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Members of the Politburo of the Chinese Communist Party Central Committee pictured at Peking Airport in April 1974: from left, Wang Hung-wen, Vice-Chairman of the CCP CC; Yeh Chien-ying, also Vice-Chairman of the CCP CC and, since January 1975, China's Minister of Defense; Madame Chiang Ch'ing (wife of Mao Tse-tung); and Premier Chou En-lai.

-John Burns/Toronto Globe and Mail.

China has achieved impressive gains in both agri- | cided at about the same time to reduce defense exculture and industry, yet it remains a country with penditures in favor of greater investment in industry potentially severe economic problems. The most and agriculture." critical is the apparent slowdown in the rate of agricultural growth in recent years, a development that could have extremely serious implications for the future. In order to cope with this problem, the Chinese leadership in 1972 made a basic decision to effect a significant increase in imports from the West' many of these imports in high technology areas having direct relevance to the expansion of agricultural production. The Chinese evidently de

7 The level of Chinese imports from non-Communist countries jumped from $1,805 million in 1971 to $2,300 million in 1972 and to $4,270 million in 1973. Total Chinese trade including exports as well as imports may have increased another 30 to 40 percent in dollar terms in 1974. Current Scene (Hong Kong), Vol. 12, No. 12, December 1974, pp. 5 and 7.

8 For a list of complete plants sold to China in 1973, see US-China Business Review (Washington, DC), Vol. 1, January-February 1974, pp. 36-37. For a similar list covering January-March 1974 and plant sales under negotiation at that time, see ibid., Vol. 1, No. 3, May-June 1974, pp. 38-39.

These recent trends suggest that economic planners in Peking have made a strong case for giving absolute priority to maximizing investment and technological development. The Chinese leaders, however, also face substantial pressures from industrial workers and others for higher living standards, as evidenced by the many strikes-some of them prolonged and bitter-that occurred during the 1974 campaign to criticize Lin Piao and Confucius.1o The tension between the need to accumulate funds for investment" and the desire to meet workers' de

9 Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, World Military Expenditures and Arms Trade, 1963-1973, Washington, DC, US Government Printing Office, 1975, p. 27.

10 The New York Times, Nov. 15, 1974, p. 3.

11 Levels of investment in industry since the beginning of the 1970's have been markedly higher than they were in the 1950's and 1960's. See Dwight Perkins, "China's Fourth Five-Year Plan," US-China Business Review, Vol. 1, No. 2, March-April 1974, p. 20.

mands for consumption is thus serious and growing. | concerning the future vitality and endurance of the

A related ideological problem involves the extent to which material incentives should be used to stimulate production.

In foreign affairs, the major policy issue is how to maximize China's national security-through continued efforts toward rapprochement with the United States and an improved relationship with Japan or via a relaxation of tensions with the Soviet Union." This question, moreover, overlaps with the issues of military/civilian relations and economic development strategy. It impinges on the former because the logic of détente is one that should force the Chinese military to accept a new and different set of threat perceptions—something that is never easy for a military establishment to do and also because it enables civilian leaders to argue for lower defense expenditures. It impinges on the latter because, as noted above, the increased inflow of Western imports that has accompanied détente now represents an integral part of the post-1972 Chinese strategy of economic development.

The military is not the only group in China that harbors doubts about détente. Dependence on any foreign country has been a touchy issue in Chinese politics for the past 100 years, and it remains so today. In addition, the recent economic difficulties of the non-Communist West have undoubtedly decreased Peking's confidence in a strategy of relying on the strength and vitality of the United States to counter the Soviet threat in Asia." More immediately, the economic malaise in the West has hurt Chinese exports and thereby diminished the PRC's ability to pay for increased imports. To offset this loss, China is rapidly developing its oil-export capacity (and is promising virtually all its oil exports to Japan in an effort to keep that country from turning increasingly toward the USSR)." The situation, however, remains complex and difficult, and Peking has recently agreed to financing arrangements that are very close to the type of medium-term borrowing that China eschewed during the 1960's." Thus, for a range of reasons-from differing expectations

12 A policy coupling militant opposition to both the US and the Soviet Union with a strengthening of China's ties to the Third World may also have some advocates in Peking, although this clearly seems to be the least likely alternative in the current policy debate.

13 As an oil exporter, the USSR has not experienced economic difficulties comparable to those faced by the United States and Japan over the past few years.

14 See Nicholas Ludlow, "China's Oil," US-China Business Review, Vol. 1, No. 1, January-February 1974, pp. 21-23.

15 See Audrey Donnithorne, "China's Foreign Trade System Changes Gear," ibid., pp. 16-17.

West as a counterweight to the Soviet Union to more narrow calculations of bureaucratic interest-disagreement continues in Peking regarding the desirability of détente with the United States and Japan and continued hostility toward the USSR.1

And finally, there is still controversy in China over the proper composition of the civilian ruling organs. During the Cultural Revolution, Mao attacked the CCP organization for harboring career-oriented bureaucrats who had become too attached to both reformist problem-solving methods and the perquisites of office. By the end of that upheaval most of the old apparatus had been destroyed and replaced by military-dominated revolutionary committees." The drive to restrict the political role of the PLA after the Ninth Congress, however, created a pressing need for civilian personnel with the requisite administrative and political skills, and the "old cadres" (i.e., those who had held responsible party and government positions before the Cultural Revolution) provided an important reservoir of the necessary talent. The old cadres have consequently been rehabilitated in large numbers during the past few years, as symbolized most strikingly by the rapid resurgence of Teng Hsiao-p'ing, the former head of the party Secretariat, who had been vilified during the Cultural Revolution as the "No. 2 person in authority taking the capitalist road."

The rehabilitation of old cadres nevertheless remains a highly-charged issue in Chinese politics, for it has implications not only for the legitimacy of the Cultural Revolution itself but also for the future careers of people who achieved some prominence during the turmoil of that enormous campaign, as well as for factional politics in anticipation of the succession. While the legitimacy question may be of symbolic importance, the other two aspects raise more concrete political problems of great sensitivity. In short, the People's Republic now faces choices across a broad spectrum of issues that will profoundly affect the course of the ongoing Chinese revolution during the last quarter of this century. All consideration of these problems is, moreover, complicated by the dominant immediate concern pervading Chinese politics-namely, that in the

16 The question of a moderation of policy vis-à-vis the Soviet Union may not, in fact, be openly debated among Chinese policymakers in view of Mao Tse-tung's vociferous opposition to any compromise with Moscow.

17 There was also a tendency for military figures to take over leading positions even in party bodies as these were reestablished.

near future the CCP will have to undergo its first change in top-level leadership since the Long March 40 years ago. The imminence of the succession to Mao Tse-tung (and Chou En-lai) effectively weds policy preferences to power considerations in a way that makes it impossible to analyze the one without due consideration of the other. And the fate of Mao Tse-tung's two previous heirs apparent-Liu Shaoch'i and Lin Piao-highlights the reality that the stakes are high in personal as well as policy terms.

Contending Forces

There are three major groups currently vying for power in a post-Mao China. The following profiles of these groups and their policy positions are necessarily oversimplifications to a degree. In some cases, the policy preferences of individual personalities are not sufficiently well known to permit identifying them clearly with one group or another. Moreover, some high-level leaders may not "fit" precisely into

any of these groups. Nevertheless, the profiles that follow are offered as rough approximations based on the best available evidence.

Chou En-lai heads what may be called the "Peking group," which also counts among its members central economic planners and many rehabilitated high-ranking officials from the pre-Cultural Revolution state bureaucracy. These men are relatively urban-centered and are willing to use any reasonable means to expand China's economy, if necessary at the short-run cost of increased social inequality. They see China's long-term security as dependent upon rapid industrialization and eventual achievement of economic independence, and to reach these goals they favor the importation of foreign goods and technology insofar as these benefit China's economic growth. While China remains weak militarily, they seek security in an active diplomacy calculated to play off one potentially threatening power against another.

The "Shanghai group" counts Yao Wen-yuan and Chiang Ch'ing among its leaders, and at the recent

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Members of the CCP Politburo at Peking Airport in April 1974: from left, Chang Ch'un-ch'iao, CCP First Secretary in Shanghai; Wang Tung-hsing, Director of the Central Committee's General Office; Hua Kuofeng, CCP First Secretary in Honan Province; and Ch'en Hsi-lien, Commander of the Peking Military Region.

-John Burns/Toronto Globe and Mail.

National People's Congress Chang Ch'un-ch'iao voiced the group's concerns. These people are fundamentalists who insist that China must not sacrifice revolutionary values on the altar of economic development. They have concentrated their efforts on cultural and educational policies as the prime vehicles for changing the way 800 million Chinese think. Reducing the spread of the "three major differences"-between workers and peasants, between town and country, and between mental and manual labor-is of great importance to them." Distrust of foreign countries is another characteristic of the group, whose members fear that economic and political intercourse with other nations especially the United States and the Soviet Unionmay corrupt the revolution.

Third and last is the "military group," which includes China's major PLA commanders, the most important of whom at present is probably Ch'en Hsi-lien. These men may be reluctant to entrust China's post-Mao leadership entirely to civilian party officials. Their precise policy preferences are not altogether clear; however, most members of the group seem to edge closer to the "Peking group" so far as domestic priorities are concerned. In the sphere of foreign policy, they may share with the "Shanghai group" a mutual distaste for détente with the United States, but as men who are acutely sensitive to China's national security concerns, they almost certainly diverge from the "Shanghai group" in their preference for toning down the intensity of the PRC's conflict with the Soviet Union.

The Second Plenum and the NPC

The January 1975 meetings of the 10th CCP Central Committee's Second Plenum and the National People's Congress provided a good deal of information on the current intersection of policy perspectives and power relationships among the three contending groups just described. The communiqué issued by the Second Plenum, which met first and finalized the agenda for the Congress, announced the elevation of Teng Hsiao-p'ing to the positions of Vice-Chairman of the CCP Central Committee and member of the Standing Committee of the Politburo. Chou En-lai and Chang Ch'un-ch-iao

18 On this and other positions of the "Shanghai group," see, e.g., Yao Wen-yuan, "On the Social Basis of the Lin Piao Anti-Party Clique," Hung Ch'i (Peking), No. 3, 1975, translated in Peking Review, Vol. 18, No. 10, March 7, 1975, pp. 5-10.

delivered major reports at the Congress, which formally approved a new State Constitution and made appointments to all top-level government positions, including the premiership, vice-premierships, and heads of all ministries and commissions of the State Council.19

Reassertion of civilian control over the military emerged as a major leitmotif of the January meetings and actions that flowed from them. The post of Defense Minister, vacant since the fall of Lin Piao in September 1971, was at last filled by the NPC's appointment to that position of Yeh Chien-ying, a 76-year-old Army man known to have a long association with Chou En-lai. Much more significant were two civilian appointments to top-level army positions made public immediately after the conclusion of the Congress.20 Teng Hsiao-p'ing, on top of his elevation in the party hierarchy, became the first civilian Chief of Staff of the PLA in the history of the PRC, and Chang Ch'un-ch'iao was named to the key post of head of the PLA's General Political Department. Finally, Article 15 of the new Constitution enacted by the NPC made the Chairman of the CCP commander-in-chief of the armed forces.21

The January developments thus clearly marked a further consolidation of civilian party control over the PLA. These decisions did not, however, add up to a complete resolution of the civilian/military problem, for any long-term solution must be one which will enable the party to bring young and dynamic military leaders into positions of power with full confidence that they will not use these positions to obstruct the party leadership. Perhaps what is most striking about the National People's Congress and related events, in this respect, is the evident lack of movement in such a direction. Cur

19 For the official English translations of the communiqué of the Second Plenum and of the documents of the First Session of the Fourth National People's Congress, see Peking Review, Vol. 18, No. 4, Jan. 24, 1975, pp. 6-25. The communiqué of the Second Plenum is on p. 6. The most important of the Congress documents appear on the following pages: Press Communiqué of the Congress, pp. 6-8; list of the Premier, Vice-Premiers, and ministers of the State Council, pp. 11-12; Constitution of the PRC, pp. 12-17; Chang Ch'un-ch'iao's "Report on the Revision of the Constitution," pp. 18-20; and Chou En-lai's "Report on the Work of the Government," pp. 21-25. All subsequent references are to these translated texts. For the Chinese texts of the first two Congress documents, see Jen-min Jih-pao (Peking), Jan. 19, 1975; for the Constitution and Chang Ch'un-ch'iao's report, ibid., Jan. 20, 1975; and for Chou En-lai's report, ibid., Jan. 21, 1975.

20 The New York Times, Jan. 30, 1975, pp. 1 and 4.

21 Overall command of the armed forces has previously been vested in the Chairman of the Republic, the post last held by Liu Shao-ch'i but now omitted from the Constitution.

rently, a 76-year-old military leader and two party | groups. In the sphere of domestic policy, Chou

men, the youngest of whom is in his sixties, head China's central military establishment. This leadership dilemma signifies the party's continuing inability to remove the military question from the agenda of Chinese politics.

On questions of economic strategy, the NPC seemed to mark the victory of Chou En-lai's approach and priorities. Chou used his "Report on the Work of the Government" as a platform to announce a basic plan of economic development for the remainder of the century. His plan allows for another five years of putting things in order, to be followed by 20 years of rapid economic growth." Several articles of the new Constitution reconfirmed the priority given to pragmatic economic policies by guaranteeing the continued existence of private plots (Article 7), side-line production (Articles 5 and 7), and the system of remuneration according to type and quantity of work done (Article 9).

The NPC also confirmed Chou's placement of a number of longtime associates, all with impressive pre-Cultural Revolution government careers, in key administrative slots under the State Council. Of the 29 ministerial appointees announced at the NPC, 18 were individuals with substantial pre-Cultural Revolution experience in Chou's State Council, while another seven were men who had spent most of their post-1949 careers in the military."3 Five of the latter were placed in ministries in charge of military-related heavy industry, repeating a pattern that already existed prior to the Cultural Revolution. The remaining ministerial posts were filled with an assortment of former provincial party secretaries and others (including a champion ping-pong player, who was named head of the Physical Culture and Sports Commission)." The twelve appointments to the more important rank of vice-premier reflected a somewhat greater attempt to balance competing political interests, but they, too, were striking primarily for the number and prominence of former close associates of Premier Chou included among them.

The reports made to the Congress by Chou and Chang Ch'un-ch'iao provided ample evidence of the conflicting viewpoints of the Peking and Shanghai

22 Chou's "Report," loc. cit., p. 23.

23 Wang Cheng, who was appointed head of the Fourth Ministry of Machine Building, has had substantial experience in both the military and governmental bureaucracies and consequently is doublecounted in these figures.

24 The author is grateful to Steven Butts of Columbia University for providing background information on these newly-appointed ministers.

26

stressed the need to give priority to rapid economic growth and quoted Mao Tse-tung to the effect that China should "learn from the good experiences of other countries," adding that "we must always adhere to this line." 25 He also ticked off a number of accomplishments of the Cultural Revolution and the subsequent movement to criticize Lin Piao and Confucius, concluding with the optimistic observation that "the emergence of all these new things has strengthened the all-around dictatorship of the proletariat over the bourgeoisie in the realm of the superstructure. . . ." .” * Chang Ch’un-ch’iao, by con trast, subtly raised the issue of the non-economic costs of the pragmatic policies advocated by Chou, and he also seemed to challenge Chou's implication that the dictatorship of the proletariat in China was now secure. Reaching into the Maoist lexicon for a quotation on the continuing importance of class struggle, he warned that "the bourgeoisie will seize hold of many fronts if the proletariat does not occupy them." " Chou thus implied that the social and political costs of his strategy of economic development need not be high, whereas Chang voiced concern over the abuses to which that strategy might lead.

In the sphere of foreign policy, the clash of views was more muted, though still apparent. For his part, Chou reaffirmed the policy of détente with the United States, albeit cautioning the US on the need to continue implementation of the provisions of the Shanghai Communiqué of February 1972. He also reaffirmed China's policy of maintaining good relations with Japan.2 Chang Ch'un-ch'iao, on the other hand, did not speak to foreign policy in any detail in his report on the revision of the Constitution, although the Preamble to that document provided him with an excuse to address this issue if he had chosen to do so. Chang did hint, however, that he disagreed with the thrust of Chou's remarks in that realm"an indication that foreign policy issues may well have been the subject of undisclosed contention during the January meetings.

On the issue of the make-up of the governmental apparatus, Chou's and Chang's reports gave clear evidence of continuing tension over the relative roles

25 Chou's "Report," loc. cit., p. 24.

26 lbid., pp. 21-22. Emphasis added.

27 Chang's "Report," loc. cit., p. 20. Emphasis added. 28 Chou's "Report," loc. cit., p. 24.

29 Chang asserted that "only by emancipating all mankind can the proletariat achieve its own final emancipation." See Chang's "Report," loc. cit., p. 20.

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