The Chinese Party-State

Outline

• Center of the party-state– Party structure at the center– Government structure at the center– National People’s Congress

• Local structure of party-state– Local people’s congresses– Local Party & government organs

Communist party-state

• Organizational design of political system– the difficult task of institutionalization

• Mao Zedong borrowed from– the Leninist party-state of the Soviet Union– the imperial system of ancient China

• principles of guardianship and hierarchy• Mao added the idea of the “mass line”

Common Features

• The political systems of imperial China and the former Soviet Union

• centralized control• bureaucratic administration• the role of ideology

– no room for private, individual interests– no room for organized opposition to the state

Changes in the System

• Great Leap Forward (1958 - 1961)• Cultural Revolution (1966 - 1976)• political reforms in the post-Mao era• substantive issues, policies, and the

allocation of power have changed greatly• the formal structure of the political system

has endured

Communist party-state

• Guardianship– the Party represents the historical best

interests of the people– the “people’s democratic dictatorship” allows

no organized opposition to party leadership• Hierarchy of party and govt. organizations

– “democratic centralism”– consultation and implementation

V illa ge

T o w n sh ip

C o u n ty/D is trict

C it y

P ro v in ce

C e n ter

Party Structure

T o w n sh ip

C o u n ty/D is trict

C it y

P ro v in ce

C e n ter

Governm ent Structure

Village

CCP General Secretary

• Jiang Zemin (1989 - 2002)• Hu Jintao (2002 - )

Politburo Standing Committee

• Each heads party work in one area– organization and personnel– propaganda and education– finance and economy– political-legal affairs– foreign affairs– etc.

CCP Central Committee

• About 200 members (and 150 alternate)• membership in CC reflects political power• Central Committee departments:

– Department of Organization– Department of Propaganda– Department of United Front– Department of International Liaison

CCP National Congress

• Meets every 5 years since 1977– 1977, 1982, 1987, 1992, 1997, 2002– 16th National Party Congress– November 2002– 2154 delegates

• elects– Central Committee

PRC Head of State

• President• Jiang Zemin

– 1993 - 2003– also the then CCP General Secretary

• Hu Jintao– 2003 - 2008– also the current CCP General Secretary

Central Government

• Premier: Wen Jiabao (2003-2008)• State Council• 29 Ministries and Commissions

– Ministry of Foreign Affairs– Ministry of National Defense– Development and Reform Commission– People’s Bank of China, etc.

Central Military Commission

• Commanders-in-chief of the People’s Liberation Army

• in both the central Party and government structures

• same composition• Chair: Hu Jintao• 11 members

National People’s Congress

• According to the constitution, the highest organization of state authority

• NPC Standing Committee– the permanent body of NPC exercises all but

the most formal powers of the NPC• 8 Special Committees

– legislative affairs, nationalities, agriculture and rural, foreign affairs, etc.

National People’s Congress

• NPC plenary sessions– meet annually in Beijing– for about 2 weeks

• the nearly 3,000 deputies are elected– for 5-year terms– by provincial-level people’s congresses

Power Relationship

CCP Politburo

National PC State Council

Local People’s Congresses

Eligible votersTownship

Eligible votersCounty

County or district PC’sCity

City PC’sProvince

Provincial PC’sNational

Elected byPeople’s Congresses

Provincial Level Governments

• 22 Provinces• 5 Autonomous

Regions• 4 Municipalities• 2 Special

AdministrativeRegions

5 Autonomous Regions

• Inner Mongolia• Xinjiang Uygur• Guangxi Zhuang• Ningxia Hui• Tibet

Directly Administered Cities

Special Administrative Regions

• Hong Kong (since 1997)• Macau

Local Governments

• Cities– 4 cities at the rank of provinces– 15 cities at the rank of “semi-provinces”– 283 cities at the rank of prefectures– 374 cities at the rank of counties

• 1,636 counties and 852 city districts• 35,484 townships (and 900,000 villages)

Local Party Structure

• 3.5 million party committees, party general branches, and party branches

• provinces, cities, counties, townships, and villages

• enterprises– state-owned enterprises– private enterprises

Replicated at lower levels

Local party committee

local people’s congress local government