(Dhanada K Mishra)
In the just concluded 19th party congress, secretary and party supremo Xi Jinping gave an unusually (even compared to similar long boring speech standards of the past!) long opening speech to the gathering of over 2000 party officials gathered from all corners of the vast country representing its multitudes of regions, provinces and constituencies.
Held every 5 years, the week long gathering had some major tasks including electing a 25 member central committee, 7 member standing committee of the politburo, 11 member Central Military Commission, approve the work report of the last five years and sanction the policies for the next five years and onwards.
With so much to accomplish, usually the agenda and the decisions are predetermined by the top echelons of the party only to be rubber stamped. Its been a long tradition of the party that all debate and discussions usually take place behind close doors and once decisions are taken everybody falls in line.
This year’s congress was special in that the rising star of China – all powerful Xi Jinping was to be confirmed for a second term and his ambitious policies including a tough anti-corruption drive, consolidation of power, strategies for sustaining China’s economic growth etc were to be endorsed in a way that would make Xi as important a figure in China’s political pantheon as the legendary Mao Xedong and Deng Jiaoping.
As it so happened, not only Xi has been re-appointed to his position as the supreme leader but his policy vision titled ‘Socialist System with Chinese Characteristics’ is going to be enshrined in the party constitution – which is the highest form of approval only accorded before to Mao Xedong while he was still alive.
Another central theme of Xi’s historic speech was his enumeration of China’s ambition to be a major super power and developed country by 2050 which was never pronounced in as much detail by a top leader on a widely watched forum like party congress before.
Some are comparing this announcement to the post-second world war ambition of the then Nationalist government of China to dominate the world!! These developments have certainly made the current event a major milestone.
Coupled with the recent declaration of the gigantic ‘Belt and Road’ project designed to sustain and accelerate China’s economic growth powered by expanding trade through land, rail and sea routes to all parts of Eurasia and east Africa over next 30 years and the Doklam stand-off, India has to closely watch the developments in coming years.
Among the several key focus areas announced by Xi going forward is to strengthen and modernize the Chinese armed forces, promote the Chinese Socialist policies with special characteristics internationally, take leadership roles on world stage in tackling global issues like climate change, terrorism and cyber-security.
With the United states increasingly conceding leadership role on the world stage, many experts believe that China is well placed to take its place and lead on all these crucial fronts. All of these ambitious plans are linked by Xi to the very survival of the Communist party and its rule.
Hence it can be taken for granted that the party under the leadership of Xi Jinping will do everything in its capacity to realise the dream in order to give people the prosperity they want in exchange for the single party rule and curbs on freedom of expression and demand for democracy.
Xi Jinping was born in Beijing in 1953 – the first supreme leader to be born after the communist take over in 1949. His father was a senior party functionary, but was disgraced and expelled from the party before being sent to the rural area to work as farm labour.
In 1968 at the start of Mao’s cultural revolution, he was also arrested by which time Xi’s formal schooling had all but ended. Xi himself was ordered to work on pig farm which he quit after the tough rural life became intolerable. He was arrested on his clandestine return to Beijing and send back to hard labour digging dirt and breaking stone in mountainous rural regions.
However on this stint, Xi showed leadership skills which made him the leader of his group which led to the opportunity to pursue higher studies at the famous Tshinghua university in Beijing. He studied Chemical Engineering in the 70s having already re-joined the youth brigade of the party in 1974.
Later he became the secretary to one of the party leaders Geng Biao who was a junior to his father. In mid-eighties he got his first opportunity of foreign travel when he visited the United States to study its agriculture. His two week stay with an American family made a deep positive impact on him about USA and its society. He pursued post-graduate studies at Tshinghua University from 1998-2002 and obtained a doctorate in Communist philosophy, Law and Political Science.
By then he had risen through the party ranks to have become the highest administrator or the Governor of Fujian province. He made a name for himself by attracting foreign investment from Taiwan for his province.
He was also subject to some allegation of indiscipline and anti-party activities for which he was transferred to the neighbouring Jhejiang province where he proved himself as an able administrator achieving a growth rate of 14%. He also became known for his anti-corruption drive which resulted in his induction in to the 16th party central committee in 2002 as well as land him the prestigious job of governing Shanghai.
He was nominated to the eight member polity-bureau of the central committee at the 17th party congress in 2007 as well as the responsibility to handle 2008 Beijing Olympics and the sensitive Hong Kong – Macau affairs for the party. In the next party congress in 2012 he was to be nominated as the President.
In one of his signature moves, he introduced a very strong anti-corruption drive under a separate division under a powerful and independent administrator reporting directly to him. This was around the same time the demand for Lokpal institution in India was at its peak. While the Lokpal demand met a sad end, Xi’s anti-graft drive has resulted in hundreds of high ranking powerful party and government officials caught for corruption and sent to prison.
At the same time thousands of grass-roots level party and government officials have also been caught the anti-corruption drive. This was certainly a big factor in the rise of Xi’s stature within the party an din the country as he rights identified corruption to be the root cause behind the economic slow down as well as disaffection of the common people with the party.
Apart from the anti-graft drive, Xi had taken a strong stance against the pro-democracy and human rights activists in China and Hong Kong. To that extent he has called for a strong military and aggressive postures in South China sea in order to establish Chinese authority and also create a nationalistic fervour in the country. On the top of it, he has been incessantly talking about a prosperous and developed China by 2050 which has become known as China 2050 vision.
As a first step towards this vision, Xi’s plan includes complete removal of extreme poverty by 2020 which seems feasible given the success of China’s anti-poverty programs which has lifted 850 million people out of extreme poverty as per UN estimates between 1981 and 2013. Towards this end, a household targeting model is being implemented as opposed to the regional model earlier.
One of the major threats to China’s dreams has been its demographics which thanks to its strict one child policy has not only stabilized but now runs the risk of ageing which would make its productivity and growth rate suffer. Recognizing this danger, the government under Xi has relaxed the policy to allow for two children instead of one child.
This will have far reaching consequences for China and also the world. Instead of being defensive about its governance model, China plans to showcase its success in poverty alleviation and wealth generation to the aspiring developing countries. Like Mao said, ‘The colour of the Cat is not important as long as it catches the mouse’. Its socialist model with Chinese characteristics is likely to be an important topic of global interest and research in coming years.
It also proves that in spite of significant corruption, economic growth and effective implementation of anti-poverty programs by government does yield results in short term. In addition China is also planning to expand its soft power and encourage its culture to spread across its boundaries all around the world with substantial investment in sports, games, music, arts etc.
The show piece in China’s vision 2050 is the ‘Belt and Road’ project. A plan that envisions connecting up to 60 countries, investing 2-3 trillion American dollars or 150 to 250 lakh crores over next 20-30 years has far reaching consequences. No wonder it makes countries like Japan and India wary.
The project not only enhance and accelerate China’s trade by creating multiple alternative routes and opening new markets for its products, but the influence that China will command is immeasurable. Parts of this project are already under construction in Pakistan, Srilanka and Vietnam.
Most developing countries in need of investment to create quality infrastructure are keenly looking forward to this mega-project. The second such ambitious project China is already working on in a big way is the Pearl River Delta development which includes the rapidly growing and hugely prosperous regions of Hong Kong and Macau.
The nineteenth century belonged to the European colonial powers such as Great Britain and France, the twentieth century certainly belonged to the United states with its vast military power and the power of science and technology.
The twenty-first century or at least the second half of it shows all the signs of belonging to China based on its huge population, economic might and ambitious plans. In the post 2nd world war China just before the communist take-over, the then nationalist Kumintang government had declared a similar ambition to be a world dominating power. While the current Chinese dream is very similar in nature, there is one big difference.
At that time China was poor and today China has enough money to fuel its ambition and achieve its dream! Whether India will have a place in this scheme of things will largely depend on our success in getting rid of our continuing scourge of poverty and our ability to showcase an alternative growth and development model that would be more sustainable and benign to the future of the world.
(The writer is a Civil Engineer and academician, the author heads the KMBB College of Engineering of the Sambad group and writes for the Sambad editorial page. Currently he is based in Hong Kong University of Science and Technology as a Research Fellow working on ‘Green Concrete’ technology.)
