HONG KONG – It may be hard to imagine, but 25
years ago, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was nearly toppled by a nationwide
pro-democracy movement. It was the late paramount leader Deng Xiaoping’s steely
nerves and the tanks of the People’s Liberation Army – dispatched to enforce
martial law and suppress the protests in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square – that
enabled the regime, at the cost of several hundred civilian lives, to avoid
collapse.
On the 25th anniversary of the Tiananmen
Square massacre of June 4, 1989, two questions stand out: how has the CCP
survived the last quarter-century, and can its rule endure for another 25
years?
The answer to the first question is
relatively straightforward. Policy adjustments, clever tactics of manipulation,
and a healthy dose of luck enabled the CCP to win the support it needed to
retain power and suppress destabilizing forces.
To be sure, serious mistakes were made.
Following the massacre, China’s conservative leaders attempted to reverse the
liberalizing reforms that Deng had initiated in the 1980’s, plunging the
Chinese economy into recession. And the Soviet Union’s implosion in 1991 caused
a panic in the CCP.
But Deng again managed to save the Party.
Mustering all of his energy and political capital, the 87-year-old leader
revived pro-market economic reforms, unleashing an economic revolution that
delivered an unprecedented wave of growth and development, thereby boosting the
CCP’s credibility considerably.
Deng and his successors buttressed this trend
by granting Chinese citizens considerable personal freedoms, fueling the
emergence of a culture of crass consumerism and mass entertainment. In this new
world of “bread and circuses,” it was far easier for the CCP to regain public
support and suppress the opposition. Carefully orchestrated moves to promote Chinese
nationalism and exploit xenophobia also helped.
Even repression, the mainstay of the regime’s
survival, was fine-tuned. China’s newly acquired wealth enabled its leaders to
build one of the world’s most technically sophisticated Internet firewalls and equip its internal security forces with
the most effective tools.
In dealing with China’s small but resilient
dissident community, the regime depends on the strategy of “decapitation.” In
other words, the government eliminates the threat posed by leading opposition
figures by jailing them or forcing them into exile, regardless of their
prominence. Liu Xiaobo – who won the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize – was sentenced to
11 years in prison, despite worldwide protest.
However cynical, the approach has worked. But
the CCP might not have been quite so successful had it not gotten lucky in a
few critical areas. For starters, the post-1992 reforms coincided with a surge
of globalization, which provided China with massive capital inflows (about $1 trillion in foreign direct
investment since 1992), a slew of new technologies, and virtually unimpeded
access to Western consumer markets. China thus became the workshop of the
world, with its exports rising more than tenfold by 2007.
Another factor that worked in the regime’s
favor was the so-called demographic dividend (an abundant labor force and a
relatively small percentage of children and elderly dependents). This provided
China with plentiful low-cost labor, while saving the government large
expenditures on pensions and health care.
The problem facing the CCP now is that most
of the factors that enabled it to survive since Tiananmen either have already
disappeared or are headed in that direction. Indeed, for all practical
purposes, pro-market reforms are dead. A kleptocracy of government officials,
their families, and well-connected businessmen has colonized the Chinese state
and is intent on blocking any reforms that might threaten their privileged
status.
Moreover, the CCP can no longer count on
rising prosperity to sustain public support. Rampant corruption and rising
inequality, together with obvious environmental decay, are causing ordinary
Chinese – especially the middle class, which once had high hopes for reform –
to become increasingly disillusioned.
At the same time, given rapid population
aging, China’s demographic dividend has all but dissipated. And, given
that China is already the world’s largest exporter, with more than 11% of the
global market share, there is little room left for export growth in the coming
years.
That leaves only repression and nationalism
in the CCP’s post-Tiananmen toolkit. And, indeed, both of them continue to play
a central role in President Xi Jinping’s strategy for ensuring the Party’s
survival.
But Xi is also experimenting with two new
devices: an unprecedented anti-corruption
campaign and an attempt to revive pro-market reforms. So far, his war on corruption has made a
bigger impact than his plan for economic reform.
On the surface, Xi’s strategy seems sound.
But waging war on corrupt officials and pressing for deep reforms aimed at
dismantling China’s kleptocracy will inevitably bring Xi into conflict with
China’s political and economic elites. The question is how he can overcome
their resistance without rallying the Chinese people, whose political
mobilization could endanger the one-party system.
The CCP defied the doomsayers after 1989: It
survived and preempted any further threats to its power. But the odds that it
can hold on for another quarter-century have grown long – and are unlikely to
improve.
Minxin Pei is Professor of Government at Claremont McKenna College and a non-resident senior fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States.
