MANAGING THE MANDARINS

It has always been a fiction that the Chinese government and Communist Party were separate. Deng Xiaoping tried to bring in a degree of separation to prevent a recurrence of Mao’s autocracy. But it was never in doubt who was in charge: the CCP. Before the Xi era, many organisations were “double nameplated” (eg the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection and the Ministry of Supervision largely shared the same staff, even if they treated Party and non-Party members somewhat differently). 

Since Xi Jinping came to power, the separation has narrowed considerably. “Party, government, army, society and education – east and west, south and north, the party leads on everything,” as Xi declared at the 19th Party Congress in October 2017. As Xinhua reported in 2021, nationwide, 80% of all officials are CCP members, and 95% of leading cadres (ju/xian ji). The figures for central government departments will be higher. This change has been affected in five major ways.

First, decision-making powers were centralised under increased Party control. There have always been both Party and state leading small groups (LSGs), whose role is to design, coordinate and oversee the implementation of policy. Xi Jinping set up new Party LSGs, including the most important Central Commission on Comprehensively Deepening Reform, as well as other commissions to oversee governing the country according to law, auditing, and education. He also upgraded existing LSGs into commissions, under the Party, to be in charge of, for example, cybersecurity and informatisation, finance and economics, and foreign affairs. 

Second, the position of General Secretary of the CCP grew in relation to that of Premier. Thus, Xi sidelined the power and prestige of Wen Jiabao and Li Qiang. To reinforce his role and power from January 2015, Xi instituted the practice of “personally listen[ing] to reports from Standing Committees of National People's Congress, the State Council, Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, the Supreme People’s Court and the Supreme People’s Procuratorate. Third, the Party took over responsibilities hitherto undertaken by the state. Thus, the United Front Work Department took over work on Overseas Chinese, religion and ethnic minorities. The Party now takes the lead in finance, Hong Kong and Macau affairs and technological development. Separate committees, for example for Party secretaries-general and state secretaries-general are now united in one body.

Fourth, all civil servants now come under the same discipline and regulations as CCP members. Thus, the CCDI and the Ministry of Supervision are one organisation, and the responsibilities of the China Academy of Governance now belong to the Party Schools. And lastly, particularly since 2015, the CCP has extended its reach into other sectors. Branches and cells now exist in most state-owned enterprises, private companies, and foreign funded enterprises. By the end of 2017 the Party had a presence in 61% of social organisations and 95% of public institutions. "Leading Party members' groups" have been set up within most organisations to ensure the implementation of the Party line, theories and policies.

It is also worth singling out the extension of Party control into three other major areas. Firstly, Party control in rural areas is seen as crucial. Since June 2019, the Party has declared an intention “By 2020, … to develop an institution structure and policy system for modern rural governance” and “By 2035, the country plans to…perfect the Party-led rural governance model”. Secondly, control of and the role of the Party in education has been strengthened. Thirdly, the People's Liberation Army has been under much stricter political control since Xi held the “Gutian Meeting” in Oct 2014, in which he reemphasised that the PLA is the Party’s name, not a national army and that political loyalty was the most important military requisite. All these measures above have been backed up by both Party and state laws and regulations.

Why all this change? Partly it reflects Xi’s belief that an identity of Party and state makes for good governance. Other reasons might include: a need for coordination across government in a complicated world; issues which are increasingly cross cutting and serious (national security for one); an emphasis on law based governance which requires more uniformity; avoiding duplication of responsibilities, resulting in job saving and streamlining government; Xi’s emphasis on national unity and the United Front Work Department (which has absorbed religion, Overseas Chinese, and ethnic affairs); and facilitating better government discipline, implementation, and combating corruption. 

Finally, CCP doctrine now declares the outstanding importance of the “Two Maintains” and the ”Two Establishes” – in essence, the Party as the core and Xi Jinping as the core of the core. If Xi is to dominate, it is easier to dominate one pyramid of power, than two.

These remarks were presented by Charles Parton OBE at Global Conference for New Sinology (GCNS), 2024