TSR-PRC

People’s Republic of China 2009

China’s Economic and Social Developments

[Government and Documents] [Security Issues] [Information and Sites] [News] [Papers]

Contemporary China: A Book List and Websites about China and Southeast Asia (Prof. Lynn White, Princeton University) Categorized by subjects and has been updated. This list is long, but you can use the subject categories at the left of your screen to find items you need. Websites about China and Southeast Asia is a clickable list of websites, giving access to thousands of articles about China and Southeast Asia.

~ 2006 ; 2007-2008; Current

China Wants Officials to Disclose Assets to Party
(AP, Sep. 20, 2009) The top anti-graft body of China's Communist Party plans to require government officials to disclose details of their investments and information about their family members as part of an ongoing effort to curb corruption.

China’s Xi Not Named to Party Military Commission
(Bloomberg, Sep. 19, 2009) China’s Vice President Xi Jinping wasn’t named a vice chairman of the ruling Communist Party’s Central Military Commission, signaling President Hu Jintao may want to hold on to some power after his scheduled retirement in 2013.

China Watched for Sign of New Leader By Michael Wines
(New York Times, Sep. 15, 2009) The appointment of Vice President Xi Jinping to a military post could confirm that he will succeed Hu Jintao as president, but much remains uncertain.

China Accelerates Filling Up Its Oil Reserves
(Wall Street Journal, Jan. 5, 2009) China recently completed construction of four oil-reserve bases -- together representing the first phase of its strategic oil-reserve plan. Those bases can hold 102 million barrels of crude oil, and China is now pushing ahead with the construction of the second phase.

CCP Party Apparatchiks Gaining at the Expense of Technocrats By Willy Lam (China Brief, Jamestown Foundation, Dec. 16, 2009) The latest reshuffle in the provincial-party leadership has validated a seminal trend in Chinese politics: the rise of party apparatchiks and the relative decline of technocrats.

Hu Jintao Unveils Major Foreign-Policy Initiative By Willy Lam
(China Brief, Jamestown Foundation, Dec. 3, 2009) Chinese President Hu Jintao has signaled his administration's readiness to play a bigger—and perhaps more constructive—role in global affairs through the release of a five-pronged foreign policy game plan.

The Case of Xi Jinping and the Mysterious Succession By Alice Miller (China Leadership Monitor #30, Hoover Institution, Fall 2009) Seen in the context of broader trends in leadership politics, and absent any indication that Xi has fallen out of favor, however, the plenum’s abstention from making leadership changes may reflect broader reforms in leadership selection procedures being implemented in anticipation of the Party’s 18th Congress in 2012.

The Best Laid Plans: Xi Jinping and the CMC Vice-Chairmanship That Didn’t Happen By James Mulvenon (China Leadership Monitor #30, Hoover Institution, Fall 2009) This article re-examines the assumptions of the promotion forecasts, analyzes the possible reasons for Xi’s failure to be promoted, and offers alternative scenarios.

Intra-Party Democracy in China: Should We Take It Seriously By Cheng Li (China Leadership Monitor #30, Hoover Institution, Fall 2009) This article argues that intra-Party democracy not only reflects the need for institutionalizing the new rules and norms of elite politics in the PRC, but might also provide for an incremental and manageable experiment of Chinese-style democracy.

Chinese Analyses of Soviet Failure: The Party By Arthur Waldron
(China Brief, Jamestown Foundation, Nov. 19, 2009) According to the Chinese official narrative, the failure of the Soviet regime to continue is not attributable to a broad systemic phenomenon, but rather to a very specific failure of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.

China’s 11th Ambassadorial Conference Signals Continuity and Change in Foreign Policy By Bonnie S. Galser and Benjamin Dooley (China Brief, Jamestown Foundation, Nov.4, 2009) The internal debate over the modest reformulation of Deng Xiaoping’s taoguang yanghui dictum suggests that even though China is willing to become more involved on the global stage, it will do so cautiously and selectively. Hu, Wen Speeches on China’s 11th Ambassadorial Conference (Chinese)

Time for PRC to Remember Its Past By Dominique Moisi
(Taipei Times, Oct. 22, 2009) To refuse to deal with a painful past is to risk reproducing it. Such a choice can encourage the most dangerous nationalist tendencies within a society, especially young people, that does not know what hides behind the silence and official lies.

Beijing Hires a Media Guru By Cristian Segura
(Asia Times, Oct. 10, 2009) Effective communication has become a mantra for the CCP. Seventeen out of the 31 provincial secretary generals have previously worked at the party's information office.

China Anniversary: Why the Communist Party Still Enjoys the Support of Its People By Malcolm Moore (Telegraph, Oct. 3, 2009) The Chinese Communist Party is reviled around the world for its human rights abuses, but it still enjoys unswerving support from those Chinese old enough to remember life beforehand.

On Day for China Pride, Little Interest in Ideology By Michael Wines
(New York Times, Oct. 1, 2009) Prosperity is a condition, not a value. And on the eve of a great patriotic celebration, at least a few Communist leaders must be wondering whether lashing patriotism to eternal prosperity is not, at least a little, like riding a tiger.

CCP 17th Central Committee Plenum Skips Xi Jinping and Inner-Party Democracy By Willy Lam (Jamestown Foundation, Sep. 24, 2009) The biggest piece of news to have come out of the Fourth Plenary Session of the Chinese Communist Party’s 17th Central Committee is what that did not happen: the induction of Vice-President Xi Jinping into the policy-setting Central Military Commission.

China Party Scholar Hints at Xi Jinping Promotion
(Reuters, Sep. 22, 2009) A Chinese Communist official held out the possibility that Vice President Xi Jinping could still be promoted to a military position, in a step toward ultimately taking over the nation's top leadership post.

Party’s Agenda in China Seems to Fall Flat By Michael Wines
(New York Times, Sep. 21, 2009) Initial reports from the Communist Party’s Central Committee policy meetings suggested that there were few, if any, changes.

Hu Jintao Picks Core Sixth-Generation Leaders By Willy Lam
(China Brief, Jamestown Foundation, May 15, 2009) It is obvious that President Hu, a one-time CYL boss who heads the CCP’s powerful tuanpai (CYL Faction), has played a pivotal role in the elevation of these forty-something neophytes.

Secret Memoir Offers Look Inside China’s Politics By Erik Eckholm
(New York Times, May 15, 2009) Zhao Ziyang, who was ousted as Communist Party chief in 1989, left behind a first-person account of China in crisis.

CCPLA: Tightening the CCP’s Rule Over Law By Willy Lam
(China Brief, Jamestown Foundation, Apr. 2, 2009) Beijing is beefing up its control apparatus to counter unprecedented challenges to the Chinese Communist Party administration this year.

Mixed Signals from 11th National People’s Congress By Willy Lam
(China Brief, Jamestown Foundation, Mar. 18, 2009) The clout of the military and security forces, Beijing’s most reliable weapon for muzzling dissent, has expanded. This has fed speculation that the People’s Liberation Army will be getting even more resources for the modernization of weaponry.

News Media Run by China Look Abroad for Growth By David Barboza (New York Times, Jan. 15, 2009) China’s biggest state-controlled news organizations plan to spend billions of dollars to expand overseas as part of a government effort to improve the nation’s image abroad and to create respected international news organizations.

China Braces for a Turbulent 2009
(The Age, Jan. 3, 2009) Is it time to dust off predictions of the downfall of the Chinese Communist Party? No. But it could easily be the most difficult year since the Tiananmen "incident" of 1989.