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- Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
- Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
- Sprache: Englisch
Since the founding of the People's Republic of China over 70 years ago, five paramount leaders have shaped the fates and fortunes of the nation and the ruling Chinese Communist Party: Mao Zedong, Deng Xiaoping, Jiang Zemin, Hu Jintao, and Xi Jinping. Under their leaderships, China has undergone an extraordinary transformation from an undeveloped and insular country to a comprehensive world power. In this definitive study, renowned Sinologist David Shambaugh offers a refreshing account of China's dramatic post-revolutionary history through the prism of those who ruled it. Exploring the persona, formative socialization, psychology, and professional experiences of each leader, Shambaugh shows how their differing leadership styles and tactics of rule shaped China domestically and internationally: Mao was a populist tyrant, Deng a pragmatic Leninist, Jiang a bureaucratic politician, Hu a technocratic apparatchik, and Xi a modern emperor. Covering the full scope of these leaders' personalities and power, this is an illuminating guide to China's modern history and understanding how China has become the superpower of today.
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CONTENTS
Cover
Series Page
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Preface and Acknowledgments
Notes
1. On China’s Leaders and Leadership
Perspectives on Leadership
The Influences of Chinese Political Culture
The Influences of Chinese Leninist Culture
Notes
2. Mao Zedong: Populist Tyrant
Mao’s Inheritance and Immediate Challenges
Building the Nation, 1953–1957
Leaping Forward, Backward, and Forward Again: 1958–1965
The “Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution” and the End of the Maoist Era, 1966–1976
Notes
3. Deng Xiaoping: Pragmatic Leninist
Deng’s Comeback and Power Play
What Did Deng Inherit?
Implementing Reforms
Deng Xiaoping’s Stain: Tiananmen
Deng’s Last Stand
Notes
4. Jiang Zemin: Bureaucratic Politician
Jiang Zemin’s Past as Prologue to the Future
Reforming the Party
Jiang Zemin and the Military
Jiang Zemin and the Economy
Jiang Zemin and China’s Foreign Policy
The End of Jiang Zemin’s Rule and Transition to Hu Jintao
Notes
5. Hu Jintao: Technocratic Apparatchik
Hu Jintao’s Life and Career Path
Hu Jintao’s Decade in Waiting
Hu’s Inheritance
Hu Jintao’s Major Policy Initiatives
Reflections on Hu Jintao’s Rule
Notes
6. Xi Jinping: Modern Emperor
Xi Jinping’s Rise to Power
Dismantling Dengism
Navigating the Middle Income Trap
Revamped Repression
Xi Jinping on Balance
Notes
7. China’s Leaders in Contrast
Mao Zedong
Deng Xiaoping
Jiang Zemin
Hu Jintao
Xi Jinping
Notes
Index
End User License Agreement
Guide
Cover
Table of Contents
Series Page
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Preface and Acknowledgments
Begin Reading
Index
End User License Agreement
List of Boxes
Chapter 2
Box 2.1
Chinese Political Names
Chapter 6
Box 6.1
Xi Jinping and Bo Xilai
Box 6.2
CCP Central Committee Document No. 9 (2013)
List of Illustrations
Chapter 2
Figure 2.1
Mao Zedong (1893–1976)
Figure 2.2
Mao Zedong Proclaiming Founding of People’s Republic of China, October 1, 1949
Figure 2.3
Mao and Stalin in Moscow, December 1949
Figure 2.4
GDP Growth During First Five-Year Plan
Figure 2.5
Great Leap Forward (1958–1960) Rural Steel Furnace Movement
Figure 2.6
Cultural Revolution Propaganda Poster
Figure 2.7
Red Guards Denouncing “Counterrevolutionary Revisionist Element” During the Cultural...
Figure 2.8
Chairman Mao Anoints Hua Guofeng as His Successor
Figure 2.9
Mao Zedong Lying in State, September 1976
Chapter 3
Figure 3.1
Deng Xiaoping (1904–1997)
Figure 3.2
Deng Xiaoping in Montargis, France, 1920
Figure 3.3
Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping, 1959
Figure 3.4
Deng Xiaoping and Hua Guofeng, 1979
Figure 3.5
Hu Yaobang (1915–1989)
Figure 3.6
Zhao Ziyang (1919–2005)
Figure 3.7
Deng Xiaoping Addresses United Nations, 1974
Figure 3.8
Trial of the “Gang of Four,” 1981
Figure 3.9
Growth of Township and Village Enterprises (TVEs), 1978–2008
Figure 3.10
Average Annual Growth by Sector, 1980–1985
Figure 3.11
Restructuring of SOEs and Their Employment Impact
Figure 3.12
Deng Xiaoping Dons Ten-Gallon Cowboy Hat During State Visit to the United States in Recognition...
Figure 3.13
Tanks in Tiananmen Square, June 5, 1989
Chapter 4
Figure 4.1
Jiang Zemin (1926–)
Figure 4.2
Jiang Zemin Delivers Deng Xiaoping’s Eulogy, February 26, 1997
Figure 4.3
Regional Shares of National GDP, 1989 and 2002
Figure 4.4
Jiang Zemin with His Successor Hu Jintao at 16th Party Congress, November 2002
Chapter 5
Figure 5.1
Hu Jintao (1942–)
Figure 5.2
President and CCP General Secretary Hu Jintao with Premier Wen Jiabao, March 2009
Figure 5.3
China’s Reported Incidents of Mass Unrest, 2000–2010
Figure 5.4
China’s Vice-President Zeng Qinghong, 2008
Figure 5.5
President Hu Jintao Meeting the Author, Washington, DC, January 2011
Chapter 6
Figure 6.1
Xi Jinping (1953–)
Figure 6.2
Xi Jinping Introduces CCP Politburo Standing Committee, November 15, 2012
Figure 6.3
Bo Xilai Sentenced to Life in Prison, September 23, 2012
Figure 6.4
Xi Jinping as Teenager in Rural Liangjiahe Village, Shaanxi Province, 1969
Figure 6.5
Xi Jinping: People’s Liberation Army Commander-in-Chief
Figure 6.6
Images of China in Cross-Section of Countries, October 2020
Figure 6.7
Xi Jinping: Emperor for Life?
List of Tables
Chapter 1
Table 1.1
China’s Principal Leadership Positions and Leaders Since 1949
Table 1.2
China’s Political Orientation Since Mao
Chapter 2
Table 2.1
Output of Selected Goods During the First Five-Year Plan
Chapter 4
Table 4.1
Chinese Assessments of Factors Contributing to the Collapse of the Soviet Union
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Previous Books by David Shambaugh
Where Great Powers Meet: America & China in Southeast Asia (2021)
China & the World (edited, 2020)
The China Reader: Rising Power (edited, 2016)
China’s Future (2016)
International Relations of Asia (co-edited, 2008 and 2014)
China Goes Global: The Partial Power (2013)
Tangled Titans: The United States and China (edited, 2012)
Charting China’s Future: Domestic & International Challenges (edited, 2011)
China’s Communist Party: Atrophy & Adaptation (2008)
China–Europe Relations: Perceptions, Policies, and Prospects (co-edited, 2008)
China Watching: Perspectives from Europe, Japan, and the United States (co-edited, 2007)
Power Shift: China & Asia’s New Dynamics (edited, 2005)
The Odyssey of China’s Imperial Art Treasures (co-authored, 2005)
Modernizing China’s Military: Progress, Problems, and Prospects (2002)
Making China Policy: Lessons from the Bush and Clinton Administrations (co-edited, 2001)
The Modern Chinese State (edited, 2000)
Is China Unstable? (edited, 2000)
The China Reader: The Reform Era (co-edited, 1999)
China’s Military Faces the Future (co-edited, 1999)
Contemporary Taiwan (edited, 1998)
China’s Military in Transition (co-edited, 1997)
China and Europe: 1949–1995 (1996)
Greater China: The Next Superpower? (edited, 1995)
Deng Xiaoping: Portrait of a Chinese Statesman (edited, 1995)
Chinese Foreign Policy: Theory & Practice (co-edited, 1994)
American Studies of Contemporary China (edited, 1993)
Beautiful Imperialist: China Perceives America, 1972–1990 (1991)
The Making of a Premier: Zhao Ziyang’s Provincial Career (1984)
CHINA’S LEADERS
From Mao to Now
DAVID SHAMBAUGH
polity
Copyright © David Shambaugh 2021
The right of David Shambaugh to be identified as Author of this Work has been asserted in accordance with the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
First published in 2021 by Polity Press
Internal silhouettes designed by Steve Leard
Polity Press65 Bridge StreetCambridge CB2 1UR, UK
Polity Press101 Station LandingSuite 300Medford, MA 02155, USA
All rights reserved. Except for the quotation of short passages for the purpose of criticism and review, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher.
ISBN-13: 978-1-5095-4652-7
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Shambaugh, David L., author.Title: China’s leaders : from Mao to now / David Shambaugh.Description: Cambridge ; Medford, MA : Polity, 2021. | Includes bibliographical references and index. | Summary: “A world-renowned Sinologist explores China’s modern history through the lives of its leaders”-- Provided by publisher.Identifiers: LCCN 2021008012 (print) | LCCN 2021008013 (ebook) | ISBN 9781509546510 (hardback) | ISBN 9781509546527 (epub)Subjects: LCSH: Zhongguo gong chan dang. Zhong yang wei yuan hui--Biography. | Heads of state--China--Biography. | Statesmen--China--Biography. | China--Politics and government--1949- | China--History--1949-Classification: LCC DS734 .S43 2021 (print) | LCC DS734 (ebook) | DDC 951.05092/2--dc23LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021008012LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021008013
The publisher has used its best endeavours to ensure that the URLs for external websites referred to in this book are correct and active at the time of going to press. However, the publisher has no responsibility for the websites and can make no guarantee that a site will remain live or that the content is or will remain appropriate.
Every effort has been made to trace all copyright holders, but if any have been overlooked the publisher will be pleased to include any necessary credits in any subsequent reprint or edition.
For further information on Polity, visit our website: politybooks.com
Dedication
Dedicated Admiringly to the Memory of Roderick MacFarquhar The Doyen of Chinese Leadership Studies
PREFACE AND ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Ever since I first started studying China and its politics in 1973 I have focused on a variety of aspects and dimensions of the Chinese political system, but none more consistently than its senior leaders and leadership. My first book in 1984 was in fact about a Chinese leader (Zhao Ziyang); it traced his life and career path from being a sub-provincial official in Guangdong province to becoming the national Premier and then General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party,1 and other Chinese leaders have played a central role in many of my subsequent publications. Of course, leaders matter a great deal in the life and politics of all nations, but their impact is greater in certain autocratic systems—of which China is one. I have long been interested in the different dimensions of how Chinese communist leaders rule—their individual idiosyncrasies, how they interact with each other, what strategies and tactics they adopt, how they use the institutional levers of power and control at their disposal, how they impact Chinese society, and how they interact with the other leaders from other countries.
This book about China’s leaders has thus been percolating in my mind for many decades. As I have taught my own university courses on Chinese politics during the past three decades, I have always adopted a leader-centric approach, and would assign individual biographical books and articles on different leaders, but I always wished that there was a single volume that covered China’s main leaders and their periods of rule from 1949 to the present. The one that does successfully do this was edited by the eminent Harvard professor Roderick MacFarquhar;2 in this volume and all others that he authored during his distinguished career, Chinese leaders played the central role in his analysis. Rod unfortunately recently passed away in February 2019, but during his scholarly career he was truly the doyen of the study of Chinese communist “elite politics.” Rod was always most kind and mentoring to me (although I was never his student), I hold him in extremely high esteem, and therefore I admiringly dedicate this book to his memory and to all that he contributed to the scholarly study of Chinese politics. During the period 1991–1996 when I served as the Editor of The China Quarterly, the leading journal in contemporary China studies, which Rod founded in 1960, Rod was also very supportive and mentoring from across the Atlantic and his professorial position at Harvard.
While China has many leaders at any given time, who populate the approximately 25-member Political Bureau (Politburo) and the 7-member Standing Committee, there has always been one dominant “paramount leader” (much more than a primus inter pares). This book is about the five main individuals who have been in this position (Mao Zedong, Deng Xiaoping, Jiang Zemin, Hu Jintao, and Xi Jinping)—but it also definitely considers others who held the top institutional portfolios as party leader (Hua Guofeng, Hu Yaobang, Zhao Ziyang) as well as a variety of other Politburo members who have been significant political players in their own rights.
While the book is centered on the lives of these individual Chinese communist leaders it is also very much focused on their times as well. It is thus simultaneously a survey of the evolution of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) over the past seven decades. Taken together, I hope that the combined focus on leaders and their times will serve as a good overview and introductory text for students and readers who seek a comprehensive survey of the PRC. In trying to make this an accessible and readable account that keeps the narrative moving along, inevitably I have had to make numerous judgments along the way concerning certain facts and events—providing sufficient detail but not so much as to bog the reader down. This has been a fine balance to strike—providing lots of detail but not too much. As Chinese politics (like all systems but perhaps more than most) are filled with lacunae, specialists and scholars of Chinese politics will inevitably ask, “What about this or what about that?” But I have intended this book to be more for the general public and students than for my scholarly colleagues, so I hope they will remember this when they read it.
Although I have been teaching this material for a long time and thought I had a pretty thorough grasp of the intricacies of different leaders’ careers and their periods in power, once I got into the research and writing I realized that there was still a great deal that I either had forgotten or did not know. I have done my very best to check, double-check, and be very careful about all the events and actors covered in this study—but any errors or oversights are, of course, my own. For certain periods and leaders I have sought the advice and expertise of some of my close and respected colleagues, who were generous enough to read over the draft text to help catch any errors and offer suggestions for improvement. Stanford University Professor Andrew Walder is truly one of the world’s leading experts on Mao and the Maoist era,3 and he was most gracious in reading and reviewing that chapter, as well as the introductory chapter. Robert Suettinger—now an independent scholar who had a distinguished career in the US Government as one of the CIA’s chief analysts of Chinese politics, as National Intelligence Officer for East Asia, and as Senior Director of Asian Affairs on the National Security Council—was kind enough to read the Mao chapter and parts of the Deng Xiaoping and Hu Jintao chapters. Professor Ezra Vogel of Harvard University (recently deceased), who himself wrote the definitive biography of Deng Xiaoping,4 was kind enough to read and improve the draft of my Deng chapter. Robert F. Ash, my former colleague at the University of London’s School of Oriental & African Studies (SOAS), was extremely generous with his time and carefully read all of the chapters in draft—his careful eye and “blue pencil” caught countless things that merited revision. Bob also was a particular help with the sections in each chapter on China’s economy, and helped to design some of the graphics in the book. I am enormously grateful to all four individuals—Andy, Bob, Ezra, and Bob—each of whom have been close personal friends as well as much-respected professional colleagues. I am also grateful to Harry Harding for steering me to broader studies of leadership (he too has been a close China colleague and friend for many years). I am also in debt to the two anonymous reviewers arranged by Polity Press—I do not know who you are, but I am sincerely grateful for your eagle eyes and constructive suggestions. Lastly, I am grateful to my student Miles Ogden-Peters for his research assistance on the Hu Jintao and Xi Jinping chapters.
I am also indebted to the great team at Polity Press in Cambridge, England, for their highly professional support throughout the writing process. This is the second book I have published with Polity,5 and I cannot recommend the press more highly. Louise Knight, editor for politics and international relations, is an absolute joy to work with. Editorial assistant Inès Boxman has also been superbly helpful and hardworking on many logistical dimensions of the book, most notably tracking down photographs and permissions reproduced in this book. Evie Deavall has been a first-rate and efficient production editor, shepherding the manuscript through to publication. I am also grateful to Ann Klefstad for expert copyediting and to Elizabeth Ball for compiling the Index. One of the great things about Polity as a publisher is their speed of production—this volume went from final draft manuscript to published book in six months! It was truly a team effort by all of these individuals. Altogether, working and publishing with Polity has been a very enjoyable experience.
While this book has been brewing in my brain for a long time and I have been teaching it for many years, I actually wrote it over a brief ninemonth period (May 2020–January 2021) during the COVID pandemic (it was one positive side effect of hibernating at home). Like all of my previous books over the past quarter century, it was written mainly at our summer home near Traverse City, Michigan and at our winter home in Arlington, Virginia. I am most fortunate to have such wonderful domiciles in which to live and be creative.
Last, but not least, I must again thank my wonderful wife Ingrid Larsen for her love and support throughout our four decades of marriage, as well as her patience and tolerance during the writing of this book. Our two wonderful sons Christopher and Alexander, now young professionals in their own right, are a constant source of pride and love for me. Our faithful golden retriever Ollie once again lay by my side and kept me company as I wrote this book, although sadly she passed away just before its conclusion. One could not ask for a better canine companion. Such family support has been critically important for me personally and professionally for decades, including during this project. I cannot be more grateful to them.
January 2021Arlington, Virginia USA
Notes
1.
David Shambaugh,
The Making of a Premier: Zhao Ziyang’s Provincial Career
(Boulder: Westview Press, 1984).
2.
Roderick MacFarquhar,
The Politics of China: Sixty Years of the People’s Republic of China
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, third edition, 2011). Also see Jane Perlez, “Roderick MacFarquhar: Eminent China Scholar Dies at 88,”
New York Times
, February 12, 2019:
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/12/obituaries/roderick-macfarquhar-dead.html
; David Shambaugh, “In Memoriam: Roderick MacFarquhar (1930–2019)”:
https://www.soas.ac.uk/news/newsitem138486.html
.
3.
Among his many impressive and insightful publications on the Mao era, see Walder’s magisterial study
China Under Mao: A Revolution Derailed
(Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2015).
4.
Ezra Vogel,
Deng Xiaoping and the Transformation of China
(Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press, 2013).
5.
See David Shambaugh,
China’s Future
(Cambridge: Polity Press, 2016).
CHAPTER 1ON CHINA’S LEADERS AND LEADERSHIP
LEADERS MATTER IN ALL POLITICAL SYSTEMS—BUT IN SOME THEY MATTER much more. Leaders in totalitarian systems, or authoritarian leaders in single-party systems, are unconstrained by the checks and balances of democracies, and thus their actions are more determinative and have an outsized impact on their societies and the world beyond their borders. China is such a case.
This book assesses and contrasts the five main leaders that the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has had over its first seven decades: Mao Zedong, Deng Xiaoping, Jiang Zemin, Hu Jintao, and Xi Jinping. While a number of other leaders have served as President of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and as Premiers (heads of government), this study focuses on the five principal Party leaders (Hua Guofeng, Hu Yaobang, and Zhao Ziyang will be folded into the Deng chapter, as their brief tenures at the top were not really long enough to merit separate chapters). The book is about the leadership styles of these five individuals, as well as about these men’s times and records as paramount leaders. Each had a distinctive leadership style: I characterize Mao as a populist tyrant, Deng as a pragmatic Leninist, Jiang as a bureaucratic politician, Hu as a technocratic apparatchik, and Xi as a modern emperor. These descriptions tell us not only about the individual leaders’ styles of rule, but also about different aspects of the Chinese political system itself. The main analytical approach is therefore to explore the intersection between each individual’s persona and style of rule with China’s developments domestically and internationally. Readers will therefore not only gain an (admittedly compressed) survey of the last 70 years, but one seen principally through the lens of the leader’s visions and actions during each period in power (Mao Zedong 1949–1976; Deng Xiaoping 1977–1989; Jiang Zemin 1989–2002; Hu Jintao 2002–2012; Xi Jinping 2012—). This book is primarily intended for students and readers who wish to gain an overview of the past seven decades of Chinese politics—in itself quite a task—but it is also a study for specialists who wish to dig inside the persona of each leader and try to understand how their socialization shaped their particular styles of rule.
One might assume that there has been much continuity of leadership style in a Leninist political system such as communist China. Actually, I find that there has been a considerable degree of discontinuity of style among these five leaders. This can be seen in particular in the different ways they each approached institutional bureaucracies of party and state, as well as varying differences over policies. Their differences are also evident in the manner that each performed their public roles, in how each approached the mass public, how each used the language of propaganda and ideology, and how each dealt with their contemporaries and subordinates. Each leader also approached the outside world and China’s foreign relations in different ways.
Of course, each ruled at a different period of time—and thus confronted differing sets of policy challenges at home and abroad. Each was born, reared, and matured professionally during different decades; this is why each is said to have represented five different generations of leaders (五代领导人). They also therefore faced different tasks: only Mao had to build a regime and country from scratch—all the others inherited a system and nation-state, to which their efforts can be said to have been additive and supplemental. Even though the system and country that Deng inherited from Mao had been deeply traumatized by the late Maoist era, the anarchy of the Cultural Revolution, and had to be rebuilt, the CCP and PRC nonetheless were well solidified by that time (1977). Deng’s reforms did nonetheless constitute significant qualitative changes, albeit within the existing systemic framework. The post-1989 (Tiananmen massacre) China that Jiang Zemin inherited from Deng, and the policy adjustments he made, were also a significant departure from the 1980s—yet these changes were more to the superstructure rather than the foundation of the CCP operating system. Hu Jintao made minimal incremental changes to the system, although he (and his Premier Wen Jiabao) did launch a number of social policy initiatives (which largely went unrealized). Xi Jinping has certainly been a strong leader—the strongest since Deng (some judge since Mao)—but, again, the changes he has made to the system have been largely additive rather than fundamental and original.
They have certainly shown commonalities as well. As with all Chinese leaders since the “self-strengtheners” of the late Qing dynasty (1870s–1890s), they sought to build China economically, make it “wealthy and powerful” (富强), to maintain its territorial integrity and sovereignty, to protect its national security, to recover its lost dignity and respect, and to strengthen the country’s position in Asia and the world.1 All also sought to continually strengthen the Chinese Communist Party institutionally (Mao and the Cultural Revolution being the major exception, although it can be argued that Mao too was trying to remake and thus reinvigorate the Party). As leaders of “new (socialist) China” (post-1949) they had the common vision of reducing poverty and social inequalities, increasing literacy and education, reducing the rural–urban gap, eliminating social vices, and maintaining social stability (the Cultural Revolution again being the exception). Yet the means and approaches for achieving many of these goals varied considerably among the five leaders. Thus, when conceptualizing the similarities and differences among these five leaders it may be analogous to think of a house or building where the foundation, walls, and roof remain the same—but the interior rooms and wiring were constantly being altered.
Perspectives on Leadership
It is also useful to view Chinese leaders through different prisms and paradigms that have been developed to analyze leadership and authority. When doing so, we also see differences. Max Weber famously distinguished between three types of political authority: charismatic, traditional, and legal-rational.2 By Weber’s criteria, all five leaders exhibited elements of each. All five were “traditional” in that they operated in—and continued—the patrimonial male-dominant, hierarchical political system that had characterized China since its inception. All five (to differing extents) were “legal-rational” in that they all were comfortable with and sought to build strong institutional hierarchies to administer both the state and society, and the decision bases for policy were taken more or less rationally and meritocratically within these institutions. Mao’s post-1966 attack on bureaucracy could also be interpreted as a deviation—but, again, he was trying to remold the bureaucracy, not destroy it altogether. Mao was not an anarchist. Concerning Weber’s third type of leadership, only Mao and Xi can be said to have been “charismatic” leaders—motivating the masses through personal populist appeal—the other three (including Deng) were not. Jiang Zemin was certainly extroverted and gregarious, but that is not the same as being charismatic.
Another popular paradigm is of “transformational” versus “transactional” leadership, as famously put forth by the American political scientist James MacGregor Burns in his classic book Leadership.3 Transformational leaders, Burns argued, seek to transform society through ideas; they are generally intellectuals who pursue an ideological agenda. Three of our five Chinese leaders—Mao, Deng, and Xi—can be said to have been the former, as they all truly had a qualitatively transformative impact on society and institutions. Burns also defined four specific sub-categories of transformational leaders, into which I would place each leader: ideational leaders (Mao, Deng, Xi), reform leaders (Deng, Xi), revolutionary leaders (Mao), heroes (Mao), and ideologues (Mao, Xi). He also noted that transformational leaders “recognize and exploit an existing need or demand of a potential follower.”4 In this regard as well, Mao, Deng, and Xi all tapped into popular needs of the mass public—all three through deep nationalist yearnings as well as preference for “strongman” leaders, Mao through the appeal of egalitarian socialism, Deng through the opportunity of economic empowerment, and Xi through a preference for social order and crackdown on privileged corruption. Jiang and Hu were transactional leaders, “exchanging” the right to rule for incremental improvements in people’s lives and patronage of specific bureaucracies (what Burns described as “bargains with bureaucrats”). Jiang and Hu also acted more in what Burns describes as a “managerial style” (similar to a corporate boss), and were “consensus builders” rather than transformative proactive leaders. Jiang and Hu were also the most comfortable of the five operating within “groups” and “collective” leadership, both typical of the transactional style of leadership.
The academic field of “leadership studies” in the United States has burgeoned since the 1960s and has produced a vast literature as well as dedicated leadership schools on university campuses. One leading scholar of leadership (and practicing psychologist), Daniel Goleman, who is known particularly for his pioneering work on emotional intelligence, has identified six distinct leadership styles: coercive (demands immediate compliance), authoritative (mobilizes people toward a vision), affiliative (builds personal relationships with colleagues), democratic (forges consensus through participation), pacesetting (sets high standards for performance), and coaching (develops successors for the future).5 Mao, Deng, and Xi distinctly exhibited coercive tendencies. Mao and Xi, to a lesser extent Deng, were authoritative. Deng, Jiang, and Hu were affiliative. Deng, Jiang, and Hu were democratic. Deng, Jiang, Hu, and Xi were all pacesetters. Only Mao and Deng can be said to have been concerned with fostering (coaching) their successors.
Of course, leadership is also very culturally and system dependent.6 Leaders who would succeed in Europe would not likely succeed in the Middle East, for example, and those who are successful in autocratic systems are not appropriate for democratic systems (and vice versa). Nonetheless, it is interesting to consider leadership skills comparatively, as certain ones do transcend different political systems. Take, for example, the seven core leadership qualities identified by the American politics scholar Fred Greenstein for successful American presidents: vision, political skill, organizational capacity, public communicator, cognitive style (how a leader acquires and processes information), emotional intelligence, and moral character.7 If we were to apply these to China’s leaders, I would judge that Mao, Deng, and Xi all possessed vision. Mao, Deng, Jiang, and Xi all possessed political skill (defined by Greenstein as being motivational and able to forge political coalitions). Deng, Jiang, and Xi all excelled at organizational capacity. Mao and Deng were poor public speakers, while both Jiang and Hu were rather robotic in their public presentations (Jiang was just the opposite in private). Only Xi was a good public communicator. Each had their own distinct cognitive style of processing information. So-called emotional intelligence—the ability to read and channel others’ emotional needs—is a key ingredient noted in many studies of leadership, as it naturally creates “followership.” The best leaders inspire and incentivize followers, and thus do not need to rely on other forms of inducement. I would say that only Mao and Xi, among our five leaders, possessed this skill. Finally, what about moral character? Here, all five strike out if measured by the repressive system they presided over and the personal use of arbitrary power each wielded. But, if measured on the basis of the behavioral type of Chinese Communist Party members and society’s citizens that each sought to foster—then we can say that all five advocated policies encouraging honesty, clean living, noncorruption, frugality, and other traditional communist values. There has been an additional expectation that China’s leaders should embody the traditional Confucian archetype of the caring, benevolent, and patriarchal figure (all five fit this paradigm).
Some leaders exhibit the character trait of narcissism (excessive interest in or admiration of oneself), and this has been extensively studied by political psychologists.8 When it occurs in leaders this personality disorder usually leads to a compulsive desire of the leader for mass adulation and the creation of a “cult of personality.” Among the five leaders in this study, it is clear that Mao had a severe case of narcissism, Xi Jinping has a very strong case, and Jiang Zemin had a mild case. Deng Xiaoping and Hu Jintao were self-effacing individuals who were not so inclined (although in Deng’s case the propaganda apparatus nonetheless still tried to create such a cult of personality).
An individual leader’s lifelong socialization is also critical to understanding their behavior. It is well established in the fields of psychiatry, psychology, social psychology, psychohistory, political psychology, and psychopathology that pre-adult and early adult socialization are critical formative periods that do much to shape how a person behaves throughout their life. In particular, at least the following experiences and relationships have been identified as key influences: where one grows up and their standard of living; relationships with mothers and fathers; degree of maternal nurturing (or lack thereof); experiences in school and relationships with teachers; and relationships with peers. All of these encounters usually have far-reaching impacts on subsequent personality development. For example—for boys—maternal nurturing, a secure home environment, interactive siblings, financial stability, supportive primary and secondary school teachers, and inclusivity with a network of peers can all lead to a secure ego, confidence, and an outgoing adult personality. Conversely, antagonistic relations with fathers, a sense of neglect from mothers or abandonment by parents (even if they are away from home working), bickering with siblings, financial instability, harsh discipline from teachers, exclusion by peers—these experiences can all lead to an alienated, frustrated, angry, repressed, aggressive, insecure, insular adult personality type. This latter type is frequently associated with the development of strong anti-authoritarian and frequently narcissistic adult personality types. These two sets of general pre-adult characteristics have also been found across multiple national-cultural environments and are not simply characteristics of modern Western societies. Indeed, in pre-modern agrarian or early industrialized societies they are quite common.
To what degree do these early family rearing and socialization features shed light on the five leaders covered in this study? One interesting commonality is that only one of the five (Jiang Zemin) grew up in a close-knit and stable nuclear family environment. All the others had very disrupted youths with absent or deceased parents.
Mao and his father had very strained relations, they clashed frequently, and Mao’s anti-authority persona has been attributed to his deep antagonistic relationship with his father.9 His father made Mao work in the fields beginning at age six, something he resented. As Mao described his father in an interview with Edgar Snow in Yanan in 1937 (his only known reflection on his youth and family): “He was a hot-tempered man and frequently beat both me and my brothers.”10 Mao told Snow that he grew to “hate” his father. Being unfilial toward his father, in such a patriarchal traditional culture, gave Mao an “Oedipus complex” (a Freudian reference to Greek King Oedipus, who unknowingly killed his father and married his mother), in the view of Sinologist and social scientist Richard H. Solomon, who authored a comprehensive psychocultural biography of Mao.11 In sharp contrast to his father, Mao’s mother was very nurturing and indulgent of her first son—thus providing him with a strong sense of self-confidence and a self-assured ego. As he described her to Snow: “My mother was a kind woman, generous and sympathetic, and ever ready to share what she had.”12 Mao was also very protective of his mother (sometimes physically) when she clashed with his father. There was much acrimony in the Mao family household. Mao’s anti-authority trait deepened in primary school, where his teacher frequently punished and beat him. Mao described his teacher as belonging to the “stern treatment school; he was harsh and severe.”13 After five years in this school and one too many beatings Mao ran away, never to return. These early childhood experiences proved pivotal for Mao—producing resentment of his father and authority figures, and instilling “revolutionary” traits in him at an early age.
In Deng Xiaoping’s case, his father was absent for long periods from the family residence in rural Sichuan, and thus Deng did not have much of a relationship with his father. His mother, like Mao’s mother, was loving, and doted on her first-born son. But she died when Deng was only 14. Deng then left home for middle school in Chongqing, also never to return. At just age 16 Deng had the wrenching experience of being sent on a long steamship trip to France for an overseas work-study program (which turned into much work and little study). Altogether Deng spent a total of six years abroad in France and one year in Moscow before returning to China at age 23. These early experiences on his own certainly bred a certain self-reliance in Deng. While in France Deng developed a liking for French food, liquor, and a passion for croissants. He found a series of odd jobs and factory work, but his schooling only lasted three months. Deng did find a peer group in relationships with other young Chinese and Vietnamese (including Ho Chi Minh) then studying and working there, many of whom were active in socialist politics following the Bolshevik Revolution (1917). One of these individuals who did play an important mentoring role in Deng’s life was Zhou Enlai, who was six years Deng’s senior and who brought him into the nascent Chinese Communist Party Socialist Youth League. Deng’s main job in the League was to produce propaganda pamphlets, for which he became known as “Monsieur Mimeograph.”
Hu Jintao was also deprived of parents early. His mother died when he was only 7, and because his father (a merchant) was often away on business traveling throughout the lower Yangzi delta region, Hu and his three sisters were raised by an aunt. While the aunt was a good provider, Hu never had the security and familiarity of a close nuclear family. This likely contributed to his own self-reliance, and possibly also to the aloofness he displayed as an adult.
Jiang Zemin is the only one of the five leaders in this study to have had a fairly normal nuclear and extended family life, growing up in Yangzhou, Jiangsu province. His father was a writer and part-time electrician, and Jiang recalled later that his mother was doting and loving.14 The Jiang family was well-to-do and well-known in Yangzhou, an important cultural and commercial center for centuries. Jiang was one of five children. His uncle Jiang Shangqing and his wife were second parents to Jiang Zemin, essentially raising him. Jiang Shangqing was a leftist intellectual who was active in communist underground activities, arrested and rearrested by the Nationalists’ police, and who had just joined the communist Red Army when he was killed in an ambush during the Japanese occupation in 1939, thus becoming a CCP martyr (giving the extended Jiang family a communist pedigree). Following his death Jiang Zemin’s natural father Jiang Shijun offered their son to his brother’s widow, as the couple had no male children of their own.15 This was not as disruptive for young Jiang Zemin as it might seem, as he had been living mostly with the aunt and uncle from an early age. Other than this anomaly, as described in Chapter 4, Jiang’s upbringing was quite normal and quite intellectual—which may have given him a secure self-confidence.
Xi Jinping was also thrust into the world at the tender age of 14, when he was sent from Beijing to rural Shaanxi province during the Cultural Revolution. His father had been imprisoned five years earlier and his mother was sent to a rural cadre school. The Xi family household thus broke apart early in Xi’s young life—he was just 9 when his father was imprisoned— Xi was thereafter sent to a boarding school on the outskirts of Beijing.
Thus, if self-confidence and independence born of adversity at an early age is a characteristic of individuals who become leaders, all five leaders in this study had their youths and home life disrupted and had to learn to cope on their own in their mid-teens. Only Jiang Zemin had the semblance of a normal family life, although he grew up in split households between his birth parents and his aunt and uncle.
Of course, leaders—like all humans—are not static creatures. Despite the important impact of childhood and early adult socialization, we all learn and change as we grow older. Certain learned “lessons” from the past are assimilated and applied to the future—or at least they should be (“those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it,” famously observed philosopher George Santayana). So, a leader at one stage of his or her career may act differently at another. It is thus relevant to consider mid-life and late-life experiences. As individuals approach death, paranoia and irrationality grip some leaders. However, it is not only that people pass through identifiable stages in the life cycle, but psychologists observe that the transitional periods from one stage to the next can be particularly unpredictable and unsettled (like “power transitions” in international relations). Three key transitions are distinguishable: adolescence to young adulthood (ages 17–22); the young adult to middle adulthood transition (ages 40–45); and mid-life to late adulthood transition (ages 60–65).16 The literature in psychology generally argues that one’s political orientations are formed by stage 1, habits of decision-making and leadership emerge by stage 2, increasing decisiveness occurs by stage 3, but that “decisional sclerosis” can set in after age 65, with increasing unpredictability, irrationality, and dogmatism frequently apparent (which fear of death only exacerbates).17
In the case of the five leaders in this study, it does not seem to me that these transition points were very influential (the exception being Mao, who certainly grew quite irrational, unpredictable, and dogmatic in his sixties). Rather, I would argue, more significant in shaping the personas and leadership styles of the five were experiences they all had during their twenties and thirties, prior to the mid-life transition point noted above. As is described in detail in their individual chapters, it was primarily during these two decades of their lives that each really began to form a distinct leadership style and modus operandi.
While it is important to analyze leaders in their adult years, psychologists have long established that people are actually creatures of habit, and are quite resistant to change and adaptation. People’s essential personalities are fairly firmly established by early adulthood—absent profound experiences (such as war, natural calamity, or life-altering events). Their basic belief systems and worldviews (weltanschauungen) are predominantly determined by one’s twenties—and they are determined by a combination of family, school, community, and peer group socialization influences. Thereafter, as the psychological theory of cognitive dissonance (expounded most thoroughly by Leon Festinger)18 tells us, adults go through life selectively accepting evidence that confirms pre-existing beliefs and images while rejecting (dissonant) information that contradicts the core belief systems established by their twenties.
With respect to our five Chinese leaders, I would argue that the theory of cognitive dissonance and the argument that their worldviews were strongly formed prior to their thirties applies really only to Mao. Deng, Jiang, Hu, and Xi all forged their professional personas during their thirties and forties—through working in and managing CCP institutions. All three were strong institutionalists, and I would argue that this was an outgrowth of their work experience rather than their childhoods, teenage years, twenties, or revolutionary activities (in the case of Deng).
All of these features of human development and behavior should be kept in mind when reading this book, as Chinese leaders are not unique human beings—they are susceptible to many of the behavioral patterns that psychologists, political scientists, and other researchers have discovered across multiple countries and cultures. Recognizing this, individual countries and cultures also exert their own specific influences on individual leaders. In this context, the next two sections discuss, respectively, the unique impacts of Chinese traditional political culture and that of Leninist-type communist parties.
The Influences of Chinese Political Culture
CCP leaders are, of course, communist (Marxist-Leninist) in their orientation. In the next section we examine the unique aspects of communist party systems and how that institutionally and normatively shapes the environment in which the CCP leaders examined in this book must operate. They are also Chinese leaders and are thus deeply shaped by historical and cultural traditions of politics and rule. As far back as Plato’s Republic it has been recognized that the cultural socialization of politicians is determinative of their orientation and behavior. There are limits to the political culture approach, of course, as criticisms tend to take aim at the level of (over)generalization of alleged influences, but I nonetheless am one political scientist who finds this analytical approach extremely insightful and valuable. Below I list a number of the most salient residual elements and built-in assumptions from Chinese historical political culture that have continued to influence post-1949 CCP leaders:
Leaders should inherently be benevolent (王道) and look out for the best interests of the people. Rulers should set a moral example (道德) through their behavior. Legitimacy is based on benevolent and benign morality.
While benevolence is preferred, coercion against usurpers is justified to maintain stability and the sanctity of the regime; excessive coercion, however, is considered hegemonic (霸道) and thus illegitimate.
The physical core (内心) of China is ethnically Han; other ethnic groups on the periphery, as well as further away, are “outsiders” (外人) or “barbarians” (夷人).
Other powers are predatory, foreigners have ulterior motives to take advantage of China, and thus are not to be trusted.
China is a global great power with over 3,000 years of history and a highly accomplished civilization and is deserving of respect from all others on this basis. Restoring China to global status as a respected great power is the primary mission of all Chinese leaders.
China is the leading power in Asia and should be treated deferentially by all neighbors (the “tribute system”).
Beginning in the late eighteenth century until 1949 China experienced external aggression and plundering by foreign (mainly European) powers—leading to the “century of shame and humiliation” (百年国耻). China must never again be subjected to such physical dismemberment, social exploitation, and psychological trauma.
Japan’s aggression during the Sino-Japanese War (1894–1895) and atrocities in China (1937–1945) are unforgivable.
A strong national identity and patriotic nationalism must be inculcated in all Chinese.
To the greatest extent possible, China must remain as autonomous and self-reliant (自力更生) as possible vis-à-vis other nations; (inter)dependency is a recipe for manipulation.
Avoid open confrontation with others, but use deception and a variety of Sun Zi-like tactics to neutralize and overcome adversaries.
A strong state is the best defense against both internal and external threats.
Disorder (乱) is an ever-present possibility, but to be avoided at all costs. Consequently, a premium is placed on maintaining “stability” (稳定) and order (秩序).
Regional and local centrifugal forces are always strong and pull against the centripetal power of the Center. As a result, there is a tendency for the periphery to feign compliance with the Center (a phenomenon known as “the sky is high and the emperor is far away”: 天高皇帝远).
Elite politics can be a zero-sum game of “tigers eating tigers.” Never trust others, as they likely are seeking to subvert your power and position.
Maintenance of “face” (面子) and avoiding embarrassment is essential not only in Chinese society, but also in dealings with foreigners. Elaborate lengths are gone to in order to avoid public embarrassment and maintain appearances of confidence and grandeur.
The people of China are a “loose sheet of sand” who need to be led through the tutelage of enlightened elites.
Maintain flexibility and avoid dependence in foreign relations.
Play the long game and keep a clear eye on end goals. Time is always an asset. Do not be impatient. Maneuver is a constant tactical feature, as all relationships are eternally fluid.
Vigilantly safeguard China’s territories and claimed sovereignty.
These are many of the operative assumptions I believe China’s leaders are inculcated with. They are subliminal assumptions, which individual Chinese may not even be conscious of, but these assumptions all are inherited from the past and have real impact on people’s behavior. Additionally, China’s leaders have in common with leaders of other developing countries their nation’s historical encounters with Western imperialism and colonialism, the strong mission to gain independence and autonomy, and thus the imperative to undertake modernization and nation-building.19
The Influences of Chinese Leninist Culture
In addition to these historical and cultural influences, all Chinese Communist Party leaders must operate within, and are deeply influenced by, the fact that the CCP is a Leninist-type party. This has both institutional and normative dimensions and consequences.
Institutional Imperatives
The former involves the institutional structures and policy processes that are unique to communist parties: the Central Committee and its departments, the Politburo and Politburo Standing Committee, Leading Small Groups (领导小组), Party committees (党委), Party groups (党组), and Party teams (党班子) that are embedded within the vast majority of institutions in society (factories, schools, neighborhoods, media, the military, all provinces, all cities, all counties, all villages, etc.). Leninist communist parties are like cellular organisms that permeate all elements of a society—they penetrate into the society and thereby control from the inside. The embedded institutional structure of the CCP is pervasive throughout China. China’s leaders must operate within this institutional framework. Among other manifestations this means that there are built-in mechanisms of constant surveillance among Party members and by the Party vis-à-vis all levels of government and throughout society.
Party congresses are held every five years (since 1982). In between, plenary sessions (or plenums) are held—usually once or twice per year. It is customary that each plenum focuses on a specific policy area (third plenums are about the economy, fourth plenums about the Party and ideology, fifth plenums usually about legal and administrative affairs, sixth plenums are about culture, and so on). While there is no fixed requirement, and it has fluctuated a great deal over time, the Politburo (政治局) usually convenes only for plenums, while the Politburo Standing Committee (政治局常委) usually meets once or twice per month. The state (government) structure is entirely separate (although also penetrated by the CCP at all levels). It includes the State Council and all of its ministries, commissions, bureaus, and agencies. It is headed by the Premier—who is also a senior leader, but not the preeminent one (technically the Chairman of the National People’s Congress outranks the Premier). Also on the government side is the state (PRC) President and Vice-President, but both are simply titles and do not come with attached institutions. The national judiciary is similarly a separate system (also referred to as the political-legal system, 政法系统) from the Party and government, but national leaders rarely interface with it. Finally, the preeminent leader is also normally Chairman of the Central Military Commission (CMC, 中央军委), a Party institution (although there has been a separate state CMC since 1982, with identical membership).
There has been fluctuation in these positions, their occupants, and their terms of occupation over time. The evolution of the five principal Chinese leaders of this study, as well as other top leaders, can be found in Table 1.1. With the exception of Hua Guofeng, prior to the 1990s those leaders who held these Party, military, and government positions were divided—but since Jiang Zemin’s tenure (1989–2002) China’s preeminent leader has held the trifecta of positions: CCP General Secretary, CMC Chairman, and PRC President. Only two leaders (Hua Guofeng and Zhao Ziyang) served both as CCP leader and State Council Premier (Hua simultaneously, Zhao consecutively), while “normally” the Premier has not held another position. Similarly, some served only as state President.
In China power does not always correlate directly with institutional positions. While the table below lists no fewer than eighteen individual leaders over the past seven decades, it is fair to say that only the five analyzed in this book have been the “paramount leader.” Some readers may question why I have not included Hua Guofeng, Hu Yaobang, and Zhao Ziyang as “paramount leaders” worthy of their own individual chapters. The reasons vary in each case. Hua Guofeng was certainly China’s preeminent leader following Mao’s death and the arrest of the Gang of Four in 1976, but his authority over the military was certainly constrained by Marshal Ye Jianying—and by mid-1977 Deng Xiaoping had returned to the senior leadership and immediately and progressively began to whittle away at Hua’s institutional positions and authority. By September 1980, Hua was stripped of the premiership in favor of one of Deng’s chosen disciples, Zhao Ziyang. Less than a year later, in June 1981, Deng himself seized the CMC chairmanship from Hua, while inserting his other disciple Hu Yaobang as CCP Chairman. Thus, Hua Guofeng’s tenure was really too short and too constrained to merit a separate chapter and consideration as one of China’s principal leaders. While there is a better case to make for Hu Yaobang and Zhao Ziyang, each of them very much operated under Deng’s preeminent status and each only possessed a single portfolio (and neither served as President or CMC Chairman). Hu and Zhao certainly played significant roles, and we will consider them in Chapter 3, but I do not feel that either merits inclusion among the principal leaders of the PRC.
Table 1.1: China’s Principal Leadership Positions and Leaders Since 1949
Normative Imperatives
Another, perhaps more important, set of characteristics of the CCP as a Leninist party, which influences its senior leaders, are normative elements. There are a number of these—all unseen—which constitute the “operating software” of the CCP.20
Regulate everything. The CCP and its leaders carry out their work according to an enormous number of rules and statutes, as embodied in the Party and state constitutions,21 as well as a plethora of internal (内部) regulations. Official rules and regulations are certainly important, particularly in a party that is so extraordinarily characterized by formally specified procedures. The CCP is an extremely “scripted” party that leaves little to chance. Thousands of handbooks are published for Party committees and members (党员手册) which specify everything from who sits where at a meeting to precise procedures for all activities. There is likely no more formally organized political party on the planet. These voluminous stipulations and imperatives really do guide the behavior of Party institutions and members on a daily basis, and thus it is important to appreciate just what an excessively regulated environment China’s leaders have to operate in. These regulatory and behavioral stipulations have increased significantly since 1989, and notably under Xi Jinping.
Hierarchy, discipline, and factionalism. As a Leninist party, within which leaders and rank-and-file members alike must operate, three elements are notable: hierarchical organization, maintaining discipline, and constraining factionalism. They are all interrelated. Hierarchical command is one essential characteristic of a Leninist party. In real ways, both before Xi Jinping but certainly under him, the CCP operates a lot like a military—orders and directives are given and are to be followed. Those who do not do so are punished. The CCP is a hierarchical vertical institution with horizontal mechanisms that penetrate throughout society. Leninist parties like the CCP are not voluntary organizations, where members participate out of their own free will and make their own decisions about what to say and do—there is rigid and strict discipline. This is what is variously referred to as the “dictatorship of the proletariat,” the “people’s democratic dictatorship,” or “democratic centralism.” The concept underlying all three terms is that the Party is the “vanguard” of the “masses” and “people,” and legitimately acts on behalf of the populace. So, where does the aforementioned term “democratic” come in? This harkens back to Mao’s concept of the “mass line,” first developed by him in Yanan (the Communists’ revolutionary stronghold after 1937) whereby the Party floats a policy idea to the masses, gets feedback from them, and then it makes a policy decision—after which strict adherence is required during policy implementation. This “down-up-down” process of policy formulation and implementation is meant to (theoretically at least) give the veneer of mass participation in the system. Related to the need to maintain strict hierarchy and discipline is the corollary of checking factionalism. Factionalism is an endemic feature of Chinese political culture. Rooted in interpersonal guanxi and the belief that there is safety in personal networks, Chinese citizens, cadres, and leaders alike have a long history of factionalism. It is hard-baked into the DNA of Chinese politics. There are a variety of factional types in the PRC: institution-based, locality-based, patron/client-based, “line”-based, issue-based, school-based, and more.22 The past seven decades (and before the CCP seized power) have been rife with factional struggles and power plays. Some losers find themselves in Qincheng Prison (the facility outside of Beijing reserved for elite prisoners). But factionalism runs exactly counter to hierarchical Leninism. Hence there has been a longstanding attempt by the CCP to quell factionalism within its ranks and particularly at the top of the system. This has particularly been the case since the leadership split on the eve of the June 4, 1989, massacre.
The nomenklatura. The CCP may portray itself as a mass political party, representing the vast peasantry and working class of China, but in fact it is very much an elite party. Its current 94 million Party members only represent approximately 6 percent of the population of 1.5 billion people. Because of this obvious asymmetry of leaders and led, and the popular perception that the Party is a class in itself,23 the CCP goes to extensive lengths to promote the propaganda narrative that the Party “cherishes the people,” “puts people first” (以人为本), and otherwise is not detached from the masses. But not only is the Party a small percentage of broader society, but there is a “Party within the Party.” This is known as the nomenklatura—a Soviet term to identify the list of official positions in the Party and throughout the country that must be staffed by Party members. The most recent data we have on the CCP nomenklatura is from 2003, when there were 525,000 individuals identified as “leading cadres” (领导干部), essentially the nomenklatura corps. These elites not only run the Party—they run all major institutions in society (media, major universities, state-owned enterprises, and many companies, and so on).24 There is a list of 3,800 institutional positions (编制 in Chinese) that require the appointment of a “leading cadre” selected by the CCP Organization Department. The nomenklatura
