 broadest ones.(on page 216)  Typically a leadership small group consists of a Politburo Standing Committee member and several others in or out of the Politburo.  In fundamental sense, the leadership small groups define the way political power in both the party and the government is organized.  Leadership of LSG ◦ (relevant parts are Party departments or government ministries and commissions, and their subordinate organs). Leadership small group Systems(xitong) Relevant parts

13.  Most of the head of the leadership small groups are members of Politburo Standing Committee.  The remaining Politburo members hold the top “outside” posts(chairman of NPC; head of Chinese People’s Political Consultative Congress, etc.)  This system is very important though it is largely hidden from public view.(e.g. Li Peng)

14.  Xitong (system) is the name used to indicate a group of bureaucracies that together deal with a broad task the top political leaders want performed. 6 particularly important Xitong:  Party affairs  Organization and personnel  Propaganda and education ◦ (under party affair functional area)  Political and legal affairs  Military ◦ (under state security functional area)  Finance and economics ◦ (under government affairs functional area)

15.  The distinction of party and government is not clear in the Xitong, but current reforms are seeking to remove the administrative links between the xitong and enterprises & social organizations. ◦ ( 党政分开： separate the party affairs from governing)  Xitong may over time have variable boundaries( organizations can shift from one xitong to another). ◦ back to the question of organization and institution.

16.  Headed by General Secretary of CCP, members are the most important personnel of the first secretary of every territorial party committee, down the hierarchy through the level of the township.  Unusual in a vertical relationship among different levels of the political systems of the xitong and characterized by “leadership ties”.  CCP decides all major issues and control access to and advancement in the political system.

17.  Determines the appointment of positions of authorities throughout the political system and in related bodies.  Consists primarily of the personnel departments at all levels of the party and government bureaucracies.(not only in territorial party committees but all public sectors of Chinese system.  Dossiers kept by it are extremely powerful factors in the lives of China.  All organization department in the party are supposed to operate according to instructions peculiar to this Xitong.  The organization department’s territorial party committee directly commands the organization department. ◦ (mainly professional relations/yewu guanxi)

18.  Decentralized and characterized by “professional” ties.  Shape the values and perspectives of the entire population. Numerous units fall under the sway of it.  The major task of this xitong had made the work under it in a mess.(contradictions between thought control and development of knowledge).  Nowadays the fundamental tasks at the beginning seems to be impossible to fulfill. Now the Chinese are access to all kind of media sources-though not completely.

19.  In charge of the civilian coercive apparatus.  The largest bureaucratic hierarchy within this Xitong utilizes a dual leadership (under their territorial party committee and public security organ in a higher level)  Outside the party, the Xitong runs the court system, the prosecutors, the labor camps, the prisons, the fire departments, the border guards, the uniformed police, the secret police, issuance of passport, etc.  Within the party, there is Discipline Inspection Commissions, to investigate problems and enforce party discipline

20.  The major government ministry under this xitong is Ministry of Public Security.  Under the Maoist leadership, it became a tool to “ferret out” and persecute “enemy class”.  When Deng and his reform-minded colleagues came into power, they took measures alarming to the public-security authorities. The series of reform actions reduced the role of the public- security apparatus.

21.  Reformers also created a more complex situation for the public-security apparatus.  Even under reform, this xitong remains very large, extensive, and powerful.  But poor training and uneven distribution of the forces are problems for China.

22.  Charged with making the urban economic grow.  There are inner contradictions inside the xitong.(between economic development and financial support)  In the economic reform, actually the officials in this system are the group benefited the most. (led to all kinds of unfairness).  The boundaries of this xitong is vague, as it includes several different subsectors. And the economic reforms have encouraged its decentralization.

23.  The military retained a special place in the new political system after 1949: ◦ Military Affairs Commission of CCP has the real leader ship of the military power which has the same bureaucratic rank as the State Council and is thus not under government control. ◦ The Ministry of Defense has little real power and the government Military Affairs Commission is actually just another name of Military Affairs Commission of CCP. ◦ The Commission has been headed at all time by the most powerful individual in the CCP.

24.  State within state: ◦ party control is exercised at the very top via the MAC; ◦ General Political Department  running party activities in the PLA  military personnel decisions  security and counterespionage work in the PLA. ◦ General Logistic Department ◦ General Stuff  In 1980s Deng brought some changes: reduce the average age of officers; required formal officer training school for promotion, etc.

25.  China divides its army in two ways: ◦ strategic reserve forces ◦ garrison forces  In recent years PRC is keeping advancing itself by different ways. It now becomes a professional military force, reducing the imprint of its revolutionary origins and has become less involved in domestic policies throughout the century.  The Party controls the gun and the military protects Party rule.

26.  All of the xitong aim to shape the behavior of China’s people.  Different xitong played core roles in different period of time.  Except Finance and Economic xitong and Military Xitong, the other 4 were hurt badly during the reform period.  The xitong as such, as noted previously, are virtually invisible on China’s organization charts.  Most of the organs in xitong other than the military report to the territorial party committees rather than up the line within their xitong.(professional relations)

27.  The Chinese Communist party retains the power to: ◦ 1. decide all major political, social and economic policy issue. ◦ 2. appoint the leaders all public sector bodies (including government offices, public institutions, and SOEs).

28.  Four methods are employed to achieve continuing control: ◦ Nomenklatura appointments and interlocking directorates ◦ Leadership small groups ◦ party ‘core groups’ ◦ ‘party life’

29.  The nomenklatura consists of ◦ lists of leading positions over which party units exercise the power of appointment and dismissal; ◦ lists of reserve candidates for those positions; ◦ rules governing the actual processes of appointments and dismissals.

30.  All positions of real importance in China fall under the nomenklatura. ◦ includes positions in the party, government, universities, research establishments, religious organizations, libraries, and so forth.

31.  After reform in 1984, all members of party core group (top party members who are officials in the ministry) are on the nomenklatura list of the Central Committee.  The party core group control the nomenklatura list for those at a level below them in the ministry, but must report to the Central Committee.  At territorial level, the party organization departments make recommendations for appointments, the party committee has the final power of approval.

32.  In the mid-1990s, to increase transparency in the appointment process, regulations came out: ◦ The regulations posit requirements in terms of educational level, training, and prior work experience for various types of positions and endorse the idea that officials should move up the system one step at a time, encourage nomination of more candidates.

33.  Interlocking directorates: having key party officials themselves directly take charge of state bodies.  Top officials in the government in each territorial jurisdiction typically also hold positions on the party committee that governs that jurisdiction. e.g. Wen Jiabao, Politburo & Premier.

34.  Party core groups: the top few party members in each government ministry and commission. ◦ They decide issues, then carry them out by donning hats as ministers and vice ministers.  Party life: a series of activities intended to familiarize CCP members with the polices and to maintain a sense of discipline.

35.  Roles: make the decisions on the major substantive issues that confront not only the government but all public institutions.  Challenges: from the monopoly of political power. ◦ Corruption and lack of commitment to real public service. ◦ Changes of China’s society and economy are faster than are adjustments in party organization and function. The rapidly growing private sector has little participation in the CCP. ◦ CCP has not developed the capacity to articulate the various interests in Chinese society in a way that inspires confidence among segments of the population.