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EDITORIAL
China: Bad idea in the making?
Rumors abound as senior Chinese
Communist Party leaders are gathering at the
northeastern beach resort of Beidaihe for their
traditional annual summer retreat. Will he or won't he?
Will Chinese president and CCP general secretary Jiang
Zemin take the plunge, push for retaining his top party
position and jeopardize what until recently was expected
to become the first orderly leadership change in the
communist era?
It may just be idle speculation
by foreign commentators. But it's difficult to ignore
the ever noisier drumbeat in state media touting Jiang's
weirdly named "Three Represents" theory (that the party
represents advanced productive forces, advanced culture
and a wide sector of the population) and calling for
elevation of this conundrum to the level of basic
Marxist party doctrine along with Mao Zedong Thought and
Deng Xiaoping Theory. Not that there is anything
particularly wrong with the "Three Represents" (except
for its name): it boils down to the call for opening
party membership to entrepreneurs. What's awkward is
that a bit of common sense, which merely acknowledges
China's current social and economic realities - that
entrepreneurs and the private sector are playing an ever
more important role in Chinese society and that it would
be foolish for the party to exclude them from
representation - should be held up as a major
philosophical breakthrough. Commentators could be
forgiven for suspecting an ulterior motive behind the
whole hullabaloo.
Whether that's merely to give
Jiang an honored place in party history, or allow him to
hold on for a while longer to the party's top position,
or at least, emulating Deng, to retain the third of his
major positions as chairman of the Central Military
Commission (CMC) and continue to exercise influence from
behind the scenes, is open to question and speculation.
Our guess - and fervent hope with China's well-being in
mind - is that no more than the latter and, ideally, no
more than the first option is what Jiang and his cohorts
are shooting for. Any attempt on Jiang's part to extend
his tenure as general secretary would almost certainly
lead to factionalization, pitting Jiang's "Shanghai
faction" against the new power base his designated
successor Hu Jintao has been busy building over the past
few years. It would, further, provide an in for leftist
conservatives headed by former propaganda chief Deng
Liqun, who have openly complained that Jiang and his
Politburo colleagues are abandoning workers and
peasants. "Someone wants to take the hammer and sickle
out the party flag and put in their place a computer and
satellite," Deng reportedly fumed in a recent private
gathering.
The guy who dreamed up the "Three
Represents" and is behind the push for Jiang to retain
as much of his power as possible is the general
secretary's longtime trusted lieutenant and head of the
party's powerful organization department, Zeng Qinghong.
He has been helpful over the years in smoothing Jiang's
relations with the military (his father was a
Revolutionary War hero heading the 3rd Field Army) and
has been active in numerous other ways on Jiang's (and
presumably his own) behalf by placing trusted cadres in
key secondary leadership positions.
But by
pushing for extension of his term as general secretary
Jiang would be violating the express wishes of Deng
Xiaoping, who not only picked him for his job in 1989,
but also designated Hu as his successor. A viable
compromise might be for Jiang indeed to retain the CMC
chairmanship for a while longer, to have his theory
enshrined in the party charter, and for Zeng to attain
the position of membership in the Politburo Standing
Committee to which he has long aspired.
There
are no certainties in all of this. Not even the exact
date for the 16th Party Congress, which will make the
final succession and key appointments decisions, has
been set - perhaps September, perhaps as late as
November. But we hope that Jiang and Zeng - as they cool
their heels at Beidaihe from Beijing's summer heat -
will realize that much is to be gained (including
historical standing) from the Deng-mandated orderly
third-to-fourth-generation leadership change, much to be
lost from overstaying one's time. Hu replacing Jiang as
general secretary in the fall and as president at the
National People's Congress next March, Vice Premier Wen
Jiabao succeeding Premier Zhu Rongji in March is the
best outcome for political and economic policy
continuity and progress along the lines charted by Deng.
Other outcomes represent bad ideas whose times should be
past and will raise serious questions regarding China
risk.
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