Teaching Comparative Government and Politics

Thursday, January 27, 2011

China: Competing power centers

Another dimension to the distribution of power in China is the competition between various parts of the regime and sections of the country. Here's an analysis from David E. Sanger and Michael Wines in The New York Times. I'd argue that the competition is not new. Some years ago, the PLA was manufacturing and selling satellite TV dishes while the civilian government was outlawing them. Nonetheless, along with the government-party dimensions, these ideas are important.

China Leader’s Limits Come Into Focus as U.S. Visit Nears

China is far wealthier and more influential, but Mr. Hu also may be the weakest leader of the Communist era. He is less able to project authority than his predecessors were — and perhaps less able to keep relations between the world’s two largest economies from becoming more adversarial…

President Obama’s top advisers have concluded that Mr. Hu is often at the mercy of a diffuse ruling party in which generals, ministers and big corporate interests have more clout, and less deference, than they did in the days of Mao or Deng Xiaoping, who commanded basically unquestioned authority…

Divided leadership has made it harder to resolve disputes with China, much less strike grand bargains like the reopening of relations between the two countries under Mao…

Mr. Hu, of course, has the power, at least on paper, to reach across differing bureaucracies. Often, though, he cannot or will not. The debate over revaluing [Chinese currency] a constant thorn in the relationship with the United States, has not advanced much partly because of a fight between central bankers who want the currency to rise and ministers and party bosses who want to protect the vast industrial machine that depends on cheap exports for survival.

So far, the battle has made it impossible for China to act decisively — and it is struggling with inflation as a result…

The rise of state-owned corporate behemoths, independent power centers in their own right, has also changed the politics in China and made it harder to address disputes with the United States and other big trading partners...

Teaching Comparative blog entries are indexed.

The Fourth Edition of What You Need to Know is available at Amazon.com or from the publisher (where shipping is always free).

Labels: China, political culture, politics