As the Chinese People's Republic (CPR) enters its third decade the question of viability as a stable nation-state has become increasingly urgent. Events since the Great Leap Forward seem to indicate an internal crisis of confidence which has slowly led to the present emergence of military power within the Government. If unity and stability can be maintained only by using the People's Liberation Army (PLA), then a situation is arising which closely resembles the Nationalist regime in the late 1920s and throughout the 1930s. At that time, the army under the leadership of Chiang Kai-shek dominated much of the political life of the state. A sense of impending war (against Japan in the 1930s and against the Soviet Union in 1969 and 1970) also reinforces the tendency of the civilian leadership to rely on military instruments. Of course, Lin Piao is not Chiang, Mao Tse-tung is not a Sun Yat-sen, nor is Liu Shao-ch'i a modern counterpart of Wang Ching-wei. Analogies can be constructed, but the problem is that students and scholars of modern China have not devoted sufficient attention to the Nanking state as a comparative referent for Communist China, with the result that they have largely been unprepared to ask questions which a knowledge of the Kuomintang (KMT) experiment might have raised.

The early 1960s witnessed significant changes in the commodity structure of Mainland China's international trade. One of the most striking developments during these years was that China became a net food importer, whereas in the 1950s, when Russia was her most important trading partner, China had been a net exporter of foodstuffs, and roughly one third to one half of China's exports to the Soviet Union had consisted of processed and unprocessed food. These exports were reduced to a mere 3 to 5 per cent, of China's total exports to Russia during 1961–63. Accompanying this change was a pronounced increase of China's imports of food from western countries. During 1952–60, China's purchase of “cereals and cereal preparations” had accounted for but 1 per cent, or less of her total imports from the West. This was augmented to approximately one-half of total imports in 1961–63, about one-third in 1964–66 and roughly one-fifth in 1967. The single most important item of the imported food has been wheat, amounting to four to five million metric tons a year since 1961, and coming mostly from Canada, Australia, Argentina and France.

The 1965 debate between Lo Jui-ch'ing and Lin Piao over the question of priorities in national defence policy, which was prompted by the threatening situation created by the bombing of North Vietnam in February of that year, as well as hints appearing in 1969 during the more critical months of the Sino-Soviet border dispute, suggest that strong differences still exist amongst China's policy-makers as to whether priority should be accorded to quick-fix types of conventional defence or to establishing a sound economic and scientific-technological basis for the long-term development of China's national defence programme. This issue, which usually comes to the surface at a critical juncture in Chinese decision-making or in a crisis situation, is frequently difficult to identify since it may be indirectly expressed in other debates, no less real, regarding the emphasis to be accorded political as against military training, or over the best strategic defence for China. The interlocking nature of these issues cannot be ignored. Moreover, it is usually in the broad context of such debates that hints appear suggesting that China's political and military relationship with the Soviet Union remains a latent source of dissention within the Chinese leadership.

The winds of political change in Taiwan have begun to breathe. In some areas, turnover within the leadership is substantial and the new incumbents are generally both younger and better educated than their predecessors. While Mainlanders, especially those from the Lower Yangtze Valley, dominate the political system, explicit and not insignificant steps are being taken to increase Taiwanese participation. Changes in the status of Chiang Ching-kuo, eldest son of President Chiang Kai-shek, give further indications of his preparation for eventual supreme leadership. A group of intelligent, well-educated and relatively young technical experts have moved into top leadership positions and are having a substantial impact on policy-making. Against this background, constraints on political dissent continue. This article is an attempt to investigate these trends and analyse their importance for the political system on Taiwan. In order to provide the framework for this discussion, the article begins with a brief introduction to the political setting, the central party and governmental organs.

Isaac Deutscher once observed that the Chinese Communist revolution presents the paradox of “the most archaic of nations avidly absorbing the most modern of revolutionary doctrines, the last word in revolution, and translating it into action. Lacking any native ancestry, Chinese Communism descends straight from Bolshevism. Mao stands on Lenin's shoulders.” This echoes the generally accepted view of the historical relationship between Maoism and Leninism. Among most western students of Chinese communism it is something of a truism that Marxism came to China in its Leninist form; for different reasons, Maoists have long been saying that Mao (and now only Mao) is the true heir of Lenin. Indeed, the “thought of Mao Tse-tung” is no longer simply considered the practical application of “the universal truths” of Marxism-Leninism to the specifically Chinese historical situation, but is explicitly celebrated as a new and higher stage of universally valid revolutionary theory; it is “invincible Marxism-Leninism-Mao Tsetung Thought” that now propels world history forward. In contemporary Maoist eyes, Mao stands on the shoulders of Lenin as firmly as Lenin presumably stands on the shoulders of Marx.

In the half-century history of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), only nine congresses have been held. Since six of these were convened during the first seven years, only three congresses have been held since the Sixth Congress in 1928. If the Seventh Congress in 1945 can be characterized as the consolidation of Mao's rule over the CCP, and the Eighth Congress in 1956 as the consolidation of the CCP's mastery over the China mainland, then the Ninth Congress, held in 1969, is the story of the victors and victims of the Cultural Revolution.